Page 15 of The Pocket Pair

“I thought it would be more … ” James trails off, clearly fighting for the right description.

“Exciting? Interesting?” I offer.

“Anything other than this.”

The Ladies Literary and Libation Society is not a book club. Not a wild party either. More like … a formal committee meeting to help plan town business. With alcohol. At least, I’m guessing, based on the wide variety of flasks. Though Ashlee Belle has a whole tea set.

Also? To my total surprise, Big Mo is here. The gentle giant and cook in Mari’s diner is in a quiet corner with a six-pack of root beer. It’s the hardest thing he’ll drink—understandably so. His wife and daughter were killed by a drunk driver years ago when he lived in Houston. Now he’s a Sheet Cake staple, and apparently, the only male allowed in the LLLS by some kind of special dispensation.

“Let’s take another swig and move on to the next order of business,” Lynn Louise declares, banging a gavel on the circulation desk. All the women—and Big Mo—raise their flasks, tea cups, and glasses in a toast.

I’m hit with a sudden memory of my mom just months before she died. She was too sick from the cancer and chemo combo to attend, so they held a special meeting in her bedroom. Winnie pressed her ear to the door to listen, but Dad took me out in the back and we threw the football until the ladies left.

I focus my gaze and my attention back on the conversation below. And on Val, who finished braiding her hair and is now running the tips of her braid across her cheek like a paintbrush.

Why is everything she does suddenly so … so … so …

There isn’t a word for the tight spiraling of my heart as I watch Val laugh at something Lindy says.

“We’ve resolved the feral hog problem,” Lynn Louise says, and wild hogs are enough to snap my mind off Val.

“A big thank you to Kitty Bishop,” says Judge Judie—who is an actual judge, but not to be confused with the one whose name ends in a Y. All the ladies raise their glasses, flasks, and cups. Big Mo raises his can of root beer.

“So, that’s how the feral pig problem was solved,” I mutter.

“I’ve never seen a feral pig,” James says.

“They’re big, mean, ugly, and will overenthusiastically aerate your yard for you,” I tell him. “Y’all didn’t grow up hunting, I gather?”

“Football was our sport of choice,” he says. “Only football.”

Down below, Val is shaking out her braid, finger-combing the long locks out again. I’ve never been a hair man—is there such a thing?—but Val’s long locks are simply mesmerizing.

Yep. Still popping a high fever. I’m in need of aspirin and an ice bath.

I need to put Val back where she belongs—squarely in the sister’s best friend box.

Why won’t she go back in the box?

“Didn’t you have a date tonight?” James asks, as the women below move on to discussing the Sheet Cake Festival, which is a few short weeks away.

I don’t really want to get into my date. It’s pretty embarrassing.

When I saw Monika, a perfectly pretty and probably very nice girl, waiting outside the restaurant, I was struck with a feeling like motion sickness. Mrs. Fleming’s and Mari’s words squirmed around in my head like tiny parasites, making me think about uncomfortable subjects like if my mom would really be proud of me, if I’m actually like my father and in what ways, and if I’m really fighting with ghosts.

So, like an idiot, I blurted to Monika, “I can’t go to dinner with you. I’m not the man you’re looking for.”

It took approximately half a second for me to recognize I basically stole the line in Star Wars (A New Hope, but let’s face it, everyone always calls it just Star Wars) where Obi Wan says, “These aren’t the droids you’re looking for.”

I even waved my hand through the air as I said it, and realizing this made me laugh.

At which point, Monika stepped forward and whacked me in the arm with her purse. Which I probably deserved. Though according to Texas penal code twenty-two, it was technically assault.

When she stormed off, I deleted the dating app from my phone, and wandered around Sixth Street, feeling strangely restless and way older than all the college kids stumbling around from bar to bar. I’m too old for that. Too old to keep casually dating women I’m not really interested in. Wandering too far from the man I think my mama would want me to be—and I blame this thought on Mrs. Fleming and Mari. And maybe even James and Winnie with all their in-love happiness.

Whatever the root cause, a feeling of pent-up energy built and built until I slammed my knuckle into a brick wall in an alley, needing some kind of release.

Which led me to CVS.

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