Page 62 of The Evening Wolves

“Nobody ever knows what North is talking about,” Shaw said, beginning his inspection of Mamie now. “Cheese this, boots that. It’s exhausting.”

“You don’t know what I’m talking about? Really? Because you seemed to understand really fucking clearly when I said we should go to bed early—”

“John-Henry,” Tean said, “why don’t you—”

“Because that was part of my sex dream,” Shaw said. “Of course I understood it.”

Even in the restaurant’s dim light, John-Henry could tell North had gone a murderous shade of red. Before North could respond, he said, “I need to tell you about tonight.”

“Hold on,” Jem said as he took out his phone.

North groaned. “You were serious?”

“Auggie made him promise,” Tean said, half-apology, half-defense. “And they deserve to know what’s going on.”

Jem placed the call, and a moment later, Auggie’s voice came over the speaker. “Yo, yo, yo! Auggie in the house!”

Silence, except for Elvis in the background. He was singing about just what, exactly, made his whole kissin’ cousin situation alright.

“What the fuck was that?” Emery asked.

“I was joking!”

“See, even when he’s literally pocket sized,” North said, “he’s absolutely fucking unbearable.”

“I thought it was cool, Auggie,” Tean said. “You sounded like Arsenio Hall.”

Theo’s laugh came across the line. It went on and on until it cut off with a muffled grunt.

“I don’t know who that is,” Auggie said when he came back on the call.

Emery opened his mouth.

“And don’t tell me! You know this is a curse, right? People my age think I’m cool.”

“People your age,” North said. “He’s a couple of years younger, and he acts like he’s a Gen Z sex doll.”

“I think you’re cool,” Shaw said absently as he positioned the Eisenhowers in various poses of carnal knowledge. “Just like Casino Hall.”

“Definitely like that,” Jem said, nodding vigorously.

Tean muttered something that sounded threatening, and it only made Jem’s grin bigger.

“John-Henry?” Theo said. “Before I have to put the children to bed, please? And I mean all the children.”

Another grunt came across the line.

Before John-Henry could begin, though, the waitress with the shoe-polish hair came over. She took their orders, which included a four-and-a-half-minute fight between North and Shaw about the morality of cheese on a cheeseburger, and Jem, meanwhile, asking the woman about everyone in every picture hung on the walls. Every single one of them. When the waitress finally left, Emery had a tiny tic near the corner of his eye.

“A lot has happened tonight,” John-Henry said before anyone could get started again. And then he told them about arriving at Brey’s house, the door that wouldn’t latch, and finding the man upstairs.

“What did he look like?” Emery interrupted.

“Around Auggie’s height. Muscular. Dark hair, but he had it buzzed.”

“Oh,” North said, “so, like a walking jizz stain. Got it.”

“It’s not fair when I’m not there,” Auggie said. “Because I can’t beat him up.”

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