Total pages in book: 107
Estimated words: 102167 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 511(@200wpm)___ 409(@250wpm)___ 341(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 102167 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 511(@200wpm)___ 409(@250wpm)___ 341(@300wpm)
“Did I ever tell you about the time Beau pissed his pants in a McDonald’s parking lot?”
“What?” Her gaze jerks to mine, her pretty hazel eyes a haze of warring emotion and her cheeks pink with stress.
“Yep. He did.” I laugh, remembering what is probably Beau’s worst nightmare and one of my favorite memories. “We were there one night, getting a bite to eat after the club, fresh out of U of M at this point, and a cop came to the window just as Beau was getting ready to go inside and break the seal from the entire night.” I grin at her and keep going. “The cop had questions because I guess some kids had been seen littering and breaking shit in the parking lot the last couple nights, and he wanted to make sure it wasn’t us. Ron was driving and DD, so there was no danger of DUI or anything crazy like that, but the more we answered, the more questions the cop had, and every time Beau tried to make a move to go to the bathroom, the cop panicked and started yelling at him. This went on for like fifteen minutes, and eventually, Beau couldn’t hold it anymore and ended up fucking pissing his Bottega Veneta slacks for all, including the cop, to see.”
“Oh my God!” Avery squeals, her face relaxing into its normal state for the briefest of moments as she slaps her hands into the sand beside her thighs. “I can’t believe I’ve never heard that before!”
“Yeah. Well.” I snort. “We were sworn to secrecy under the threat of certain death, but given the circumstances…” I shrug. “It feels like we deserve to tell a few secrets.”
Her eyes dance as she nods, her teeth gnawing at her lip in concentration. “Okay. I definitely have some Beau secrets.”
Maybe I should feel bad for making my best friend the target of all these fun memories, but knowing he’s probably curled up in a dry, warm bed with his pregnant wife while we’re damp and half damaged on some beach in the middle of fucking nowhere has run my well of sympathy dry. Plus, he wouldn’t mind. Beau Banks is as fucking stand-up, self-sacrificing, team-player as it gets.
I smile, curling my fingers into the sand mindlessly. “Let her rip, then. Let’s hear one.”
Avery’s face is noticeably lighter as she transports herself into her memories.
“When we were little, I used to like to play dress-up tea party. My mom used to make Beau play with me. At first, he hated it. But then? He got into it. Like, aggressively into it.” Her eyes brighten with amusement, and she fights the urge to laugh. “And when I grew out of it? He made me keep playing. He called himself ‘Pretty Little Princess,’ held out his pinkie when he drank imaginary tea and everything.”
“Holy shit!” I say in a burst, my face aching from the size of my smile. “And how long did this go on?”
“He was in eighth grade the last time he made me play!” she screams, and I fall back into the sand with a thud, hysterical and howling.
“Oh my God! More! I need more!”
Avery laughs, turning to face me and getting up on her knees for this one, her whole body vibrating. “Okay. High school graduation. Beau got drunk on my dad’s vodka and puked in our bushes out front. You could smell the vomit for days until the landscapers found it, and to this day, my parents think it was Ronnie.”
I guffaw. “Ronnie always holds his vodka! It’s whiskey that’s his problem.”
“I know! What about you? You have to have another one!”
I smile lazily. “Oh, Ave, I’ve got secrets for days.”
“Do one about Beau again,” she insists. “It’s distracting me.”
I nod, thinking through my Rolodex of twenty-five years of memories, settling on another night Beau would kill to have expunged from God’s official record. “Oh yeah. This one’s gold.”
“What? What?” Avery presses, shuffling closer on her knees, eyes bright with anticipation.
“One night, we were out at a club…Poison, I think, right after it opened. Beau and Bethany had just broken up, and she was very obviously with Seth. Tension? Off the goddamn charts.” I grimace. “This girl in a tight black dress was all over Beau the whole night, and because he was mad and mixed up and all fucked in the head from that stupid dickhead stealing his girl, he was eating it up. Feeding her shit out of his teeth and letting her grind all over him and everything. He gets three fingers into a good time with the girl in the booth, and this giant lurch of a fucking guy comes over spouting angry threats about rearranging his body for getting with his wife.”
“Oh my God!” Avery cracks up, already loving where this is going.