Total pages in book: 124
Estimated words: 117574 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 588(@200wpm)___ 470(@250wpm)___ 392(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 117574 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 588(@200wpm)___ 470(@250wpm)___ 392(@300wpm)
2
AUGGIE
“Thanks,” I mumble to the bartender, when he slides a second draft beer in front of me. I shouldn’t have ordered it; I’ve got to study for an upcoming exam when I get back home. But Dad is ridiculously late for the mysterious “drinks” he wanted to have with me, in the middle of a workday, and I’m feeling anxious. Dad couldn’t have asked me here simply to spend quality time with his second son. That’s not a thing for Alexander Vaughn. Even during my childhood, when my parents were still married and supposedly happy, Mom was essentially a single parent to my brother and me, thanks to all the travel Dad “had” to do to build his budding empire.
Sure, Dad swooped in to watch Max’s water polo matches and my swim meets. And he always looked the part in family portraits and Christmas cards. But I can’t remember a single time my father ever wanted to simply talk to me in order to get to know me as a person. That was especially true during the time I had to go to speech therapy as a kid to overcome a stutter. I think, in his mind, that old stammer somehow made me defective. An embarrassment. It certainly doesn’t help that, nowadays, my stutter comes back, now and again, if only subtly, when I’m nervous or stressed.
My phone buzzes with a text from Dad:
On my way. Work meeting went long.
God, I hope I’m only being paranoid and Dad didn’t ask me here to give me some bad news in person. But what else could it be? Dad would never schedule an in-person conversation when a text or phone call would do. Especially with me. I’m far from his favorite person, so sitting down and having a beer with me isn’t how he’d ever choose to spend his valuable time, if something wasn’t up. Frankly, considering the man pays my tuition, I’d have thought he’d want me to get every bang for his buck by attending every possible class, rather than ditching an important one to come here to have drinks with him for no apparent reason.
If I had to guess I think Dad’s going to tell me he’s cutting my brother and me out of his will. I bet when he asked his lawyer to change his will to exclude his now-ex-wife, Ashley, he got the bright idea to exclude Max and me, too. Max doesn’t speak to him at all anymore, and my communications with him mostly revolve around his tuition payments. I’ve tried to talk to him about more than that, of course, but he doesn’t seem interested. Without Max or Grandpa around to serve as a translator for the two of us—a bridge, if you will—it’s become harder and harder for us to find common ground.
Movement at the front door of the bar interrupts my wandering thoughts. But it’s not Dad bursting into the bar; it’s a curvy sprite of a redhead who looks like she’s come to Captain’s to claim winnings on a Powerball lottery ticket. As she bounds into the bar, I can’t help chuckling at her enthusiasm. She’s adorable. Exuberant. Effervescent, I’d even say. The kind of person who lights up every room she graces with her presence, including this one.
She reminds me of my first love, Kelly Gessler, actually—the vivacious, freckled redhead who stole my heart at age fourteen at summer camp in June, and then did me the honor of touching my hard dick for the first time as a parting gift in August. Both in terms of her physical looks and general vibe, that redhead is a dead ringer for Kelly.
Hold up. Does this adorable redhead remind me of Kelly Gessler . . . or is she actually Kelly, all grown up? She looks to be around my age, so she could be the genuine article. Granted, Kelly’s family moved to Massachusetts after our magical summer together, and I never saw or heard from her after that, much to my teenage heartache. But it’s not far-fetched to think Kelly might have moved back to Seattle as an adult, the same way I did to attend vet school.
With a whoop, the exuberant redhead plants both feet at once, like she’s leaping to safety in a game of “The Floor is Lava.” After sticking her landing, she throws up her arms, wiggles her hips, and shouts, “Let’s get this party started, Crazy Girl!” And that’s it. I’m now convinced she’s Kelly Gessler because that’s exactly the sort of funny, exuberant thing Kelly would have said back in the day. Either way, though, even if this firecracker isn’t Kelly, she’s definitely got my undivided attention.
A female whoop erupts to my left, and the next thing I know, a pregnant brunette has joined the redhead in some bizarre choreography that makes the entire bar, not only me, laugh and applaud. The show doesn’t last nearly long enough, if you ask me. In short order, the two women are hugging and chatting.