Boys South of the Mason Dixon ~ Abbi Glines

by Abbi Glines

  Asher Sutton

  JOE GREEN MADE wooden lawn furniture. It was a popular item in Malroy and the only place you could buy it was Denver’s. Today, I’d been going back and forth to Joe’s to get the chairs, tables, and front porch swings that he’d made for the summer season. Hannah waited on me out front to deliver every load. She was showing me where to display them. That was her job, other than answering the phone and working the entrance of the business. She handled the design of the store, the placement of the items they sold, and stuff like that.

  I was on my last load when Dallas’s truck pulled in. Hannah noticed him first. She was moving a table around, to put a pot with some fancy ass flowers inside it, hoping to draw customers’ attention. Dallas wouldn’t be coming to see me unless there was a problem. He’d have me bring something home if we needed it at the house. No reason to come pick it up. I wiped the sweat from my forehead with my towel, tucking it back in my pocket, and hopping down from the bed of the truck just as he was headed my way.

  “That your youngest brother?” Hannah asked, squinting against the sun.

  I replied, “Yeah, give me a minute,” walking toward him. My first thoughts, of course, went to Momma. I was the worrier in the bunch.

  “Take your time,” Hannah called after me, though I was too focused on Dallas to even care. The frown on his face meant this was about an annoyance rather than a problem. It couldn’t be Momma. I sighed with relief. “You seen Steel?” he asked.

  “No, why, should I?”

  Dallas shook his head and said, “Naw, just thought maybe he’d come looking for you. He’s been gone since Dixie came by this morning. She drove off and he left shortly after, slamming his door, then spinning his wheels so hard, gravel went flying all over the place. I was headed out to hit the bag some before work when I saw it all. Momma said to give him some time, then go looking for him. I figure he’s a big boy and can handle his shit, but fuck if I’m gonna tell Momma that. A world of hurt would rain down on me.”

  I knew this was coming after Dixie had talked to me yesterday. She did the right thing and I was glad, though I knew Steel was crushed. She didn’t love him the way she should. He needed to move on, all three of us did. I was tougher than Steel. I’d handled this thing far longer. “I have two more hours here. Then I’ll go looking for him,” I promised.

  Dallas scowled like that was stupid. “He needs to go get laid.”

  “Tell Momma I’ll find him. Don’t worry about it. He doesn’t need your sarcastic comments. Not right now, anyway.”

  “He’s sure as fuck not gonna want to see you, either. We all know she broke up with him because she’s still hung up on you.”

  No point in saying that wasn’t true, “I might be exactly who he needs to see right now.”

  “Whatever. I’m heading to Jack’s. I need a beer. This is too much fucking drama. It’s like I got a bunch of goddamned sisters.”

  “Jack won’t give you a beer. You’re seventeen. But call me if he shows up there.” He was already going back to his truck, “Yeah,” beings his lengthy response.

  When I turned around, Hannah was arranging furniture nearby, and I could tell she’d been trying to listen. There was that nosey look about her. I walked back to the truck to get the rest of the swings, hoping to avoid her questions. I got three unloaded and placed where she wanted them before she cleared her throat.

  “I overheard some. I couldn’t help it. He was talking loudly. Do you, uh, need help finding Steel?” Overheard my ass. She’d been straining her neck to hear us talk. I replied brusquely, “No, I need to do that alone.”

  She busied herself with the Adirondack chairs, fucking around with the all-weather pillows, before looking back again. “I thought they were engaged.”

  This town talked too damn much. “She never said yes, Hannah.”

  “Oh,” her voice was soft. Like she was disappointed. “I can’t imagine a girl turning Steel down. He’s such a good guy and all.”

  The need to defend Dixie was strong. But I fought it. Had to let it go. “Love is a fickle bitch. Can’t pick and choose where your heart will lock in. If we could, life would run a helluva lot smoother. We’d all be goofy happy.”

  That made her silent for a while. I was done unloading and about to ask if she needed me to rearrange anything else that was too heavy for her. Instead, she put her hands on her hips, and got that look that meant she was going to offer her opinion whether I wanted it or not.

  “Some people want what they can’t have. Has nothing to do with love. It’s more of a way to protect themselves from really feeling something deep. You were Dixie’s first love. She’s built that fantasy in her head and needs to move on from it.”

  Yeah. She should’ve kept that to herself. I counted backwards from ten before meeting her gaze, “Or maybe some things aren’t your business and sticking your nose where it doesn’t belong speaks volumes about you.”

  Her cheeks immediately flushed. I’d driven my point home and I knew I had been harsh. I wasn’t a mean guy, I controlled my temper most of the time, but I couldn’t stop myself on this occasion. Bray would’ve lit her ass on fire and left her in scalding tears. His temper could burn down a whole damn forest. But I had gone too far.

  “This isn’t easy. We’re dealing with it the best we can. Having others who don’t know the whole story give their opinions is, well, it’s unkind, Hannah. There’s so much shit you don’t know.” I was trying to ease the sting of my words and realized that I might have only made it worse.

  She nodded. “Of course. You’re right. I shouldn’t have said anything. I don’t have a filter on my mouth. My momma has always said that.” She looked forlorn and I hated myself for making her feel that way.

  The fact she owned up to her actions made me respect her a little more. Hannah wasn’t a bad person. “We all say shit we wish we could take back, Hannah,” I replied, offering her a small smile.

  She smiled back. “Thanks,” she returned, her cheeks still pink.

  “I can appreciate it when someone knows they’ve messed up and owns up to it. I don’t always do that myself. Not many people do.”

  Her soft laughter was attractive and genuine. “I have a very blunt mother. She takes no shit, and I guess it’s helped me in my life, without me even knowing it.”

  “I figure you’d be the same either way. My momma shuts us down fast, no punches held, but not all my brothers have learned much from that. Some did, others didn’t.”

  Hannah smirked, “I’d say you and Bray, for one, are nothing alike. I remember him from high school.”

  I gave her a nod and said, “None of us are like Bray, he’s different from us all. Dallas, however, is running a close second on the smartass scale the older he gets.”

  “Bray looks hot while he’s being nasty. I’m sure that helps with all the girls he goes out with.”

  “Like a charm,” I assured her while smiling.

  She laughed again. It was pleasantly appealing. Not annoying or grating for once. Hannah would make it just fine in this world. Getting to know her was nice. I could admit she was attractive and I liked more than just her looks. But my heart was not in it. When I left here today, I wouldn’t think of her again until I returned to work tomorrow. Her face wouldn’t stay in my mind, her smile would fade ever so quickly. Only one face always stayed with me, even when I prayed to God for some reprieve.

  Dixie Monroe

  WORK WENT ON and on. All day I’d thought about this morning’s encounter with Steel. With relief also came sadness. He’d looked at me with such hate. That was hard to accept because I didn’t want him to hate me. Steel was special to me, but I understood his reaction. I didn’t want him to regret the moments we’d spent together, but wanting Steel to remember me fondly was selfish of me. If he needed to hate me, then I had to accept it. I would hate me, too.

  I finished cleaning up the salon and wiping down the tanning beds, which was the part of my job that I hated the most. When it
was ready for reopening tomorrow, I locked up and stepped outside, coming face to face with a very drunk Steel leaning against my Jeep.

  “You’re either stupid or just a bitch. I can’t figure it out.” Steel slurred as I slowly approached him. I stated the obvious, “You’re drunk.” He cackled loudly, responding as if it were a mystery, “Oh, she’s a sharp one, folks. Guess she’s not stupid after all. Just a bitch. A mean ol’ bitch.”

  It stung hearing Steel call me a bitch, but he was drunk and hurting, so I couldn’t let it get to me. Instead, I tried to be sensible, “Get in the Jeep. I’ll drive you home.”

  He gave me an incredulous look. “You think I’d get in that Jeep with you? Shit, girl, maybe you are stupid. I want nothing to do with you. Nothing! You hear that, Dixie Monroe? N-O-T-H-I-N-G!”

  I could have pointed out that he was here to see me. That I hadn’t gone after him. But I was dealing with a drunk man. I saw no point in arguing with him. “You can’t drive like this.”

  He pushed off from my Jeep, held his arms wide, then revolved in a dizzying circle, spinning while flapping his arms a little. “Do you see my motherfucking truck? Do you? No, you don’t. How you reckon I’m gonna drive it if it aint’t here?”

  Steel was right. No evidence of a truck. “So you’re just walking around drunk?”

  “Ain’tyourproblemwhatthefuckIdo,” he snarled, but the way his words ran together, it didn’t sound as angry as he hoped.

  “Steel, you’re here at my Jeep. I must wonder why? If I’m a stupid bitch . . .” I was not going to reason with a drunk man. I should text Brent and have him come get Steel. Bray wasn’t around lately and wouldn’t care if he remained on foot. And Asher . . . well, Asher was no longer someone I could contact. Yesterday, he’d made that as clear as it had ever been.

  “Wanted to see if you were planning on running to Asher now that you’re free of me.”

  “No, Steel, I’m not. Asher doesn’t want me. He made that clear to me. I broke it off with you because you deserve to be loved by someone who is not me. With their whole heart, and not only half of one.”

  He released a nasty laugh. “Yeah. Fuck that. I don’t want anything to do with love. I’m over it. I can drink and fuck my way through life. Sounds a helluva lot more fun than dating you.”

  I tried to hide the humiliation he made me feel with his words because Steel had more substance than that. He was kind and could love someone for life. Steel could give a woman a home and a family. I knew that. It had been one of the reasons why letting him go had been so hard. But that woman should be able to offer the same in return. I’d never been able to do that with him. His brother always stood between us and would’ve probably stayed there forever.

  “You’re meant for more than bars and one-night stands.”

  He stared off down the road as the cars whizzed by, “I thought so, too, but you know what, Dix, I think I’ll like bars and a different woman every night just fine. That actually sounds good to me.”

  I guessed all men needed to be a little reckless before they finally settled down. This might have been Steel’s time to have a taste of that life. But I knew it wouldn’t make him happy. At least not forever. Daddy always said a man sowed his wild oats before he realized that the love of one woman was all he needed to thrive. When I’d been with Asher and thought we’d always be together, Daddy would warn me outright, “Don’t be planning a wedding and babies, Dixie. That boy has wild oats to sow before he’s ready for that. He goes out and comes back to you in the end, then it’s a love you can trust. You need to date other men, too. Might be more to life than Asher Sutton.”

  I hated hearing him tell me that. I would roll my eyes and ignore it. I couldn’t stand the idea of Asher being with anyone else. But that was when I thought fairytales came true, when I believed Asher was my future. My focus then returned to Steel, “Then I guess you can go see if that’s the life you want. It’s not my place to tell you what is right for you. You’re a grown man.”

  He turned to me, straightening his torso. “I just might thank you one day. For breaking my fuckin’ heart.”

  I had nothing to say to that. He began walking toward the town center. Or rather, swaying toward it. I considered following him, calling Dallas maybe to yank Steel from the street, when Asher’s blue truck suddenly emerged from around the corner. The Sutton boys always took care of their own. I was no longer needed so I climbed in my Jeep and quickly drove away. Asher didn’t want to see me. Steel even less. He’d said what he couldn’t say sober.

  I also felt a little better. This morning left me raw, the wound remaining wide open, but Steel’s words made sure that it would begin to heal. Steel had been an important part of my life for a year. We’d become a couple. And I wanted us to work, until Asher came back. Now I knew that had been a lie all along. Steel would now be a part of my past, and maybe one day I could remember this and not feel sad about it. But that’d be a while from now.

  Leaving this town was my only option. I had to make a new life somewhere else. I didn’t want to leave my parents. I hadn’t wanted to leave Scarlet either, but now she’d left me. I liked this place, I loved my home, but my life here had always been intertwined with the Sutton boys.

  A new town with new friends and a new independence would help me get on with my life. I’d tell Daddy tonight I was ready to commit to Clemson in the fall. He could pay the tuition and I’d start making plans to leave Malroy in August. My chest felt heavy from knowing I had to leave. Even though Asher would be leaving soon and finishing his last year at Florida, this town was still my connection to him. It was the place where he’d been mine.

  I looked in the rearview mirror as I came to a stop at the red light. Asher was outside his truck talking to Steel who was now more animated and yelling at Asher, while Asher remained calm and relaxed. Right now, they had to be both wishing they’d never met me. Dixie Monroe had been nothing but a problem. But soon I’d be gone and they’d be rid of me for good.

  Asher Sutton

  THIS WASN’T OVER with Steel. He’d cursed me, drunkenly ranted, and then asked for Brent to come get him. I left him there with him. Brent was probably who he needed right now. They both were hurting. They both needed to drink and forget. They could drown their sorrows together. Hopefully, they wouldn’t both wake up next to women they didn’t know. But then maybe that was what they needed after all. As long as they stayed away from the married ones. Bray was infamous for messing around with married women he didn’t realize were married. It was a miracle he hadn’t been shot yet. Brent and Steel were hurting, but they were both more cautious than Bray.

  I didn’t want to go home and talk about Steel. He could tell them what he wanted when he was sober enough. What I needed right now was silence and my thoughts, but I knew I wouldn’t find any peace. As I turned my truck onto the dirt road that led to the lake connecting our land to the Monroe’s working farm, one that no one used unless Luke was fishing. At least not anymore. My brothers and I used to swim and fish there as kids, but those days were long gone.

  It had also been the spot where I’d taken Dixie’s innocence. She’d told me she loved me along that grassy bank. I’d told her I loved her, too, holding her naked body snugly against mine for the very first time. Most would say any teenage boy would declare love when he had a naked female in his arms. But I knew this moment had been special. It had been honest and real. I’d known I loved her before that moment. It had just fallen from my lips as emotions washed over me like a tidal wave. She hadn’t been my first, but she was my one.

  I turned off my truck lights and sat there in the dark watching the moonlight dance across the water. Dad taught us to swim here. There were nights when I was away that I’d close my eyes and think of just sitting here. Recalling good days made me less homesick, but it also kept breaking my heart.

  All of a sudden, movement in the corner of my eye caught my attention. I turned to see Dixie standing several feet away. She’d been sitting. I hadn’t
noticed. But she was leaving now. I should let her go. It was best for both of us. The right thing to do. But I couldn’t. Not here and not right now. Not when some of my best memories came from this place. Here, I felt weak, my soul longing for what it couldn’t have. I got out of my truck and walked to her. She stopped, didn’t move, her gaze locked on me. The moonshine seemed to draw a bright halo around her, as if she didn’t belong to the night.

  “You come here often?” I asked. It was something I wondered about often. We had so many memories here. Did Dixie think of me when she came to the lake?

  “Yes, sometimes . . . some times more than others.”

  She didn’t have to explain that to me. After this morning with Steel, I imagined she needed to be alone, much like I did now.

  “You did the right thing,” I told her.

  “I know,” she replied, not needing my approval. “But it was the hardest thing to do.”

  “I wasn’t being condescending. If you’re out here worried about the shape you found him in earlier, drunk in the middle of town . . . he’ll be okay.”

  She gazed back to the water, her eyes no longer on mine. “He hates me now, maybe he always will, but he said today he might thank me in the future. I don’t think he meant it, but I’ll hope and pray that’s the case. Have to hold on to that.”

  Steel told me I was a selfish bastard and that he wished I would’ve stayed gone. He didn’t want my opinion or any other moral horseshit. He said that Dixie was free now, and that I might as well go take her since that’s what I’d wanted all along. I’d called Brent and let him take over. Steel was drunk, and sober or drunk, he didn’t want me there.

  “I’m leaving,” she said, her eyes back on me, a determined gleam in them. “In August, I’m going to Clemson.”

  She was starting over. Getting away. That would be good for her. She’d make new friends and there would be other guys. She might even fall in love again. My heart felt like someone was squeezing it by hand at the mere idea of her loving someone else. But I had to let her go. “You’ll like it there. Beautiful campus. It was one of the colleges I visited.”