Sidecar Crush (Bootleg Springs Book 2)

by Claire Kingsley

What the hell had happened? I’d been angry, no doubt about that. But how had it turned into me storming off, leaving Leah Mae outside in the cold? Telling her I was going to Charlotte alone. And I’d called her Leah.

  I’d meant to. Wasn’t proud of that. Lying in my bed, staring at the ceiling at four o’clock in the morning, I could hear how cold it had sounded. It had been downright mean, and I knew it. Too late to take it back, now.

  Since I wasn’t sleeping anyway, I got up and went out to my workshop. Flicked on the lights. The place was a wreck. There was stuff everywhere—discarded bits of scrap, nails and screws, tools. It was typical for the aftermath of finishing a project. I tended to create a bunch of chaos while I worked. When I finished, I’d clean it up so I could start over again.

  I couldn’t leave for Charlotte until I got my tire fixed, so I went to work on setting my workshop to rights. Put stuff away, returning bits of metal to their bins. Found new places for the smaller pieces that I could use later. Tools went back in their drawers or on hooks on the wall.

  There was a stack of boxes over by the door that I hadn’t dealt with yet. Stuff from my dad’s place. I stood in front of it, my hands on my hips, eying it all with suspicion. More than likely, there was nothing in there but junk. Scarlett had said to save pictures, but everything else could be tossed out or given away.

  I blew the dust off the top box and opened the flaps. There was an odd assortment of things. Faded papers, old bills, one of Scarlett’s report cards. A discipline slip with Gibson’s name on it. A half-empty roll of tape. Some brittle ribbon and an old sewing kit. I figured there wouldn’t be much else of interest, but I dug around a bit more.

  At the bottom, I found a large yellow envelope stuffed with old pictures. Scarlett would want these, for sure. I pulled out a few and thumbed through them. Mostly us as kids. There were a bunch of Gibs. I could tell it was him by his big, cheesy smile. Didn’t see that expression on him often nowadays, but he’d always hammed it up for pictures. Got yelled at for it, too.

  And then I found one of her.

  My mama had been a pretty lady. Scarlett took after her. She’d had long auburn hair and freckles on her nose and cheeks. Big gray eyes. She was wearing a Sunday dress—all covered in pink flowers—and holding a baby. It was hard to tell who the baby was. One of us boys, to be sure, judging by the blue outfit. By her smile, I reckoned it was Bowie. He’d always been the easiest of us all. He’d probably made Mama smile all the time.

  I blew out a long breath. I missed my mama. She’d been the only one in the house who’d really seen me. There hadn’t been much she could do about Dad, but at least she’d noticed me some of the time. When I’d drawn her pictures, she’d put them up on the fridge. Granted, they’d always seemed to get knocked down and trampled. But at least she’d told me she liked them.

  Although, truth was, she hadn’t been the only one who’d seen me. I’d stayed out of Dad’s way as much as possible—life had been easier that way. Bowie had always been busy with all his friends, and Scarlett was the baby. We’d had to raise her ourselves for the most part.

  But Gibson had paid attention to me, in his own way. He’d made sure I had a lunch every day. Kept the bullies at school off my back. Showed me the best hiding places for when Dad was drinking and it was best to be scarce. Maybe that was why fighting with Gibs was bugging me so much. Gibson and I didn’t fight. He kept a lookout for me and ignored me the rest of the time. Been that way since we were kids. I wondered if it would ever go back to that, or if I’d screwed it all up by dating Leah Mae.

  I tucked the pictures back in the envelope and set it on a shelf. I didn’t much want to keep going down memory lane. I’d give them to Scarlett and she could do what she wanted with them.

  The next box was the same size. I picked it up to move it to a shelf, but it was oddly heavy. Out of curiosity, I opened it up.

  Looked a lot like the other box—papers and so forth. There was another big envelope and I peeked inside. Instead of photographs, this one had newspaper clippings. A lot of them, in fact.

  The newsprint felt brittle between my fingers, so I pulled them out carefully. There was an article about Gibson playing football senior year at Bootleg Springs High School. Bowie winning an award. An announcement about the Bootleg Springs Historical Society charity lunch with a big photo of Mama and a smiling six-year-old Scarlett.

  There were full newspapers, too, folded in half. Three of them. I pulled them out and my heart felt like it was stuck in my throat. The front-page story on two of them was Callie Kendall.

  The photo I’d come to know so well from her missing persons posters smiled back at me from the front page of the Bootleg Springs Gazette. It declared her missing and seemed to be reporting on the search. The second paper was more of the same, from about a week later. I reckoned a lot of Bootleggers had kept these papers. It had been a defining moment in the town.

  The third newspaper had me especially confused. I didn’t see anything about Callie on the cover. Spreading it out on my workbench, I paged through it, wondering why my parents had kept it. Then, on page five, I saw something that surprised me more than anything.

  It was me.

  Way at the bottom, there was a small photo of me standing in front of a sculpture I’d done. Wasn’t metal, but I’d worked with a lot of materials as a kid. This one was clay, and I’d entered it in an art contest. Won first place.

  The article was barely a caption. Just my name, and age—eleven—and a sentence or two about me winning. I didn’t remember ever seeing this—didn’t think I’d known my picture had been in the paper. But my parents had kept it?

  Couldn’t hardly be a mistake. There didn’t seem to be anything else of interest in the entire issue. And the fact that it hadn’t been cut out like the others made me wonder… had my dad hung onto this? Seemed like Mama would have cut out the little snippet about me, not kept the whole paper.

  But that didn’t make a whole lot of sense. My dad had never liked me doing any kind of art. Said it wasn’t manly. I’d shown him things, but he’d always scowled. Had he kept this?

  I folded up the paper and put it all back. That didn’t explain why that box had been so heavy, so I moved a few things out of the way.

  And just when I’d thought I’d been as surprised as I could possibly get, I saw what weighed so much.

  I pulled out a hunk of metal that was roughly in the shape of a dog. At least, that’s what I’d been going for when I’d made it. It was the very first metal sculpture I’d ever made. The thing that had made me fall in love with the medium.

  I’d talked Clint Waverly, the local mechanic, into teaching me to weld after seeing a video at school about an artist who worked with metal. It had been fascinating to watch, what with the sparks flying and the heat and electricity coming together to forge pieces of hard steel together.

  Once I’d gotten the hang of it, he’d let me come over and use his tools as long as he didn’t need them. I’d found some rusty old wrenches in the garage—stuff my dad had probably forgotten was even out there—and used them to make this. Didn’t look much like a dog, now that I looked at it through the eyes of an adult. But at the time, I’d been mighty proud of it.

  I’d given it to my dad. And gotten yelled at for stealing his tools.

  He’d asked me where I’d gotten the wrenches, so I’d told him. I could still see his face, getting red with rage. He’d said it was stealing, and no son of his was going to be a thief. He’d yelled that I’d ruined his perfectly good tools, grounded me for a month, and thrown the sculpture out the back door.

  I held it in my hands and stared at the messy welds. They looked like frosting spilling out between the edges of a cake if you pressed down too hard.

  But he’d kept it.

  I didn’t understand what that meant. He’d been so angry at me, I’d been a bit afraid he’d smack me for it. Dad had never laid a finger on us, but he’d yelled loud enough, it had felt like being hit. Had to me, at
least.

  Why had he kept this all these years? Had he known it was in here, or had my mama rescued it and put it away? Somehow, I didn’t think so. Mama hadn’t been home when I’d shown him. I didn’t think she’d ever known about it. By the time I’d gone looking for the sculpture, it had been gone. I’d always figured Dad had thrown it away.

  While I was upstairs, cowering in my bedroom, had he gone outside and picked it up? Dusted it off and tucked it away in his closet?

  I’d never really understood my father, and I didn’t understand him now. But suddenly, I saw things a little differently. Maybe he hadn’t hated me like I’d thought. A terrible feeling, to think your daddy hates you. I’d thought it many times. The times he’d been nice, and even affectionate, had only confused me more. But maybe those times had been more true than I’d known.

  Maybe my dad had been proud of me.

  That was enough to get my chest worked up tight and my throat feelin’ thick. I swallowed hard and put the sculpture away. Maybe I’d get it out again and put it somewhere in the shop—a nice reminder of how far I’d come. But for now, I couldn’t bear to look at it any longer.

  I finished tidying the workshop around the time the sun came up. I had a long drive ahead of me, so I got cleaned up, made some coffee, and packed my bags for my trip. Checked my phone, thinking maybe Leah Mae would have texted. Wondered if I should text her.

  In the end, I didn’t. I put the spare tire on my truck and drove into town to get it fixed. Then without allowing myself to think too much about her, I got on the highway and headed out of Bootleg. It was probably better this way. I’d just disappear. Fade into the background and let her move on. I was pretty good at that—had a lot of practice over the years. Lord knew I had no idea what to do to fix things between us, or if they could be fixed at all.

  Or whether I was worth the trouble.

  34

  Jameson

  The humid air made my shirt cling to my back. It was warm for October, but I reckoned that was just Charlotte for you. The fact that I couldn’t seem to stop pacing didn’t help much, either.

  I was outside in a staging area near the central courtyard where we’d installed my piece this morning. She’d arrived safely from Bootleg Springs—not a scratch on her. They’d unloaded her fine, and I’d put on the finishing touches, securing her to the metal base where she’d live out her days.

  I didn’t think I’d ever been more proud of a piece of art than I was of my angel. She looked magnificent—perfectly proportioned. Soft, organic lines. She looked like she ought to be breathing.

  My client, a man by the name of Everett Davis, had come to see her around the time I’d finished up her installation. At first, I hadn’t been sure what to make of his reaction. He’d stood stock still, just looking at her. His mouth had parted, and after standing a while, he’d walked slow circles around her. When he’d finally spoken to me, he’d seemed to have trouble deciding what to say. All he’d managed was, it’s beautiful.

  I took that to mean he was pleased. Hoped so, at least.

  “Jameson!” Deanna power-walked her way past security, wearing a flowing black shirt and wide-legged slacks. Her dark hair had streaks of silver, and it was pulled back in sleek ponytail. She took off her sunglasses. “Oh my god, Bodine. Mr. Davis is basically in love with you right now.”

  “How’s that?” I asked.

  “He loves the piece so much, you left him speechless.”

  “I reckon he didn’t say much.”

  She laughed. “You have outdone yourself. Even after seeing pictures, she absolutely blew me away. I knew you were good, but this… Jameson, the piece is stunning.”

  I gave her a polite nod. Would have tipped my hat, had I been wearing one. “Thank you, Dee.”

  “I hope you’re ready to get back to work,” she said. “Hits to your website are up by a thousand percent. I’m not kidding. I’ve had inquiries from all over the country. You’re about to be more in demand than you thought possible.”

  “Wow… that’s great news.”

  “I hope you’re excited under that humble exterior of yours,” she said with a smile. “Your career is taking off.”

  “I’m just a little overwhelmed is all.”

  “God, you’re adorable. Too bad you’re taken. My niece is here.”

  I rubbed the back of my neck and glanced away. “Yeah… um, thanks, Dee.”

  “Where is she, by the way?” Dee asked. “No Leah Larkin after all?”

  “Um, no.”

  “Is everything all right?”

  I cleared my throat. “She couldn’t make it. Is there water around here anywhere? I’m hotter than a sinner in church.”

  “Yeah, of course,” she said. “I’ll be right back.”

  “No, no, just point me in the right direction, and I’ll fetch some myself. Don’t need you going to any trouble.”

  She stared at me a moment, a strange look on her face. I was about to ask her what she was looking at, but she finally answered. “If you go in through the main lobby doors, there’s a big table with bottled waters.”

  I nodded again. “Thanks.”

  The lobby was blissfully cool, the air conditioning in the brand-new building working like magic. I grabbed a water and took a few sips. We were starting soon, so I didn’t linger. I grabbed another bottle in case Dee was thirsty and went back outside.

  People meandered around the courtyard, checking out the new building, but my sculpture was covered. A platform stood next to it with a podium, microphone, and big speakers. A man was up there—seemed to be checking the wiring.

  I headed back toward the staging area, but something—or rather someone—caught my eye. I had to do a double, then a triple-take. Was that Gibson?

  He stood near the covered sculpture, his arms crossed, sunglasses on his face. I stopped and stared at him. Was I seeing things? He seemed to notice me and sauntered over. It was indeed my brother.

  “What in the hell are you doing here?” I asked. Maybe not the nicest thing I could have said, but I wouldn’t have been more surprised if my dead father had been standing there.

  “You should have told us about this,” Gibson said. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

  “Told you?” I asked. “Why?”

  “Are you fucking kidding me?” he asked. “This is a big deal.”

  “What, my sculpture?”

  Gibson shook his head, then swiped his glasses off. “Yes, your sculpture. Jesus, Jame. Are you serious? This is one of those you’ve made it moments. Don’t you get that?”

  “I reckon.”

  “You reckon,” he said, shaking his head. “You know, most people aren’t good enough to make a living the way you do. Or brave enough to take the risk to try.”

  I stared at him, dumbstruck. It was hands down the nicest thing Gibson had ever said to me. Maybe the nicest thing he’d ever said to anyone—that I knew about, at least.

  “Thanks.”

  “If you’d said something, we all would have been here. I came down ’cause…” He trailed off and looked away, clearing his throat. “Because I wanted to make sure you weren’t here alone.”

  I looked down at the ground, feeling a bit choked up. Those weren’t tears stinging my eyes. Just a little breeze stirring up something in the air. “That was good of you.”

  “I, uh…” Gibson paused again. Seemed like he was having some trouble figuring out what to say. “I was here this morning and saw your sculpture before they covered it up. It’s, um… it’s real good.”

  “Thanks, Gibs.”

  He put his sunglasses back on. “Yeah. All right, don’t think about all the people and shit. Just be proud of your work. You earned this.”

  I nodded and he punched me in the arm before walking away. And just like that, the Bodine brothers were good again.

  Dee found me again while I was still a bit dumbstruck over seeing Gibson.

  “Are you okay?” she asked. “They’re almost ready to st
art.”

  “Yeah, fine. Water?”

  She took the bottle. “Thanks. We’ll wait over here.”

  I followed her to the platform where a few people, including Mr. Davis, had gathered. He shook my hand again and said how much he appreciated me being here. I just tried not to think about all the people congregating in front of the platform. One second, it looked like just a handful; the next it was getting downright crowded. Someone had obviously signaled that things were about to begin, and the crowd in front of me swelled.

  My heart beat hard in my chest, but I took a few deep breaths to calm my nerves. I could do this.

  We all stepped up onto the platform, and a man I didn’t know started in on a long introduction, talking about Everett Davis. He had an impressive list of accomplishments leading up to opening the beautiful building behind me.

  Mr. Davis took the microphone and said a few words, mostly thanking people. Talked about his vision, and his hopes for the future. He was a good speaker—held the crowd’s attention quite well.

  “Now for the moment I’ve been waiting for,” he said. “When I discovered the artwork of the young man standing next to me, to say I was impressed would be a vast understatement. I understand architecture and design, but Jameson Bodine understands beauty. I was fortunate enough to commission a piece from him, and I have to say, it blew all my expectations out of the water. And they were high expectations.”

  He signaled for the sculpture to be uncovered. I watched, my heart hammering, palms sweating, as two men pulled the canvas sheet down.

  A collective gasp rippled through the crowd, followed by a low murmur of sound as people reacted to her.

  “It’s my great pleasure to introduce you to the artist of this remarkable piece, Jameson Bodine.”

  The crowd applauded, and Mr. Davis gestured for me to take his place behind the podium.

  I swallowed hard and blew out a quick breath. My stomach was queasy, but I squared my shoulders and stepped up to the microphone.

  And then I saw her.

  Leah Mae moved closer to the platform, slipping her way through the crowd of onlookers. Her hair was in a loose braid, hanging over one shoulder. She wore a pretty yellow dress with a chunky turquoise necklace and her favorite cowboy boots.