The Good Guys Box Set: TRUCKER, DANCER, DROPOUT, and A Trucker Wedding

by Jamie Schlosser

“I guess we have a lot of catching up to do, huh?” she asked, her legs still firmly wrapped around me.

  “Yeah, we do. Speaking of that, what are you doing now? Want to come over?”

  Her face fell. “I can’t.”

  “You have another date or something?” I sort of meant it as a joke, but I couldn’t keep the edge out of my voice at the thought of her seeing someone else.

  “No.” Ellie’s eyebrows furrowed together the same way they always used to when I pissed her off. “It’s nothing like that. I’ve just lost a lot of sleep lately and I’m tired.” She gave me a pointed look because I was the reason for her loss of sleep.

  “But will you go on a date with me? Soon?” I asked hopefully.

  I didn’t even try to stop myself from sounding desperate. Normally, I would’ve tried to play it cool. But this was Ellie. We could just skip all the bullshit.

  “I have Friday night off,” she told me as she lightly ran a finger over my left eyebrow.

  That was only three days away. What I wanted was to spend time with her now, but I guess I’d just have to be patient.

  “Friday it is, then.” I grinned and took out my phone.

  After exchanging numbers, I walked Ellie to her car. We made out against the driver’s side door until both of us were numb from the cold and sporting chapped lips.

  Before I walked away from her, I said goodbye in the best way I knew how.

  “Three,” I said quietly, and took a step back.

  A bright smile lit up her face. “Two.”

  “One.” I grinned because she remembered.

  The whole goodbye routine had started because we could never decide who was going to say bye last. We’d spent many phone conversations arguing about who got to have the last word, so I had come up with the solution.

  We looked at each other for another few seconds before we both uttered the last word at the same time. “Bye.”

  After I got home I took off my boots, flopped down onto the couch, and sent Travis a text. Even though it was late, he responded right away.

  Me: I’ve got something tits oasis when you grab ass.

  Travis: Wtf?

  Me: Omg. Autocorrect is ducking with me again.

  Me: Fuck.

  Me: I have something to tell you when you get back. That’s what I typed out, I swear.

  Travis: Does it have something to do with a girl?

  Me: Yeah. How did you know?

  Travis: Hank told me.

  I rolled my eyes. Of course my dad told him. That was the thing about being as close as the three of us were—there were no secrets. Most of the time, I liked it. Other times, I just wanted some damn privacy.

  Me: My dad is a nympho gopher.

  Travis: Hahaha.

  Me: Dammit! A nosy gossip.

  Giving up on the conversation, I changed into a T-shirt and sweat pants before crawling into bed. Ellie’s scent still lingered on my pillowcase and I buried my face in it, wishing she was with me.

  I thought back to the other night, to the times when I felt that emotional pull.

  Although I didn’t know it was Ellie at the time, somehow my subconscious recognized her. That was the only explanation I could come up with for the instant connection we had.

  Just thinking about having her back in my bed made me hard as a rock. I looked down at the wood I was sporting and sighed.

  Friday couldn’t come fast enough.

  My phone chirped, alerting me that I had a message. Colton and I had been texting almost non-stop since the other night.

  But his text would have to wait.

  Scrunching my face up against the freezing wind, I put my arm around Ava and tried to shield her from the harsh weather as we approached the community college where I would be taking my classes. Snowflakes started to blow around us and I hoped this errand wouldn’t take too long.

  Adjusting the purse on my shoulder, I took Ava’s hand when we got close to the entrance. The automatic sliding doors opened, blasting us with a wall of welcome warm air, and I looked around for a map that would direct me to the bookstore.

  “What are we doing here?” Ava asked while skipping next to me.

  “I have to buy some books.”

  “What kind? Yittle Critter books?”

  I laughed.

  “No. Boring books,” I replied. “For my classes.”

  “How many?”

  She twirled and almost bumped into another student. The young guy already looked a little lost, but when his eyes landed on Ava a panicked expression crossed his face and he glanced around as though he was wondering if he was in the wrong building.

  “Sorry,” I sent the apology his way as I took Ava’s hand again. “Well, I’m taking three classes, and I need five books,” I told her, looking down at the crazy outfit she was wearing.

  Usually, I let Ava pick out her own clothes. As long as it was weather-appropriate and she wasn’t naked, I didn’t really care what she wore.

  Today she picked out a poofy purple princess dress. She put up a little protest when I told her she had to wear a long-sleeve shirt and pants underneath it, but as soon as I told her we could match she gave in. She thought the black leggings, pink shirt, and brown fur-lined boots made us twins. Add to that the fact that our gray wool coats were almost identical, she was one happy girl.

  The hallways of the college seemed like an unending maze, but eventually we found the bookstore.

  Pausing in one of the aisles, I took out my course list. English 101, Bio 121, and Math 098. I didn’t know what to expect out of these classes. I only knew two things—they were required, and my study skills were super rusty. At first, I’d been a little disappointed that I wouldn’t get to dive into the medical stuff, but the class counselor told me I had to get all the prerequisites out of the way.

  After locating all my books, I went up to the counter to pay. I almost choked on air when the cashier announced the total.

  Holy crap. Almost $300 for five books? I’d even picked out the used ones.

  Sighing, I handed over my debit card and made a mental note to ask for an extra shift at Caged next week.

  As I dropped the books into my large purse, I felt a tug on my coat and glanced down at Ava’s worried expression.

  “Are you frustrated?” she asked as we walked toward the exit.

  “No, Bug. These books were just very expensive.”

  She stopped me before we could get back out into the hallway and looked up at me with teary eyes. Her chin wobbled. “We can sell my Barbies if you want.”

  “Oh, sweetie, no.” I kneeled, dropping down to her level. “We don’t have to sell any of your toys. I’ve got it covered.”

  “Okay.” She gave me a watery smile.

  My sweet, sensitive girl. I picked up her hand and kissed it, then she did the same to me.

  We resumed our walk, trying to find our way out of the building when my phone chirped again.

  Colton: Hoes your day?

  Colton: HOW is your day? Autocorrect ruins my life.

  I giggled, gaining Ava’s attention. “What are you yaughing at?”

  “Just a funny friend,” I said before typing back a reply.

  Me: Good. Just got the books for my classes.

  Colton: Excited for our date tonight? I can’t wait to sex you.

  Colton: SEE you. Omg. That’s what I meant.

  Me: Suuuure. I think you had it right the first time though ;)

  Unable to stop myself from smiling, I slipped my phone into the pocket of my coat.

  “Are you so happy?” Ava asked, beaming up at me.

  “Yeah, Bug,” I replied, swinging our hands between us. “I’m so happy.”

  Ava ran to the living room as soon as we got home because I promised her she could watch Tom and Jerry while she ate her lunch. I warmed up the leftover spaghetti and meatballs from the night before, then dished it onto a Scooby-Doo plate.

  Setting it next to her on the couch, I reminded her of our de
al. “You have to eat it all, okay? Every bite.”

  “Okay,” she agreed, already entranced by the TV.

  My phone started ringing from the kitchen. Not many people called me these days, so I wasn’t surprised to see Chloe’s name flashing on the screen.

  “Hey, what’s up?” I answered while unloading all the books from my purse onto the counter.

  “Hey.” She paused, then her tone turned suspicious. “You sound cheerful. What’s up with you?”

  I huffed out a laugh. “What do you mean? I can’t be happy to hear from a friend?”

  “No, you can… But that’s not it. You sound peppy. Did you get laid or something?” Taken aback by her accurate guess I hesitated, and she gasped. “You did! Oh, my God. Who was it? Fess up, Hoe Bag.”

  I sighed. There was no way I could deny it. “I really can’t go into details right now,” I said, glancing around the corner at Ava, who wasn’t holding up her end of the deal. “Hang on a sec, Chloe.”

  Leaning down over the back of the couch, I tapped the full plate next to Ava. “You gotta eat, baby. Or else I turn off your show.”

  “Okay, okay.” She picked up her fork and took a big bite.

  Satisfied, I went back into the kitchen and realized Chloe was still talking. “What?”

  “I said, it was the guy from the other night, wasn’t it?”

  “What guy?” I asked, wondering if the rumor mill at Caged extended to ex-employees. I wouldn’t be surprised if Tasha had been gabbing.

  “Don’t play dumb with me,” Chloe said, sounding insulted. “The guy! On the dance floor. The one I hooked you up with.”

  I gasped. “That was you?”

  “Um, you’re welcome.”

  “I knew him,” I blurted out.

  “Oh. Like you knew him? Or you knew him then you got to know him?”

  Shaking my head, I smiled as I tried to decipher Chloe’s code talk for sex. “Ava can’t hear you. You can say it. Yes, I knew him a long time ago. Then I got to know him,” I told her, then groaned when I had to say the worst part. “But he didn’t know who I was… And I sort of didn’t tell him.”

  “What the hell? Back it up. I’m confused.”

  I groaned again. “Me, too.”

  “So you had sex with him,” she whisper-yelled, “and you didn’t tell him that you knew him?”

  I slapped a hand over my face, because when someone else said it back to me it sounded really bad. “Yes. But he knows now, and we have a date tonight.”

  She made a tsk tsk noise, and I could imagine her shaking her head at me in disapproval. “Okay. We’re gonna talk about this. Soon.” She paused. “But let’s talk about the fact that you have a date tonight!”

  “Don’t get too excited.” Glancing around the corner, I was happy to see that Ava was making progress on her lunch. “For all I know, he might just be looking for a good time.” I lowered my voice. “And he doesn’t know about Ava yet.”

  I realized my concerns went unnoticed when I heard Chloe singing through the phone, “Bree is gonna get married, Bree is gonna get married, Bree is gonna—”

  “Chloe!” I laughed.

  “Is that Chloe?!” I heard Ava shout from the other room before she came barreling into the kitchen, her feet pounding on the laminate floors. “I wanna talk! I wanna talk!”

  I put it on speaker phone and Chloe’s voice filled the kitchen.

  “Miss Ava, is that you?”

  “Yeah, it’s me,” Ava responded much more calmly now that she had Chloe’s full attention. “Where are you?”

  “I’m at my house. Where are you?”

  “I’m at my house, too.” Ava smiled and excitedly clasped her hands under her chin. “Are you coming over?”

  “Well, I wish I could, but I have to work tonight.”

  “Aw, man.” Ava pouted, and I rubbed her chubby cheek.

  “You get to hang out with Grandma and Grandpa tonight,” I reminded her. “If you go finish your lunch I’ll let you have an Oreo.”

  Those were the magic words. She scampered back into the living room.

  Chloe’s laugh came through the phone. “It’s nice to know where I rank next to Oreos.”

  “Don’t be offended. I’m pretty sure Oreos come before me, too.”

  “Listen, if you need someone to watch her don’t hesitate to ask. I can help out with your classes, date nights, whatever.”

  “Thanks.” I smiled. “I’ll take you up on that and I’ll even pay you.”

  She made a dismissive sound. “Your money’s no good with me. I only accept currency in the form of dirty details about your new man.”

  “He’s not my man. It’s the first date.”

  Nervousness suddenly hit me as I realized that in a matter of hours, I was going on a date—a real date—with Colton. Colton Evans. The childhood version of myself would’ve been crapping her pants about right now.

  So much had happened in the last fifteen years. There was so much he didn’t know about me. What if he didn’t like what he found out?

  “Get out of your head,” Chloe said, reading my thoughts.

  “No, you get out of my head. It’s creepy when you do that,” I told her with a smile.

  She sighed. “Have fun. Live a little. It’s going to be great and you deserve this. And don’t forget to tell me everything.”

  “Okay, okay,” I agreed, holding my hands up in surrender.

  After we ended the conversation, I tried not to think too much about the outcome of tonight. I busied myself with the dishes, then Ava helped me clean the kitchen. When I say she helped I mean she dumped an entire bottle of vinegar water on the floor, then attempted to soak it up with a roll of paper towels.

  Ava smiled up at me, still mopping at the puddle, and my heart swelled with love.

  I just had to hope Colton didn’t tuck tail and run when I told him about her.

  Ellie: Suuuure. I think you had it right the first time though ;)

  Fuck.

  I felt my cock start to thicken as I read over Ellie’s last text, which let me know she was up for a repeat of the other night. Having an erection at work was totally unprofessional. I set the phone down on a nearby tool box while trying to make my hard-on go away.

  Friday was usually one of our busy days at the shop and I’d just gotten done fixing a loose belt on an old Cadillac. Next up was a standard tire rotation, then after that, an oil change.

  “So what did you have to tell me?” Travis asked beside me, reminding me of the text I’d sent him a few nights ago.

  Travis and Angel came back from their trip the day before, but I hadn’t gotten a chance to talk to him yet. Now that he asked, I couldn’t wait to spill the news.

  “Do you remember the first day we met? When we got into a fight?” I picked up a rag to wipe the grease off my hands. I faced him as I thought about the day my dad introduced me to the boy living three houses away in our new town.

  “Of course,” he replied with a smirk. “That shiner I gave you lasted a week.”

  “Yeah, you got me good.” I chuckled. “But I threw the first punch. Do you remember why?”

  “We had a disagreement about some game or something. Right?”

  I shook my head. “No. It was because I was pissed that we had to move and I didn’t want a new best friend. I was angry and I took it out on you.”

  “That’s why you hit me?” he asked incredulously. “Not cool, man. And all these years you let me believe it was because you were jealous of all the marbles I won. I just thought you were a sore loser.”

  “My dad was so mad at me. I’d never punched anyone before.” I chuckled. “Do you remember that stupid shirt he put us in together?”

  Travis barked out a laugh. “The get-along shirt. I wasn’t very happy about that either, but you decided I wasn’t so bad by the end of the day, huh?”

  I nodded. “You’re kind of impossible not to like.”

  He put a hand over his heart like he was touched. “T
hanks, man.”

  As I thought back to that day, I remembered how mad I was. I had lost my mom, my home, and my best friend. Then my new neighbor came over, and the last thing I wanted to do was play nice.

  Honestly, I needed to let out some of the anger I was holding in. When I hit Travis, it felt good. Really good.

  When he hit me back? Not so much. He’d been smaller than me at the time, and I underestimated him. Seven-year-old Travis had one hell of a right hook.

  Then my dad put us in that stupid over-sized T-shirt. He even went as far as taking out a Sharpie and writing ‘The Get-along Shirt’ on the front.

  Travis and I spent the first hour giving each other the silent treatment while I held a bag of frozen peas to my eye and he dabbed at the blood coming from his nose.

  The turning point for us had been when he told me his dad had died in a car accident a few years before. That’s when I realized Travis wasn’t much different from me. We called a truce, and my dad and I walked him home that night.

  When his mom came out to meet us, she swayed on her feet, eyes glassy and words slurred. Her brown hair was in a messy ponytail and she had a smear of what looked like spaghetti sauce down the front of her pink T-shirt. Despite her appearance being in total disarray, her face lit up when she saw Travis. She thanked us for bringing her son home, then stumbled a bit as she walked back up to the house.

  Travis was right there to catch her. He put her arm around his shoulders, letting her lean on him, and guided her up to the house.

  Over the years I would come to learn that Karen Hawkins was one of the sweetest people in the world, drunk or sober. But it was clear that Travis had taken on the role as man of the house, and I gained respect for him that day.

  As my dad and I walked home, he told me Travis was going to need us. Grudgingly, I agreed.

  But what I didn’t tell my dad was that I thought maybe I needed Travis, too.

  “Anyway,” I said, bringing my thoughts to the present. “The girl I was best friends with before I came here… Her name is Brielle. She was the dancer from the night of my birthday.”