by Jack Harbon
“Because you’re reading it. You find it interesting, and I find you interesting, so I wanted to see what it was about.” The way he said it, so nonchalantly, as if it were the time or the weather, unnerved Jordan just a bit.
I find you interesting. Jordan shifted slightly, ignoring that remark.
Just a few days ago, Rex had ripped into the entire genre, insulting Jordan and anyone else that had even a mild interest in love stories. Now here he was, showing off his copy? It didn’t make sense to him.
“Okay, so why are you telling me all this? Do you want a pat on the back for not being as pretentious as I said you were?”
Rex chuckled, and even with how irritated he was at the man’s presence, Jordan found himself quickly falling for that deep, sultry laugh.
“Jesus, Jordan, you act like I personally wounded you.”
“Sorry,” he said quietly. “I guess I just don’t like it when people insult me to my face and then try to be buddy-buddy with me a few days later.”
Rex sighed and folded his arms over his chest.
Seriously, he needed to stop doing that.
“Look, I’m sorry for making fun of your little books, okay? I bought this book because I wanted to see what it was all about, and I actually don’t hate it.”
“Seriously?” Jordan’s eyes narrowed.
“Seriously. I mean, the pacing is slow as hell, but it’s not the worst thing I’ve ever read. It’s no Pride and Prejudice, but…”
“I thought you didn’t read little books like that.”
“I graduated high school, Jordan. Everyone reads that book in high school.”
Fair enough. It was now Jordan’s turn to fold his hands over his chest. “So, what now? Are you saying you want to join my silly little book club? Or did you really just come over to ease your guilt about being a douchebag at Millerstone?”
For the first time, Rex’s arrogance gave way to something else. His cocky smirk softened, and that playful gleam in his eye disappeared. “Both? I mean, I’m not gonna say sorry about Millerstone because that was funny, but maybe I shouldn’t have gone so hard on you.”
“Yeah, maybe,” Jordan muttered. “I just don’t really see you joining Meet Cute Club.”
“Wow, I thought romance was for everyone.”
Jordan wanted to be mad that he was throwing that statement back in his face, but he had a point. If he kept Rex from joining Meet Cute Club, he’d be no better than Rex when he took it upon himself to judge all the books that he read. He couldn’t preach about how inclusive the genre was and then exclude Rex from the experience.
“Fine,” he said, glaring at Rex. “You can join. But this isn’t a joke. This isn’t a chance for you to throw all your Devil’s Advocate hot takes at us. We’re serious about these books here, and you should be too.”
Rex’s perfect teeth glimmered as he smiled. “Deal.”
“I’m serious, Rex.”
“Okay! This isn’t a book club about kissing. This is serious, serious business.”
Jordan groaned and turned around, walking to the living room. Rex followed close behind. When all eyes fell on the two of them, Jordan cleared his throat and said, “Everyone, I’d like you to meet our newest member of Meet Cute Club!”
Rex gave a nod of acknowledgement to everyone sitting around the table. “Hey. I’m Rhett Bailey, but everyone just calls me Rex.”
Three
Amy sat back on her haunches and made a show of dusting off her hands. Rex stood at the opposite side of the room, eyeing her down suspiciously. “You done?” he asked.
“I don’t know how you do this,” she said, looking around at everything in the spare bedroom. Dozens of boxes towered over them, stacked five and sometimes six tall. Rex had to admit that it was excessive, even for Nana Bailey.
“It’s a challenge, but it’s kind of nice to go down memory lane. Sometimes I forget about all the good things that happened.”
Amy had been over twice since Rex agreed to clean out the house, and since her visit the first night he dropped off his bags, he’d spent every night unloading all of their grandmother’s belongings and looking through everything she’d accumulated over her seventy-three years. One thing that had surprised him was just how much she loved to collect.
Buttons, pins, bookmarks, and even postcards. Each of her interests got their own special book, where she’d write a little story about how she found the item and why she wanted to add it to her collection. Two nights ago, Rex had holed up with his dinner and spent the entire night reading all about her adventures in coin-hunting.
“Good things happened, Rex. You know they did,” Amy said with a sigh. “Your whole life isn’t a Charles Dickens novel.”
“Fuck off,” he laughed, rolling his eyes at her. “That’s not what I’m saying. It’s just that I’ve forgotten a lot of the good things that happened when Dad was still around in my life.”
“Yeah, well, when it comes to Dad, it’s hard to suss out the good memories from the bad ones.”
There was a bitterness in her tone that Rex felt deeper than anyone else possibly could. The utter disappointment that their father was. The wasted potential and the crushed dreams. Most kids eventually realized their parents were human. Rex realized that his father wasn’t even fit enough to call himself a man.
“How’s your mom doing?” he asked, folding his arms over his chest and leaning against one of the sturdier box towers.
Amy picked at her cuticles, almost making it a point to avoid looking at him. “She’s alright.”
“Amy.”
“Rex.”
“You can talk to me. You know that.”
“I do,” she said. After a moment, Amy groaned and let her head fall back. “I hate him, Rex. He’s such an asshole! Mom’s been making herself sick, that’s how upset she is. I hear her every night after dinner, retching in the bathroom. She can’t even eat anymore. Not since she found out.”
Hindsight was the worst gift Rex had ever received, and listening to Amy talk about her mother’s reaction to their father’s affair was like seeing his own life play out in front of him. He recalled all the nights spent holding his mother in his arms to keep her from falling apart entirely. The way she’d stared dead ahead of her, eyes glazed over, unresponsive. Alan Bailey must’ve been a witch or something, because the way he left women spent after he was done with them was something supernatural.
It was cruel, nihilistic evil.
And now, all Rex wanted to do was comfort his baby sister and help her work through this pain. With Georgia being the woman his father left his mother for, it was hard for Rex to muster up much empathy for her, but caught in the middle of all of this was Amy. The person who hadn’t asked for any part of this scenario. She was innocent, the one good thing to come from this bad situation, and Rex wanted to strangle his dad for playing a part in Amy’s anguish.
“C’mere,” Rex said, jerking his head. Almost reluctantly, Amy got up from the floor and dragged herself towards him. Rex pulled her into his arms and rested his chin on the top of her head. She’d just turned twenty-one, but to him, she was still the kid he’d been forced to babysit all those years ago.
“He’s just…he’s so…”
“I know. He’s exactly that.”
“Mom is going to kill me if she finds out I told you. So, if you talk to her, don’t mention this, please.”
Rex couldn’t see a conversation between them happening anytime soon, but he still agreed to make her feel better. If there was one thing that he and Amy had inherited from Alan, it was the inexplicable knowledge of what not to say. The reaction not to give. Playing clueless and keeping tight lips was the way of the Baileys.
“One day, we’re going to have to tell them to clean up their own messes,” Rex said once Amy stepped back from the hug.
She smiled sadly. “You say that, but look where you are. Standing in Nana’s house, cleaning up. Doing what Dad refuses to do. And I spend every night cleaning
up my mom’s vomit. You’re nuts if you think we’ll ever stop doing this.”
Rex knew the truth should have hurt him. The idea of always being behind his family, picking up the pieces, should have made him sick. The only thing he felt was numb. This was how they’d been raised. This was their world, the way of the Baileys. Some cycles just couldn’t be broken. Still, Rex gave his empty promises and preached his hollow words on the off chance that they could offer Amy some kind of solace.
“Maybe,” Rex shrugged. “Or, maybe we’ll get lucky and get to live our own messy lives.”
“The only thing messy that I want is a double bacon cheeseburger from Barney’s. Can we go get something to eat?”
“I was thinking the same thing.”
“Perfect.” Amy looked around at the boxes and shook her head. “I don’t know how you’re gonna pull all this off.”
“Me, either. This is a problem for future me,” Rex replied. “Now, you go get washed up.”
Amy nodded and headed off to the bathroom. When she returned, she had his copy of Duke’s in her hands. She turned it over and read the back, scoffing. “Was this Nana’s?”
“Yep,” Rex said, reaching for it. Amy turned away and flipped through some pages, stopping at the bookmark. It was a Millerstone receipt with the rest of Rex’s order.
“I guess Nana was able to buy books from the grave then, hm?” When she looked at Rex, her tiny, doll-like face was scrunched up suspiciously. “Why’d you buy this? Doesn’t really seem like your speed.”
“No reason.”
Amy cleared her throat and began reading from the intimate scene that Rex had stopped on. When he complained, she laughed and said, “Tell me the truth, and I’ll stop.”
“Alright, fine. There’s this guy.”
“Ooh.” Amy’s brows waggled up and down suggestively. “What’s his name?”
“Jordan.”
“And you bought this book to impress him?”
“Uh…kind of? He gets in a mood whenever I tease him, kind of like how you do. I thought I’d join his silly little club and make fun of him some more. That’s why I have that book.”
“You like him, don’t you?”
There was no point in lying to Amy. Not when she knew as well as he did what the truth was. “I guess. He’s cool, or whatever. Very high-strung. Always tense.”
“He sounds terrible.”
“You sound jealous.”
“Of your boyfriend? Not at all.”
“Of me teasing someone other than you,” he said, suddenly snatching the book back. “Gimme that.”
“Whatever, jerk-ass. I’m ready to go eat. Whenever you’re done reading your kissing book, I’ll be waiting in my car. Bye!”
“It’s not—”
Amy held up her hand and marched out of the room, leaving Rex standing with his book in his hand. He called out to her again, “It’s not a kissing book! It’s also got some political commentary about the treatment of women and… Never mind.”
No use. She wouldn’t understand unless she read for herself, and more important than that, Rex wasn’t going to defend this book. That was Jordan’s role in all this, not his. No, sir. Rex tossed the book onto the dresser a few feet in front of him and hurried out to the car.
Barney’s Burger Barn was the place to get a classic hamburger and shake combo. Rex had been going to Barney’s for as long as he could remember. Standing behind the counter, the larger-than-life man himself grinned wide and waved at him and Amy. His deep brown skin glowed from the red neon light of the sign above him.
“Usual?” Barney asked, looking between them.
“You know it.” Rex led Amy to a booth near the front of the restaurant and collapsed into his seat, sighing and stretching. With its vintage aesthetic and jukebox playing Buddy Holly, Barney’s was the closest a place could get to the ‘50s without a pack of greasers threatening Black people and McCarthyism running amok.
Some of the only few fond memories Rex had of his father were attached to this place.
As he and Amy ate, they talked about her plans for finishing up her senior year of college and where she was going to move after graduation. She’d been considering leaving Oklahoma for years, and Rex encouraged her to go. There was so much to explore and experience outside of their tiny little town. The best thing for her would be to get away from home, at least for a few months.
When Rex rose from his seat to get refills for his and Amy’s drinks, he did a double-take. Sitting in the back of the restaurant was none other than Jordan Collins, face buried in a book, hand blindly searching for a French fry on his tray.
A tiny jolt ran through Rex, and he turned and hurried to the counter. Was he…nervous? That didn’t make any sense. Not when it came to Jordan, one of the most uptight men he’d ever met. In all of his dating experience, he’d been the calm, collected one. He’d been the cucumber, as an ex-boyfriend would say.
But something about Jordan was different. Maybe it was the way he held himself—confident but not arrogant. Yes, he was a man reading—as Amy had so eloquently put it—kissing books, and fuck you if you had a problem with that. There was something perfectly unnerving about that sense of self-assuredness that Rex could only find himself more and more drawn to. In the grand scheme of things, it wasn’t a big deal, but in a place like Sweet Rose, people put weight on the littlest things.
Barney slid the cups back to Rex, snapping him out of his head.
Carrying them back to the table, Amy leaned forward and said, “That’s him, huh?”
“That’s who?”
“The guy you were talking about earlier.”
“His name is Jordan.”
Amy tapped her chin and leaned out of the booth to get a better look at him. “Jordan and Rex, sittin’ in a tree—”
“You stop that,” he warned, pointing at her.
Raising her voice, she said, “What, stop talking about Jordan?”
“Amy!” Rex hissed. “I’m serious. Knock it off.”
She fell back into her seat, giggling. This was the exact reason that Rex always made fun of her whenever he could. She messed with him just as much as he did her. “Wait until your graduation day, you brat. I’m going to make it miserable for you.”
“Yeah, yeah,” she said, rolling her eyes. “Why don’t you go talk to him? He’s right there.”
“He’s busy.”
“And? I mean, do I have to remind you about the time you almost got us arrested for street racing, all because you wanted to get that one guy’s phone number? You’ve done far worse than bother someone while they’re reading.”
“Just eat your food,” he grumbled, sitting back and picking at his lettuce.
Rex’s frustration lay more in himself than anything Amy could’ve brought up. It wasn’t like him to get this way about men around him. In every other situation, he relished knocking them off their game, taking control of the situation and laying it on thick. He left them flustered and blushing, not the other way around. Yet here Rex was, trying not to get caught staring at Jordan from across the room. It didn’t make any sense.
“Go talk to him,” Amy said after she finished her burger. “I need to use the restroom. When I come out, you better be over there talking to him.” She rose from the table and left without giving Rex a chance to argue. Annoyed, he turned back to look at Jordan. The other man flipped the page of his book and smiled to himself.
It had to be one of the nicest smiles Rex had ever seen.
Mustering up all the arrogance he could, he took a breath before crossing the room.
Even with his eyes glued to the page, Jordan could feel the presence of someone approaching him, and he glanced up to see who it was. His stomach clenched when he immediately recognized him. He knew that tattoo sleeve and self-important walk anywhere.
Rex.
Lovely.
Maybe it was childish, but he still hadn’t entirely forgiven Rex for the incident at Millerstone. It wasn’t like Jor
dan to hold a grudge, but these books were his safe space. In a world of bigotry, violence, and injustice, he’d found a place to escape real life, where every struggle and trial the characters experienced led to an ending that made it worth the strife.
Sure, the industry could do with much more diversity and meaningful conversations about representation, but that was a different topic for a different time.
Right now, it was time for this guy.
“Hey,” Rex said, sliding into the booth across from Jordan.
“Hi.”
“Wow, is it cold in here or is it just you?” he teased.
“I’m perfectly room temperature, thanks,” Jordan said, putting his bookmark between the pages and tossing the novel on the table. He leaned forward and swirled a French fry around in his pool of ketchup. “Can I help you with something?”
“I just wanted to talk, that’s all.”
“About?”
“I’ve been reading The Duke’s Deadly Bride.”
“And?”
“And it’s not really my cup of tea,” Rex said, shrugging. “I mean, it’s fine, but everything is moving really slow. And Hawthorne is an asshole. He doesn’t understand boundaries, and he keeps bugging Elizabeth.”
Jordan gave Rex a pointed look.
“Hey,” he started, cracking a smile. “I’m not an asshole!”
“Okay.” Jordan struggled to keep from smiling as well.
“I’m not!”
“If you say so.” He took a long sip from his soda before he said, “Are you going to DNF the book, then?”
Rex shrugged. “Maybe? I’m already about halfway through the book, so I might as well finish, but this isn’t exactly what I expected. You hyped it up so much, and I’m just a tad bit let down.”
Indignation rattled around inside of Jordan. “I didn’t hype this book up. I told you the genre was great, not that every book you’d read was.”
“Okay, well, if you know everything about the genre, what should I read after this? I have all the time in the world after work.”
This was the moment that always made Jordan’s heart flutter. The chance to give someone a recommendation. The hope that filled him when he thought about the possibility of someone else loving the same book as much as he did. But with that excitement came a brief moment of pressure. What if he picked something and they hated it? What if they thought differently of him if he recommended some weird shit?