Chapter 27
“Oh, that’s right,” she said, “you don’t know. Jason’s birthday is the fifth. Jason loves roller coasters and fireworks. And we love Jason, so we indulge him in this. You will come with us, yes?”
Andy nodded and pulled her into a quick hug. “Thanks,” he said, trusting that she’d understand without asking that he didn’t mean just the invitation.
“My birthday is not until the fall. October nineteenth,” she said thoughtfully. “I’ll be twenty-one. Isn’t that what I’m supposed to claim now? Forever 21?”
“Too late,” Andy said. “I already know your terrible secret. Don’t worry, I’ll get you a walker and a Life Alert bracelet for your birthday, so you’re all set for your waning years as an ancient crone.”
“And I shall get for you a pacifier and a bib for yours,” Kat shot back. “When is that? I seem to have forgotten, in my senile old age.”
“Memorial Day, this year,” Andy said without thinking, caught up in the banter. “Maybe that will help you remember.”…Crap, he hadn’t meant to give away any more potentially identifying information. Maybe she wouldn’t believe him; the sale banners for the holiday had started going up just today, so maybe she’d think he’d just picked it out of thin air.
“Poor you,” she crooned. “That’s the busiest day of our year. Scooter will not let you out of work. You will be cursing your mother by the end of the day. It’s awful. Horrid. The worst.”
“But at least I’ll have the privilege of seeing your smiling face all day,” Andy responded. “What better way to celebrate?” What would he even do with a day off, anyway?
Jason coughed, a deep rumble. How the hell did he move that quietly? Andy understood Kat ghosting around, she was so tiny, but Jason could probably bench-press a Volkswagen microbus if he had a mind to do so. It was unnatural. “Are you flirting with my mail-order bride?”
“He says this—” Kat turned to Andy with an air of disgust. “—and he has yet to actually propose to me. I should get a refund.”
Jason, much to Andy’s astonishment, blushed. “Dinner’s ready.”
Andy hadn’t known Jason could do that. “Lead on then,” he said, and ostentatiously offered his arm to Kat. “May I have the honor of taking you in to dinner?” he asked in his best Masterpiece Theater accent.
“Oh, he’s adorable, Jason,” she said. “I want one. Can we adopt him? I’ll feed him and take him for walks and everything.”
Jason snorted. “You burn water. And Dymok thinks I’mthe feeding person, so, no, you can’t have another pet.”
“I’ll just make Scooter adopt him, then. I can have a pet by proxy.” She ruffled Andy’s hair.
Andy tried, really, really hard, not to think too much about being adopted by Scooter, cuddled and petted and—He wasn’t terribly successful.
Dinner was incredible. Jason was a good short-order cook, but apparently that wasn’t the only skill under his belt. He presented and carved an elaborately braided beef wellington, along with roasted miniature vegetables and a cranberry walnut salad with goat cheese that Andy had several helpings of, because vegetables that weren’t potatoes were scarcely seen at Dockside. The wine he’d picked went reasonably well, even if it was a tannin-heavy red that made Andy’s teeth feel fuzzy.
“This is amazing,” Andy said after barely remembering to swallow his mouthful. “Why aren’t you a chef for one of the fancier restaurants?”
Jason actually smiled. “Because I like to cook,” he said. “I know, I know, that sounds weird, but short-order is easy. I don’t have to think about it. Working in a fancy place, I’d have to think, all the time, and make sure everything is exactly right and deal with sous and infighting and bickering, not even mentioning customers with a bug up their ass, which you get more of, the fancier the place gets. There’s more drama in a kitchen than on a stage. Cooking like this…this is an act of love. And I don’t love that many people.”
Andy paused, fork halfway to his mouth. “Huh.” It sounded—not rehearsed, but like Jason had been asked this before, actually put some thought into it. Andy pointed the fork at Jason, greens wobbling on the tines. “Also, because Dockside is where Scooter is,” he guessed.
Jason nodded, not even trying to deny it. “And that’s where Scooter is.” 11
Scooter pried himself out of bed at fuckme o’clock on Memorial Day. Friday had been a good night, steady. Saturday had been crazy and Sunday had been so bad that they’d all collapsed as soon as they shooed the last customer out the door, deciding en masse to do cleanup in the morning. Which was a dumb damn decision, and they made it every fucking year.