kidding, right?” I cried. “After everything you guys went through? All those nasty fights? The crazy arguments? Even the physical stuff, and all the hateful things you said about each other before you both left town?”
I scanned each of their faces, then glanced over to Adrian for help. He was leaning back against the wall, casually sipping his beer. In his button-down shirt he looked like a tattooed businessman, with silver cuff-links that matched the thick chain around his neck. Twilight Zone indeed.
“Well a couple of things have happened since you left town,” said Luke. “Most notably, we both came back.”
I remembered how full of rage they were when they’d left, and how neither of them could stand to even look at each other. At that point, they could barely look at me.
In business together! Of all the crazy things—
I’d felt tremendous guilt at being the unwilling wedge that ultimately drove them apart. And yet in dating Luke, I’d done just that. What began as something pure and beautiful got twisted in a hurry. I didn’t know what to do. Who to approach, or what I would even say.
And then they’d both found out of state colleges that would accept them… and that was it.
“Are you surprised?” asked Warren.
“That the two of you patched things up? To put it mildly, fuck yes.”
“Well it wasn’t easy,” said Luke. “We returned to North Glade at around the same time, both of us sick of college.”
“Probably sicker of college than we were of each other,” Warren added.
“Yeah, so it was about two years since we’d seen each other,” said Luke. “Then one day I’m gassing up at the Mobile station and this lunatic pulls right into the pump on the opposite side of me.”
I could picture it in my mind, almost as if I were there.
“Uh oh,” I said. “So what happened?”
“He sucker-punched me,” said Luke.
“Bullshit,” laughed Warren. “You shoved me first.”
“I wouldn’t have shoved you if you weren’t two inches from my face,” Luke pointed out. “But yeah, we started right up where we left off. Only this time it came to blows. We got into a knock down, drag out fight,” he went on. “Right in front of that waterfall-fountain thing at the edge of the property.”
“The one with the fish in it?”
“You mean the one that used to have fish in it,” Adrian smirked. “Until these assholes broke it.”
“More like shattered it,” Luke admitted. “But yeah. It’s not there anymore.”
I shook my head, half excited, half still in disbelief. “Oh my God! So what happened after that?”
“Well, we beat the shit out of each other for a good five minutes,” said Luke. “Back and forth, blow for blow.”
Warren chuckled. “People were watching. Some were screaming. The guy running the Mobile station came out clenching a broom, although I don’t know what the hell he expected to do with it.”
“How did it end?” I asked.
“Sirens,” said Luke. “As soon as we heard em’ we bolted back to our vehicles and took off. We were a couple of miles away when my phone rang, and when I looked down for the first time in years I saw Warren’s number.”
“Touching,” yawned Adrian. “Like a fucking Hallmark movie.”
“Shut up asshole,” Luke poked him. “Anyway, the only thing left to do at that point was go out for beers. One minute we were slugging away at each other, and fifteen minutes later we were hoisting pints.”
I scratched at my head. “That’s… that’s just crazy.”
“Is it, though?” Luke asked. He drained his glass. “We’d been friends forever, Kayla. Since before either of us met you.”
“I know,” I smiled. “And I’m glad. It’s just… well…”
“Back then we were young, angry, jealous. We were stupid.”
“Glad you added that last one,” Adrian quipped.
“In the end though,” said Warren, “we looked at it the same way: you’re an amazing girl. We both loved you. We both wanted you for the same reasons. So could we really blame each other?”
“Yeah,” Luke agreed. “It’s not like one of us could fault the other just for wanting the same thing. We arrived at the same common ground. That you were an awesome fucking girlfriend.”
I blushed deeply and smiled. “Well, now you’re talking sense.”
“And stupidly,” Luke finished, his voice going a little more solemn, “we let you slip away.”
For a moment the table fell silent, the only noise coming in from the chatter around us. We were four old friends, reunited again. Dressed like we were going to a wedding.
“There’s more too,” said Warren.