Sitting all the way up, I immediately wished I hadn’t when my arm all but gave out, and my head started to pound.
Two double whammies when I wasn’t prepared.
Groaning, I slowly lowered myself back to the bed, my face making contact with the note again, and laid there for a few long minutes as I tried to get my wits about me.
My shoulder felt like it was on fire.
Yesterday I’d had a day off, but today I wouldn’t be so lucky.
I had a million and one things to do today, and my dad was coming over to do them with me.
Laric had told me last night that he had something he had to do today, meaning that I had to get to my appointment on my own, with my own protection.
Enter my awesome dad.
My awesome dad that I would be talking to today about what…
“Open the door, you little rat. Why aren’t you answering your phone?”
I sighed and pushed up again, thankfully being able to hold myself up without wanting to blow chunks or gouge out my brain.
I walked to the front door after I could pry myself out of bed, yanked the door open, and stared at my brother who was standing next to my father.
Adam looked at me like I was a slug.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” He took a step back as if he was scared to catch whatever it was that I had.
I felt my eye twitch. “I’m hungover. Let me get dressed. You’re really early.”
“I’m not early,” Dad disagreed as he pushed past my slow, shuffling self. “You’re late. We were supposed to be here at this time.”
I glanced at the kitchen clock as I moved, realizing that he was right.
When I made it into the bedroom, I slowly bent over to get my phone off the charger, only to see that it’d never made it there in our haste to get to the bed last night.
Oops.
Grinning, I tossed it onto the bed and went to the bathroom to get ready.
That took way longer than I was willing to admit, and by the time that I arrived outside, dressed as I could get for the day without help minus the shoes, it was to find Adam and my dad drinking Laric’s beer.
“You do know that it’s only ten in the morning, correct?” I asked as I walked past Adam, snagged his beer, and took a long swig.
It tasted disgusting, but I was hoping that it would help with my hangover.
I handed it back to him, and he looked at the bottle top with a tilt of his head. “You brushed your teeth, right?”
I snorted. “Yes. I did. I even brushed my tongue. See?”
I bent over and pressed my tongue to Adam’s eye, and he tried to pull away, but at that point, I’d already had my arms wrapped around him.
He wouldn’t hurt me. I knew he wouldn’t. So, he squealed like a little girl and stayed put, not moving a muscle.
“You didn’t brush your teeth! You lied!” he cried out.
I snickered and pulled away from him, nearly knocking the beer out of his hand in the process.
“I know,” I said. “I lied. My toothbrush is out here.”
He wiped the spit off his face with his shoulder, glaring at me. “You’re lucky you’re hurt, or I would’ve punched you in the throat.”
“You would not have,” I disagreed as I walked to the sink in the kitchen and started to brush my teeth. “What are we doing today?”
“We’re going to your appointment,” he said as he drank a cup of coffee. “We need to run by your place so you can get some more clothes, I’m told. But I thought I’d just send Adam over there while we’re getting your appointment done. Then we’re going to go to some place in Avinger to eat. I haven’t tried the place yet, but I’ve heard that they have the best steaks in East Texas. And since we’re not supposed to eat anywhere predictable, I made a reservation there. Your man said he would meet us there.”
My man.
I spit my toothpaste/spit on the side of the sink that didn’t have dirty dishes in it, then washed the residue down the sink with the spray nozzle before rinsing my mouth out with it, too. When I was done, I turned off the water, and placed the nozzle back on the hook thingie that it resided on. And then saw a hair tie on the side of the sink.
Mine.
My stuff was a little bit everywhere, slowly taking over Laric’s entire house.
Grinning when an idea occurred to me, I wrapped the hair tie around the spray nozzle and then positioned it.
Either it’d get my dad, Adam, or Laric.
Win-win-win.
Smiling to myself, I reached for a coffee cup and winced when a pain traveled through my shoulder.