Page 31 of Tito

“She made it clear,” I said with a laugh. “She was pretty pissed off when I left.”

He peered into his empty glass. “Damned shame things are the way they are.”

I had no idea what he was talking about. “What do you mean?”

“If you were drunk and she ripped your clothes off, it’d be called a fun time,” he said. “If she’s drunk and you do it, it’s rape. I suppose it was a good decision on your part to walk away. Especially beings as you don’t really know her.”

“My fear of her claiming rape isn’t why I walked away.”

“Why’d you do it, then?”

“Several reasons,” I said.

“Enlighten me,” Hap said. “I’ve got to live vicariously through you and dip-shit over there, and he refuses to talk to me about women.”

“I didn’t like the thought of having sex with her if she wasn’t even going to remember it the next day. Then, I don’t know. I guess I realized we had some things in common during dinner. I was hoping if I withheld on the sex that she might go on a second date.”

Hap raised his empty glass and turned it upside down over his open mouth. “In theory, that sounds like a good plan. May or may not work.” After a considerable wait, a lone drop of whisky fell onto the tip of his tongue. He grinned. “What did you two have in common?”

“She was bold, quick-witted, and had a really good sense of humor. She was also intelligent. Very much so, to be honest.”

“All characteristics that you clearly don’t possess,” Hap said with a laugh. “Sounds like a match made in heaven.” He leaned forward and looked past me, at Braxton. “You planning on hoarding that bottle of scotch, or are you going to share it?”

Braxton tossed the bottle through the air like it was a boomerang. My muscles tensed at the thought of it crashing down on the porch and shattering in a thousand pieces.

As if it were as common of an occurrence as tying his shoes, Hap caught the bottle mid-flight, by the neck.

He gave Braxton a thankful nod. “Thank you, son.”

“Thank our naïve friend,” Braxton said.

“I’m not naïve.”

“I’d argue that,” Braxton said, raising his open hand over his head.

While my focus was on Braxton, the bottle of scotch flew into my field of vision, from behind me. No differently than his father, Braxton snatched it from the air without a second thought.

“You had no idea that girl wanted to use you for sex,” he said, uncorking the bottle. “I did. Considering that we both had the same information to formulate our opinion, I’d say that makes you slightly naïve.”

“I think my judgement was clouded.”

“By what?”

“Hope.”

“Hope?” He poured his glass half full and handed me the bottle. “Of what?”

“That there would be more to it than that,” I responded. “More than just a one-night-stand.”

“What were you hoping for?”

I held onto the hat for ten years, denying the existence of everything associated with how I obtained it. Realizing I lost it brought a flood of suppressed memories that I wasn’t prepared to deal with. With those memories came pain.

Tremendous pain.

I hoped being in Reggie’s company could eliminate that pain.

Being honest wasn’t going to be an easy task. I poured my glass half full of whiskey. Being vague with Braxton prompted him to poke and prod until he got the results that satisfied him. In the end, he controlled the outcome by asking the right questions or diverting the conversation along a path that evoked the response he was after.