Nice Buns (Cheap Thrills Series Book 7), page 29
Oh, and he’d also moved in three weeks ago, after deciding that us both owning a house was stupid and declaring mine was nicer than his.
On the down low, though, Cody had said that to him and told him it made more sense for us to live together. He then used it as an excuse as he began moving his stuff into mine.
Seeing who it was, I looked over at Sayla and waited for her to look up.
It didn’t take long.
“Shit,” she hissed, ducking her head down. “Why’s your brother here?”
Shrugging a shoulder, I tapped her on her tape covered leg. “Who knows, but at least you’ve got something pretty covering your leg and armpit hair.”
Hearing her words used against her, she scowled at me.
“Hey, baby,” Alex greeted, leaning over the couch to kiss me. “You guys doing the Duct Tape waxing challenge?”
“Yup.”
“What, you don’t say hi to your family anymore?” Roque pouted as he dropped down in one of the armchairs.
“Yeah, just not you.” Given that I winked at him, he knew I was full of shit.
“I had to go to see DB today, and I thought I’d pop by when I saw Alex leaving. Gotta say I’m glad I did.” He stared down at Sayla’s legs and smirked.
Getting up from the couch, Jacinda walked stiffly to the camera. “Okay, are you ready to shoot the next bit?”
Picking up my phone, I unlocked it and turned on the camera. “Ready to go. We can pass this down to take closeups and then mix it together.”
Hitting the button on the camera, we waited for her to get back and then launched into the explanation while Roque and Alex watched quietly.
“Sayla and Evie don’t think it’ll work, but I don’t see why not. In fact, I was so certain about it that I did my bikini line, too.”
Sayla’s head snapped in Jacinda’s direction. “You put it on your bikini line?”
“Sure did. I’ll pull it off in the bathroom, but it’s stuck firmly to the areas. Now, do we pull individually, or should we all go at the same time?”
“Let’s do it at the same time, otherwise we could be here for hours doing it,” I suggested. “Armpits or legs first?”
We all decided to do the armpits first and then the legs. As I lifted a corner of the tape, I had a sudden thought that although doing the challenges was fun, sometimes it was also a bad idea.
This being a good example of a bad idea.
See, as I’d lifted the tape, the skin had pulled up with it, and I’d gotten a taste of how painful it was going to be.
Taking in a deep breath, I waited for Jacinda to count to three.
And then I screamed my ever-loving mind off.
Sayla was still rocking slightly on the couch, and I hadn’t put my arms down since I’d torn the last strip off my armpit. We’d gone from armpit one to leg one, then leg two to armpit two. That’s when my arms had gone up in the air. My legs stung but under my arms felt like I’d rubbed acid on them.
And did it work?
I was too scared to look in case it’d taken off skin.
“At least you’re not in the same predicament as Jacinda,” Alex said gently as he rubbed my back.
That’s when both me and Sayla started laughing. Somehow, the pain had caused us to forget that she’d applied the tape to her bikini line, too.
Waddling up beside the bathroom door, we heard her yelping over the sound of the shower running.
“I don’t want to pull it off. Why won’t it just come off with water,” Jacinda wailed.
“Are you okay?” I called through the door.
“My twat’s covered in ducks that are going to rip it clean off my body,” she screamed. “What do you think?”
Squeezing in next to me, Sayla pressed her ear against the door to listen better. “That you should have gone with the camouflage tape?”
There was a thud as she threw something at the door in response.
“Was that your twat? Did the whole thing come off?”
It was mean, but it was also karma. Jacinda was usually the one in our shoes, like with the non-pain-free pain-free wax.
After five minutes of trying to wash it off, Jacinda realized there was no going back.
“Maybe try peeling it slowly in case the area’s too sensitive or delicate for it, babe,” I shouted. “You don’t want to try pouring anything like nail polish remover on it in case it burns your burger.”
There was a moment’s silence, then we heard, “Fuck it!” followed by a scream that would summon the hounds of hell itself.
In fact, it managed the impossible and woke my lazy dogs up, who started howling with Bernice the longer the scream went on.
Christmas Day….
There were people everywhere in the house.
I assumed when they’d suggested fun that it meant relaxing and maybe playing a game. Unfortunately, my boyfriend decided it was the best day to do a challenge.
“This is called the Toe of Satan,” Alex said as he laid out a lollipop in front of the three of us.
“Gross,” Sayla gagged. “Why call it the toe of anything?”
“The good news is that for today’s challenge, DB, Carter, and Raoul will be joining you.”
All three men looked at Alex like he’d lost his mind.
“Do we have to record this one?” I asked, looking at the number of phones pointed at us. “Couldn’t we just do a private challenge for once?”
I wasn’t sure how I was going to react to this lollipop, and if it was finding my inner Jacinda and screaming the house down, I didn’t want people witnessing that humiliation.
“Yup.”
“Wait,” Dave held up a hand. “What did we do wrong?”
“The poop face pillow? The hearing device—”
“That was an antique. We thought you’d appreciate us investing in something for you,” Carter argued.
The hearing device in question was indeed an antique and was used by people about a century ago to help them hear.
It was also a joke, so I wasn’t buying what Carter was trying to sell. I was also not buying this damn toe.
“Do you think Satan gets camel toes?” Jacinda whispered, staring at the lollipop. “With a toe like that, it’d have to be pretty spectacular.” Feeling us staring at her like she’d lost her mind, she rubbed her face with her hands. “Sorry, I’m nervous.”
“You have to keep the lollipop in your mouth for a full minute. If you don’t, you get to do one of the things the girls ranked as their most painful challenges of the year on their recap last week.”
I’d lived through that pain once, no way was I doing it again, so I’d be keeping this in my mouth for a minute. How bad could it really be? I’d survived some of the other chili challenges intact, and the ones I hadn’t, all it’d taken was a couple of days and three bottles of Pepto.
Unwrapping it, I stared closely. There weren’t any chili particles in, no bits that said danger. It was a clear candy that looked totally harmless.
“When I get to three, pop them in your mouths, and we’ll hit start on the timer,” Cody instructed, holding his phone up.
The way it looked was misleading. It wasn’t harmless, it was fucking evil.
Ten minutes later…
I hadn’t been able to feel my mouth, lips, or nose for almost ten minutes now, and at this point, I doubted I’d ever get the sensation back.
With my eyes streaming and yogurt pouring out of my mouth onto the grass, I tried to focus on breathing. Beside me were five other bodies, all scattered in various states of pain and taste bud decomposition.
Was my airway swollen, too?
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Alex squat down beside where I’d landed when I’d run out here with the yogurt, but I couldn’t even move my head.
“You okay, baby?”
“Doh!” I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to fit my tongue in my mouth again.
Lowering his head so he could see under my hair, Alex shot me a smile.
“While I have you here, I need you to hear me out on something.”
Was he high? The only thing I had working properly was my hearing.
“Oh, hey, Principal Teller,” I heard Cody yell and closed my eyes against the embarrassment. Of all the people in the world that I never wanted to—constantly—see me in states like this, it was him.
“Mom tried that lollipop that’s ranked nine million on the Scoville unit. It’s called the Toe of Satan.”
“I see. And here was me thinking she’d at least have a day off. Is she alive?”
“She’s breathing,” Cody assured him. “And I checked her pulse a second ago.”
Had he? Jesus Christ, I’m telling you those things were death on a stick. I hadn’t even felt him do it.
“Anyway, while I’ve got you here, I wanted to tell you something. When I moved here, I never expected to get a new neighbor who’d pull me out of the trench I’d dug for myself. I was living life, but I wasn’t living life.”
I wasn’t living anything right now. I was at death’s door.
“I’d always walk away from our encounters wondering how you managed to make every situation weird and random, but after a while, I realized I was living for those moments. They made me smile, they made me laugh, and when I least expect it, they’d pop into my mind at work, and I’d start laughing again.”
Given that my mouth was the size of a blue whale’s, I’d never laugh again.
“DB has been the center of my world for a long time, and then along came Tabby and Sheena, and now that I’ve got you and Cody, too, I get to enjoy more people being part of its center.”
A noise that sounded like a donkey braying behind me made me jump.
“That was DB agreeing,” he explained. “He’ll tell you with words once he can feel his mouth.”
The people watching us burst out laughing.
“What I want to say is—and Cody’s given me his permission—will you marry me?”
I stared numbly at the grass, willing my hand to move because there was no way my mouth would.
Finally, I managed to move it, so it was resting on its side on the grass, and gave him a thumbs up.
“Is that a yes?” he checked.
If he wanted words, he was screwed. Instead, I moved the thumb up and down, hoping he’d understand.
“She said yes,” he yelled at the crowd. “It was a thumbs up, but that’s fine by me.”
As he slipped the ring onto my finger, I heard Tabby talking to Dave behind me.
“Oh, just so you know, I’m pregnant.”
There went the farmyard animal noise again. I wasn’t sure if it was a good noise or a bad one this time, though.
Epilogue
Alex
Six years later…
“Normally it’s the Valedictorian who does the speech for students, but this year, they voted against it, and the parents supported it.
“In the letter we received when they notified us that they were requesting a student-elected speaker to do the leaving speech, they said getting the best grades didn’t always make you the best person to be the voice of the students.” Principal Teller lifted his head and smiled at the audience. “I have to say, I agree.”
As the roar of cheers, hooting and claps sounded across the auditorium, my daughter jumped in my arms and glared up at me like I was responsible for it.
“I didn’t tell them to do that.”
“Shh, Daddy, listen.”
Evie snorting next to me didn’t help either because Elora covered her mouth with her hand, scrunched her face up, and let out a high-pitched giggle.
“Having your own opinions and views on how things should go is essential, but when you fail to mix it with those of other people, that’s when we encounter issues. So, I wasn’t about to let an old tradition prevent our students from having the ceremony they’d worked so hard for.
“It also makes better sense to have a class elected speaker.” Teller turned to face the side of the stage and waved the elected speaker on. “Come and join me, please, elected speaker.”
Evie gasped loudly. “He never told us.”
Leaning to look around me, DB smirked. “He told me.”
Over the years, the fact I wasn’t part of Cody’s DNA makeup had never even occurred to me. I loved him as much as I loved DB, and watching him walk up to stand behind the podium, I felt a lump in my throat.
In fact, having Cody was what’d made us decide to adopt Elora. I’d always respected people who adopted. It was just a beautiful thing to happen because it created a family instead of having individual human beings.
Even if Neil had decided to play a better role in Cody’s life, I still wouldn’t have looked at him any differently. He hadn’t, though, and helping Cody through it, helping him grow into the young man he was today, was an absolute honor for me, and I knew that DB felt the same way. He’d become the big brother he never expected to be—twice—and he loved every second of it, regardless of the age differences.
And now that we had Elora, I could say I felt complete.
Clearing his throat, Cody tapped the cards in his hand on the podium. “I was going to read this from the cards, but I think I’ll go off script. Six years ago, I was in a place that I wouldn’t call bad, but I would say was great. I had it a lot better than a lot of kids do, though, and I owe that to my mom.”
Squinting out over the audience, he stage whispered into the microphone, “Let’s see if I can embarrass the hell out of her. Yo, Mom, go and stand up so everyone can see you.”
“I’ll kill him,” she hissed.
“Y’all probably already know her from Delicious Divas or the internet. If you don’t, she co-owns the salon in town and also has the internet’s most popular beauty and hair review site, also called Delicious Divas.” He leaned forward onto his elbows, like he had all of the time in the world.
At the side of the stage, Principal Teller started laughing, whereas the organizer of the graduation ceremony was looking exasperatedly up at the ceiling.
“If you don’t know Delicious Divas, you obviously have a hair pickle going on. All you need to do to resolve the situation is call the number on the card I’ve glued to the cool booklet they gave you when you came in. You’re welcome.”
Everyone started laughing, but beside me, Evie was sinking down in her seat with her hands over her eyes.
“Mama, up you get. Say hi,” Elora yelled at her mom, making everyone laugh harder.
“Before I give her enough to kill me with, I need to mention a change that happened and the reason my class elected me as the person to speak today. When I was eleven, a man came into my life called Alex Bell. Sorry, Detective Alex Bell.
“He gave me his time even when he was busy, he gave me his attention even when he needed to focus on something, and Alex never once made me feel like I wasn’t enough for him.”
He didn’t say it, but left unsaid were the words ‘unlike my dad.’
“And then he helped me through a health problem and never went away. He fell in love with my mom, and the rest is history.”
Elora crawled off Evie’s lap onto mine, but when I went to wrap my arms around her, she just kept on going until she got to her big brother. At four, she was way too big to be doing it, but she was absolutely ruined by all of us, especially her big brothers and her aunt.
“He’s doing well,” Walton said as he leaned between the two of us. “He stuttered and drooled through most of the rehearsals.”
“Sit back, dear.”
“I’m comfortable right here, thanks. Unless my beautiful grandbaby wants to come say hi to her grandpa?”
Sighing, she stood up on DB’s thighs, making him grunt, and then held her arms out, totally making the point that she was doing this as a favor to him.
Not that he cared, though. Nope, Walton just took Elora and sat back down again.
“Told you it’d work,” he whispered, likely to Lesley or Roque, who were sitting on either side of him.
I was transfixed by my son, though, and what he was achieving on the stage. “Then along came my big brother, and he did the same thing. DB didn’t care that Mom had a kid or anything like that, he just liked that we were all happy. Between the three of them—”
“Ahem,” Elora shouted, and because it was so quiet, Cody heard it where he was.
“Sorry, snitch. Ladies and gentlemen, allow me to amend my previous statement. Between the four of them, my grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, dogs, chickens, the people who sweep the streets—just kidding.”
Everyone burst out laughing, and I sat watching my boy open mouthed.
“He could do this as a profession,” DB murmured.
That’s what I’d been thinking.
“But because of them and the fact I have the best baby sister in the world, and an amazing lady called Mrs. Carpenter, who passed away three months ago, I’ve achieved things in my education that I didn’t think I would.
“Sometimes we don’t need to explain everything that’s going on, or that’s happened to us in vivid detail to people or on social media. Sometimes, just pointing out that people have made a difference to us is enough. So that’s what I’m doing today.
“Our journey is our story, and my journey is what started mine, thanks to my family. Sometimes, that’s all it takes to help you focus on what’s important instead of getting distracted by what isn’t. It can also be all that you need to power through things you never think you’ll get through.”
Then, turning to look at his class, he raised his fist in the air. “We’ve all supported and helped each other get to where we’re headed off to next. So let’s make it count.”
All of the students stood up and yelled, “Make it count!” back at him at the same time.
Once they’d seated themselves again, he grinned out at the parents. “I’ve had the privilege of growing up with your kids, and all I can do is thank you for creating such awesome people.”
The parents all stood up and began clapping.
