Let the chips fall where they may.
I found a spot down the block from the duplex Ivy shared with her brother. I went up to the door and hit the bell, then tucked my hands in the pockets of my trousers. My palms were actually damp.
Was this what it was like to meet the parents, so to speak? I hadn’t done it since Darla. It wasn’t an experience I was looking to repeat.
Yet if Ivy wasn’t with someone new—and didn’t want to maim me with her ice cream scoop—I would be doing it again with her actual parents at some point. She also had another brother.
Bloody big families. Another reason I wasn’t cut out for the coupled up way of life.
Almost on cue, Ian’s singsongy voice echoed in my head.
Anthony says what you focus on determines your results. Focus on what you love about your family. When bad thoughts creep in, smack your wrist to break the chain of negativity.
The asshole had actually said that to me in a text the other day. I’d wanted to kick his arse, but I’d actually found myself doing just as he suggested more than once.
If I ended up slapping myself a lot while talking to…Auggie? Was that what Ivy had called him? If I ended up slapping myself a lot while talking to him, maybe he’d think I had a twitch.
Or that I was a man in a strange land. I could use that excuse for any number of things.
The door swung open on my third ring of the bell. The guy was tall and well-built, the sort of fellow who wore T-shirts that nearly ripped at the seams from his flexed muscles. And in my case, the expansion of his chest as he stared me down.
“It’s you?”
I didn’t know how to answer that question. I looked over my shoulder. No one else on the porch. Just me.
I took off my mirrored sunglasses as I attempted a smile. “Hello…Auggie.” Sweat trickled down my temple and I rubbed it away. “I’m Rory. Is your sister around?”
“Auggie?” He smirked. “No, she isn’t. Can’t you use her name? Do you even know it?”
He stomped down the hallway, leaving the door open for me to follow. Probably hoping I would so he could spring out and strangle me.
Carefully, I walked into their living room and sat on the first piece of furniture that would hold me.
Auggie—not a fitting name, by the way—pushed a hand through his shaggy hair. It was cut short in back, longer in front, but from the way he was plowing through it, he might be bald soon.
“I’m guessing you’d prefer if I didn’t call you Auggie. So, August, is it?”
“I don’t give two shits what you call me. What’s important is what you call my sister.” He turned and crossed his arms over his bullish chest. “What’s your story?”
“Story?”
“Yes. Do you have a job? A dozen other children in other states? A record?”
“My own? No, not yet, although I’ve considered doing one as Carlos did, bringing in a variety of guest singers while I play the guitar. Of course I’d bring in other musicians too. I know my way around an acoustic, but I also know some very talented—” I broke off at August’s hard stare. “I’m guessing you didn’t mean that kind of record.”
“What are you blathering about?”
“She didn’t tell you about me?” It hurt more than I would have expected, although how could I expect her to tell everyone about us when I’d done little more than breeze in and out of her life?
I hadn’t earned my spot. I was just an occasional visitor in her world.
“What she told me could fit on the head of a pin. You play guitar? You realize that’s not exactly a stable job when it comes to having a woman and a family.”
I cleared my throat. How best to say this without sounding like a douche? “I do okay, no worries there. Not that Ivy and I have made it to the family stage yet.”
August narrowed his eyes. “You got a problem with stepping up and being a man?”
I took a quick glance between my spread legs. “Best as I can tell, I am one, mate, so if you have a problem with me, maybe you should just spell it out.”