Best Friend's Ex Box Set

"Let's see, what's today?" she asked as she looked out across the fields and did the math. "Two weeks."

"Wait, your parents died two weeks ago?" I repeated trying to grasp the enormity of it all.

"Yeah, about that," she shrugged.

"How did it happen?" I asked stopping to lift the straw hat and wipe my forehead with the sleeve of my shirt. Grace had worried that the bright light would make my head feel worse, so she'd given me a spare hat from the rack by the door.

"Buggy accident," Honor said plainly. "They had to shoot Toby 'cause both his front legs were broken."

"I'm assuming Toby was a horse?" I said hoping I was right.

"Yeah," she said kicking the rock a little harder and sending it skittering out into the road. Honor followed it and kicked it back onto the shoulder where she rejoined me without saying anything more.

"You doing okay?" I asked feeling stupid for doing so, but not sure what else to say.

"What do you think?" she said looking up at me. Honor had the same blue eyes and blonde hair as her sisters, but there was a defiance in her face that none of the others seemed to have, and it made her seem tougher than the rest.

"Good point," I nodded. "Sorry for asking."

"Nah, it's fine," she said giving the rock a hard kick and watching it sail through the air landing a good distance in front of us. She looked sideways at me and asked, "What about you? Where are your parents?"

"They live in Chicago," I said, sidestepping the rest of the discussion about how I'd been disowned.

"You like it there?" she asked tugging at the neck of her dress and bending her neck to blow air down into it.

"It's a great city," I replied. "Are you hot?"

"What do you think?" she asked giving me the universal look teenagers reserve for adults who ask stupid questions.

"Yeah," I said as I looked up and saw that we were within a hundred yards of the phone booth. "You want to wait while I make this call?"

Honor simply nodded her head and kicked the rock toward a large elm tree that offered a shady respite from the summer sun. I watched her flop down on the ground. Leaning against the trunk, she began absently pulling grass blades out of the dirt before tossing them out away from her.

After a few seconds, Honor called, "You gonna make that call, English, or just stand there watching me be bored?"

"No need to be rude about it," I said irritated by her impatience. I walked over to the big, red booth and pushed on the folding door until it opened. Inside was an old AT&T push button phone with a silver face and a slot at the top for coins. As I stood staring at it, it dawned on me that I hadn't made a call on a pay phone since I was a kid and I wasn't entirely sure I remembered how to do it. I grabbed the receiver and hit 0 on the keypad, waited a few seconds and an operator came on the line asking if I needed assistance. I told her I needed to place a collect call, gave her Bugsy's number, and then waited. When the call went through, I said my name and waited for Bugsy to accept the charges.

"Jesus H. Christ, Wallace!" Bugsy yelled into the phone. "Where the fuck have you been? I've been texting, calling, and emailing you since yesterday!"

"I had an accident," I said quietly and then waited for him to calm down and listen. It took a few minutes, but he finally calmed down.

"What the hell happened with the meeting?" he demanded.

"It didn't go well," I replied.

"What do you mean it didn't go well?"

"Let's just say we didn't see eye to eye on the turbine project," I said.

"Goddamn it, Adam!" Bugsy shouted into the phone. "You were supposed to sell the deal and then get your ass back here so we could start working on the logistics!"

"Yeah, well, there's been a change in the plan," I said as I grew increasingly irritated with my friend's impatience.

"Adam, we can't afford to have you dicking around in Amish country," he said as I heard his fist pound on the desk. "You have to wrap this up and get back here A-SAP! The clock is ticking and if we don't nail down this manufacturing contract, we are so incredibly screwed I don't even begin to know how to explain it."

"You think I don't know that?" I shouted into the phone. "Jesus, Wiseman! I get it! I've been part of this deal since the beginning and I know perfectly well what's at stake!"

"Chill, Wallace, chill," Bugsy said shifting into his calm controlled self. "What do we need to do to make this work? How much time do you need?"