I look at Nick and Aaron, wondering if I should ask and shake the thought from my mind. Nick shoots me a curious glance, his brows furrowed. I motion for him to forget it and he shakes his head to signal that he won't. 'Never mind,' I mouth.
Again, he shakes his head to continue our silent argument. I nod my head, waving it off. We do this for awhile, Aaron leaving the room in his frustration. Nick narrows his eyes and mouths his special nickname for her, my head bouncing up and down to confirm his suspicion. I look around and lean forward, motioning for him to do the same. Once his face and mine are a mere couple inches away, side by side mind you, I take a deep breath. "What does she mean when she says something like 'small quirks about me that you'll soon be used to and are more amusing than worrisome'? I'm kind of afraid to know what they are," I whisper in his ear and he bursts out in a fit of laughter. "What? I don't find it funny!" I growl at him.
"Her 'smaller quirks' are harmless and happen very sporadically," he explains, his arm cradling his middle and sighs.
"How harmless?"
"Extremely. The only time you have to worry about Boog is when she blacks out, but I'm sure Deven warned you."
"Kind of, but not in great detail. She told me not to piss her off."
"All I'm gonna tell you is if she blacks out, run and hide."
"Why?"
He feels the top of his head, bowing it as he shows me a scar three inches behind his hair line. "She almost gave me a concussion when I was a teenager, she was about 12 when she did it."
"That would mean you were about..." I think aloud, one eye closed.
"Fifteen and in between tour dates in Europe, we had two or three weeks off and by the time we had gotten on stage again, it had pretty much healed up. Two years later is when I asked her out, but nothing much happened between us."
"Doog!" Mikkaila scolds him and he smirks.
"He asked a question and I answered him honestly, Boog, promise."
"Not the point! Hope hopasop topo looearopnop onop hopisop owopnop," she argues.
"It is the point, he needs to know about your boplooacopkop outopsop!" he shouts.
"I haven't had one since 2014, Nickolas!"
"After it finalized," he states.
"Yeah."
"How can I tell when one is about to happen?"
"JC, it's as simple as her whole body is tensed up and she has the 'someone is gonna die' look," Nick explains to me.
"She had them ALL the time when she was a teenager!" Aaron shouts from the kitchen.
It's now the end of April and I had spent from December until early March with her and the kids, New Year's was spent out alone together as adults. She's almost done thoroughly cleaning all three buildings while still working 47 hours a week, managing the kids and handling life in general which includes all us guys.
I pull up to her house and see a yellow VW Bug parked outside her garage, knowing her green Kia Sorento is parked in there as I wonder who could be here. I walk inside, greeted by her laughter that's obviously accompanied by another female. Who is this person? I walk downstairs and see a woman around her age helping her put up more glow in the dark items in the glow room, more black lights and lean on the doorframe. This woman has almost black hair, wide hips and a little girl and a boy near Grahm's age. The woman is thick with curves, but not too thick and has a laugh close to Mikkaila's. "I see you put the key I gave you to use," Mikkaila teases me, the other woman turning on her heel to look me over and the two children decide to dismiss me after scanning me quickly.
"Yeah. I'm J-osh," I say, correcting myself before saying my stage name and offering my hand to her friend.
"I'm Aly, one of Elise's childhood friends and it's been nearly thirty years of craziness," her friend introduces herself to me, embracing my hand with hers. She's acting kind of sketchy, maybe because she thinks I'm not worth Mikkaila's time and just trying to protect her childhood friend. I look at Mikkaila and she blushes.
"Can I talk to you, Mikkaila?" I request, slightly nodding up toward the main floor of her quaint home.
"Sure?" I follow her lead into her room, closing the door behind me and she plays the radio at a level to ensure nobody is able to eavesdrop on this conversation.
"What's wrong?"
"She's being skittish and seems sketched out by me," I observe, telling her how her friend had acted.
"She just doesn't know you yet." I sigh, feeling like it's high school all over again and drop my face into my hands. I look at her, beginning to talk with my hands.
"Mikkaila, I can tell when people don't like me and when they're being judgmental. Aly, she doesn't like me because I'm wearing the clothes I am right now. She thinks I'm nothing but absolute trouble for you based on my looks and not who I really am, the man YOU know me as and not like the paps have portrayed me as." My hands have been rapidly going in random directions as I talk, agitated as I speak my mind.
"She has been told you're NOT like that, Joshua," she growls at me, her hands angrily as she just about tears my head off.
"She doesn't seem to understand me as a person, for the man I really am, or for who I am and what I mean to you."
"She does!"
I heave a heavy sigh, frustrated over the matter and groan. "Grrrrr!"
I rush out of the room, quickly leaving her place and head for the house I bought a few months earlier. I ignored her calling after me when I I toss my keys onto the counter and drop my head onto its surface. "Why do they always stick together? Maybe birds of a feather truly do flock together." Yes, I'm thinking out loud to myself and answering my own questions. "Josh, they've known each other practically their whole lives. Maybe they talk about everything."
A few minutes of silence and then a rapping at my door, violently pulling me from my own thoughts. The door slowly opens and I hear Deven calling out my name from the front of my abode. "JC?!"
"Kitchen."
I can already tell she isn't happy with me by her voice and how she happens to be heavily walking toward me. "Elise is crying and all I could understand is that you're why!" she screams at me, stabbing me in the chest with a finger when I turn to face her.
"I can tell Aly is judgmental and doesn't like me because of the paps, she won't even give me the chance to prove that I'm not that way."
"She is the type of person to sort of jump the gun sometimes."
"Just sometimes?"
"Ehhh, okay, a lot of the time," Deven confesses slowly.
"She looked me over and immediately brushed me off, labeling me just like the paps have ALWAYS done. I know I'm far from perfect, but I try to be a good guy. I know I fuck up sometimes, yet somehow I tend to fix it."
"JC," she laughs, "I've seen you calm her down when she was pissed, you've made her the happiest I've seen her be in 10 years. No one else has ever accomplished that since I've been around, but I've done my share of dabbling in the divorce and fucked up so much between her and Percy. I've also managed to save the friendship I nearly destroyed because I'd seen what I was doing wrong."
"Whoa! Back up. YOU fucked up things between her and Percy during their divorce? How the fuck did you manage that? How did you nearly destroy the friendship you two share? How did you realize you almost lost one of the best friends you could 'ever ask for' as you put it?"
"I would run my mouth and they'd fight and Aly made me realize it, made me back off to look at everything in a different light because she did the same, but stopped before the first court date because she always picked a side and then would flip flop. Elise always tried to treat us good, but she does have her days where she doesn't and Percy, don't EVEN GET ME STARTED ON HIS LOSER ASS! Don't get me wrong, Elise ALWAYS pushed me to follow my heart and believed in me. She always pushed me to better myself, always wanted me to succeed and always cheered me on every way possible. She never turned her back when I spent months doing nothing but that to her when she needed me most."
"Name a few times," I demand.
"When she found out Leilani might be epileptic, which she is. When she found out about the hole in her mom's heart. When she found out her and two of the kids have the same thing. When she found out that she needed surgery a year ago and decided against it until a month ago, choosing to have it done after the guys come to stay here."
"She has a hole in her heart?" I repeat, feeling horribly for how I'd acted.
"Yes. Her surgery is scheduled for Wednesday and is using her vacation time for it."
I push my hand through my hair and sigh. "I feel like shit now. Is that why Aly is there?"
Deven slowly nods her head. "Aly is only there until the kids all get home and will be taking them until next weekend, considering she goes for surgery in a couple days."
"It's in two days and I didn't deserve to know?"
"She didn't want to worry you, she knows you'd worry yourself sick about her."
"Who's her proxy?" I demand.
"I am."
