In The Woods

Chapter 19

7:00 could not come sooner enough. I ride my bike to Hangers again, but plan to meet Ash and Julia there.
When I said I can't wait to see Igor again, I didn't mean I liked him or anything! No way! He's like, 70!
I lean my bike against the wall and see that Julia's is already here. Then I reluctantly step inside.
The bartender working yesterday isn't here today. Instead there's an unfriendly looking guy. I walk up to him. "Can I please have a water?" I ask. He doesn't even look at me. Just grabs a random glass and fills it with tap water. When he hands it over, I see he put it in a shot glass. Omg....
I spot Julia sitting over in the corner. She looks scared. I walk over to her and sit by her. She lightens up when she sees me because she's not in this place alone anymore. "Hey," I say. "Did you see Igor yet?" She shakes her head but as if on cue, he walks through the door. I watch him go up to the bar and give the bartender a man hug. You know where you slap hands and embrace each other? I call those man hugs!
He sits down at the counter and orders a beer. He looks around and I am about to go up to him. "We should wait for Ashley," Julia says. So I sit back down. But Ashley never comes.
We've been waiting for an hour. Right now, it's 8:03 and Ash hasn't showed up. She's always on time. As I wonder what's taking so long, Igor sees us. Finally! He hasn't even looked up from his newspaper the whole time he's been here!
He slips off his stool and drags it over to us. "Hi," he says awkwardly. "How come you never told me you were here?"
"We were waiting for Ashley," I reply. But my phone rings. When I pull it out of my back pocket, Igor says, "WOH YOU HAVE THE IPHONE 6?!?!" ~(Yeah. I do)~
The caller ID says: Ashley. I pick up.
"Where are you? We've been waiting for an hour," I scream. "Relax! I found something on Cripson's Instagram you'll never believe! Bring Igor too," she says back in a whisper.
As we stand on Ashley's front porch, Igor looks around. "I wish I owned a house like this," he says. I feel bad again. I don't know what he did to lose his daughter and have a crap house, but it makes me pity him for the thousandth time. Ashley opens the door and looks at us. "Come in, hurry," she says excitedly.
She immediately takes out her iPad. "You said Cripson has a son right?" Ashley asks Igor. "Well, yeah. He doesn't pay any attention to him, but his name is-" "WAIT! I WANTED TO TELL THEM," Ashley yells. Oh gosh. That only means one thing. We know this person. "Okay okay," Igor says holding his hands up innocently. She clicks on Instagram. She goes to Cripson's profile and quickly covers the picture with her hands. We can only read the caption: Me and my son.
"You read that?" She asks. "Yes and?" I say. She uncovers the picture. Igor doesn't look surprised to see his nephew, but my eyes open wide and my mouth falls open. I'm shocked. My eyes trail over to the boy sitting next to Cripson.
Tall.
Huge.
Scowl on his face.
Red hair.
Cripson's son is Gingee.