The Beautiful Truth

// 99

"You look ridiculous," Talyn told me, grinning when I climbed into his truck a few hours later.

I laughed. I imagine I did—I was wearing a tank top, cutoffs...and thick socks under my knee-high rain boots.

"Thanks! So do you," I replied, grinning right back.

Talyn had on a similar get-up—old Pontiac football shirt, ratty Abercrombie camo cargo shorts and his own lace-up rain boots...although untied.

The power was still out around most of the county, so obviously there was nothing better, or even more logical to do than...party. And, appropriately, all the teenagers, twenty-somethings, and probably a few outliers had decided, since no real damage was caused by the storm, to go out and see where it had touched down. And play in the mud.

With more than half a case of beer left from our last trip to Airport Road, and the promise of Mandrino moonshine upon our arrival, we headed out. Apparently Jason had gotten back just before the storm, and now with no electricity had, with the help of a few high school friends, rallied the troops. It had just gotten dark, but it was already 85 degrees and humid as hell again. This afternoon's storm probably wasn't the last of them.

My phone was charging on Talyn's console when it rang. I reached for it and smiled widely.

"Micki!" I exclaimed, happy to hear from her.

"Hey gorgeous!" she greeted me. "How are you? I just saw on the news that a bunch of storms went through earlier, is everything OK?"

How sweet was she? "Yeah, everything's fine—I mean, we don't have electricity at the moment, but—"

"You had electricity before the storm?"

"Yeah, and indoor plumbing too!" I added sarcastically, recognizing where she was going. "Which you would know if you'd ever been here, oh wait. You totally have."

"Yeah, yeah," she laughed as I put her on speaker phone. "So what are the young, beautiful, and powerless of Pontiac doing tonight?"

Talyn laughed. "God Micki, Sawyer's rubbing off on you."

"Hey, Talyn!"

I laughed, rolling my eyes. "We're going out to see where the tornado touched down...and get drunk while we play in the mud. How's that for redneck?"

"I love it," Micki admitted. "Send pictures."

I smiled. "Of course."

"How's Palm Springs?" Talyn asked.

"It's good," she said without hesitation. "I miss Berkeley, but you know. This place is good for me...it's just so hot."

I laughed. "I'd take dry desert heat over this trans-storm front mugginess any day. My hair is a disaster."

"Yeah, mine too," Talyn mocked me.

"Yeah, but you were just basically unattractive to begin with," Micki teased him.

I laughed again. "So how was your class? Didn't you start today?"

"What class?" Talyn asked.

"Um, it's a drawing class over at the local community college. They thought it would be good for me to do some outside, non-athletic activity, and I used to be really into art when I was little, so..."

"That's great!" Talyn encouraged her sincerely. "Today was the first class? How was it?"

I stared at him quizzically. He'd totally usurped my phone call, but I kind of didn't mind.

"It was fun," she said, audibly smiling. "Just drawing and shading a bunch of shapes, nothing to get excited about yet, but it was good to focus on something besides nutrition and group therapy."

Talyn smiled. "Well, a few more weeks and you'll be drawing naked fat men, so you've got that to look forward to."

"Great," Micki laughed, despite herself. "Well, you two have fun, I've gotta get going. I just wanted to make sure you were OK."

"We're fine," I assured her. "Thanks for callin' Micki, I really miss you."

"I know," she cheered. "Talk to you tomorrow!"

Talyn and I told her goodnight and continued toward our usual field. When we pulled up, it was already packed. Looking around, this seemed like as big a high school reunion as our trip out over Thanksgiving.

I looked at Talyn before sliding out of his truck, hesitating with my hand on the door.

"What?" he asked, grinning widely.

What I'd wanted to say was 'kiss me' or 'if you go slow, I can do this' or...well, mostly the latter. The storm had ended, my dad came home unscathed and as nonchalant as ever, but the tension between me and my best friend was still there.

I wanted to reach out and touch him. I wanted to lean against his chest and breathe him in. I just wasn't so sure I wanted this to happen in public yet.

But instead of honesty, I took the comedic way out. "Your hair really does look like shit."

Talyn cackled. "Yeah, yeah...maybe if somebody hadn't been running her fingers through it over and over and..."

"OK, OK," I laughed nervously, feeling my cheeks go red as I let myself out, my heavy boots pulling me to the ground with a splat. "Ugh, gross."

Talyn stopped to pull a couple of beers out of the back, then sloshed around to meet me. "Where do you think Mandrino is in all this?"

I looked around, cracking open my Bud Light. "Probably over with that mob of people," I nodded toward the thickest part of the crowd about fifty yards off.

"Oh, I bet that's where it touched down," Talyn suggested.

I took a drink and shrugged. "Come on then."

"Just don't walk too fast," Talyn said, throwing his heavy left arm over my shoulder. "My shoes'll fall off."

"Brother," I groaned.

We walked to the edge of the crowd, Talyn's arm never dropped. It was different—we'd walked like this a thousand times, but this time, it was different. I wedged myself a little closer to him and kept walking.