Are You Mad at Me?

Road Trip!

Veneer didn't bring up the conversation while they ate. Everyone was pretty excited for their big reunion concert. Veneer listened but didn't really add anything until Poppy asked him if he was excited. He swallowed the mouthful of cereal he was chewing, "Yea, can't wait!"

After breakfast, Veneer left to get dressed. He still hadn't completely gotten used to overalls, but they weren't that hard to put on. Pulling on his shoes and grabbing his 'special bag', a hand sewn denim satchel with a few valued things in them that he never left without, he met the others at the door.

About an hour down the road, Veneer could feel his eyelids getting heavy. He yawned and got more comfortable. John smirked from where he was in Veneer's front pocket, "Sleepy?" Before he could answer, he was asleep. He never traveled very well, even as a kid. Within the first hour, he was usually asleep.

A long time later, Veneer slowly began to wake up. He refocused for a moment; everything was pretty quiet. Bruce was taking a turn driving and looked into the rearview mirror when he heard Veneer yawning, "Well, look who decided to come back to life." Veneer rubbed his eyes, "Hi, Bruce. How long have I been asleep?"

"About three hours. I almost thought you were going to sleep the whole drive away. I still can't believe you slept through that near accident Tiny had."

"What?"

"Exactly. We had to get him to a rest stop before he messed up the whole bus. We even checked on you to make sure you didn't get too comfortable." Setting aside the idea that they thought he would pee himself, Veneer gave Tiny a puzzled look, "Why didn't you go before we left?"

"That's what I asked him." Branch added. Tiny looked at them like they were crazy, "I didn't have to then."

They conversed a while longer, but John, who'd gotten the silent permission of the other brothers, began humming softly but loud enough that only Veneer heard it, making his wakeup a bit fake. Veneer was soon back asleep.