Page 32 of Saint
I drop my face in my hands, slumping my shoulders in deep, bodily misery.
“I’m sorry,” Jamie whispers, and he does truly sound sorry, the sweet asshole. “Sean had just called you that once at a family dinner—”
I groan. FuckingSean. Of course it would be him.
“Okay, well now I have to know,” Brother Crispin asks from the edge of the table. “What is Flamin’ Hot Aiden?”
“A better question would bewhom?” Elijah replies. I look up enough from my hands to glare at him. He smiles evilly back.
“Flamin’ Hot Aiden is no one,” I say, a little desperately. “He’s dead. He died at Rockhurst High School.”
“No, he didn’t,” Elijah corrects. “Because I believe that you got the tattoo your freshman year ofcollege.”
“Ah, so we’re back to the tattoo!” Brother Thomas crows.
“Look,” I say, trying one last time to head this off. “It’s not really an abbey appropriatestory—”
This was absolutely the wrong thing to say. Everyone perks up in unison, like meerkats on the savannah, except instead of scenting a Nat Geo photographer, they’re scenting a juicy story, which all monks love.
“Not-abbey-appropriate stories are our favorite kind, aren’t they, Brother Titus?” Brother Thomas says.
“They are indeed, Brother Thomas,” Brother Titus agrees.
“No,” I say. “It’s not—the abbot would kill me.”
Brother Amos laughs. “The abbot wants to know about your mystery tattoo just as much of the rest of us. Come on, you know you’re going to end up telling us.”
“He’s right, you know,” Elijah says to me. “You might as well have dignity in defeat.”
It’s a mistake to look over and see that smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. The things I’ve done to see that smile...
I feel the old me surge up a little. The impulsive me. The fun-time guy who made everyone laugh with his reckless, ridiculous misadventures.
“Well, I—fine.Fine. I’ll show you the tattoo. But first I want you all to know that I’m not proud of any of it, the tattoo or being Flamin’ Hot Aiden.”
“But whomst is Flamin’ Hot Aiden?” Brother Titus asks. “We need to know this person in order to understand the story. We needcontext.”
Context. Oh God.
I grab my glass and take a few quick swallows to fortify myself.
“In high school,” I start, already regretting everything about this entire night and maybe my life in general, “I liked three things. Girls, sports, and Cheetos of the Flamin’ Hot variety.”
Brother Titus leans forward, propping his chin on his hands and looking at me with giant eyes. “Go on,” he urges.
“And the sports made it easy to meet girls, especially from Sion.”
“What’s Sion?” Jamie asks.
“Sion is one of the sister schools to Rockhurst, my sweet Episcopalian,” Elijah answers, his eyes staying on me. “An all-girls school companion to the all-boys school.”
Jamie nods and then squeezes Elijah’s hand affectionately. Part of me wants to make this story as silly and rotten as possible, just to spite all his healthy, well-adjusted goodness. The other part of me wants to jump into the bushes at the edge of the beer garden and stay there until I’m a skeleton and no one expects me to tell my most embarrassing stories in front of my ex’s fiancé.
But it’s too late; I’ve already given them too much. The table is practically salivating with interest now.
“Anyway,” I go on, “after every football game, I’d eat a bag of Flamin’ Hot Cheetos. It was my thing. My happy place. But there was a party after the game, and there was a girl there, Chelsie Lynch. I could tell that things were going to end well on the making-out front that night, except...”
“Your Cheetos,” Brother Titus realizes.
