Page 36 of Good For Me

River

About Three Months Later

“You doing okay?”

I look up from the bottle of beer I’ve been staring at to see my brother, Fox, has taken the seat at my side. “You’re all zoned out, man.”

“Yeah,” I tell him, trying yet again to shake off my funk. I manage a grin. “Tired. Maybe I’m getting old.”

He holds my gaze for a second too long, just enough for me to know he’s worried. Great.

I’ve been getting that a lot lately. Apparently, I’m pretty shit at making my family believe I’m doing better than I feel.

But tonight is most definitely not the time to dwell on that. “He looks like he’s having a good time,” I say, jerking my chin out to the dance floor where our cousin Will is wrapped around his fiancée, Eva.

Fox nods. “Wyatt planned a good party.”

Wyatt planned anepicparty. I might have given him a hard time about the lack of strippers at his brother’s bachelor party, but we both know the day he planned was perfect for Will.

We started this afternoon with a huge group of guys—Will’s friends, some co-workers from his tattoo shop, and all the males in the family, including our dads. Our first stop was a kick-ass adult arcade where we ate a shit-ton of fried food while playing pool, foosball, and video games before racing each other on the go-cart track. The venue was all ages, so Will got to hang out with his brother, Silas, and the younger cousins before we moved on to the over twenty-one portion of the evening. We hit a steak house for dinner, then a cigar bar, before we started club hopping. Finally, we met up with the girls here at Ruby’s bar—which she shut down early so we could use the entire patio.

All the musicians in the group—in other words, basically everyone—have been taking turns up on the stage for the last few hours while everyone else either dances, gets progressively drunker, or both.

It’s been a great day. I’ve got to spend hours with all of my favorite people. We’ve had good food and there’s been excellent music and my cousin is about as happy as I’ve ever seen him.

And no matter how hard I try, I can’t fucking enjoy it.

I’m in a rut. There’s no other way to put it. I’ve been a grumpy asshole for approximately the last three months. Work sucks. I haven’t felt like going out. The only time I really feel okay is when I’m out on my surfboard, alone on the water.

“Dude,” Fox says in a low voice, and I startle from my maudlin thoughts yet again to look at my brother. He’s watching me with a concerned, slightly freaked out look on his face. “Do you have a thing for Eva?”

I nearly spill my beer all over myself. “What?”

“You’re like, staring at them. You look depressed as hell.” He leans closer. “Seriously, do you have a thing for her? Are you upset she’s marrying Will?”

“Shut the fuck up, dude,” I mutter, pushing him away. “Of course I don’t have a thing for Eva.”

The idea would make me laugh if I wasn’t in such a shitty mood. Eva’s a catch. Totally gorgeous and funny, not to mention insanely talented—her last single was just certified platinum. But I’ve never looked at her with any kind of interest. It’s been obvious from the first time I saw them together that she and Will are meant for each other.

My idiot brother raises an eyebrow. “Really? Cause you usually hit on her sister whenever Katherine’s around, and you haven’t even looked at her. Or any of the other women here.” He narrows his eyes at me as if he’s considering something. “Actually, I don’t remember the last time I’ve seen you with a chick.”

“You keeping track of my hookups, bro? That’s creepy.”

He points at my face. “There’s something going on with you. Your face is weird.”

“It’s my usual face, Fox.”

He continues to watch me with narrowed eyes, clearly not buying my denial. Luckily the best distraction appears at our table—our friend and housemate Bodhi slides into one of the empty chairs.

“What’s wrong with you?” he asks me immediately, and I groan into my beer. So much for distraction.

“His face is weird, right?” Fox asks.

“Totally weird,” Bodhi agrees.

“There’s nothing fucking wrong with my face," I snap.

“I think he has a thing for Eva,” Fox says in a loud stage whisper.