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Though six-foot-two, Golden still needs to lift on his tiptoes to see me better. “You look healthy enough. It wouldn’t hurt you to get a haircut.”
Roughly mussing his shoulder-length, blond hair, I glance toward where our president steps out from his back office.
Zoot is a hard man to know. He looks a lot like his brothers with his dark hair and eyes. But he isn’t charming or reasonable like Noble and Elvis. He also doesn’t hold himself with the raw, crazed energy of Aunt Fred’s brothers in the Hills Chapter.
Instead, he just seems like an asshole. Aunt Fred once compared Zoot to an awkward, irritable kid tormented by bullies. Sure, he doesn’t react to much of anything, seeming content to glare and silently rage. Eventually, though, he’ll lose his shit on the latest troublemaker and keep raging until he’s worn himself out. No one in Banta City wants to be the final straw for a man like Zoot.
“Bear, come back so we can talk,” he says in his version of a warm voice before frowning at Golden. “Alone.”
“Uh-oh, maybe you’ve got cancer or something,” Golden says and smirks at Indigo. “Zoot’s using his ‘your mom was hit by a bus’ voice.”
While Indigo shoves Golden for bringing up his dead mom, I start wondering if my own mom really did die.
Between Siobhan and Carys doing their sympathetic smiles and now Zoot trying to show humanity, something has clearly gone terribly wrong.
I soon stand in Zoot’s large office filled with a dozen chairs and one small desk long past its expiration date.
I watch him lean back in the desk chair. Suddenly, he sits forward and rests his hands together like a well-meaning shrink preparing to discuss heavy topics with a small child.
“Fred was supposed to be here, but she’s running late,” Zoot explains, trying the leaning-back position again. “I guess I could tell you,” he adds, seeming awkward over using words. “Did you ever hear about Noble’s girlfriend?”
Shaking my head, I feel like the walls are closing in on me as Zoot’s dark eyes try their damnedest to be sympathetic.
“Back in the day, my brother met this wacky chick when her band played at a club we ran. He was in his early twenties. Xana was barely legal. The band cranked out awful noise. Fred insisted they were punk. To me, they sounded like little girls who never learned to play their instruments right.”
I don’t react to his words since I sense I’m about to get jumped. Zoot doesn’t help my anxiety when he studies me with an overly intense gaze before remembering he’s telling a story.
“Xana had pink hair and was always really happy. Like, she smiled all the damn time, and she was fucking nuts over Noble. They were glued together. I didn’t figure they’d last. In a way, I hoped they wouldn’t. Her sunshine personality was rubbing off on him. You know how I don’t trust people who smile too much.”
“It’s true you’ve mentioned that fact before.”
“I’m sure you heard how the Lisky brothers did that drive-by years ago, right? People occasionally mention how Noble ended up nearly dying. He was basically in a coma for months and real close to death. And that’s why I’m president, and he isn’t.”
“Yes, I have also heard that information.”
Zoot narrows his eyes at my robotic tone. Shrugging, he continues to do his best impersonation of a casual person.
“Well, what people don’t really talk about is how when those assholes started shooting at us, one of their bullets went straight through Xana’s heart. She was smiling and staring at Noble like he was the best thing ever. Then, she was just gone. I never saw someone die like that. Fast, I mean.”
“That’s sad about her dying,” I mumble, sick of waiting for him to drop the hammer on me.
“After Noble woke up and realized Xana was gone, he wasn’t good for a long time. Do you know Sick Ricky from the Hills Chapter?” he asks, and I nod since I’ve obviously met everyone in the other chapters. “So, he told Noble not to worry because it was all about timing. Xana was the right woman for that right time, but another woman would come along down the road when the timing was right again.”
Since I don’t know if I’m supposed to agree with Sick Ricky, I only nod.
“Timing is everything,” Zoot says as his voice gets that far-off sound to it. “If Xana had gone inside just a minute earlier, she’d be alive. I don’t know whether her hair would still be pink, or she’d smile so much, but they’d probably be together. But the timing wasn’t right, you know?”
“Sure.”
“And that’s what you’ve got to understand,” he says, leaning forward and wearing a concerned, slightly constipated expression. “How timing is everything.”
“Am I dying?” I ask as I hear Aunt Fred’s voice from the other side of the office door.
Zoot doesn’t answer as his sister-in-law enters. She offers a tender smile, likely sensing he didn’t have the balls to tell me.
“I was saying how timing is everything,” Zoot explains.
Smiling at his words, Aunt Fred nods. Her thick mane of brown-and-gray curls bounces from the movement. Her blue eyes glow with warmth. I always feel safer when she’s around.
