AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“When is your mayor thingy?”
“You mean my swearing in?”
“Yeah.”
“On Wednesday night at the town meeting.”
“Are we all invited?”
“It’s a town meeting. The whole town is invited. But you don’t need to come.”
Cooper looked at him. “Of course we’re coming. It’s not every day our brother is sworn in as mayor.”
“It’s no big deal.”
“Of course it’s a big deal. Shit, man. You’re the damn mayor.”
Cabe grumbled. “He’ll still be the mayor in thirty minutes. Can you discuss it then?”
Cooper glanced at Gage and grinned, then pulled an emergency whistle out of his backpack. He carried it in case they came upon a mountain lion or a bear. They’d never had a chance to see if it would actually scare the animals away. And they all had their doubts. But right now, it appeared Cooper was glad he had it on him. He put a finger to his lips, then waited five minutes for Cabe to fall back asleep. When it appeared he had, Cooper moved closer to him and blew the whistle. Cabe jumped out of his sleeping bag with a string of curse words, then lunged at Cooper. They both went down to the ground and wrestled around for a moment. Cooper quickly overpowered Cabe and pushed him away.
Gage had remained in his bag, watching the display. “Wow guys. Real mature.”
Cooper got to his feet laughing, then held a hand out to Cabe. Cabe slapped it away and stood up without help.
“Bastard.”
Cooper continued to laugh. “Man. That was great.”
“Yeah. You just wait. I’ll get you back when you least expect it.”
“Bring it on, brother.”
Gage sat up and got out of his sleeping bag. “Did you guys bring breakfast?”
Cooper shook his head. “Not much.” He dug through his pack. “Just some banana nut muffins.” He grinned as he held them up. “You enjoy your granola bar, though.”
Gage scowled at him. “Toss me one of those.”
“Say please.”
“Screw you.”
Cooper laughed again, then tossed a muffin to Gage. “Fine. But only because it’s the day after your birthday. Welcome to thirty.”
Gage shrugged. “Feels a whole lot like twenty-nine.”
They spent another two hours at the camp, then packed up and headed back. They took their time and got back to Gage’s house two hours later. He looked at his brothers.
“Thank you for crashing my solo camping trip.”
Cooper nodded. “Anytime.”
Cabe patted Gage’s shoulder. “We’ll always have your back, brother.”
They continued on to Cooper’s, and Gage went inside his house. He dropped his pack by the door and headed for the bedroom. He needed a shower. Then maybe he’d go talk to Sydney. She deserved some answers.
Halfway through his shower, he remembered where the thing he was looking for yesterday morning was. He finished his shower, then wrapped a towel around his waist and went into the bedroom. After opening the top drawer of his dresser, he dug under a stack of neatly rolled socks in pairs with one black and one gray. He found what he was looking for and took it out. He looked at the baseball card. It was from some obscure player who never amounted to anything. But he and Seth had thought the guy was cool because he came from Oregon. Gage had given it to Seth the morning of the accident for a birthday present.
