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“Yep, Grampsie is one in a million. Your lucky catch. What the fuck are you two doing here besides perving on us and getting your jollies?”
“Bringing you breakfast,” Auggie said, hefting the bag.
“And coffee,” Theo said.
“But if you’d rather us leave so you can continue, uh, exhibiting with the windows open…”
North made a gimme gesture, and Auggie’s smirk grew as he handed over the bag. Theo set the coffees on the nightstand, and then they took the only chairs in the motel room. The bag held two enormous biscuit sandwiches, a clamshell container of home fries, and a hubcap-sized cinnamon roll.
“Holy Jesus,” North said, “this is as big as your head, Strawberry Shortcake.”
The nickname only made Auggie roll his eyes, but Theo’s little frown came back. It was too easy, really.
North was cuffing the sandwich wrapper and opening his mouth when Shaw emerged from the bathroom, dripping wet and holding a washcloth in front of himself. Auggie’s eyes got huge, and then he started to laugh into his hands. Theo didn’t exactly make the sign of the cross, but he did look like a man seeking divine intercession.
“Hi, Auggie,” Shaw said brightly. “Hi, Theo!”
“Put some pants on,” North barked.
And then he realized his mistake.
Shaw’s eyes fastened onto the breakfast sandwich. “No, North! Our diet!”
“No diet,” North said and took the biggest bite his jaws were capable of. It was, admittedly, hard to swallow. And that made a voice in North’s head perk up, the one that sounded like Shaw, that sounded like all those bad blowjob jokes, the ones about how he’d chewed the head off Nick’s dick or whatever Shaw was always going on about. North powered through—there was that Shaw voice again, droning on about Nick—and managed to get the food down. The other day, at the park, Tean had been talking about geese not chewing their food, or maybe it had been ducks, and that memory came back vividly now.
“We’re on a strict diet—” Shaw said, trying to climb across the bed—and, in the process, dropping the washcloth.
North elbowed him away. “Get off the bed. And get away from my sandwich. And get some fucking clothes on so you’re not hanging dong in front of small fry; he’s strictly PG-13.”
“Oh God,” Shaw said. “Sorry, Auggie.”
“You know—” Theo began.
But Auggie squeezed his arm, laughing, and Theo grimaced and settled into his chair.
North finished the biscuit sandwich and half the coffee before he felt human again, and he entrusted Auggie with safeguarding the cinnamon roll because he knew if he left it to Shaw, the traitorous weasel would either eat it all himself or feed it to birds or summon an army of mice—God only knew, the list went on and on. He padded into the bathroom, and he chose to ignore—because he was an adult, and adults didn’t argue with children—Auggie’s final comment.
“Ok, I know you’re going to think I’m joking, but is one cheek bigger than the other?”
The shower, added to the food and caffeine, went a long way toward completing that process of turning North back into a functioning person again. When he’d finished, he checked his stomach in the mirror and decided Auggie was full of shit. It was muscle. And mass. Then he checked his ass. It was hard to tell if there was a size difference. But there wasn’t, because that wasn’t a thing that happened to people. And it was this goddamn cheapass mirror, that was all.
Towel around his waist, he returned to the bedroom just in time. Shaw had the cinnamon roll in his lap, and when North threw a look at Auggie, Auggie sank down guiltily in his seat. Head thrown back, Shaw was saying, “And then sometimes he says—well, moans, really—‘Yes, yes, Shaw, right there,’ and he’s talking about this spot—”
“What the fuck is wrong with you, bird brain?” North snapped as he snatched what remained of the cinnamon roll—less than half!—from Shaw and dropped onto the bed. “And you two, don’t you have anything better to do?”
“Aside from bringing you breakfast?” Theo asked drily.
North scratched his cheek with his middle finger and attacked the cinnamon roll.
“Actually, we do have a reason for coming over,” Auggie said.
“Wonder of wonders,” North muttered, but the sarcasm was dampened by the mouthful of bread and icing.
“So, first of all, that guy Gid?” Auggie glanced from Shaw to North. “He’s the one who chatted me up in the Cottonmouth Club a few days ago.”
For what might have been the first time in his life, North forgot about a cinnamon roll. “You’re shitting me.”
Auggie shook his head. He held out his phone, displaying a publicity photo of the Moss family, and pointed to Gid. “Gideon Moss, right? He’s the one who had you at gunpoint last night?”
