I shake my head at the memory and can remember how sad I felt that I wouldn’t get to eat it. It was my favorite. It had little chips of chocolate and raisins that had been soaked in orange juice.
“Oh, that’s awful.”
I shrug. “It was what it was. But this man, he stood and gave those boys a dressing down that scared them to death, because they never bothered me again. And I knew right then and there that I wanted to be just like him. Become a biker and, hopefully, grow to his size. Be the kind of man who wasn’t scared of anything or anyone but chose to stick up for a kid.”
“Who was the biker?”
“It was Grudge’s father. His road name was Hammer. He asked me who my folks were, and I told him who my mom was and where I lived. I told him my dad had left two months earlier, a year after Mom’s accident that left her paralyzed and reliant on a wheelchair. Told him how money was tight and how Mom was doing her best to feed us. The following weekend, he showed up with some other guys from the club. They did some yard work and other jobs on the outside of the property. They put a ramp in, which we’d never been able to afford. And ripped out the bathtub to install a wet room Mom could wheel in and out of. A couple of old ladies showed up with a car full of groceries. Without the club, I don’t know how we would have kept our heads above water.”
“Wow. There’s a lot to process in that story,” Wren says. “I’m sorry to hear about your mom’s accident.”
“T-boned at high speed. Dad stuck it out for the months Mom was in hospital, but I think he checked out mentally from the moment he saw her on that hospital bed. But Willa, Mom, and I figured it out. My grandpa was still alive back then. Took a community, though, to keep us whole and together.”
Wren is thoughtful, for a moment. “That’s an impressive endorsement for joining a motorcycle club.”
I shrug. “We’re a bit different than the New Jersey guys. Hung out with them plenty at Sturgis. They’re close knit. Tight. I guess we’re all still a bit…”
“Uptight?” Wren offers.
I raise an eyebrow. “No.”
“Insular?”
I don’t drop my eyebrow.
“Typically closed-off guys.”
I huff. “Thought you would have been the first to avoid gender stereotyping.”
Wren laughs at that, and I’m taken again by just how cute they look when they smile. “Relax, big guy. I get stereotyped and misgendered and deadnamed about a billion times a year. You can take the generalization of being a closed-off guy.”
I grab the celery from its packet. “When you put it like that, it’s fair. I don’t know what it is that stops us quite coming together like they do. Was King mad about the money going missing?”
I start chopping, trying to hide the fact I’m holding my breath, nervous about the answer.
“Not really. I mean, he’s pissed it happened, but he didn’t seem to blame the club, from what I could tell. I think he’s also got bigger things on his mind. Personal things. His wife, Rae, is having a hard time with her pregnancy. Has this thing where she throws up all the way through it. She’s taking it in stride, but King? I swear to God, that man would burn down the world forher. He even paid for a consult with the same doctor who treated the future queen of England.”
I take the chicken out of the pot and throw in the celery, carrots, and onions to let them simmer down. “Willa, my sister, threw up a lot with the twins. Her ex-husband never even brought her a glass of water. Let that be a lesson in picking the right husband. Partner. Whatever.”
While the veggies simmer, I open a bottle of wine. White. I don’t drink it, but I messaged Ember, who runs a bar, to ask her what wine would work best with my mom’s chicken and dumplings recipe.
“You want a glass?”
Wren toggles quickly between screens, the colors reflected onto their skin and hoodie as they change.
“What?” Wren asks, looking up suddenly.
I offer them the glass. “Wine. Would you like some?”
“Oh. Yes, please.”
I try not to pay too much attention to how their lips part around the rim of the glass as they take a first sip. When Wren’s eyes meet mine again, I’m glad to see some of the tension I noticed in them earlier is ebbing away.
“How did you get your road name? Is it because you like fishing or something?” Wren asks as I grab myself a beer.
“It’s a wild story.” I move back to the counter and add the other ingredients to the pot before leaving it to simmer. When I turn around, Wren is looking at me.
“You can’t tell me it’s a wild story, and thennot tell me the wild story!”
