My bedroom door was flung open, and Remy cheerfully bounded in and threw all the covers off of me.
“This is your big day,” he told me. “The polls open at six a.m. We need to get ready to bus people in.”
I lay back on the pillow. I hadn’t slept last night. My mind tormented me with visions of a landslide mayoral win for Meg. She would be at the victory party, Walter standing next to her. They would kiss… I could not allow that to happen. Even if I didn’t win, I wanted to at least be standing next to her. But I wasn’t sure if Meg was ever going to take me back. If she hadn’t by now, would she ever? Not to mention, my winning the mayor election would probably nuke any chance of her allowing me back in her life in any meaningful way. But if she did win, there was still the chance that she would just go ahead and settle for Walter.
Fuck.
I’ll win the election then worry about winning Meg.
“Get up!” Remy called, sticking his head back in the bedroom. “This is your big moment! I made breakfast burritos.”
* * *
After ridingwith Remy to drop my little brothers off at school, we went to our first stop to pick up residents to take to the polls.
“Shouldn’t we have brought food?” I asked Remy as the school bus trundled down the country road. “Why didn’t Karen provide any catering?”
“I told her not to bother. The folks at good old Shady Hills Retirement Community don’t like eating food off schedule,” he explained, turning down a long drive. “It gives them the runs.”
“Holy smokes.”
“You didn’t think you’d be giving rides to good-looking twentysomethings, did you?” Remy grinned at me. “We are serving the neediest. And these people cannot drive because the state took away their driver’s licenses on account of all the mailboxes and flower beds they were destroying.”
There was a line waiting for the bus when we pulled up in front of the three-story building.
“I’ll lower the wheelchair lift,” Remy said cheerfully, “while you help these young ladies up the stairs.”
“Oh, you teaser!” a woman with blue hair permed within an inch of its life, large dark sunglasses, and a walker covered in pink said with a laugh as Remy winked at her.
I offered her my arm.
“I’m sitting next to you!” she declared as she hobbled up the steps. “I’m the president of your fan club, Hunter.”
We slowly made our way down the bus aisle as the elderly woman prattled on. “I downloaded some shirtless pictures of you off the internet, and I had my granddaughter upload it to one of those custom-pillow websites. You know, the ones in China that can print anything on a shower curtain, pillow, blanket, you name it. She didn’t want to—gave me a lot of grief—but I told her I’d disown her if she didn’t.”
“I’m flattered,” I said weakly. I helped her into a seat.
“I don’t know why Meg doesn’t just waltz right into your campaign office and bend over and give you a mouthful,” another woman said. She was tottering precariously on the top step of the bus. I grabbed her before she fell backwards.
“Can we still ride this bus if we’re not voting for you?” an ornery older woman with a cane and a shirt that read Team Meg on it asked me.
“Yes, ma’am,” I assured her. “We are here to take people to the polls, no pressure.”
“Good,” she said. “Because I’m not voting for you. The way you paraded all those hussies through town—you should have settled down with Meg like you were meant to. She’s a good, small-town girl.”
“I did try…” I began.
The old woman whacked me with her cane.
I bit down a curse.
“Youtried? I hope that’s not how you’re having sex with women; you can’t just nose around down there then pop back up with nothing accomplished and complain that you tried, and now you’re tired and giving up. If it takes an hour to get someone off, it takes an hour.”
“Now, Myra,” another older man complained as Remy secured his wheelchair in the back of the bus. “I told you my arthritis acts up this time of year.”
“Both of you,” Myra said, pointing at the older man and me, “need to try harder.”
* * *
