Page 100 of Bossman

That…led to another swig.

Maybe two.

Since my eyes were apparently unable to see anything else, I shut them, letting my head loll back on the top of the couch. An image of Reese filled the darkness. She looked so beautiful beneath me, smiling with her big blue irises. So I opened my eyes again and took another gulp from my bottle while staring at the guitar.

As I swallowed, my lids drifted closed again. Reese bending over my desk, looking back at me while she bit her lip nervously and waited for me to take her.

Another swig.

Eventually, I must have passed out. Because I woke to daylight streaming in the window and the sound of my doorbell being pressed over and over again.

The only thing that could have been worse than the two women I found standing on the other side of the door at six a.m. was if my mother had also been with them.

I hesitated, and my sister Anna yelled. “I saw you look through the top of the door, jackass! Open up.”

Groaning, I begrudgingly unlocked the door. I attempted to impede their entry after I opened it, but the two of them walked right past me.

“Come on in,” I grumbled sarcastically.

Sam’s hands were on her hips. Anna handed me a giant cup of coffee.

“Here. You’re going to need this.”

“Can we do this later in the day?”

“We didn’t want to chance you being drunk.” Anna leaned in, took a sniff of me, and scrunched up her nose. Waving her hand in front of her face, she said, “Are you still drunk from last night?”

I shook my head, walked back to the living room, and slouched into my couch. My head was pounding, and the last thing I needed to hear was whatever these two had come to say.

They followed me. It was a mistake to sit in the middle. At least if I’d sat near one armrest, I couldn’t be the middle of an estrogen sandwich.

Sam started in first. “This crap needs to stop.”

“You’re fired.”

“You’d have to be a boss to fire me. Right now you’re acting more like a little boy.”

“Screw you, Sam.”

“Screw you, too.”

Anna joined in. “We gave you two weeks. That’s all you’re getting.”

“How are you going to stop me from taking more time off if I want?”

Sam crossed her arms. “We’ve made a schedule.”

“For what?”

“To babysit you. Until you come back to work and rejoin the land of the living, one of us will be following you around.”

“I need Motrin.” I stood and walked into the kitchen. To my surprise, my shadows didn’t follow. Since the kitchen was empty and didn’t have two women in it, I drank a few glasses of water and quietly attempted to get my thoughts in order.

My peace didn’t last for long. They took seats at the table and stared at me.

Anna started the lecture. “We left things too long when Peyton died. You lost years that you can’t get back doing shit like this. We gave you two weeks to grieve your loss again, but that’s it. Time’s up.”

“I’m a grown man.”