Prince Player(154)
“Chuck works on Wall Street,” I explain.
She nods, understanding. “Tell me an embarrassing story about him from back then,” she says to Chuck.
His grin gets bigger and he looks at me. “I’ll let you choose. Deer or pie?”
I groan a little bit. “Deer,” I say. “Please, never the pie story.”
He laughs a little. “I’ll let him tell that one,” he says, looking back at Sadie.
“Now I’m interested,” she says, nudging me. “Tell me the pie story. Is it, like, an American Pie thing?”
Chuck laughs and I shake my head. “Not at all,” I answer quickly. “Chuck, just tell her the damn story.”
“Back in the day, we had a senior prank thing. Kids probably still do it,” Chuck starts out. I sip my whisky, smiling a little bit. I actually like this story. “So Gavin here gets it in his head that he’s going to have the best prank of all time.”
“Oh, no,” Sadie says, sensing where this story is going.
“Oh, yes,” Chuck says. “Gavin bought this, what was it, deer piss?”
I nod. “Deer urine.”
“Gotcha. Deer piss. It attracts deer, right? So he takes his uncle’s truck with this horse trailer on the back, fills the trailer with food and deer piss, and he leaves it there.”
“My uncle was pissed,” I say, grinning.
“Did that actually work?” she asks, astounded.
“Well,” Chuck says. “The next day, it’s senior prank time. It’s lunch, I’ll never forget this. Our cafeteria has these big doors that go outside. Well, in the middle of the lunch period, those door suddenly get thrown open and Gavin yells, ‘DEER!’.”
“I wasn’t too creative,” I say to her, shrugging.
“So he throws open the back of the trailer, and this freaking deer, scared out of its mind and flipping out, runs into the cafeteria. Kids start to freak, run away, it’s total chaos as this deer runs around, kicking and breaking shit. It was total madness.”
“I got suspended for a week,” Gavin says.
“What happened to the deer?” Sadie asks, laughing.
“Janitors caught it eventually and had animal control take it away.”
Sadie laughs, shaking her head. I grin at her, a little embarrassed, but it is a good story. Chuck mercifully left out the part about the deer kicking some poor kid in the arm and nearly breaking it. That was one of the stupidest things I’ve ever done. That poor deer was probably scarred for life, although I don’t think it was ever actually hurt.
Sadie seems to like it, at least, and the conversation quickly moves on to other memories. Chuck keeps it light and stays away from the more embarrassing tidbits. I finish my drink and Sadie finishes hers, which finally prompts me to drag Chuck away, back to the bar under the pretext of getting more drinks.
“Well?” I ask him.
He shrugs a little. “I like her.”
“So you get it then?”
His smile slowly fades. “Listen Gavin. That girl is trouble.”
I pause, a little surprised. Sadie is lovely, smart, and entertaining. She’s clearly getting along great with Chuck. As far as I can tell, the night is going perfectly.
“Why do you say that?” I ask him.
“Same reason as before. She’s charming, smart, pretty, all that,” he says quickly, “but she’s still a Tillman.”
“And that’s trouble,” I finish for him.
“That’s right. It’s trouble.” Chuck gives me a serious look, a rarity for him. “Don’t get too involved.”
“Don’t worry,” I say. “I know what I’m doing.”
“Says the guy that once released a freaking deer into a crowded cafeteria.” He sighs, shaking his head. “Do what you got to do, I guess.”
“Don’t I always?”
He grins and shrugs a little. “You sure do.”
I clap him on the back, gather my drinks from Lucy, and head back over to the booth. Chuck stays behind to close out his tab, since his part of the evening is finished.
I slide back into the booth across from Sadie. “Chuck coming back?” she asks.
“No,” I say. “I think he had enough stories.”
She pouts. “I wasn’t finished. He was just getting to the good stuff.”
“There is no good stuff, I promise you that.”
“I don’t think so,” she says, smiling a little. “You have a bad reputation.”
“That’s because you rich folk think us poor people are all bad apples.”
She smirks a little. “You’re rich folk too now, remember?”
“Hm. Guess so.” I look at her for a second and an idea hits me. “Let’s get out of here.”