Truth or Beard(28)

It also had something to do with their sister Ashley Winston, and Jackson acting like a fool about her in high school.

I remembered Ashley growing up, mostly because she was so darn pretty and sweet. Just the nicest girl in the history of forever. I think most people expected her to be catty because she was so pretty, but she was the opposite.

I pulled at my bottom lip with my thumb and index finger, my narrowed eyes seeing nothing of the colorful foliage umbrellas framing the mountain road. Fall color was out in full force and would be for the next few weeks, assuming we didn’t get any unseasonal snow.

I’d be lying if I said the Smoky Mountain landscape wasn’t a big draw and factor in my decision to return home after college. The other two main contributing factors were my family and the student loan deferment plan for STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) teachers who taught in underserved areas. Living at home helped me save money and pay off my student loans. And I was the only high school calculus teacher outside Knoxville for fifty miles in every direction.

My predecessor, Mr. Tranten, had taught math as high as Algebra II. This was the first year high achieving math students in our area and the surrounding valleys weren’t bussed off to Knoxville for trigonometry and calculus.

But ever since I was a little girl I’d dreamt of seeing the world, experiencing it, and not as a tourist. I wanted to be a world traveler. I’d craved freedom and adventure. Being home now felt like preparing for launch. I’d been savoring the time with my family, storing memories, because—if all my painstaking planning came to fruition—I wouldn’t be seeing them much in the coming years.

“We’re here.”

Claire’s pronouncement pulled me from my thoughts. I stared out the windshield as she placed her car into park and turned off the ignition, glaring at the open garage of the auto shop. I saw a pair of boots sticking out from underneath the car and my heart kept asking my head, What if that’s Duane? My head kept putting my heart off, saying, We’ll cross that circumcised penis when we get to it…

“Are you going to get out of the car?”

I shook my head. “I haven’t decided yet.”

Claire sighed. “The sooner you get this sorted, the sooner we can go back to my place and drink wine.”

“Well, that settles it,” I said distractedly, still not moving.

She paused, likely waiting for me to do something; I could feel her eyes on me. “Jess, what are you stalling for? What are you afraid of?”

Just as the words left her mouth, two redheaded and bearded male specimens of mighty fineness sauntered out of the garage. The boots under the car were a decoy, likely Cletus. My breath caught and I held it, my eyes widening behind my sunglasses.

The twins were both dressed in sky-blue coveralls and black work boots, with a white undershirt peeking out at the collar. Claire had been wrong last Friday; their hair was approximately the same length and so were their beards. Even the grease stains on their hands and clothes seemed identical. I forgave myself a little for my mix up on Halloween.

They looked exactly the same and I hadn’t seen either of them for going on three years.

Regardless, now I knew immediately which of the two was Duane. If I’d given myself a moment at the community center, I would have been able to figure it out. Duane carried himself differently than Beau, he always had; how he stood, where he looked, and the line of his mouth was in stark contrast to his sociable brother.

Beau swaggered even as he stood still, glanced around at his surroundings, his brow untroubled, and his smile was easy.

Duane held himself straight and aloof, his eyes never leaving his brother’s, as though Duane only ever focused on one thing at a time. His slight squint made him appear deep in thought as Beau chatted cheerfully. Duane’s smile was almost reluctant. I’d noticed the reluctant smile on Friday, too. His smiles were reserved, secretive, like he rationed them.

I glanced between the two brothers and didn’t have to wait long to figure out whether the mystical Beau voodoo spell had truly been broken.

It had.

I looked at Beau now and felt a placid warm fondness. He really was such a nice guy.

Another sign of Beau’s diminished power: I looked at Duane and felt powerfully and irrationally irritated, flustered, and insecure. These weren’t unusual reactions to his proximity; however, each swelled inside me with a sudden surprising fierceness, and were paired with something new—abrupt and intense longing.

Duane hadn’t made any attempt at contact over the last five days. Of course neither had I. After his admission at the lake, we’d walked back to the bonfire in strained silence, my hand in his. Releasing me as we approached, he’d disappeared after depositing me with Cletus, telling his brother to take me home. He’d walked out of the ring of light provided by the fire and that was the last time I’d seen him…if you didn’t count all the odd dreams I’d been having about him since.