Boone
I’ve been home two months now, and every day feels like I’m getting further behind than ahead.
I can’t do it all. The house, the fields, my dad. They all need one hundred percent of my attention, but I don’t have three hundred percent to give.
Staring at the yellow legal pad in front of me isn’t helping move things along, but the words just aren’t coming together the way I want them to. I keep getting distracted by my too-young waitress with the cool gray eyes and round, curvy body.
My cock is not happy that I’ve been out of prison for two months and haven’t gotten it wet yet. I keep telling myself that’s why I watch Madeline so close when I’m in the diner. Yeah, she’s too young for me, but she’s got the body of a woman. The kind I like. Soft and a little plump. She won’t break under the weight of a big man. And she’d give him something to hold onto.
She’s working through the tables, warming up coffee. Occasionally knocking things over or spilling things. It always makes me smile, though I’m smart enough not to let her see me doing it.
She’s all wrong for me. But Jesus, those tits. I can hardly think about anything else sometimes.
“Whatcha working on there, Boone?” she asks when she gets to me.
The Big Mac’s Diner T-shirt she’s wearing is tight. She’s got an apron on over it, but the view of side-boob I’m getting is making me hard. I really need to get laid. Soon. I wish I knew why I didn’t go get some. I’ve seen the way women look at me. I could spend an evening in a bar and go home with one. I should. I could use a little softness in my life as much as my dick could use some pussy.
But that’s not me. Not even the new me.
I was ready to marry my high school girlfriend before I was arrested. I never cheated, never wanted to. I don’t want random sex—well, some of me does—and I’m not going to meet my future wife in a bar hook-up.
I flip the pad over so Madeline can’t read it, so she shrugs and tops off my coffee. “Farm stuff,” I explain.
“Top secret farm stuff?”
“Something like that.”
I’ve come in to Big Mac’s a few times a week, trying like hell to get used to people again. And to earn a smile or two from Madeline. They aren’t easy to get. Not since I called her Mad Maddy that day. But I can’t let it go. I need to get right with her, so I keep trying.
She was the first one in town to treat me normal, and I really screwed it up. I won’t screw it up more by acting on my attraction to her. She deserves a chance at getting out of this town, not getting stuck here with someone even more notorious than her old man.
“Madeline, how’s school going? You pass that test you were so worried about last week?”
There it is. That shy ghost of a smile. It’s worth drinking the shitty coffee for. “I did.”
“Never doubted you would. You’re smart.”
“Yeah, my brains have gotten me pretty far,” she says, gesturing to the diner. “My maid is cleaning my mansion as we speak.”
“Madeliiiine,” Big Mac bellows from the kitchen.
“What is his problem with you?” I ask when she flinches at his voice. I don’t like that. She’s a good person. I feel like she’s had a rough enough life without some asshole yelling at her all the time. “Big Mac needs to talk to you with more respect.”
“I screw up a lot.”
“Maybe you should try to get a different job. There are other restaurants in town.”
She shakes her head. “I can’t afford to go to school and pay rent somewhere. I work for room and board.”
I clench my fist so hard that the pencil in my hand snaps. “They don’t pay you?” Despite all that has happened to me, I have a strong sense of justice. Hell, maybe it’s because of what happened to me.
Her eyes get big, and she picks up the half pencil that rolled onto the floor. “I get tips. Sometimes.”
“That’s not even legal.” Big Mac is a hefty guy, but I can take him. I’ve taken bigger men out. Not something I guess I should be proud of, but if Madeline needs me for my muscle, I’m hers. “That’s ridiculous that you don’t earn a wage.”
I’m so angry. If I could have one thing go my way, I’d use it to make sure she had a better life. She deserves more. I know we hardly know each other, but she brings out protective urges in me. Makes me feel like the kind of man I used to think I was.
“They’re like family...sort of.” She grimaces. “They were my last foster family just before I turned eighteen. They could have just tossed me out. But they let me rent a room above the garage in exchange for working here.”
Shit. That’s right. Her old man is dead. Though I can’t say anyone probably mourned him. Maybe she does. I remember her dad. He was a vicious motherfucker, always condemning people to hell. It’s hard to believe that little girl always at his side was my Madeline. I don’t think she ever spoke to anybody back then. Just stood there mute and wearing a long pioneer dress next to her father. Her hair was always a nest of tangles, and her eyes too sunken for her face. It will always haunt me that I didn’t try to help that little girl. Especially now that I know her. And like her. “How old were you when your dad died?”
“Fifteen.” Oh, man. Alone so young.
“And you went into foster care.”
“Look, this isn’t really the conversation I want to have with my customer while I’m working.”
“Maybe we’re friends then.”
She turns those gray eyes on me. There’s no trust in them. “Right. Okay, friend. What are you hiding on that pad of paper then?”
“It’s not important.”
Her eyes go cold. “Sure thing. Friend.”
“Madeline...”
“Boone, it’s okay. But don’t pretend we’re buddies, okay? I’ll respect your privacy and you respect mine. We just stick to things like the weather and if you want an English muffin or wheat toast.”
Fuck. I should let it go. She’s right, and the last thing I need is to get more obsessed with her anyway. I don’t need to know more about her life. I don’t need to get to know her better. What I should be concentrating on is getting my life back on track. And that means the house, the fields, and Pops. Not my curvy waitress.
Even as I am thinking all this, I flip the pad back over. “It’s a Craigslist ad.”
“You hiring on the farm?”
My dick is saying, “hell, yeah,” at the thought of hiring Madeline. But no. She’s too young. Isn’t she?
“I’m looking for a wife.”
***