“Dragging me along, man. I was kind of…” Dylan cast a look at the bar behind him and then shrugged.
“Kind of what?”
“Excited. She seemed cool. We talked for a couple weeks so I was kind of invested. I was already in the parking lot when she cancelled, and I thought about just leaving, but then I saw you.” Dylan cocked his head and narrowed his blue eyes. “Do you believe things happen for a reason?”
“No.”
“Fair enough. I’ll buy you a cheeseburger and a beer.”
At that inopportune moment, Tawk’s stomach growled. He hadn’t eaten a bite of anything since Jess had fed him whatever fucked up power she’d exerted to manipulate his reality, but a cheeseburger sounded good about now.
Tawk inhaled deeply and then gestured to the entrance of the bar. “Let’s go.
“Boom,” Dylan said, clapping his hands once. “Date with a dragon.”
“I will leave right now.”
“I’m kidding, geez. Don’t get so sensitive. Let’s make pet names for each other. I’ll call you Evil Eyes, and what would you call me?”
“Shut the fuck up.”
Dylan stood there opening the door for him with a blank grin frozen onto his face. “I like it.”
Tawk ripped him away from the door and shoved him toward the parking lot before he let it swing closed and let himself in. Dylan was not holding a door for him. He shut the door firmly behind him so Dylan wouldn’t think he was holding the damn thing open for him.
“Rude,” Dylan announced as he pried the door open.
Tawk made his way directly to the bar and sat down. When Dylan tried to sit right beside him, he pointed to a seat one chair down.
“Fine,” Dylan muttered, leaving an empty seat between them.
The bartender wasn’t busy, so they ordered food and drinks, and basically had this place to themselves.
“Maybe your lady found another man because you were bringing her to a dive bar for your first date,” Tawk said.
“The bar was her idea. She’s a local girl. She said this place has the best peanuts.”
Tawk stared at him. “She based her date preferences on the quality of peanuts?”
Dylan pursed his lips. “I thought it was weird too.”
“Take the next one to a steakhouse.”
“Chhh, what next one? I’m not a big dater.”
“Why not?”
Dylan scooped a cup of peanuts out of a silver bucket beside him and slid the cup over to Tawk, then grabbed one for himself. “My life has revolved around my brother for a while. He needed some help. I was dating a lady back where we come from, butGarret got Turned into his freaking grizzly, and he had no help, no guidance. He didn’t even know what he was doing for a while, so we moved out here where he could travel out to the wilderness easily, and Change when he needed to.”
“What happened with the lady?” Why did Tawk care about any of this? This was so strange. Why was he asking questions and encouraging conversation?
“I held on for a couple weeks, but long distance isn’t my thing, and it wasn’t her thing either. We weren’t invested enough to try to make it work. It wasn’t deep enough, you know?”
A couple weeks ago, he would’ve said, ‘no,’ but now, he did understand deeply. He was having trouble even dragging himself away from Tammy.
“So, you’re ready to date again?”
Dylan busied himself by removing shells off peanuts. “Garret’s good now. He has a Crew, and he’s got Raynah, and a baby, and he’s just…solid. I’m not really needed anymore.”
