This is book 2 of the A Rose by Any Other Name series.
It's been months since Derrick and Mike broke up, but, Derrick is still heartbroken. He needs to focus on rebuilding his life but it's hard when the magic federation is harassing him to join th...
Writer's Note— You guys deserve a chapter solely dedicated to the cast of this story since I have a lot of characters. It will take me some time to come up with that since I can be picky with people. If anyone has any suggestions for people who match how they envision any characters I am very much open to that.
Chapter song —Push on For the Dawn -Corinne Bailey Rae
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"Hodgins can I ask you something?" Roe asked me between tentative slurps of her ice cream. There was vanilla ice cream on her nose and her chin but that didn't make her look any less serious.
The three of us had gone to an ice cream parlour in the neighbourhood and I had an ice cream sandwich while Roe attacked her double vanilla scoop waffle cone with 'all the sprinkles.'
"Anything, kid." I replied to her question, wondering how she managed to get so messy, so fast.
Margaret got up to go to the bathroom, leaving the two of us alone. Roe seemed more nervous than I'd ever seen her, chewing on her lip, and staring hard at her ice cream. She took a deep breath before finally speaking, raising her blue eyes to mine.
"What happened to your boyfriend?" And then Roe went back at her ice cream again, not at all acting like she asked me an emotionally difficult question.
I shifted uncomfortably in my seat, pretending I hadn't heard her. My ice cream sandwich felt like a cool, unsatisfying glob in my mouth. Even as I neared a brain freeze, I ate it quickly, wanting to experience anything other than thinking about what had happened between me and Mike.
A couple more noisy slurps passed and Roe looked up at me. "Hodgins?"
I shrugged. "I don't know what to tell you, Roe. We just broke up. It— It be like that sometimes." Every time someone asked me about what happened it was like a sealed wound was reopened yet again, pain refreshed anew.
"It be like that sometimes?" Roe quirked her head at me like I was speaking another language.
"Yeah." I said. "It's like a saying. You know how hakuna matata is 'it means no worries, for the rest of your days.' Well, this is like that...sort of. Like, sometimes things happen."
"Oh." Roe said and then Margaret came back to the table.
Roe launched into a tale about spongebob, and her mother nodded along but I was distracted. I kept thinking of Mike, and Ricky and magic and about how lonely I was.
"Derrick, are you okay?" Roe said quietly. She put her tiny, sticky hand on top of mine. It felt like a gesture far beyond the years of a child.
"Yeah," I lied awkwardly, wishing I could focus on the good instead of the bad. "It just be like that sometimes."
#
It had been more than a shock to me that Roe's divorced parents were next door neighbours. Roe's mom had the A portion of the duplex and Roe's dad had the B portion. In fact, once we arrived at Roe's houses I saw Darren and Tommy sitting on their porch swing looking all snuggled up together.
اوووه! هذه الصورة لا تتبع إرشادات المحتوى الخاصة بنا. لمتابعة النشر، يرجى إزالتها أو تحميل صورة أخرى.
