The three teens stopped eating and looked over. Immediately, Tammy’s face lit up and she climbed out of her booth. “Mrs. Woodley, how are you?”
“Doing just great. You?”
“So great, Mrs. Woodley. I love that you guys go for family breakfast—it’s so cute. God, we haven’t caught up in forever.”
Brandon looked at his plate.
His mother reached out of the booth and pulled Tammy into an amiable side-hug. “I don’t think we’ve really caught up since I was your sitter. You’ve grown so much. How’s the ranch?”
“You know, lots of cows.” Tammy clearly had no idea how her own ranch worked. And she didn’t have to yet. Her mother still ran the ranch—Tammy had a whole lifetime to learn. She turned around and motioned for Alejo and Frank to join her. “You guys know these two, right?”
Alejo joined them with one of those smiles that went all the way up to his eyes, and Brandon’s heart sank. Alejo turned to Brandon’s father. “I haven’t met you, Mr. Woodley, but you taught my brother algebra. I love the boat shop.”
“And it loves your business,” Brandon’s father mused. He sat a little taller in his seat, reaching out to give Alejo a firm handshake. There weren’t many people who still visited Woodley Fish and Boating. It was one of several things Brandon’s parents planned to sell before they left this town behind. “You all go to school with Brandon?”
Tammy, Alejo, and Frank all turned their eyes on Brandon, and he wanted to fall through the floor. He took a deep breath, fixed his glasses, and extended his hand to Tammy to shake. Which was stupid, because he already knew her and this wasn’t an introduction.
Tammy turned to his parents, button nose wrinkled up in a silent laugh. “Yeah, we know Brandon. He’s so funny.”
“Hey, man,” Frank Paris said.
“I don’t think you and me ever talked,” Alejo said, shaking Brandon’s hand with an easy smile as if socializing weren’t the hardest thing in the world. As if he weren’t everything Brandon wished he could be. “I see you around all the time, though. Hard to miss anyone in a class of twelve.”
Brandon’s mother leaned across the table, nearly spilling her coffee in Brandon’s lap. “Kids, honestly, Brandon is painfully shy. I thought I’d call you over, make some introductions, see if I can get him out of the house. I know he could make some friends if he just branched out more. And you three are so nice.”
Brandon thought his heart might stop. “Mom…”
Tammy and Frank blinked at him, their expressions so full of pity it stung. But Alejo laughed, smooth and bright as running water. “Your mom is a killer wingwoman. You should take her everywhere.”
Brandon’s mother smiled, graciously accepting the compliment.
“Well, Brandon, you’re welcome to hang out with us whenever,” Tammy said. But her voice was hollow. She was already skipping ahead to when they got to sit back down and talk about how weird this was. How weird he was. She glanced over her shoulder at the half-eaten breakfasts on her table. “We better go before our food gets cold. It was so nice to catch up.”
She and Frank made their way back across the diner.
Alejo lingered a moment longer. He clapped Brandon on the back, then half turned to his table. “Seriously, let me know if you wanna hang.”
“I will,” Brandon lied.
He didn’t.
It didn’t matter. Within the year, Alejo Ortiz left Snakebite for college in Seattle. Tammy Barton took over Barton Ranch. Frank Paris got a job with the Owyhee County police. Brandon’s parents moved to Portland to get away from “small-town politics.”