Page 110 of Badd B*tch

The yelling. My god in heaven, the yelling. I grew up on military bases. I served with Marines on Marine Expeditionary Units. I know yelling. I can yell with the best of them, when I have to. But this?

Each TV had a crowd around it, and those crowds kept changing as the players died and were replaced. It seemed like if you died, you were out. But then you could somehow get back in? I don't know. I just know the controllers changed hands at a frenetic pace, and the crowd of spectators shifted constantly.

Also, kids were watching and playing who, judging by appearance, weren’t part of the Badd Clan, swelling the crowd even further.

I spotted Jax on the far left, sprawled out on a giant bean bag, long legs stretched out and ankles crossed, a beer bottle clamped between his beefy thighs. He was concentrating furiously, the tip of his tongue sticking out the corner of his mouth.

I waded through the cluster to the bracket and took a look—Jax and Nolan were currently in the lead. I tried to figure out who Nolan was by assessing the fervor of the cheers. I spotted a head of black hair and the profile of a face with epicanthic folds around the eyes, but that's all I could make out due to the horde of boys around him screaming encouragement as he played; the concentration of shouting behind him rivaled the volume behind Jax, which I took to mean the other one had to be Nolan.

As I watched and ate, the bracket filled in and the number of controllers being used dwindled until it was down to Jax and one other and Nolan and one other—Merrick was playing against Jax, and Lucas against Nolan, according to the bracket; this must be the finals, then.

"NO!" Jax shouted, kicking his feet in and hurriedly setting his beer bottle aside, nearly spilling it. "I see you, Merry. Fuck you, bitch! I got you!" He leaned further forward, still shouting. "Miss me, motherfucker! Yes! YES! There you are, you little shit."

Merrick was one of Baxter's boys, I decided, although I couldn't remember for sure. But it felt like a safe assumption, considering the breadth and girth of his chest and shoulders, and the jawline that mirrored Baxter's and Kieran's. Merrick was slightly smaller than Kieran, but not by much, and both had their father's improbably gargantuan build; I'd met Eva earlier today, and they both had her black hair rather than the Badd Family brown.

I finished my food and beer, and popped back outside real quick for a second can—I'd been too nervous until now to eat or drink anything, and I know better than to drink on an empty stomach when I rarely drink alcohol to begin with.

When I returned to the chaos of the tourney, both Jax and Nolan had beaten their respective opponents. Nolan was swigging RC Cola from a two-liter, one foot up on a chair in a Captain Morgan pose. He drained the last of the two-liter, paused, bumped his fist against his chest, and let out a belch that shook the foundations of the house, to raucous applause and cheers from the testosterone festival here in the basement.

"I'm comin’ for you, Jaxter," Nolan said, then belched again, just as prodigiously. "You're goin' down, boyyyy!" He flung himself airborne and did a flying People's Elbow maneuver—you can’t live and work with the kind of guys I have and not pick up a few things—onto a beanbag chair next to Jax, and snagged the nearest controller.

Jax just brushed lint off his shoulder. "You wish, punk! You've yet to beat me one-on-one."

"Today's the day, bitch."

My innate dislike of that word, having had it non-humorously applied to me a few too many times, bubbled up at how easily these guys used it, but then, it was all guys here, and they seemed to use it as a term of endearment, almost, so I tamped that down.

"Wanna bet?" Jax said.

"Sure!" Nolan said, glancing around the room and spotting me. "I've got the stakes. You ready for this?"

Jax followed Nolan's glance, saw me, grinned, winked, and then focused on Nolan. "Oh lord. Here we go. What are the stakes, No-No?"

"Fuck off with that shit. You know I hate being called No-No."

"Why do you think I call you that, No-No?" Jax made a goofy, mocking face and flipped Nolan both middle fingers. "What are the stakes?"

"Loser has to wear her flannel. Nothing beneath it." He pointed at me, then paused. "You've got an undershirt on?"

I hesitated, suddenly in the spotlight. "Yeah, but—"

"Those are the stakes."

Nolan, like all of these people, was an extra-large human, in both the muscles and height sense, and absurdly good-looking. Think Henry Golding or Simu Liu, and you'll get close to Nolan. They just weren’t as pretty, now that I got a good face-on look at Nolan.

And Jax, obviously, was a giant, as has been mentioned. I, as has also been mentioned, am tiny. So either of them wearing my thin little flannel shirt—over a tight white tank top and cutoff jean shorts—would fit rather a lot like Chris Farley in that SNL bit, Fat Guy In A Little Coat.

"You're on!" Jax said, giving me an apologetic wince. He wiggled his fingers at me. "C'mere, you! I need a good luck charm!"

I went to sit near him, only to be yanked down onto his lap, turned sideways, and cradled in the cage of his brawny arms as he prepared to face off against Nolan.

Apparently I was sitting on his lap.

Yay?

Chapter 17

Tea