“Fine, I won’t kill him. I just want to talk to him, loudly and with a few punches to his nut sack,” Jim states quietly.

Standing up from my chair, I walk around the table to stand in front of Jim. “Mr. Gillmore, I’d just like to say that-”

“Move out of the way, fuck face, or I’ll kick your ass instead,” Jim interrupts.

I nod and step out of his way. “Very good, sir.”

“Get your ass out from behind that chair,” Jim yells to Gavin.

Ava inches towards the door. “I’m gonna go get help.”

She turns and flees from the room and I have a sudden need to follow her. Jim is a scary motherfucker when he’s angry and right now, he’s pissed.

We watch as Gavin slowly stands up, his eyes darting all around the room, looking for a way out.

“What the hell is going on in here? Someone said there was a fight happening,” Liz says as she walks into the room a few seconds later with Claire right on her heals.

“There’s nothing to see here, ladies. How about you just go on back to work and let me handle this,” Jim tells Liz. “Gavin and I are going to settle this like men.”

Jim clenches his fists and brings them up in front of his face. “You want to marry my daughter? Then it’s time for a little Fight Club.”

Claire lets out a huff and puts her hands on her hips. “Oh, hell no! Fight Club is for Liz and me. You don’t get to have Fight Club! The first rule of Fight Club is that you don’t get to have fucking Fight Club!”

“Wait just a minute here,” Liz interrupts. “Did Gavin seriously ask your permission to marry Charlotte? That is the sweetest thing I’ve ever heard!”

Jim sighs, never taking his eyes off of Gavin. “You’re not helping. He is not marrying our daughter.”

“Wouldn’t you rather they get married so that the things he’s currently doing to her that are illegal in ten states aren’t frowned upon?” I ask.

“Boom! That just happened!” Drew shouts, holding his hand up for me to give him a high-five.

I reach up to smack it, quickly pulling my arm back down when I see Jim give me the look of death.

“Hey, is that glitter on your hand?” I ask Drew, taking a closer look at the sparkles on his palm.

Drew drops his arm and frantically tries to wipe his hand on his pants. “I’m not doing anything wrong or weird. Sometimes I like to cover my hand in glitter and then jerk off with it because it makes everything pretty like a rainbow, so you can all just shut up right now!”

Everyone stares at him, Gavin’s pending beat-down momentarily forgotten.

“Even though I’m going to regret asking this, the glitter is seriously from you jerking off and not cheating on Jenny?” Liz asks.

“Cheating on Jenny? Why would I ever cheat on Jenny?” Drew asks in shock.

“Well, she thinks you’re cheating on her because you keep making excuses to leave the house and you come home covered in strange glitter that she swears isn’t stripper glitter,” Claire informs him.

“This is craft glitter. Everyone knows stripper glitter is more miniscule, comes in brighter colors and smells like vanilla,” Drew tells us with a roll of his eyes.

I grab Drew’s wrist and pull his hand close to my face. There’s something familiar about this glitter but I can’t wrap my head around it.

“I’ve seen this glitter somewhere before,” I mutter.

Drew snatches his hand back. “No you haven’t! You have no idea what you’re talking about! It’s my special glitter and all it does is make my penis sparkle!”

“I think I liked this conversation much better when we were discussing all the ways Uncle Jim was going to kill me,” Gavin states with a disgusted look on his face.

“Yes, let’s get back to that, shall we?” Jim asks, moving to the edge of the table, opposite Gavin. “Did you knock up my daughter?”

“Oh, for the love of God,” Liz complains.

“What?! No!” Gavin shouts.

Jim starts to move around the table towards Gavin. “But you’ve been having sex with my daughter when the rules clearly state that I only let the two of you live together as long as you didn’t touch her.”

Gavin shuffles the opposite way around the table.

“Charlotte is NOT pregnant, I swear. We don’t even want kids! I love her and she loves me. I want to spend the rest of my life with her,” Gavin tells Jim, circling the table to get away from him.

“Jim, stop trying to kill Gavin. I have a meeting I’m late for,” Liz complains.

“Calm down, Jim. They’re probably just having anal. Anal doesn’t count,” Drew announces.

Gavin laughs and Jim stops moving, glaring at him across the table.

I really feel like I should do something to stop this. Gavin is my best friend and I don’t want to see him get the shit kicked out him by his future father-in-law. Glancing around the room I see that Ava never came back after getting Liz and her Aunt Claire so it’s now or never.

The word-vomit starts flowing before I even think about what I’m doing. “I’m pretty sure I might be falling in love with Ava, I’m a certified Brony, I let Ava spank me with a My Little Pony tail and my safe word is pancakes.”

Before I can recover my breath from my outburst, Jim’s fist connects with my cheek and stars burst in front of my eyes. The next thing I know, I’m hitting the floor with a groan.

“Dude, my safe word is ‘waffles.’ I knew I liked you for a reason,” Drew states, staring down at me.

He holds out his hand out and helps me up to my feet while I cradle one hand against my cheek that’s screaming in pain.

Everyone stands around with their mouths wide open staring at Jim, waiting to see what he’s going to do next. Hopefully he’s not going to hit me again because Jesus fuck that hurt.

“Well, I feel better. Let’s go plan this proposal,” Jim states, shaking the soreness from his hand as he turns and walks out of the room.

Chapter 19 - Interstate

 - Ava -

I try to steady myself on the sidewalk as Charlotte turns away from me to greet her best friend Rocco, but the entire street continues to swirl in front of me and I have a feeling I’m going to tip over if I don’t grab onto something.

I’ve been a little out of sorts since I realized I might be in love with Tyler. I told Charlotte she needed to take me out tonight so I could spend some time away from him and get my head on straight. Unfortunately, I decided to get a head start with a few people from work. By the time Charlotte pulled up to the bar in a cab to get me, my head was long gone at the bottom of a few glasses of booze.

“Why is your sister sprawled on top of a stack of chairs?” I hear Rocco ask as the two of them walk towards me.

I lift my head and yep, I found a nice, comfy stack of chairs right outside the restaurant to lean against.

“I can’t stand. Someone fucked up the sidewalk and it’s all uneven,” I complain as Charlotte grabs one of my arms and Rocco grabs the other, pulling me off of the chairs.

Rocco looks down at the ground and then back up at me. “Sweetie, why are you only wearing one shoe?”

I quickly look down and notice he’s right. No wonder I can’t walk. Why the hell do I only have on one shoe?

“I lost a shoe. Son of a fuck, I LOST A SHOE!”

I’m screaming. I know I’m screaming and there’s nothing I can do about it.

Charlotte and Rocco hold onto me as they both examine my feet.

“How the hell did you lose a shoe?” Charlotte asks as I lift into the air a foot that’s missing one nude Lauren Conrad platform heel, wiggling my naked toes.

“THAT FUCKING CAB STOLE MY LC SHOE! FUCK YOU CAB!” I shout, shaking my fist in the air at the cab that pulled away ten minutes ago.

Charlotte pushes me into Rocco and tells him to keep an eye on me for a minute as she runs inside a corner store next to the restaurant.

“You’re really cute, Rocco. We should make out,” I tell him, trying not to slur as I rest my head on his chest and he wraps his arms around me.

Rocco is a great guy and even though he’s one of Charlotte’s best friends, he’s quickly become my friend, too. He endeared himself further when he pretended to be Charlotte’s boyfriend a few months ago to make Gavin jealous. I wonder why Charlotte never dated him?

“You’re really drunk, and I’m still gay,” he reminds me.

Oh, that’s right, he’s gay.

“Plus, your sister already informed me that you’re in love with Tyler. Is that why you’re a hot mess tonight?” he continues.

I push away from him and put my hands on my hips. “I am NOT a hot mess, I’m FABULOUS!”

Rocco looks me over from head to toe. “Ghetto fabulous, maybe. You’re wearing one shoe and that black eyeliner is staging a protest as it runs down your face in fear.”

He puts his hands on either side of my face and uses his thumbs to swipe away the mess under my eyes.

“You know, there’s nothing wrong with being in love with Tyler,” he tells me softly. Before I can argue with him, Charlotte comes back outside with a bag in her hand. “Alright, dumbass, I got you a pair of shoes. Give me your foot.”

Rocco holds me tighter as I let Charlotte remove my one, lonely shoe and replace it with a pair of flats. I’m too drunk to care that I’m letting a cheap pair of shoes from a corner store touch my feet.

“Alright, let’s go get some food in you to sop up some of that alcohol,” Charlotte announces as we make our way into the restaurant.

After we’ve been seated and our orders taken, Charlotte and Rocco sit across from me silently, waiting for me to start talking.

I don’t want to talk. I don’t want to think about the fact that I’m so totally in love with Tyler that I want to cry. I just want to drink more and forget all about it.