Chapter 2: Shannon
December 25, 2009
I guess I don’t know where to find him. It’s that seven-foot-tall rasta dude from Scotland—or whatever his deal is. He wears a kilt, anyway, and his dreads are like four feet long. A bunch of them are purple this year, that’s new. Nice enough guy, kinda sexy in that here’s-a-razor-and-a-bar-of-soap-I’ll-be-back-in-an-hour way, but he’s no Ben.
“Naw, Benny bailed,” he tells me. “Three or four months ago. Benny was my boy, too. I kinda miss the little squirt.” I make to pay for my coffee, but he waves my money away. “It’s on the house, Freckles.” He raises a mug, touches it to my cardboard to-go cup, says, “To Benny!”
“To Benny,” I say. I take a sip of my coffee. I can’t help it now, the way he’s getting all sentimental, gazing off at nothing in the m
