My Ex and My Best Friend Planned My Reunion Roast. The Town Chat Roasted Them Instead. novel · Chapter 3 of 24
Chapter 3: Fish Fry
Brock stages a peace toast in front of the whole Legion Hall and Britta says his speech first, then keeps the mic.
The Tern Lake Legion Hall holds two hundred people, and by six-thirty on Friday it held two hundred and ten.
The program taped to the door said WELCOME HOME FISH FRY, and under it, in bold, 8:15 BRITTA'S APOLOGY (A FEW WORDS).
I took it down, folded it into a square, and put it in my pocket.
"Souvenir," I told Dolly.
"Atta girl." She patted her fanny pack. "I brought my own tartar sauce. Never trust a Legion tartar."
Inside, the chat hit me like a wave of warm air.
【POLL: Cod or walleye? Cod 61%, Walleye 39%.】
【Pete: Pool is fourteen to one she doesn't make it to the second pierogi.】
【Helen: She looks tired. I'm going to bring her a bar.】
【Sue: *a lemon bar. Specify, Helen.】
I sat at the end of a long folding table with a paper plate and a view of the stage.
Brock stood by the podium in a nice quarter-zip, laughing with half the football team from 2016.
Shayla floated around the room in a pale pink dress, touching elbows, holding her phone up in a way that said she was live.
She saw me and waved with her whole hand, and I waved back with three fingers.
Over her head the lines were flying.
【Reunion Committee (Shayla, Brock + 4)】
【Brock: Here's the final. Tell me if it's too much.】
Then the whole speech came down in a block of text, with brackets and everything.
I read it twice, and then I borrowed a pen from Dolly and wrote it down on the back of my folded program.
"What are you doing?" Dolly whispered.
"Homework."
【Brock: [take a breath] Britt, I've been a coward for three years.】
【Brock: [pause, look misty] I forgave you a long time ago. I just never said it out loud.】
【Brock: [point at the ceiling like Gram is up there] She'd want us to be family again.】
【Shayla: Perfect. Hand on heart for the last part. And DON'T look at me.】
At 8:12 the lights dimmed on the stage, and a clinking sound came from the mic.
"Okay, everybody," Brock said. "Can I get everyone's attention? I want to say something I should have said a long time ago."
Two hundred people turned to look at me.
Shayla had stopped moving, with the phone tilted just right at her chest.
"Britt, would you come up here?"
I stood up and walked to the stage.
I climbed the three steps and took the mic out of his hand, gently.
"Thank you, Brock," I said. "Actually, he asked me to say a few words, and I'd like to say his first."
Brock's grin wobbled.
"Britt..."
"He practiced."
I unfolded the program and held it up to the light.
"Britt," I read, in a warm, wobbly voice. "I've been a coward for three years."
A few people laughed, because it was a good impression.
"Now he takes a breath." I took one. "Pause. Look misty."
Brock, who was already misty, froze.
"I forgave you a long time ago," I read. "I just never said it out loud."
"Then he points at the ceiling like Gram is up there."
I pointed at the ceiling.
Two hundred and ten heads looked up.
A man by the coffee urn actually said "Oh my God" out loud.
【Sue: She's reading the stage directions. Out loud. Are we sure these are real?】
【Pete: They're real. I've got the thread open. Brock's hand is shaking.】
【Helen: Maybe she just guessed.】
【Pete: Helen, she said "hand on heart." There's no way to guess "hand on heart."】
"Hand on heart for the last part," I said. "Also, don't look at Shayla."
I looked at Shayla.
Every single person in the room looked at Shayla.
She had her hand over her mouth and her phone pointed at the floor.
The live count on her screen was dropping.
"That's private," Brock said. His voice had cracked in the middle. "That is a private..."
"It's from the committee thread," I said pleasantly. "Six of you are on it. You can check."
Four of the six reached for their phones.
The sound of it went through the hall.
Brock's mother stood up at a front table with her napkin still tucked in her collar.
"Young lady," she began.
"I'm almost done, Mrs. Dettmer," I said. "You printed 'a few words of apology.' I'd like to apologize."
Every neck in the room stretched.
"To the cod," I said. "It deserved a better speech."
The hall exploded.
It was not a polite laugh.
It was a big warm roar, the kind a crowd makes after holding its breath for three years.
I handed the mic back to Brock and held on to it for one second too long.
"The rest of my words I'm saving for the reunion," I said. "I promised."
I walked down the three steps and back to my seat.
Dolly slid a lemon bar across the table without looking at me.
"Pin it," I whispered.
"Already did."
【📌 Pinned by DollyTheMod (412 reactions): Rule 1: Be kind. Rule 2: See Rule 1. Rule 3: Brock, sit down.】
At the back of the hall, by the exit sign, a man in a black cap had been eating cod the whole time.
He didn't laugh.
He set the plate on a trash can, looked at me for a long, flat second, and walked out.
Nobody typed a thing about him.
I followed the comments to the parking lot because I couldn't stop reading them.
【Pete: Pool's up to nineteen to one for dessert. Nobody saw this coming.】
【Helen: I don't understand. Did Brock do something?】
【Sue: Yes, Helen. Several things. Footnotes available.】
Then, as I crossed the gravel to my car, the whole block of the Reunion Committee thread blinked.
【Shayla has deleted the conversation.】
I stood very still next to my driver's door.
Time crawled.
A minute.
Nothing else came.
For the first time since I crossed the green sign, the air in front of my face was completely, horribly empty.
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