"The fuck?" Tom knew a bet lost when he saw it. 
"I figured you'd gone for a stress fuck to help your girl feel better, but not with that look on your face." The bartender explained in an annoyed tone.
"I'm up $20 and you owe me your evening break." Nate swaggered out, happy as a pig in shit.
"Did you see your girl?" Wade wouldn't leave it alone and Tom had no clients to keep busy with. Tom glared at him but Wade read it. "If you saw her, why are you so sour?"
"She'd been crying!" He was still bothered by it, and it didn't help that his stomach was growling, the flavourless granola bar he'd pulled from her pocket not enough to keep him full.
"Can't kill an exam for stressing her out man, take a shot and deal with it." Wade slid an ounce of tequila at him.
It helped; so did staying busy. He'd asked her to text at the end of her practicum, but that'd been before he'd shown up out of the blue. At damn near eight pm his phone finally alerted that she texted.
[stick a fork in me]
[thought this was the easy one?] It'd be a little late to start acting like he didn't care after the hug.
[long 온라인카지노게임, need sleep. Thanks for today] He stared at his phone before he put it away, crowds were pouring in after the last exams of the day.
By the time he had a moment to try again, it was the end of his shift so he could really only say [Any time]
Wednesday Tom kept his head down and worked hard enough to make up for the beginning of the week. Instead, Nate took over the role of surly asshole as Grace had locked her window; served him right.
Thursday Tom woke to a text from Jerred. [step-sis's birthday Friday, party, bring girl and gift] and the coordinates for a building that Tom actually knew. It was an old hanger for small aircrafts; long abandoned and stripped, only the hangar itself remained. A good place for a party and some short drag races, and Jerred hadn't said no business so there was a chance.
Tom was about to text the brat when his phone warned she'd beaten him to it. [Leann says Fri is her b-day, we in?] 
[You're the one who needed a fork on Tuesday, think you can keep up?]
[Booze, music, escaping puppy piss for a night, however shall I cope?] he could picture the hand wave she'd give along with the comment.
It put him in a good enough mood that when he walked into Nightside Nate and Wade had an argument before Tom saw money get placed on the bar top.
"What are you betting on now?" He sounded exasperated but even this couldn't ruin his vibe.
"I say you saw your girl." Nate called out his wager. 
"I say if you'd had her after this week you'd have booked off this morning." Wade called out, ignoring the regulars at their tables.
His friends could in fact kill his good mood, and in two sentence no less. It was now far too late, and way too complicated to try and correct their assumptions, and it was better to let them fumble in the dark than give them clues to what was really going on. But Tom was already edging into unclear waters and he didn't need them adding to shit creek like this.
"I hate you both." He repeated the familiar phrase. 
"I think I'm closest, there's no way he got laid last night." Wade pocketed the money without argument.
"Do your goddamned jobs." Tomas spat and focused on the first wave of customers.
It got worse when Tom had to book Friday afternoon off, the 24 hours notice making it pretty fucking awkward as both his friends immediately started to bet on the likely cause and outcome. They agreed he was seeing his girl, Wade was convinced she had an exam Friday am, Nate was saying she finished today but was resting up for the weekend. Tom endured in silent misery and left them to their sadism because he had nothing to say that wouldn't make everything worse.