The Scumbag's Guide To Heroism novel Chapter 445

Chapter 445: 445 | The Boardwalk Was Always The Plan [CASTLE BONUS]

"No," I said.

"It’s a little manly," Caden offered.

"It is zero percent manly. This is six teenagers in a parking lot outside a closed strip club next to a tax preparation office. This is the opposite of manly. This is what gets screenshotted and sent to Steele by someone in the nail salon who recognizes our uniforms."

"We’re not wearing uniforms."

"We’re six men aged eighteen in an SUV staring at a neon woman in a cape. The context does the work."

Caden Holt rubbed the back of his head where I had hit him and produced the specific expression of someone who had spent considerable effort planning something that was collapsing in real time and lacked the emotional infrastructure to process the failure.

His hazel eyes moved from the sign to the parking lot to the nail salon to his phone screen, where the Yelp page remained open, and for a fraction of a second the class clown disappeared and what sat in the passenger seat was a kid who had tried to do something nice and miscalculated in a direction that would follow him through the remainder of the academic year.

"Okay," Caden said. "Okay. I accept responsibility. I planned Boyz Day around a strip club that isn’t open because I genuinely did not know that strip clubs have operating hours. I assumed they were always available, like hospitals or gas stations. This is a gap in my education that I will address privately and never discuss again."

"I’m putting it in the notebook," Percy said.

"Please don’t put it in the notebook."

"It’s already in the notebook. The pen touched paper four sentences ago."

"Can you at least categorize it as a miscalculation rather than a character deficit?"

"I have categorized it as ’Holt, C. — navigational error stemming from insufficient research into entertainment sector operating norms.’ The subcategory is ’Boyz Day Incident.’"

"There’s a subcategory."

"There is always a subcategory."

Marco threw a chip at Caden’s head. It bounced off his temple and landed in the cup holder. "Brother. My man. My guy. I love you and I will defend you with my life and also my dinner plate, but you planned six hours of male bonding activities and the anchor was a building that won’t open for another two hours and forty-six minutes."

"I had a secondary plan."

"The secondary plan is ramen." Marco checked his phone. "The ramen place you found is three blocks from here. It opens at eleven."

"Everything good opens at eleven!" Caden’s voice cracked with the injustice of a universe that had conspired against his one attempt at organized social contribution. "Why does nothing in this city open before eleven? What happens between nine and eleven? What is the city doing?"

"Sleeping," Finn said. "Normal people are sleeping, Holt. That’s what people do on Saturday mornings. They sleep. They don’t ride Ubers to strip clubs."

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