The Misconception by Darlene Gardner Page A

tailor-made casual clothing and hot-footed it to the house. He wasn’t fast enough. Spray cascaded over him, followed by Billy’s teasing laughter. “Now who’s the smart guy? You don’t call a man with access to a hose a golden retriever.”
    Covering his head, laughing despite himself, Jax sprinted the rest of the way to the house and let himself in through the front door. He stood in the foyer, dripping on the wooden floor he’d insisted on paying extra for when he’d moved his mother from the inner city. She’d protested that hardwood was a needless extravagance, but he thought excess was just what his mother needed after a lifetime of insufficiency.
    His younger brother appeared in the entranceway to the kitchen, holding half a sandwich even though he’d probably eaten lunch an hour ago. Drew was blond like Billy, a trait they’d inherited from the father who’d left them before either were out of diapers.
    Eddie Bagwell hadn’t been much of a father, but at least he’d been married to their mother for a brief while. That was more than Jax could say for his own father, whose name he bore but whose face he’d never seen. The result of Sheila Drayton Bagwell’s romantic liaisons were identical, though. Both times, she’d ended up with sole responsibility for children who should have grown up with two parents. At the very least, his mother’s men should have helped her support the children they’d helped create.
    “What happened to you?” Drew asked before he finished chewing. Their mother liked to say her youngest son was a work in process, but the world better watch out when he added the finishing touches.
    Even at four inches shorter than Jax, Drew was an even six feet. His features were too large for his face, and he wore his hair preppy short, but the net effect was so compelling it was hard for strangers not to stare at him.
    He struggled with his weight, but only because his high school wrestling coach had decided he should compete at 171 pounds. This past wrestling season, that decision had resulted in serious dieting plus a sectional championship. In the off-season, Drew made up for the dieting by eating everything in sight.
    “Billy happened to me,” Jax said. “Let me give you some advice. Don’t ever call him a golden retriever. Especially when your clothes are dry-clean only. Throw me a towel, okay?”
    “Sure thing, bro.” Drew took another bite of his sandwich before he disappeared into the kitchen. By the time he reappeared and threw Drew a towel, the sandwich was gone.
    “You call this a towel?” Jax held up a square of material roughly one foot by two. “Looks more like a handkerchief to me.”
    “It’s all I could find,” Drew said while Jax toweled himself off with the oversized handkerchief. He managed to dry his face and one muscular arm before the cloth was saturated. He hoped he wouldn’t look too wilted when his clothes dried. He’d spent too many years wearing hand-me-downs and blue-light specials to not strive to look his best now.
    “Hey, you know that wrestling camp I’m going to?” his brother asked, making no move to get him another towel. “We had a guest instructor this morning. Guy by the name of Manny Ramirez. Name ring a bell?”
    Although it was as though the bells of St. Mary’s were chiming in his head, Jax shrugged. “Should it?”
    “Of course it should, man. Ramirez said he was the guy who pinned your ass in the state tournament when you two were high school seniors.”
    “Oh.” Jax shrugged again, as though the name of the wrestler who cost him a state championship wasn’t burned in his mind. Football had been so popular at Ridgeland High that he’d been well known for his outstanding play at linebacker, but wrestling had always been his first love. “ That Manny Ramirez.”
    “Yeah, that one.” Drew affected a wrestler’s stance, bouncing on the balls of his feet with his legs apart and his elbows tucked close to his body. “He sure