“Thanks,” Ace said across the table. “Fried ‘em up myself. With a little help from the assistant chefs.”
“Who you calling an assistant?” Kendrick asked. “I peeled the potatoes.”
“Doesn’t take a lot of skill,” Ace replied. He winked at Annika before adding, “Anyone can peel potatoes. But it takes special skill to fry chicken. You’ve got to get it just right or you’ll burn the outside to a crisp while undercooking the inside.”
“Yeah,” Isaiah chimed in. “We’ve had your cooking before. Bro, stick to just peeling those potatoes.”
Everyone, including Kendrick, laughed.
It felt really good to be with others and having a good time, Annika noted silently. She couldn’t remember how long it had been since she’d felt so included.
Perhaps she never had.
But something felt right about this experience. It all seemed so natural.
She prayed it would last. Though she doubted it would. Oh well. It was a wonderful reprieve for however long she had it.
“I’d eat your cooking, Mr. Kendrick,” she told him.
“Aww, thank you, sweetie. And you can just call me Kendrick. Or Uncle Kendrick if you’d like.”
That made Annika smile, just like the laughter had. Maybe they were actually accepting her as part of their found family.
“So, you came to L.A. to work in the industry,” Lana said, referencing a conversation they’d had earlier. “Where was home, originally?”
Annika looked down at her plate. How much should she tell them? She sure couldn’t tell them everything. But her past—the part before Los Angeles—was safe to talk about. Even if it was a bit sad…
“Nebraska,” she told them after looking back up. “Sort of bounced between Lincoln and Omaha. They aren’t too far from each other. I lived in both at various times.”
“I’ve never been to Nebraska,” Iris said. “Is it pretty?”
“Yeah. In a way. Really flat. But it has its own beauty,” Annika replied. “There are places where it seems like you can see for miles. It’s so open and vast on the plains!”
“That’s cool. Do you still have family there?” Cami asked.
Annika wondered again how much she should share. It wasn’t that her past was shameful or anything. She just didn’t want people feeling sorry for her. But she didn’t want to lie, either.
“I never knew my family. My mom—I was told—was a college kid at the university there in Lincoln. She signed away rights as soon as I was born. So I was raised by foster parents.”
She left it at that. There was no need to mention the group homes, string of “parents” or the time she was in an actual orphanage. Nor was there reason to admit she didn’t even know if Voss was her real last name. It was on her birth certificate. Whether it came from her biological mother or father, she didn’t know. She’d searched numerous times in databases, but no solidanswers materialized from her time. As far as she knew, it was just a random name assigned to her at birth by someone at the hospital or the State of Nebraska.
“I know a little bit about that,” Iris said. “Not exactly the same. I was raised by my grandma for a while. But when she passed, and my other relatives got tired of me, I did the foster thing.”
Annika looked her way. “I’m sorry you had to go through that.”
“Thank you. And I’m sorry you did, too,” Iris told her.
Their eyes remained locked for a moment. Annika liked the other girls, too, but she felt an instant connection to Iris. It must have been their shared experience.
She still couldn’t open up about the specifics of what brought her to Los Angeles, though. Not yet.
Maybe never.
It would be horrible to put Iris or anyone else in danger.
“You mentioned wanting to work for a studio,” Lana said. “Have you put in for any jobs?”
Annika’s stomach muscles tightened. She knew all this would come up. But again, she couldn’t put anyone in danger.
