It started with a text.Meet me behind the gym, Reyes. Your cousin said today’s rough. I’ve got something to make it better.Grief gnawed at me from the inside out, sleep-deprived from studying and waitressing. The last time he’d bullied me had been bad… but there’d been weeks of silent truce. We weregraduating. I’d thought we were burying the hatchet.
I needed to pick up the trash there anyway, so I’d figured I might as well see what he wanted.
He was waiting with a dimpled smile and shaggy blond hair, the hero right out of a freaking movie. “Hey,” he said, voice soft. “Come here.”
I stepped closer. Then it hit me.
First, a heavy thud on my shoulder. Then another and another—sweaty towels, mouth guards, rolled-up socks, and jock straps. They rained down from the bleachers above, landing all around me, pelting my head and arms, damp and sour with sweat. Laughter echoed above me, and before I could process the smell or the disgust curdling my stomach, a bucket of ice water crashed down, drenching me. I gasped, the shock robbing the air from my lungs. The cold clawed at my skin, and I stumbled back, blinking up through dripping bangs at the figures leaning over the bleachers, flashes snapping through the dark, bright and blinding.
The air thinned. Pins and needles crawled up my fingers. I staggered forward, hitting the ground, lungs fighting for space. A laugh—his—cut through the static.
He crouched beside me, his shadow cutting across my heaving chest fighting for air. “You shouldn’t have made assumptions,” he murmured.
I didn’t answer. I couldn’t.
Once they cleared into the building, I yanked my inhaler from my bag and, with shaking hands, took two puffs, then waited. The world steadied, breath by breath.
I blinked back to the present, focusing on my dad’s record in my lap. Lincoln had already taken so many things. He couldn’t take this song too. I shoved it back into the box and snapped the lock shut.
I couldn’t sell it. Not yet. But soon.
It wasone of my shifts at Reality Bites. Natasha walked in first, glossy red hair swinging over her trench coat, sunglasses perched on her head despite the cloudy day. Behind her trailed a woman I hadn’t seen before. She was perfectly curvy, with impossibly long ashy straight hair that went well with her golden-brown complexion. My chest tightened, bracing for Natasha’s usual nastiness, and I focused on stacking clean mugs.
“Well, well, if it isn’t our little cautionary tale. Check the draftbeforethe presentation,” Natasha purred, winking while stepping up to the counter. Her gaze raked over my apron and name tag. “How’s does it feel to be such a fuck-up, Nina?”
I forced a polite smile. “Can I get you something today?”
Her friend was taking a selfie with the boombox, but her focus flickered from me to Natasha and back to her phone.
Natasha’s attention was all mine. “Seriously. This is where you ended up? Couldn’t even land a pity hire at some desperate small business? Can’t say I’m surprised with your portfolio.”
“Natasha. Please, what would you and your friend like to try today?”
Natasha’s full red lips curled into a malicious smirk. “That’s right. You haven’t met my friend.” She signaled for the blonde woman to approach us. “This is Carmen. She’s our new marketing strategist. Carmen, this is the girl that got fired.”
The words punched me in the gut. Carmen looked up from her phone, assessing me head to toe before tilting her head to Natasha and offering a saccharine smile. “Oh… that’s rough for you. I’ve heard it was… long overdue.”
“Well—” I swallowed the burn in my throat. “Long overdue or not, are you ordering?”
Carmen’s eyebrows arched. Natasha laughed, low and mean. “Relax. We wouldn’t want to waste your precious… minimum-wage time.” She pointed at the cupcakes she wanted, and I boxed them in silence.
“We’re having a little celebration today,” she added, tapping her card on the tablet. “Lincoln’s promotion. Infinity Weddings signed on, thanks to Carmen here.” She leaned in slightly, her perfume sharp and cloying. “Actually… I’d invite you. You couldreallyuse the networking. But”—she tilted her head, eyes glittering—“quiet exits are so much easier for everyone.”
An acrid taste overpowered my mouth. Carmen cleared her throat, taking the box of cupcakes from Natasha. Something had been bothering me. The slides that turned up in my presentation were the worst possible strategy for Infinity Weddings. Lincoln and Natasha’s victory conversation echoed in my mind, so I decided to fish, maybe there was something to catch.
“Natasha, that’s only true if there’s something to hide. But there isn’t, right? I’m just a fuck-up, right?”
Natasha lifted her eyebrows, and she pressed her lips into a thin line. Quickly, though, her expression slid back into smooth boredom. She headed for the door, waving at me. “Suit yourself.”
My fingers curled around the edge of the counter so hard my nails bit into the wood. Carmen arched her brow, head tilting almost imperceptively toward Natasha. She leaned in and murmured, “Oh, but there is.”
I might’ve imagined her wink. Then the door swung closed, whipping their perfume scents toward me, and they laughed and walked away while I was processed.
Lynnie appeared beside me. “Hey,” she muttered, worry clouding her honey-brown eyes. “Ignore them. You’re okay.”
Shaking, I couldn’t trust my voice. I just nodded, breathing in the smell of vanilla buttercream that clung to Lynnie. She placed a Bite Me Lemon Drop cupcake in front of me. “You need a little bite. I know we’re not fancy like your old job,” she said, shrugging, “but I see you.”
Warmth bloomed in my chest, but it was tinged with something sharp and bitter. Love always seemed to come with the promise of leaving me behind.
