“Today’s tea has a little something extra for you. To celebrate your last day of manning up.”
I took the mug from my dad. “You mean womaning up. But thanks.” When I took a sip, my eyes widened. “Oh yum, horchata hybrid?”
My dad tapped the tip of my nose. “Bingo, Shorty.”
Horchata was my favorite, and my dad usually added it to chai on my birthday. Today was the last day of me and Rose running the KoBra together, so I suppose he thought a celebration was in order.
But the difference between how I felt today and how I felt a week ago was so drastic that I myself couldn’t really understand it. Instead of dragging myself out of bed and being filled with dreadon my walk to the commissary, I was actually—excited? Looking forward to it?
Maybe it was because I knew we had passed the test with flying colors. My dad would definitely cave and let me go to Tulum, I was sure of it. I was in such a good mood that I cheerfully waved at two surly middle school girls walking by me. “What’s her freaking problem?” one of them bitched to the other. I laughed.
As always, Rose was waiting for me at the truck, already prepping.
“Morning,” I said as I climbed in. Rose glanced up from where she was wiping down the oven.
“Morning!” she greeted back. Then she stood up and wiped her hands on her apron nervously. “Um.”
I kept looking at her when she wouldn’t go on. “Yeah?”
She turned around and grabbed something off the counter and shoved it at me. “Here. In case you’re hungry.”
It was a small plastic bag filled with fresh fruit tossed with chili powder. “I know you really like that one fruit cart,” she said nonchalantly.
Aw, Rose. So awkward at gestures of friendship. Taking it from her, I said, “Thanks. Do you wanna share? This is a lot of fruit.”
She shrugged and tugged at one of her delicate gold heart studs. “Sure.” I grabbed a couple of forks and handed one to her.
We ate the fruit in silence—one mango slice and melon piece at a time. Finally, I spoke up. “So, my dad says that since we did better than he thought we would, he wants us to keep going withlimited supervision. So, three days out of the week we’ll be working alone.” I glanced at her, gauging her reaction. Maybe she’d hate it?
But her face remained relaxed and she nodded. “Cool.”
“So you’re okay with it?”
She shrugged. “Yeah. I mean, even if it means our reward for surviving our punishment is the extension of that punishment.”
I laughed. “True. Well, I think he’s been excited to have some more time off the truck. He’s taking this business course at the community college, and he wants to focus on the business side and getting his restaurant started. Finding investors and space and stuff. We can handle more of the day-to-day in the truck.”
“Oh cool! I didn’t know he wanted to open a restaurant?”
I nodded, wiping some chili powder from the corner of my mouth. “Yeah, it’s his big dream. The KoBra is the first step toward it.”
“That’s so awesome!”
“Calm down, future Mrs. Shin.”
Normally, that would have pissed Rose off—normally, that would have been my intention. But she snort-laughed instead, then coughed and looked down at the fruit. “Wow, that’s spicy.”
“Oh, you probably got a pocket of chili powder.” I moved some of the fruit around until I found an area without too much of it. “Here.”
“There’s only coconut left?” She made a face as she poked around.
“Stop complaining, you ingrate.” The words came out of mymouth before I could stop them. Before she could react, I said, “Sorry, that came out wrong. I mean, actually it came out how I meant it. But I guess I don’t need to say exactly what I feel all the time.”
She looked down at the bag of fruit for a second before lifting her head to respond. “That’s okay.” Then she grinned. “Man, we’re so good at this friendship thing.”
I almost choked on my mango, laughing. “Yeah, we should do tutorials on it.”
“Put it on YouTube.”
