I fumbled for a joke, found none. “Try a horse tranquilizer.”
His smile came slowly, reluctant but real. “Might be the only thing that works.”
We stood there, two idiots boxed in by rows of cough medicine and bad decisions. In the stillness, I caught the scent of his aftershave—fresh, sharp, a little like cedar. I tried to think of anything to say that wouldn’t make it worse.
He beat me to it. “Listen. I’m sorry about the other night. At the bar. You didn’t need me to step in.” He looked at the floor and ground his boot heel against the tile. “Wasn’t my business.”
My face went hot, then cold. “No, you…” I started seeing the tampons begin to slide off the drinks and panicked. I hoisted the drinks up towards my chest and breathed a sigh of relief when the tampons stayed put. “It was fine. That guy was a loser. You did the right thing.”
He looked skeptical. “You sure?”
I nodded, then regretted it when the pain behind my forehead surged. “Trust me. If I wanted him gone, he was going anyway; if you hadn’t stepped in, my brothers would have.”
He almost laughed, but the sound got trapped somewhere in his chest. “Yeah. I believe that.”
A silence opened again. He looked at the tampons. I looked at the DayQuil. Both of us were too stubborn to admit we cared about the other one noticing.
I started to move past him, my pile of stuff only seconds from tumbling to the floor. He moved to the side but didn’t leave, just stood there with the medicine boxes clutched in one hand. “Oh, I almost forgot. A package was delivered to my place yesterday with your name on it. I’ll put it between your doors when I get home.”
I nodded. The air rippled between us before I thanked him, then muttered, ‘It was nice talking to you,’ as I scooted around him and escaped.
At the checkout, Mrs. MacPherson made a production of scanning each item, holding each box six inches from her face as if she were carbon-dating artifacts. “Hmm, this doesn’t have a price on it,” she announced, squinting at the box of tampons with the intensity of someone deciphering hieroglyphics. God forbid the pharmacy updated its system from 1972 to include a UPC scanner. “I’ll need to get aprice check.” Before I could stop her, she grabbed the ancient beige microphone, tapped it three times with a crimson talon, and bellowed as if addressing a stadium: “JIMMY! PRICE CHECK ON TAMPONS. FORTY PACK. SUPER ABSORBENCY. THE BLUE BOX WITH THE LADY DOING YOGA ON IT.” I swear I heard someone bust out laughing, probably Jake.
Jimmy came up with the price, and I threw my money at her. Without waiting for my change or the receipt, I gathered my purchases up and made a beeline for the door.
Chapter 4
Ella
After returning to the bakery, the last cake of the day was in front of me—a monster-sized sheet cake, with white icing for three-year-olds to gouge with plastic spatulas at a birthday party. I hunched over it, outlining the cartoonish blob of the Cookie Monster from Sesame Street, but my mind chewed on that awkward exchange at the drugstore. The clink of pans and the gentle warmth of the ovens tamped down the aftershocks, but just barely.
Frank wandered in, arms folded like a disheartened soccer coach and peered over my shoulder. “Hell of a job, kid. How do you pipe a border like that with hands shaking worse than a Pentecostal at Sunday service?”
His attempt at humor sparked a genuine smile out of me. “Protein from all the leftover cake scraps. Staves off the tremors.”
He eyed my work with approval. “You’re wasted on us. You could be on one of those TV shows wherethe cakes look like actual dogs, or like, super realistic babies that you cut open and it’s cake inside.”
“No, I’d rather not have my face plastered on TV,” I said, wiping a bit of green icing on a rag. “Anyway, have you heard anything about Helen’s surgery yet?”
“Not yet,” Frank said, and for just a flicker, his face uncreased and went gentle. “Think she’s still out. I’ll call her husband in a few minutes. You want me to let you know?”
“Yeah,” I said. “She’ll want to know how I fared without her here today.”
He nodded. “You know you’re off tomorrow, right? Denise will be in at 6 am, so don’t let me catch you mopping or finishing orders. You’re not paid double for caring too much.”
“You don’t have to pay me at all to do any of this,” I grinned, and Frank started to protest, but he knew I was joking. Probably.
The rest of the day was a blur: wiping down every surface, answering three phone calls, each wanting to place a cake order. By the time 3:15 rolled around, I was free to collect Nora from school. She was already standing outside under the awning by the time I arrived, hatless, her hair electric with static and defiance.
I braced for the worst. “Did you punch anyone today?”
“No,” she said, then looked down. “Just kicked alittle.”
“Progress,” I said, and she took my hand.
On the ride home, I tried to get out what had gone wrong in her day; it was mostly “the principal is boring,” and a quick tangent about how it was unfair to have “pizza day” if nobody could eat it. I nodded emphatically, the way I wished caregivers had when I was her age.
We were halfway up the drive when my phone started ringing. “Kane,” I said, reading the display.
