I checkboth ways before I pull out into traffic. I’m looking forward to leaving work this afternoon since my shift was literal hell. The guy who typically works my line with me quit, leaving me with a temp worker who is slow as fuck. I ended up having to pick up a big portion of the load, annoying considering the cartons were the heaviest they’ve been in a while.
My arms, still spaghetti noodles, were numb by the time I went back to my locker and slipped my arms through my backpack straps.
I head for Chatham U’s campus, driving down the 401 with rush hour traffic. It’s backed up, expected since it’s the main highway leading into town so tourists and college students are always coming and going.
By the time I pull onto the road that leads to Spring Meadows, I’m seventeen minutes later than I typically am. I’m blocks from the parking lot, sliding my parking pass onto the dash when I hear a pop and my car pulls to the right. The car behind me honks when I slam on the brakes and slow to a crawl. They cut into the other lane like an impatient asshole to pass at the same time I put my four-ways on, alerting other nearby drivers to be cautious.
I let out a string of expletives as I veer off to the side. I don’t have a spare this go around, never having replaced it the last time I got a flat.
I check my mirrors before climbing out. Last thing I need is for someone to take my door off. When it’s safe, I run around to the other side of my car, sinking back onto my haunches when I see it.
“A fucking nail?” I try to wiggle it free, but it’s stuck in place. There’s no way I’m getting it out unless I have some kind of tool to grip it with and even then it’s unlikely it would budge.
As if I don’t have enough shit on my plate.
Dread sinks low in my stomach. I park my ass on the curb and pull out my phone, glad that I finally added minutes to it yesterday, but when I press the side button, the screen doesn’t light up. My reflection stares back as I jab the button numerous times expecting a different result. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
It must not have charged overnight. It’s the only viable explanation.
I should throw it in the middle of traffic. It sure as hell would ease my frustrations, but I don’t have the cash to buy a new one nor do I want to go through the trouble of making sure Finn has an updated number.
What’s worse is that I don’t have a charger cord for my car.
I didn’t see the point in spending the money on buying an extra when I already have one at home.
I run through my options. Calling a tow truck is out of the question thanks to my piece of shit phone. I can walk back to the apartment, hoping a cop doesn’t come along and ticket me before a towing company can come out and haul it.
I look around, noting the coffee shop across the street and a light fixture store next to it. Maybe one of them would let me use their phone. However, my problem lies in not knowing the number for a tow service. I’d need to Google it before I call,which circles me back around to needing to walk back to Spring Meadows.
I rest my elbows on my knees, knowing I need to push up and head south but that foreboding ball of pessimism expands, keeping my knees buckled as they are. The sooner I get back and get this handled the better. I don’t need the added expense of a ticket—an irony since I recently got over worrying about this at the apartment complex—or another car sideswiping mine. It’s inches away from the fog line. All it would take is someone driving an inch too far to the right.
Bringing my hand to my face, I rub?—
“Are you okay?”
A voice startles me, causing my body to quake with a tremor and my head to snap in its direction. “Jesus.”
Donning a pair of high-waisted leggings and a top just as tight, Sebastian’s friend stares back, lifting her hands in a way to tell me that she didn’t mean to sneak up on me. “Sorry. I wasn’t trying to startle you. I thought you looked familiar from the other side of the intersection.”
As if my brain catches up with her standing next to me, her name comes back to me in a flash.
Violet.
Her clothing matches the shade of her name minus the tiny white daisies printed on the fabric. If I weren’t up to my neck in shitty circumstances, I’d grin at the irony and let my mind wander back to her dripping wet smooth skin.
Even if it did take me a minute to pull up her name, I recognized her as soon as I turned my head. She was the only one in Sebastian’s group of friends with eyes I could see a story behind, though that book snapped shut the second Webber glued himself to her side.
Her hair, the same color of the cappuccinos Aunt Bess always used to drink when Sebastian and I were kids, is collected in atight ponytail. A soft beauty mark dots the skin under her left eye, reminding me of the one Blake Lively has, only this girl wears hers better. Makes her look more sophisticated and that much more appealing.
She walks closer, and before I know what to say, lowers to sit on the curb next to me. “How long have you been sitting here?”
Considering my phone’s battery is dead and I have no way to check, I have no clue on an exact time, but it hasn’t been more than a few minutes. “Not long.”
She sees the nail in my tire. “That sucks.”
“Tell me about it.” If she hears the disappointment in my voice, she doesn’t let on. Her company washes over me, and we fall into a comfortable silence for the next few moments. I don’t know why I haven’t gotten a head start on my walk home, but I stay rooted to the curb next to her, waiting.
For what?
