“Wow.” Luz had dragged over an old, discarded barstool and plopped down onto it as Sammie had rambled on—at length—about her entire situation with Kieran. It felt good to say it all, to let the whole series of events spill out of her, unfiltered. It wasn’t until she was done and Luz was looking at her as though she were an entirely new being that Sammie realized just how badly she’d needed to talk to someone else about it. Someone who wasn’t herbrother. “That’s… a lot.” Luz hesitated, squirming in her seat. She was small, bouncy, and had never been good at keeping her thoughts off her face.
“Just say it.” Sammie buried her head in her hands, fingers tangling in her hair.
“I just never expected you to do something so exciting.”
Sammie raised her head to glare at her coworker. “Rude.” Luz’s round face split into a shit-eating grin.
“No, seriously!” She leaned forward, poking Sammie’s forehead. “I’m proud of you, trying new things, doing something that has nothing to do with this place.” She waved her arms at the giant, stainless steel tanks surrounding them. “Stilldon’t really understand why the dude’s sending you videos of threesomes on your lunch break, but good for you!”
Sammie groaned, dropping her head back to her hands. “This is so embarrassing.”
“It’s not.” Luz scooted her stool closer, leaning forward to pat Sammie’s head lightly. Why did everyone always think she needed that? “Okay, maybe it’s a little embarrassing, but no more-so than when Carson drunk dialed me last week and told me he loved me.”
Sammie raised her head again, blinking. “I’m sorry, what?”
Luz waved a hand. “He doesn’t remember. I’m waiting for the right time to use it against him.” She smiled, equal parts proud and maniacal.
“Well. Let me know how that goes, I guess.”
“But back to your problems.” Luz started to give Sammie another head pat, which she batted away. “Look, my sister does the same thing. Different platform, but same basic concept. If you want another woman to talk to about this stuff, I can give you her number.”
Itwouldbe nice, having another person, anotherwomanexperienced with sex work that she could talk to. Because the video Kieran sent—which featured two women and one man—had been paired with a question.
Is this along the lines of what you wanted to try?
Who the fuck asked about threesomes in the middle of a work day?
But, well… yeah, that was pretty much exactly what she wanted to try. With him. And the idea of it terrified her.
“Your sister would be willing to talk to me?”
Luz nodded, her smile going soft. “Maria does really well for herself, and loves what she’s doing. She’d be more than happy to help you out, and there’s no shame in needing or wanting help.”
“I know.” Sammie pulled at a hangnail. “Yeah. Yeah, I think I’d really like to talk to her.”
“I’ll give her your number and have her reach out—”
A clangingcrashrang out through the brewery. Sammie was out of her seat in a flash, Luz a beat behind her. The sound had come from the direction of the canning line. She cursed as she rounded one of the tanks to see the cause of the clatter.
Sammie’s nails bit into her palm as she clenched her fist. She’dtoldCarson to keep his stacks straight.
Now she had three cases of beer busted and spilled across her brewhouse floor.
Luz was already buzzing around, salvaging as many of the cans as she could before running off to find the mop bucket. Carson stood at the end of the canning line, blinking slowly with a look of horror on his face.
“I’m so sorry,” he finally said, a hand going up to push his bangs back as he continued to take in the mess thathehad made.
“Just help Luz get it cleaned up.” Sammie didn’t even have the energy to be mad. Okay, maybe a little mad, but she was just so fucking tired of this week already, and it was only Tuesday.
Their morning had started with Luz struggling to dial in the machine, an hour wasted on the finicky tuning mechanisms as Sammie tried to help her with it. The first canning run had gone fine, although the vibrator she had zip-tied to the whale tale didn’t seem to be working as well as Sammie had hoped it would.
The second canning run had been where things had really started to fall apart. A paper jam in the label machine. A string of low fills that Carson failed to catch. And the afternoon heat was absolutelycookingthem, beating down on the concrete blocks that made up the walls. Even with the big garage door open and fans going, Sammie had sweat through her shirt.
She had just wanted to enjoy a peaceful lunch break.
The foamy beer seeping across the floor reminded Sammie that she needed to keep going, to push past her annoyance and get back to work. They’d just lost a good portion of the order they needed to have ready for pickup the next morning, so filling enough cans to make up for it would add another hour onto their already long day.
She pulled out her phone, pushing a harsh exhale out her nose as she tried to calm herself.
