The engine sputtered, working to turn on before a grinding noise made me pull the key out. I was scared if I kept trying I would cause more damage to the car that wouldn’t be fixable.
“Mama’s got a job now,” I told her, patting the pock-marked dash affectionately. “She’s going to get you fixed up in no time.”
Or at least I hoped I would be able to fix her. It was stupid to be so attached to a car, but it felt like it was me and Peep against the world right now, and I’d be damned if I left her behind.
With a sigh I began gathering my toiletries. On my walk back from the Wharf I spotted a gym on the corner of Main street. Most gyms offered some kind of a day pass and I was in desperate need of a shower.
But as soon as I stepped inside, I knew that I was in for a headache.
The front desk assistant looked human. She was dressed in athleisure wear and her long blonde hair was pulled up into a ponytail.
Blue eyes took in my ragged appearance from head to toe and as she did so, the friendly look in them quickly faded. Whatever greeting she was about to give me died on her lips as they twisted into a frown.
Steeling myself, I stepped up to the desk. “Hi, I’d like to purchase a day pass please.”
Silence.
It was as if she didn’t want to acknowledge my presence. But then, begrudgingly, she made eye contact.
“We don’t do day passes here,” her voice was terse and impatient, like she couldn’t wait for me to go away.
My eyes glanced down at the price options list laminated on the desk. In big, bold letters there was a price for a day pass.
“It says here that a day pass is ten dollars.” I pointed at the price, trying not to let the irritation I was feeling thread into my voice.
The woman scoffed. “Yes, but that is for people who are actually going to work out.”
My face heated, probably turning the same shade as my hair.
I opened my mouth to argue with her, my desire for a shower outweighing my pride, but I never got the chance to say anything.
“Stacy, how many times have I told you to be polite to customers,” a gruff voice came from the office behind the desk. A huge man with one eye yanked the door open to glare at the front desk assistant.
Holy shit, a cyclops,my brain whispered, short-circuiting a bit. When I was small, one of my mother’s security officers had been an old cyclops with a scarred face. Some of my earlier memories of my mother also included him hovering nearby. It was surreal to see another one as most of them tended to remain in their home country of Greece.
“ButAnders,” Stacy whined, turning to face the man fully, “she’s not even going to work out. Doesn’t that defeat the purpose of a gym?”
The man’s eye rolled. “Go wipe down the equipment before I send you home early without pay.”
Stacy pouted, looking like she wanted to argue, but then grabbed a spray bottle and a washcloth and stomped off to do as she was told.
“Sorry about that, Stacy’s the child of a friend and I told him I’d give her a job,” the man, Anders, told me with an apologetic smile.
I put the cash for the day pass down on the counter. “So, Icanget a day pass then?”
I just wanted to shower away all of the grime clinging to my body from my cross-country escape.
“Yes, of course,” Anders jumped in to type some things on the screen in front of him, putting my cash into the register and handing me some change. “In fact, as an apology I’ll even include these.”
With the change he handed me a small stack of extra day passes and my gaze was caught on the intricate tattoo on the inside of his wrist.
I stared at the day passes, not wanting to accept charity from someone I didn’t know… but I also knew it would be at least a week until my first paycheck from the shop and I’d need to be showered and clean every day for work.
“Thank you,” I finally said with a sigh, accepting the passes. “Cool tattoo by the way.”
Ander’s eye squinted as he grinned at me. “Thanks I got it on the Wharf at the tattoo parlor, you know it?”
I nodded, brightening at the mention of Monstrous Ink. “Yeah, actually I just started working there today.”
