And, to top it all off, I now realize that Porter was never checking out my legs—he’d been staring at my shoes the entire time.
My cheeks catch re. I want to melt into a puddle and slide under the tacky orange carpet. I can’t look at him now, much less come up with a witty response. My mind has ipped on the autopilot switch and blanked out, and all I’m aware of is the sound of my own pulse throbbing in my ears. I’m so numb, I can’t even manage to feel anything more than the smallest drop of relief when Pangborn shows up and swaps groups with Porter so we can tour the other wing.
I swear, if I never see that boy again, it’ll be too soon. And if life is the least bit fair, I’ll be assigned a job that’s light-years away from him. I’ll do anything. Clean toilets. Take out trash. I’ll even make announcements on that stupid-ass phone. As long as it means I’ll have little to no contact with Porter freaking Roth, I’ll do it with a smile. Because one of his job requirements seems to be Getting a Laugh at Bailey’s Expense, and I would rather get on a plane and y back home to Mom and Nate if that’s how things are going to be around here.
I think about Alex, and how much better I’d feel if I could go home and tell him about all this. He would de nitely sympathize. And I need someone to vent to, because, really, could this day get any worse?
When the tour is over, and we get our schedule assignments from Mr. Cavadini, I nd out the answer to that is: yes, oh hell yes, it sure enough can.
I stare at my printed schedule in disbelief. I’ve been assigned to ticketing.
LUMIÈRE FILM FANATICS COMMUNITY
PRIVATE MESSAGES>ALEX>NEW!
@mink: I started my summer job today. It was terrible. I hate it more than Dick Van Dyke’s fake accent in Mary Poppins.
@alex: WHOA. That’s a lot of hate, gov’ner! Are you still working with your mom like last summer? Or am I not supposed to ask? Is this a Forbidden Zone topic? I’m mentally checking the list and don’t see it on there. @mink: Not my mom. (It’s on the list, but I’ll give you a break this time. The list IS kinda long.)
@alex: You can shorten it any time you’d like. Say the word and I’ll give you my e-mail. Or even my *gasp* real name!
@mink: o.O
@alex: All right, all right. Tell me about your terrible, no-good, really bad day. Does your boss suck?
@mink: Eh. Too soon to tell. I got stuck with the crap assignment and one of my coworkers is a colossal dickbag. He’s going to make my life miserable. I can already tell.
@alex: Make him miserable right back. You are Mink! Hear you roar! @mink: *cough* *sputter* *broken meow* @alex: Chin up. You’ll best this loser. Boys are dumb. @mink: So true. How was your day, BTW? @alex: Not bad. Now that summer’s started, I’m back to the full-time, two-job routine. Usually I get all the dimwit coworkers at my main job, but maybe they sent them your way. Besides, I’m still holding out hope that my groovy friend Mink might get up the nerve to come visit her dad this summer and come see North by Northwest at the film festival with me. How can you resist Hitchcock? (And you call yourself a film snob. Prove it!)
“Whatever happened to chivalry? Does it only exist in ’80s movies?”
—Emma Stone, Easy A (2010)
4
?e rest of my training is a blur. I’m not even sure how I manage to nd my way back to my dad’s house. All I know is by the time Pete Rydell walks in from work, I’m armed and ready with a memorized list of calm, collected reasons as to why I can’t work at the Cave … which quickly degenerates into me at-out begging him to please-please-please let me quit. But he’s not having it. Not even when I promise to apply to Pancake Shack and bring us home free pancakes every day for life. “It’s just a ticket booth, Mink,” he says, abbergasted that I could be so bent out of shape about taking money from strangers. And when I try to justify my bitter dislike of Porter, one of his eyebrows is lifted by so much rising suspicion, it could in ate a hot air balloon. “?e boy we almost hit on the crosswalk?”
“I know, right?” He remembers the drugged-out friend. He sees the light now.
Only, he doesn’t. ?ings are now being said about how much trouble he went through to pull strings to get this job, and how bad it would look for me to quit so early, and how living out here isn’t cheap, especially on a single parent’s salary—one that isn’t a lawyer’s salary, like Mom’s—and that he’d like me to help pay for the insurance on the Vespa and my cell phone bill.
“?is is good for you,” he says in a softer voice, squeezing my shoulders. He’s still in his CPA long sleeves and tie, not in one of his geeky 1980s sci- T-shirts, so he looks like more of a responsible adult at the moment. And I don’t ever remember him being this decisive and rm. It’s weird, and I’m not sure how I feel about it. It’s making me a little emotional. “I know you don’t believe me now, but you will. Sometimes you have to endure painful things to realize that you’re a whole lot stronger than you think.”
Ugh. He’s so earnest. I know he’s talking about what he went through in the divorce, and that makes me uncomfortable. I blow out the long, deep sigh of a girl defeated and duck out of his kind fatherly grip in one smooth movement, instantly feeling relief.
Once I have time to think things over rationally, I understand where he’s coming from … in theory. If the point of me sticking it out at the Cave is because I need to be bringing in my own paycheck and showing him that I can be responsible, I’ll just have to tough it out somehow. Figure out a way to see as little of Porter Roth as possible.
I might be an evader, but I suppose I’m no quitter. It’s just a summer job anyway, right? ?at’s what I tell myself.
Besides, I have other things to think about.
?e next morning, I break out a map of Coronado Cove the second Dad’s car has rumbled out of earshot. Time to do a little detective work. ?e Cave didn’t schedule me for my rst real shift until tomorrow, so at least I have one day of respite before I’m forced to start serving my jail term. I’d already messaged Alex, but he doesn’t answer right away. I’m wondering if that’s because he’s at the day job. During the school year, he only works the day job after school, and every once in a while on the weekends. But now that it’s summer, he said he’s working there pretty much every morning, and clocking in at another job later.
My stomach goes haywire just thinking about it.
?is is what I know about Alex’s day job: I know that it’s a family business, and that he hates it. I know that the business is on the beach, because he’s said that he can see the waves from the window. I also know that there’s a counter, so obviously it’s a retail business. A retail shop on the boardwalk. ?at narrows it to… I dunno, about several hundred stores? But two details that may help me pin him down are ones that seemed unimportant when he rst mentioned them. First: He complains that the scent of cinnamon constantly makes him hungry because a churro cart is nearby. Second: He feeds a stray beach cat that suns itself outside the shop and answers to the name Sam-I-Am.
Not a lot, but it’s a start.
