“Fifty grand…give or take ten grand,” Len says firmly. Her blue eyes finally look up and meet mine and when she sees my pale face she adds. “Not too bad. I think you’ll be able to make that at the Hamptons thing.”
“So sixty thousand dollars?” I croak, feeling sick.
“Fifty…give or take ten grand,” she repeats, pauses, and relents. “Yeah. Sixty. It just feels less painful the other way.”
“Fuck. Fuck. Fuckity, fuck, fuck.”
“Brie, seriously, we can do this.” Len covers my hand with hers on the desk. “I’m bringing everyone I know. And I will make sure they donate. We can do this.”
“I hope so,” I say and force myself not to dwell on it. I’ll panic after the fund-raiser, if I have to, not now. I can’t even think about losing this place. I won’t. I stand up. “Time to tackle the classroom. The art teacher who came in last night to teach sketching didn’t clean up afterward.”
Len looks up. “How’s Hesperia? Have you heard from her?”
I smile. She loves to pretend she’s an ice queen but Eleanor Levitt is a big old ball of mush. Hesperia is one of our recent success stories. She came to Daphne’s House two years ago when she was sixteen after she’d run away from her fifteenth foster home. She was easily angered and had major trust issues, but we convinced the judge to let her into our unsupervised housing facility and skills program and he did. Hesperia stuck with the program here, taking all our life skill classes and seminars and even earned her GED. She never once broke the rules. She left seven months ago after snagging a job and finding a room to rent in the Bronx. “Yes. She’s passed her probation period at work and got a bit of a pay bump. She’s loving the job and her roommates. She said she’s even started a little savings account and is thinking of taking college courses online.”
“Yes!” Len raises her hand for a high five and I give her one.
“I invited her to the fund-raiser so you can get her to praise your amazing accounting courses when you see her there,” I say with a chuckle.
Len feigns offense. “I don’t do it for the praise. That’s just something I have to endure, because I am an inspiring and incredible human. Not my fault.”
“Eleanor Levitt, don’t ever change,” I giggle.
“You either, Gabrielle Bennett.” She winks at me. “I’m going to stick around and get some other work done. Can I squat here?”
“Of course,” I say, heading for the door. “Feel free to come help me clean if you’re bored.”
“I’ll never be that bored, sweetheart.”
I’m smiling as I close the door and head down the hall to the classroom. I feel pride as I walk down the long, narrow first-floor hallway. Daphne’s House has been my dream since I was little. It’s a last chance for kids who haven’t had any luck. It’s not a shelter or a group home. It’s a semi-independent living facility, set up like a boardinghouse. The teens have their own bedrooms with locking doors, but they share bathrooms, a kitchen and living space. Everyone lives rent-free but must go to school or be working on their GEDs and take at least three of our offered life skill classes—be it cooking, fitness and nutrition or the budgeting and accounting classes. We also offer GED classes and art therapy, as well as yoga and meditation. We give them a safe place to start living on their own and the skills to do it successfully.
I turn into the large classroom and get started cleaning up. As I start putting away easels, I hear Selena, one of our full-time employees, talking in the hall. She’s doing the orientation for the prospective volunteers. I was hoping to do it with her but I’m more behind than I realized.
“And what’s the age range for the kids?” a female voice asks Selena.
“All of the kids are between the ages of sixteen and seventeen and they’ve all been approved by the courts for this type of living. They move out when they turn eighteen. Of course we help find them living situations afterward and have even cosigned leases for them.”
“That’s amazing,” I hear someone else say. I turn off the water I’m currently washing some brushes in and gently place them in the sink. “I’m impressed.”
“I was impressed too when I researched this place. I’m even more impressed now that I work here,” Selena tells him as I turn from the sink to look at the entryway. I can’t see them. I want to go out there, but I don’t want to interrupt either. Selena is doing a great job on her own. “They do really great work. The owner is incredibly dedicated to the cause.”
“So is there an age restriction?” another voice asks.
“We’ve never had someone come here under sixteen,” Selena tells him. “It’s much harder to get the courts to allow someone much younger to live in such an unrestricted environment. For some reason they still think that sticking them in a foster home with an adult that they don’t know or trust is better than no adult at all.”
Selena goes back into explaining what we do here. As I’m about to step in the hall to greet everyone, I hear the front door buzz behind me. I glance over my shoulder as a person seems to explode into the room. He’s a blur of broad shoulders and dark fabric and towers over me more than any kid here. He must have been expecting to run or something after he entered because his forward motion is so aggressive that he bumps into me before he can stop himself. I stumble about as gracefully as a drunk chicken. I grab the wall to stop myself from slamming into it. I turn to fully take in whoever the hell just did that.
Our eyes lock and it’s like we’re colliding again.
“Colisse!” He exhales the French swear word under his breath.
“What are you doing here?” I demand. Did this jackass hockey player follow me? Oh my God that would be insane. Is he insane?
“I’m here for the volunteer info session,” he replies.
“You’re Alex?” Selena interrupts looking at the clipboard in her hand. “I thought you weren’t going to make it.”
“I’m sorry I’m late. I’m new to the city and I underestimated my commute,” he explains to her and then he somehow manages to give her a fairly dazzling smile, which she returns with her typical friendly one. “Well if you want to join the rest of the tour, I can explain what you missed afterward.”
