“Why the heck you ain’t say you was shopping for Pup’s birthday? Lemme get this together for you,” he mutters, sliding the case’s door open and snatching the sticky note off the top of the German chocolate cake. “You supposed to lead with that around here, you know that, right?”
“Lead with what?” I frown, ignoring the sweat forming under my armpits.
“Lead with ‘Pup.’” He laughs. “He ain’t teach you that?”
“N—”
“How’s his ole’ Pops doing?”
I almost laugh in disbelief, but I hold it in as he rushes around behind the counter to pack up my order that didn’t exist five minutes ago.
“He’s…he’s doing okay,” I utter back.
I don’t know where the lie came from, it just tumbled out. Mr. Copeland glances over his shoulder, raising his eyebrow.
Jesus, please don’t ask me anything else about this man or his family.
I take another step back in case I need to make a run for it.
“Oh yeah? Tell that ole’ buster we miss him causing havoc around here, but I understand with his health and Pup’s circumstances that things might be a lil’ tough right now, ya know?”
“His circumstances?”
“Mhmm. You know Pup is the last of a dying breed around here, and that’s the problem. Ain’t no more real men anymore—just a bunch of boys that need correcting,” he murmurs, hinting at that dark air of mystery that seemed to follow Rich.
Everybody dances around its edges, but nobody wants to poke it and let the truth trickle out, and what kind of pretend friend would I be if I didn’t know what trouble my “friend” had gotten himself tangled in that had his new boss upset with him?
“Right…well, you know, with great power comes great responsibility,” I mutter back, quoting Lucky’s nerdy Spider-Man loving son.
He howls out a laugh, pulling the cake out of the box and inspecting its brown layers. “Now that’s a good one.”
I nod awkwardly, biting my bottom lip. “Spider-Man…it’s…it’s from Spider-Man. Uncle Ben said it.”
“I gotta watch that one of these days.”
His glasses slide down his nose as he sits the cake on the counter and grabs a pastry bag. “What about Arnez? How’s she doing? I ain’t been down to Lucky’s in a while so I been missing her. I heard she started taking classes at Lockwood. I’m proud of her. It’s never too late to start fresh.”
Arnez?
“Uh…Arnez is good,” I reply.
“Still causing trouble?”
“All the time.” I fling my hand out. “That’s…that’s Arnez. Always been a troublemaker.”
I belt out a fake laugh, swiping my sweaty hands down the length of my dress.
“Oh yeah, I remember the days she used to get Pup in a headlock and tear his tail up. You know why we call him that, right?”
I shake my head, staring at his wrinkled, trembling hands.
“When he was little he used to follow his ole’ man around everywhere—the car wash, Jazzy’s, Lucky’s.” He smiles big, exposing the gold implant on his canine tooth. “So… so we used to say, ‘Senior, that boy follow you around like a goddamn puppy or something.’ He was smaller back then—nothing but a lil’ ole’ runt. Senior couldn’t do nothing but laugh when we said that, so from then on we called him ‘Pup.’Everybodycalls Junior ‘Pup.’”
Another cloud of flutters dances around in my stomach as I hang on to every word that comes out of Mr. Copeland’s mouth. In all the years I’ve seen him behind that counter, I’ve never seen him smile so much. I swear his only delight ever came from turning away unprepared customers like me, but not today. Today, he talks about Rich like I hear people talk about Uncle Kenny, but the praise for Rich is different. He talks about Rich like he would’ve come up with those six dozen teacakes that he couldn’t come up with for Uncle Kenny.
He holds the pastry bag over the cake and starts to squeeze it, but stops. “Anything special I ought to put on here? I never knew Pup to celebrate his birthday.”
More sweat prickles my armpits as I mull over the little pieces of Rich’s business Mr. Copeland feeds me.
