Half of asking.If they could just come up a little bit. Another twenty-five grand or so…
That wouldjustpay off the loan my dad took on it twenty years ago, and the second I took on it to put him through rehab two times, and the third personal loan I’d taken from Gran to put him through rehab a third time. It would leave me with nothing, but I’d be free. Free to use my business degree and get a decent job, something that didn’t require mopping up vomit or roughing up drunkards. But if I was being honest, I liked owning the bar. Well, maybe notthisfailing bar, but I liked being my own boss, having my own business, not working in a cubicle.
A laundromat.
To see my father’s lifelong dream get turned into a laundromat might be worth selling at half of asking.
The phone rang, snapping me out of my thoughts. “Wayne’s Place, this is Ashton.”
“Ash, it’s Cruise.” My fry cook only called before a shift to say he wasn’t coming in. He sounded hungover.
“No, man. You can’t cancel. Maria left and I have no backup.”
“I’m sick, bro. You want me to bring the flu in and get all the customers ill?” He didn’t sound sick, he sounded tired.
“Yeah, that’s fine. I don’t care,” I told him. I was selling this shithole soon anyway.
He let a big fake cough rip. “Bro. I can’t.”
Mother fucker.
When you worked in the restaurant business as long as I had, you learned the difference between a real and a forced cough. A girl suddenly giggled in the background.
“You lying motherfucker!” I shouted, losing my temper. Maybe starting off my day with whiskey wasn’t a good idea.
“Hey, I have rights. I have rights to days off when I’m sick!” he snapped.
“Fuck you, Cruise. You’re fired.” I slammed the phone on the counter and the mouthpiece cracked. This place was going to go down in flames and I didn’t care anymore. The fryer was on its last leg anyway. I just wouldn’t serve food for a few days until Darcy got me a better offer. I would need to convince my grandma to sell it. She was co-signer on the bar for that third personal loan, so I’d have to run everything by her.
I glanced at my watch.
One hour until opening.
I should go for a walk, get fresh air, but it was too damned hot out for that.
My phone alarm blared, and I glanced down at it.
Meds.
Heading behind the counter, I started to robotically pop off the lids of the four different medications I took to keep my body from rejecting my donor heart. Every day, every time I took these pills, it was a reminder of that night. A reminder that I was here and my sister wasn’t. I held the handful of medicine in my palm for a second and considered not taking them. There was a darkness at the corner of my mind, lurking there ever since my twin died, and sometimes I wanted to fully let it in, to give in to those thoughts.
Shaking my head to clear my thoughts, I popped the pills into my mouth.
Chugging them down with tap water, I searched for a grief support meeting nearby on my phone. Maybe I could get to one before I had to open the bar. They seemed to be the only thing that helped. Hearing other people recounting their shitty lives was the only thing that made me feel normal, made me feel like I could keep going. I wasn’t suicidal, I didn’t want to kill myself, I just didn’t want to be alive. But I was starting to wonder if there was a difference.
Chapter 3
Millie
I banged on Julie’s door like a cop, much heavier and more aggressive than I’d intended, but with the amount of vodka rocking through my body, I wasn’t aware of my own strength.
Julie opened the door looking freshly showered and in cute pjs, holding a bottle of wine and popcorn. When she took in my clearly hammered and disheveled appearance, clutching an open bottle of vodka to my chest, she tried to yank the wine back, but I reached out and grabbed it. The two bottles clinked when I clutched them between my arms.
“I need this,” I slurred and stumbled into her apartment.
“So … you started early,” she observed.
I nodded, slowly, and the room spun as I did. “Right after our lunch, actually.”
