“Not sure yet, Klaus.”
“Have you left your job?”
“Ah, just evaluating.” Blue couldn’t outright lie.
“I thought you loved it there?”
“And I do, but I’m thinking it may be time for a change,” she lied.
She could feel the weight of both sets of eyes on her. Blue had never been very good at keeping things inside. She’d learned techniques to do that, but still, some people could crack her open wider than a nut in seconds.
“So what really happened?” Klaus asked. He handed the coffee through the window to Bart and then handed Blue one. “It’s apple tea. It helps. Plus the muffins.”
She handed them to Bart and then sniffed the cup. “What does it help with?”
“Everything.” His smile was gentle and for some odd reason made her want to cry.
I’m clearly losing it.Work kept me sane, and now I don’t have a focus. I’m a mess.
She sipped, and the crisp, tart taste of apple made her hum in approval.
“Told you so,” Klaus said.
“Right, then,” Bart said, turning in his seat, which put his shorts in a far more compromising situation. “What’s the deal?You have our ears, and we can keep secrets unlike the rest of this town.”
Blue focused on her cup. He wasn’t wrong. These two only talked or shared things they’d heard if they felt it was needed.
She leaned her head back on the rest and closed her eyes briefly. “I haven’t told my family, so if this gets out, I know who to come after.”
Both men nodded solemnly.
“I was told to teach a new girl, who is related to the company owners I worked for. She stole one of my designs and pitched it as her own. When I complained and demanded she be reprimanded, they told me to get over myself and that it was no big deal.”
“Shitweasels,” Klaus snapped.
She looked at him. “I’ve never heard you swear, Klaus.”
The man was now sipping innocently from his cup.
“And so you left because they have the morals of alley cats, and you were raised better than that,” Bart said. He was now eating a muffin.
“Yes. I know it was rash, but I’d been there for eight years, and they should have shown me more respect.”
“Agreed,” Klaus said.
She wasn’t sure why now felt like the right time to talk about it, but it did. Of course she’d told Lynx loosely what had gone down, and he’d said she’d done the right thing, but they hadn’t discussed it fully, as he’d been focused on touring.
“Blue, what I’ve always found is that when someone shows you their true colors, you need to understand they’re not likely to change,” Bart said. “In my opinion, you absolutely made the right move.”
“I’ll add to that,” Klaus said. “It may seem hard right now that the path you’d decided to take has deviated, but that’s often a good thing.”
“Klaus is right,” Bart agreed. “Now is the time for you to take another direction, Blue. You’re smart, with oodles of talent, and you have support. There is more in your future. You just need to wade through the grief and anger to find it.”
She looked first at Bart and then at Klaus, who was now looking at something behind her car.
“Thank you both. I probably needed to hear your words. I thought I had my future mapped out, you know, and then this happened. It’s derailed me.”
And sleeping with Jay Haddon didn’t help.But she kept that thought to herself.
