She had run to my room and busted inside. My little sister had taken one look at me sitting on the edge of my bed and crawled onto it behind me, wrapping her arms around me.
“Did it go that bad?” she had asked.
“It was a C minus. It could have gone better, but it could have gone worse,” I admitted to her, sneaking my hands up to rest over the forearms covering my neck.
Lily had just hugged me tighter. “You want to tell me what happened?”
“They were there,” I told her vaguely. “Your mom is still on drugs. Dad looks like hell. Rudy grabbed my wrist, but I got him into an armbar, and Rip pretty much threatened to kick his ass, and then he left me alone.”
My beloved little sister kissed my head at least five times before saying, “You should’ve broken his arm.”
“I know.”
“Kicked him in the nuts.”
“Twice at least.”
“Spit in his eyes.”
“Vinegar would hurt more,” I tried to make her laugh, and I did it. It wasn’t a great, big laugh, but it was something.
“I’m glad Rip went with you,” she kept going, her voice lighter than it had been a minute before.
“Me too,” I told her forearm, resting my chin on it.
She hugged me even closer. “Tell me what your boss likes, and I’ll make it for him. He deserves it for threatening stupid Rudy.”
She didn’t know what I had done and had no idea that we had basically performed a business exchange. I wasn’t about to correct her. She had enough to worry about, so I had just nodded.
Her hand rubbed my back as she said, “Come on. Let’s go to Red Lobster and take advantage of my employee discount before it runs out. My treat.”
That was how we ended up going to Red Lobster for an early dinner and then going to the movies afterward. To keep my mind off things, Lily had claimed, and it had done the trick, at least until I tried going to sleep. Then it had all come back to me. The way my dad had ignored me, like I was dead to him. What my cousin had done. The hundred and one memories I didn’t let myself think about from years ago.
Nothing helped me wind down, and nothing had kept me asleep when I had managed to doze off. I tossed and turned the entire night, thinking about all the things I should have done differently and all the things I wouldn’t have done any differently.
I was healthy. I had somewhere to live. I had people who cared about me.
And I had found a brand-new lipstick in my underwear drawer that I’d forgotten all about.
Lily and I had had some good bonding time.
I managed to leave for work before my sister left her room. I had forgotten all about what day of the week it was and what it meant.
There were our weekly meetings, and then there were our monthly meetings. Our monthly meetings were that one time every four weeks where the employees got to vent, not just Mr. Cooper or Ripley. It was everyone else’s turn.
I hated them.
Maybe it was mostly because of the day before, or maybe it was because I would have rather been in the booth working instead of sitting in a chair in the break room, listening to the guys complain about each other.
Because that’s what the meetings were for: bitching. Lots and lots of bitching. I hated it.
The meetings were a necessary evil though. Over the years, I had seen things get so heated between the guys that fights would break out. I’d worked around this many men for so long that I got that they couldn’t just get over things eventually. The problem was, if anyone got into an altercation, they would get fired.
It had happened before, and I was sure it was going to happen again, monthly meetings or not.
So, for an hour, maybe an hour and a half depending how stressed out and pissed off the guys were, I mainly just sat there and stared off into space so I wouldn’t get called out for having my eyes closed. I’d spent most of my childhood zoning out people arguing; this was nothing.
Nothing but boring.
And annoying.
And honestly a little painful.
With the exception of Jason, I really liked everyone I worked with. I couldn’t get why they didn’t let the petty crap go.
“…and it’s bullshit that I’m stuck doing all the sanding while everybody else pretends they’re busy doin’ somethin’ so that they can jump in and do the filler. My fu—damn arm gets tired too,” Jason muttered from his spot on the opposite side of the table, elbows on his knees, his face looking as irritated as his voice sounded.
Even I rolled my eyes.
It was Miguel who tossed his hands up in the air. “You’re full—”
Mr. Cooper sighed and shifted in the seat beside me. I hadn’t gotten around to telling him how the day before had gone, but he’d given me a hug when I sat down beside him, so I figured he had an idea from my body language that it hadn’t been great.
There was a groan before Miguel continued talking. “You don’t always do all the sanding. Quit exaggerating.”
I kept from making a face and let my eyelids hang low.
“Seems like it. Everybody needs to pull their weight around and do equal work. I wanna do the body filler too. I do bodywork. I don’t just sand.”
“And I don’t just…” my coworker went on while I zoned him out to focus on the man who had held my hands and put his jacket around my shoulders not twenty-four hours before.
My eyes zeroed in on the sliver of tattoos along Rip’s neck. I had brought him his coffee just like normal that morning, and he’d told me thank you just like normal too. There hadn’t been anything that indicated things were different.
That had made me feel a lot better about the day before than I would have expected.
The guys babbled on for a while longer, but I took the time to go through my mental list of what I needed to pick up at the store today for Lily’s graduation before I went home. She didn’t want balloons because she didn’t want us to waste helium on her. I had already called to make a reservation at a restaurant for a late lunch after the ceremony, but I knew that there would be at least a few people who went back to the house with us. So I needed to grab some snacks to feed them. Drinks. Ice. Chips—
“…spend this week in the booth.”
The booth? The words snatched me right out of my head. I glanced over at Mr. Cooper, who had started talking at some point, and focused on my favorite older man.
“You good with that, Luna?” His eyes focused on me like he hadn’t noticed that I wasn’t paying attention.
Shit.
“What was that?”
His expression said he was fine with repeating himself. “Jason will be helping you out in the booth for the next few weeks, starting today.”
Oh, no.
No, no, no, no.
“I’m not that far behind on things.” I smiled, pressing my hand against my stomach subconsciously. “If I need help, I know I can ask.” I made sure to keep my eyes on my boss and keep a smile on my face.
“We talked about Jason learning the booth, remember?”
Everyone in the room turned to look at Jason. Jason, the guy who purposely didn’t finish projects so I would get stuck doing so. Jason, the one who got way too much enjoyment when I got in trouble. Jason, the jerk who had cheated on my little sister.
Jason, the guy who knew I knew he sucked and hadn’t liked me since.
Great.
All I managed to get myself to do was nod and let my smile turn tight.
I didn’t want to even look at him. I didn’t like him, he definitely didn’t like me, and the only way we worked together was by giving each other a ton of room and space.
Double great.
“I know you can catch up, but you don’t need to stay late if you can get some help and knock things out faster,” Mr. Cooper continued, giving me a warm smile like he genuinely thought he was doing me a favor.
I didn’t need to glance at Jason to know why I would rather stay until midnight than have him help.
What was up with me and these jerks in my life? It was like God wanted me to meet the best and worst in extremes. There was no in-between with anyone I met.
“You good with that, Jason?” Mr. Cooper asked him.
From behind me, the guy I honestly couldn’t stand said, “Yup.”
Yup.
Of course this would happen.