“People have no idea how important that is to a successfully run business. If everyone gets along, if the atmosphere in here is great, people will recommend us.”
“Oh yes, because my affable fucking nature, not my immense ability with a tattoo needle, is what brings in all the recommendations,” Rae drawled.
Stu grunted. “It’s not your affable fucking nature or your ability with a tattoo needle that brings in the recommendations. It’s—”
“Cole,” she finished for him, throwing him a grin. “But I’m not bad either.”
Stu couldn’t help smiling at that. “Aye, you’re not bad either.”
“Right.” Simon turned toward us and shooed us with his hands. “Let Rae work.” He smiled at me as we walked out into the hallway. “So, are you accepting?”
I thought about it as I wandered after Stu into the main room. A customer waited at the counter and Simon hurried over to greet him while Stu stared at me expectantly.
So Rae had a mouth on her and I was guessing no filter between said mouth and her brain, but underneath the prickly demeanor I sensed a real affection for her employer and her colleague. Stu was loud and blunt but easygoing and laid-back. And Simon seemed just as easygoing and nice.
It couldn’t be the worst place to work.
Who was I kidding? They could be horrible and I’d still be accepting this job. I stuck out my hand. “Thank you. I’d be pleased to accept.”
Stu beamed, shaking my hand and with it my whole body again. “Brilliant. How does Monday sound?”
“Brilliant,” I echoed, smiling hugely for the first time in days, weeks even. I was relieved to finally be moving forward with my life.
Stu looked over his shoulder at Simon. “She said aye!”
Simon laughed. “Good news. Cole will love her.”
“Oh, aye.” Stu chuckled in a way that made me feel suddenly nervous. Who was Cole? Stu’s eyes twinkled. “I’m actually semiretired. I’m not around a lot, so I leave the running of the place to my manager, Cole. He’ll go over everything you need to know on Monday.”
I smiled weakly in response.
I suddenly had a very bad feeling in the pit of my stomach.
*
The room was cold and narrow, but at least it was a place to rest my head for now. Although that didn’t make the surroundings any less depressing. Not to mention I hated having to share the communal bathroom with the five other guests who were staying at the “hotel.”
I’d finished filling out the employee details form Stu had given me before leaving INKarnate. On the one hand I felt incredibly lucky to have secured a job so quickly, and on the other I was absolutely dreading meeting my new manager. I had to hope that he was just like Stu or even Simon. Not a bad boy.
Grumbling under my breath about the miscommunication that had landed me in this situation, I pushed away the form and picked up my phone. No messages. As if I really expected there to be any—I hadn’t been entirely visible back in Glasgow to my family, but at least I’d existed. Now it was like I’d been wiped from all recollection.
Ignoring the burn of anger in my gut, I got up and crossed the small room to where I’d piled my suitcases and five boxes with my belongings. I’d thrown most of my stuff out before moving. I thought it might help to purge myself of those memories in order to start over.
Searching through the boxes, I found the one I was looking for. The one box I’d kept from high school was the one with all my old sketch pads and art materials. Sketching always relaxed me—it took me out of myself for a little while. I seemed to need that a lot lately.
When I was packing up, I hadn’t had enough time to go through all my old drawings, but tonight I had nothing but time and four grim walls. I needed something to take my mind off my family problems, and I didn’t have money to buy any new books.
Hauling the box over to the bed, I wiped away the dust that had collected on the top of the sketch pads with an old T-shirt and curled up on the bed to look through them. Some of the older drawings made me smile. Drawing wasn’t something that had come particularly easy to me at first. I’d loved to do it but was never able to make a sketch come alive. Until a boy in my first-year class (one I happened to have a massive crush on) in high school showed me how to hold a sketch pencil correctly and how to stroke against the paper, not draw in hard, unbending lines.
From there I caught on quickly and I was hooked.
The art lasted. The first crush didn’t.
A sheet of paper fell out from the third sketch pad I’d picked up and suddenly I was reminded of another boy. A year ago I would have been able to look at the sketch and feel nothing but a prickle of pain—a ghostly reminder rather than the real thing.