Apparently I don’t take rejection very well. I also don’t like it when my plans get messed up. When I have to recalculate. You think I’d be used to the latter and at least some of the former, but when I’d been rejected in the past I never took it personally. I never had time or the nerve to get involved with people, and when I did—such as with Jack back in Cincinnati—I was never really invested. My heart was a shallow instrument.
And yet here I was, lying in my bed, sheets tangled all over me, staring up at the ceiling where I used to tape pictures of my favorite bands, and feeling a little sorry for myself. Where had I gone wrong? I started analyzing every detail from the night before, from the way he smiled at me to the feel of his arm around me. He obviously wanted his bandmates to know we were an item, or that I belonged to him in some way. Perhaps that’s all it was. Maybe they made fun of him for not bagging chicks or something. I had a hard time believing that considering most women were falling all over themselves to talk to the 6’0” tat-covered hottie. He could have anyone he wanted, if he wanted them. But Camden wasn’t your usual guy. At least he hadn’t been.
I mulled it over and over and the only thing I could come up with was that he just didn’t like me “like that.” Which sucked, both for my secretly fragile self-esteem and for my ticket out of this place. In order for my scam to work, I needed to get into his place and take a look around. I needed to have a better look at his security system—if he had any—and find out where his safe was. Otherwise I’d be setting myself up for major trouble, something I had to avoid in this town for the sake of Uncle Jim.
Speaking of the devil, I could hear him puttering around in the kitchen and could smell the bacon frying in its own fat. My stomach growled and I rolled over into the fetal position. I’d spent $120 last night in the name of the game which left me only $80 to start a new life somewhere. My options looked bleak.
Soon my hunger won out over my pity party and I threw on some clothes and shuffled into the kitchen. Uncle Jim was scooping a batch of baked beans onto a plate and pursed his lips as soon as he saw me.
“Thought this would get you up,” he said, handing me the plate and a fork. “You came home late last night.”
I had to smile at his parent-like interrogation and slid onto the bar stool. “Oh, it wasn’t that late. I hope you weren’t waiting up for me.”
From the way he shrugged I could tell he was. He slid into the seat next to me and started pouring an obscene amount of hot sauce on his eggs. I chose Worcester sauce instead and drizzled it all over my plate.
“So how was it?”
I sighed. “It was really nice, actually. But I don’t think it went too well on his end.”
“No?”
“I don’t know. He just dropped me off. No kiss goodnight, no plans for the next days.”
He chuckled as he delicately sliced his eggs with a knife. “You mean you wait for the men to kiss you, Ellie? Boy, I thought your mother raised you differently.”
“Well, we know she barely raised me at all.”
He looked at me sharply then said softly, “She did the best she could. You were her number one priority.”
“Until…”
“Until…she made a mistake.”
“Sounds like you’re the one who’s coming around, Uncle Jim. Whatever happened to forever punishing us?”
“You’re here, aren’t you?”
I speared a few beans with my fork and ate them before my appetite totally disappeared. “Not for long.”
We sat in silence for a while, drinking our coffees and staring out the kitchen window at the sunny palm groves outside. When I lived up north for a bit, I often thought back to California and wondered how people could ever be sad in such constant sunshine. But the truth is, sadness and anger aren’t vampiric. If you let them, they’ll follow you around the world, sunshine and stakes be damned.
“I’m sorry your date didn’t go well,” he finally said after clearing his throat. “It’s probably for the best. There’s been some rumors about that boy anyway and you don’t want to get roped up in that.”
Now that caught my attention. “Rumors? Still?”
He let out a deep breath and shrugged, putting his elbows on the table. “I don’t know. I remember that boy being all queer and funny when you were young but now it’s something else. He hangs out with…bad people.”
I twisted in my seat and looked him square in the face. “I’m bad people.”
“Not like you, Ellie. I mean bad people. City people. I like to pretend that you have morals somewhere in your skinny little chest. These people don’t.”
I narrowed my eyes in thought. “How do you know all of this?”
“I hear things. It’s a small town still, people talk. Got nothing better to do. And it’s probably nothing, maybe he just knows some of the people his daddy arrests. But if you want to give something a reason, maybe it’s best that he broke things off like that. You don’t need to get dragged into anything.”
“I don’t think Camden is like that,” I mused. Then again, I didn’t really know Camden anymore.