"No, I get it," I denied. "There’s something nice about feeding people comfort food. Stuff that puts a smile on their faces. Maybe not when you’re slogging for minimum wage and tips, but it’s honest work at least."
"Exactly. Imagine if this place was your pride and joy and you’d been working here for forty years?"
"It’d be like getting rid of family."
He nodded. "It would."
As I studied him, surprised by the insight, the waitress came over and said, "Don’t know what miracles you worked on Old Fred, but he said you don’t have to pay your tab."
Storm just smiled and gave her his thanks, and though we didn’t leave immediately, finishing up the rest of the other slices of pie on the table and hanging around until Cyan was yawning and ready for bed, I noticed that when we got up, Storm left a fifty-dollar note under a dish when he thought I wasn’t looking.
Dear Keira
I watched you play Helena in that school play today.
I think they miscast you though. At least, I hope they did.
Did you know I never read Shakespeare before you? But when Jimmy told me about the play, told me why you were staying so late after school, I had to know more.
He thinks I’m weird. He doesn’t say anything because he’s only a Prospect and Rex and I are like brothers, but he probably thinks I’m a creep on top of being weird.
I don’t care what he thinks, though. I’m just glad he goes to Jackson High.
You don’t know this, but I make him check up on you. I make sure he keeps you safe. One of the clubwhores’ girls is in your year. I asked Kendra to watch over you too.
Did you know that Jamie Grier was going to ask you to Prom?
Kendra overheard him talking about you with his friends.
He was going to slip something into your drink, honey. You didn’t know that, did you? You’ll never know, either. I’ll make sure of that. Just like I’ll make sure you’re always safe.
You should have played Hermia.
She was strong. Helena followed after Lysander like a lost puppy. That ain’t you. I know that. I can see the fire in your eyes, but I don’t think you know it’s there.
I wonder what will make you see yourself how I see you.
I hope I’m around when you realize it. I bet it’s a glorious sight.
Just like you on that stage.
Glorious.
Yours,
Storm
Dear Diary
Senior Year
God, I hate being on the stage so much. Now that Midsummer Night’s Dream is over, I finally feel like I can breathe again.
I hate that Dad makes me do this stuff. Would Johns Hopkins really not accept me because this wasn’t on my application?
Either way, it’s done. It was bullshit, and that bitch, Jilly Harlan, was Hermia. I can’t believe I had to play Helena. Although… Hermia stands up to her dad, and I can’t stand up to him long enough to get out of acting in a shitty play, so maybe Mr. Rogers saw something in me that makes it look like I’m a frickin’ pushover.
I hate that Helena got Hermia’s leftovers. Demetrius didn’t love her. He loved Hermia. But some bullshit love spell gave her her happily-ever-after. What kind of ending is that?
There were two high points to everything, though. Now it’s over, I don’t have to worry about disappointing Dad, and amid all the anxiety of the performance, I want to say that I saw The Biker there.
At least, I’m pretty sure I saw him in the seats.
Maybe that’s just my new obsession talking, though. Maybe I was seeing things. Maybe it was just stupid wishful thinking? Although, why I’d wish for him to be there, watching me in a stupid play, playing a weak ass heroine, I don’t know.
There’s something about him that calls to me.
You know, I was in the middle of that stupid scene at the beginning where Demetrius is all up in Hermia’s business and Helena was just left to watch on like a total moron, and the doors to the theater opened up. The lights are really bright on stage, but I was tilted just so that I saw it open. That’s when I’m sure I saw him. It was too hard to catch his features, but that streak of hair—I’ve never seen anyone but him with that.
Does he have a kid at Jackson High or something? He doesn’t look old enough, and I think someone would have admitted to being related to him if he was… It must be my eyes playing tricks on me. Yeah, it must be that.
Although, I’m sure that believing he was there made me put more energy into the character. Mr. Rogers was talking about casting me in the next play, and I backed the hell away from that. Acting is not my calling. No way, no how.
I wonder what The Biker’s name is.
If I asked Jimmy, I wonder if he’d tell me. It’s not like we’re friends, after all. But what’s in a name?
Seventeen
Storm
PRESENT
Godspeed - Frank Ocean
"Asher?"
I jerked my head to the side, relieved when my neck cracked. "Hey."
"Haven’t heard from you in a while," Christopher, my new NA sponsor, said calmly.
If he’d been a jackass about it, I’d probably have hung up but the guy had led the Narcotics Anonymous meetings in Manhattan where I attended for a long time, so he knew how junkies worked.
Even if I hadn’t had anything more chemical than sugar and aspartame sliding through my veins for two decades, I would always be a junkie.
People who said they were ex-addicts were fucking liars.
We were all in recovery.
All of us just waiting for that one day when shit’d hit the fan and we’d end up drowning in our vices.
I jerked my neck to the side again, needing to feel that crack.
"Storm?"
"I’m here. Thanks for answering. Wasn’t sure if you’d be busy."
"I’m glad you called," was Christopher’s serene answer. The guy was always like that. It was as if he’d swallowed Gandhi whole or something.
I wanted some of that fucking peace for myself.
"My family moved down to Ohio," I told him abruptly, staring at the plants on the window ledge.
Slowly but surely, they were starting to take over this house as well as my office at the clubhouse. Either Keira hadn’t noticed, or she didn’t care.
Eyeing the wilting leaf on a geranium plant, I tried to collect my thoughts, tried to figure out why I’d called Christopher in the first place, but my mind was blurry.
Cyan was at gymnastics practice, and because it was a three-hour training session, I’d come home. The house was empty because Keira was on a date.
A fucking date.
My jaw worked again as the desire to crack my neck hit me once more, but I had a feeling the only relief that’d come from that was if I tore my head clean off.
Ever since the MC had bought Pies You Like It, Keira had decided that she wanted to work there. I wasn’t sure what was going on with that, but I wasn’t going to argue because what the fuck did I know about running a diner? It was a relief she wanted to get involved. One more thing off my to-do list.