“I wanted to get to know you.”
“Pfft! Bullshit.”
“I’m serious!”
“Do not think that I won’t tuck and roll out of this car while it’s moving,” I warn.
“Are you always this suspicious of men that show interest in you?”
His question brings me pause. “Yes,” I answer, unable to hold it back.
“Honestly…” His chuckle falls. “It kinda… pissed me off when he told me to stay away from you.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. He told you to stay away from us, right?” he asks. “I dare you to say that your first instinct wasn’t to go jump the bones of the first one of us you could find.”
I smile. “Maybe a little.”
He looks straight ahead, the edge of his lips twitching slightly in satisfaction while I glance out the window beside me.
“Junior, where exactly are you taking me? We just passed a damn farm.”
“Patience, woman.”
“If you’re planning on murdering me, I’m gonna go ahead and warn you that I am highly trained in many forms of stage combat.”
“Stage combat?” He laughs. “Uh-oh. Better gird my loins.”
“Damn right.”
We enter a small town off the highway and by small, I mean small.
“Oh, I get it,” I joke. “You’re not going to kill me, but the children of the corn will. Okay.”
He says nothing but he fires a sly glance at me from the corner of his eyes before turning off the road into a parking lot. It’s more populated than any other area of the town and my shoulders grow a little tense.
Junior turns the car off. “Also, I forgot to ask… Do you like pizza?”
“Yes,” I answer. “I like pizza.”
“How about skee-ball?”
“Skee-ball?”
He nods. “Yeah, skee-ball.”
“I hold no strong feelings about it in either direction.”
“Good.” He unbuckles his seatbelt. “Let’s go have some fun.”
While the outside looks old and worn, the inside is full of color and life. Arcade games line three whole walls, leaving a counter on the fourth wall for people to order food and drinks or exchange tickets for prizes. I glance around, spotting multiple families sitting around with children racing back and forth between parents and machines to gather quarters to play.
“Hey, Junior!”
The old man behind the counter shouts his name and Junior beams. “Hey, Frank!”
“Where’s Maggie tonight?”
Junior shrugs. “No idea.”
Frank passes a kind glance back at me and smiles. “What can I get you and the lady?”
“Two big slices, two colas, and enough tokens to choke the machine.”
“Coming right up, Junior.”
Frank turns and passes through a curtain into the kitchen.
I stare at Junior, pausing until the old man is out of earshot. “Who’s Maggie?”
He searches my eyes for envy that isn’t there. “Maggie is my sister.”
“Ahh…”
Frank sidles back through the curtain with two huge paper plates, each with a giant slice of pepperoni pizza laying on top. “Here you go, you two,” he says, slapping them down on the counter between us. He reaches below into a small fridge and pulls out the sodas as well.
“Thanks, Frank,” Junior says, passing a crisp twenty over to him.
Frank snatches it up, opens his cash register, and counts back the change in nothing but quarters. “Let me know if you need anything,” he says, his wrinkled eyes shifting between us. “Refills, more tokens…” he leans closer to Junior, “mood music.”
“I’ll let you know.” Junior juts his head back, signaling for me to follow him.
I grab my plate and drink and we navigate through the sporadic minefield of tables and running children, all the way into the back where a lonely table for two sits off to the side in the quiet corner.
“I guess you and your sister come here a lot?” I ask, taking the seat across from Junior as he sits down.
“Sometimes,” he answers. “Not as often as we did growing up, but sometimes.”
I pause. “You grew up here?”
Junior picks up his pizza, easily balancing it in one hand. “No, about twenty minutes more down the highway. Frank’s an old friend of my dad’s, so we came here… almost every weekend when we were kids.”
I glance around, trying to imagine what Junior was like as a child. I can barely even remember what I was like as a little kid. I certainly didn’t get to go to places like this very often… if at all. “It’s nice. I like it.”
“Wait until you try the pizza,” he says, chewing softly. “I’ve never had better — but you might have, I guess. You’re from New York, right?”
“I am.” I slide my plate a little closer. “Let’s give this a try…”
I pick up the huge slice with both hands and fold the crust to make it easier to hold on to before taking a big bite of it. The cheese melts the instant it hits my tongue, mixing with a thick sauce and an even thicker pepperoni. My taste buds dance.
“Oh, wow,” I say, setting it down and covering my mouth. “That’s good.”
“Yes, it is.”
“It…” I swallow it down. “It kind of reminds me of this street vendor near the boarding school I used to go to...”
Junior takes a swig of his soda. “Boarding school?”
“The drop-off zone for absentee parents everywhere,” I say. “Cary Pierce wasn’t exactly around and my mom… well… she liked to enjoy herself.”
“Ahh…”
“Could have been worse, I guess.”
“Where is your mom now?”
Her face flashes in my memory but only for a brief second. “She died a few years ago.”
Junior’s face falls. “Oh, I’m sorry.”
“No, it’s okay,” I say. “Strange enough, I didn’t really know her that well. I’ve kind of looked after myself my whole life, for the most part.”
He stares at me for a moment, no doubt dying to ask more questions, but he keeps it simple. “Do you miss it? New York, I mean?”
“Yeah.” I nod. “But it was either stay there without the ability to pay for it or come here to live with dad…”
“Tough choice.”
“He promised me it’d be worth it. Not sure why that promise felt more legit than every other one but here I am.” I take another bite to avoid Junior’s inquisitive eyes, licking my lips to get as much of that delicious cheese flavor I can. “But… I kind of like it around here, too.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah, everyone’s so nice and welcoming in the Midwest.”
He shakes his head. “They just want in your pants.”
I laugh, nearly choking on my soda. “Well, I guess that explains it.”
“I mean… I don’t want to speak for everyone, but…” He scratches his cheek, smiling wide. “Once word gets out that all it takes to get you to go out on a date is flashing you, they probably won’t be so nice anymore.”