The café is virtually silent. After a minute, people start to talk again.
I bury my clenched fingers under my chin.
“So,” Charlie finally says. “Did you lose your phone?”
The booth seat creaks as he shifts.
“It’s one thing when someone tells you that they love you, to not say it back. I get it. But was it too much trouble to let me know that you made it back to Seattle?”
I can’t say anything.
“Look at me.” He reaches over and clasps my chin in his hand. “Is this because you lost? Really? You got second place and you should be damn proud of that. Or is this about something else?”
My eyes are wet so I close them. He kisses me on one cheek, then the other, and then his lips are on mine. He lets go of my face.
“Is this about us?” he breathes.
There’s something about the word us. I’m pinned in between Charlie and the wall, and my thirteen-year old self shrinks down into the vinyl seat, hoping she can hide or disappear. But there’s no escape from that ugly queasiness. The shame of everything, always lurking, always waiting, threatening to swallow me up.
I shove Charlie so he’ll move over, but he doesn’t budge. Instead my fingers claw at the vinyl as I climb up onto the seat. I throw my body over the back of the booth.
Charlie’s grabbing for me. “Kara!”
I bolt out the door. At the corner I’m stuck because of the bus blocking the street I feel his hand grab my arm.
I swipe the back of my sleeve over my eyes and face him.
“It’s a big deal, Charlie,” I whisper, staring at the cold gray sidewalk. “It was my only shot. I’m screwed up, okay? You don’t seem to understand that. No one does. You shouldn’t be with me. Go find a happy girl.”
His hand still holds my arm. “Kara, please? I want to help, okay? Why won’t you let me help you through this?”
“Let go of me!”
Something’s different in his eyes. A flicker of hostility? Something I’ve never seen before. “Don’t, Kara, please!”
“Get the fuck away from me, Charlie!” I pry his hand off my arm and run across the street. Once I’m on the other side, I turn back to look.
He still stands there, watching me.
25.
Remove when puffed around the edges.
..........................................................
Weeks pass without a note.
They also pass without a single spoken word between Charlie and me.
I work at Mom’s, bussing tables, taking orders, bringing out food when it’s slow. I’ve scrubbed every inch of the place when it isn’t busy. Splatters of sticky old sauce and soup used to freckle the entire café, but now there’s not a corner of the floor or wall or underside of a table that hasn’t seen my hand. It looks pretty nice in here.
When it’s busy I stay behind the cash register and help train the new girl, Jessica. She has thin, over-processed hair, high on her head in a ponytail fastened with a bow. Just like a five year old. And she grasps absolutely nothing the first, or even the second, or even the third time around. Mom doesn’t pay me for training her, or for anything else. She’s harder on me than Dickhead ever was. As part of my punishment, even my tips go to church.
Every night I go to bed with a sore body. The collapse is my only relief. But I would never ever tell Mom I’m thankful for the exhaustion that steals away my ability to think about baking, my future plans, or Charlie.
I haven’t baked a thing since the contest. My heart won’t let me. Mom won’t let me either—as punishment. But the joke’s on her.
Charlie and I have developed a pattern when we see each other at the café:
I take tubs of dirty dishes back to him and say nothing, but my whole body still reacts because it’s Charlie.
Charlie says nothing,
I rush out quickly. Each time I swallow a bigger lump because each time I miss him a little more.
Rinse. Repeat.
TWENTY DAYS AFTER THE
contest, I’m over the absolute shock of it all, but still numb. I carry back a tub of crusty bowls, setting them on the end of the triple sink for Charlie. His apron sits low on his hips, reaching all the way down to his ankles. It’s tied sloppily in back and I can’t help but think about him in the dorm room with the towel, half naked and beautiful.
“Need something?” he asks. He grabs a soup bowl while he keeps his eyes on the sink.
Before I can say anything, he squeezes the trigger on the rinse hose, blasting pea crust off the bowl.
These are the first words he’s spoken to me since our fight.
But I don’t know what to say anyway, so I just watch his bicep flex under his white T-shirt sleeve while he shoots another dirty bowl. He keeps his back to me, grabbing dishes while I try to think of anything I could say to him.
Charlie’s head turns slowly until he’s pretty much glaring at me over his shoulder. I know I owe him an apology. The rational side of me realizes that, but the rest doesn’t care.
“Kara!” I hear Mom yelling from the front.
I head out there.
Mom smiles, her teeth pressed together. I know she needs to tell me something, and I infer from her look that it’s about Jessica, the new girl. I know what it is, too: Jessica screws up the register every single shift. But Mom will never fire her. Mom needs to save her. Now Jessica has table-bussing duty, so I don’t have any reason to go into the kitchen.
“Kara,” Mom whispers. “Jessica just charged someone five hundred and sixty-five dollars for their soup. I need you to stay on the register.”
Jessica carries a dish tub past us, and given the blissful look on her face I imagine she’d skip back to the dishwashing area if she could.
I watch her over the next hour, noticing how she carries half-full tubs back, which puts her in the kitchen a lot.
When I catch her carrying a tub that holds a single fork, I decide to call her on it. “Jessica, you need to wait until a tub is full before you take it back to the dishwasher.”
She tilts her head, like maybe she’s confused. “Charlie likes me to bring him every single dirty dish, right away. I think he needs me to bring him the dishes as they get dirty, don’t you?”
I stand in front of her, trying to figure out if she’s as stupid as she pretends to be, which seems impossible. “It’s a waste of effort for you take back one single fork when we have a lot going on out here!”
“Whatever.” She sighs, scurrying around me, her straw-like ponytail whipping side to side under that bow, back to Charlie.
I wipe the counter. I hear Jessica’s squealing laughter. Charlie’s laughing, too, and I know they’re talking, but I can’t hear what they’re saying. My hands shake. I almost knock a glass to the floor. If they don’t stop it back there I’m going to knock Jessica on the floor, too.
When I look up, I see Noah staring in the window. He has both hands framing his eyes, like he’s trying to get a better view.
I set the rag down and walk around the counter, flushing a bit because now he’s looking at me. He smiles weakly and gives me a little wave before he turns and walks quickly down the street. Must’ve been looking for Noelle, I guess.
I pick up the cleaning rag again as Mason and Noelle walk in.
Mason plops down at the counter. “Hey, McKinley, ’sup?” he asks while he sticks his earbuds in.
I wipe down the espresso machine and I nod in the direction of the kitchen. “I have to train a dumbass and I don’t even get paid. That’s what’s up.”
Noelle sits on Mason’s knee with her elbows on the counter.
“Where should we do lunch tomorrow? Should we try the Indian place? Or do you want to come back here for Jesus soup? You pick.”
Noelle’s changed since I came back and told her everything that happened at the contest and with Charlie. She’s nicer. Whenever possible, she sneaks me out in her Mini and buys me lunch. She’s worried about me. Which I guess is good. At least someone is.
Jessica’s obnoxious giggling erupts from the back.
“See what I mean?” I mutter.
Noelle perks up. “Uh-oh, she’s falling for Mr. Sudsy back there. Hey, it’s not her fault you gave him up.”
I wipe the end of the steamer nozzles. “Whose side are you on here?”
Noelle takes a quick peek at Mason, who’s bobbing his head to what’s playing on his iPod. “The truth hurts, Kar. If Mr. Hoyt ever dumps his fiancée, I’ll be on him before self-gratification even crosses his mind.”
“Nice. You’re sitting on your boyfriend’s lap.”
“He can’t hear me. And we’re not married.” She readjusts so she’s straddling Mason in a particularly grotesque way at the exact moment Mom passes by.
“Ohhh no you don’t!” Mom scolds. “You’ve heard me before, Noelle Butler. You save your grinding for elsewhere. Now either hop down from there, or scoot!”
Noelle climbs down and takes the stool next to Mason. I notice the pink in her cheeks when she sips her Coke. She’ll never back-talk my Mom—ever.
Jessica emerges from the kitchen, red-faced as usual and fanning herself. She steps in next to me behind the counter and elbows me like we’re BFFs.
“Do you think Charlie has a girlfriend?” she asks.
Noelle leans across the counter. “Hey, Jess?”
Jessica pulls back, frowning. “Nobody calls me Jess. Who are you?”
Noelle cracks her knuckles and leans forward. “It doesn’t really fucking matter who I am. But here’s the thing, Jess, and I want you to know this because I’m worried about you. If you hook up with a dishwasher, he will expect you to suck on his bubbles the first date.”
Noelle is clearly too much for Jessica to process. The poor girl blinks several times. Finally she gasps, “You’re disgusting.”
“I just speak truth. Ask Kara. Now, if you want a Prince Charming, then you need look no further.” Noelle turns around and makes a gun with her hand, pointing at Hayden.
“WHAT IS GOING ON
with you and Charlie?” Mom asks later, when Jessica takes her break, and Noelle and Mason are gone.
I rearrange the bills in the drawer. “Nothing.”
She follows me to the supply closet. “Kara, I think you need to talk to him. He’s been so miserable, distant, and short-tempered with everyone lately.”
“Doesn’t seem miserable.”
“Kara, what’s wrong? I sent him down to California to bring you back. I know I should’ve gone myself. I was so swamped here and I couldn’t go, and you two are just kids and you were down there in San Francisco together, unsupervised by anyone but God himself. I can only pray that you didn’t partake in sins of the flesh because that—”
“Jesus Christ, Mom!”
“That only separates you from God, Kara. He commands you to wait until marriage. And damn it anyway! ” She whacks the supply closet door. “Stop using our Savior’s name in vain!”
I ignore Mom and walk back to the counter at the same time that Jessica bounces in and hands me a blue-gray envelope. “Sorry, Karen, I forgot to give this to you. Has your name on it. Someone left it on the counter.”
My heart pounds, but I still correct her. “Ka-ra, the end rhymes with Jes-si-ca.”
Mom turns, frowning at me, but then her face relaxes a bit and her eyes are questioning.
No, Mom, please don’t ask me anything. Please.
A group of customers walks through the door. When Mom rushes over to greet them, I turn my back, shoving the note in my pocket.
“I’m taking my fifteen,” I say to Jessica, grabbing my coat and lukewarm latte, and heading out the door. February blew its way into Seattle with a lot of snow. The Ave, dusted with white, is also barfing up Valentine’s Day. Everywhere it’s red and pink, reminding me of the loser that I am.
The door jingles and Mom zips out into the cold, all bundled up. At first I think she’s chasing after me to continue our argument, but then I see that she’s holding the paper take-out bag she thinks hides the bank bag so well. Anyone keeping track would notice how Mom leaves at the exact same time every day. Robbing her would be a cinch.
I sit down at a table outside and watch until she’s vanished. Then I take the envelope out of my pocket, tear into it, and read it.
In the dark do you think of me?
Cramming it back into my coat pocket, I walk back inside. Jessica’s rushing into the kitchen through the swinging door, leaving no one to look after the cash register.
I don’t even take my coat off as I bolt through the door after her.
Already she’s talking and laughing with Charlie.
“You can’t leave the counter when no one is there, Jessica!” I yell at her. “You are so stupid!”
She’s holding the dish tub when she turns to me, her mouth open in surprise.
“Whoa, Kara?” Charlie stands in front of her, blocking her from me. His hands are up and I see tiny bubbles of soap on his palms. “Do you really need to talk to her like that? She’s new. She doesn’t know everything yet.”
“She doesn’t know anything, Charlie! The fucking cash register could get robbed if no one’s out there watching it! A normal person would get that, obviously, after working here two fucking minutes!”