be created. I can handle an itty, bitty, teeny, tiny wasp.
Swallowing heavily, I take measured steps. The wasp flies away then lands back on my skirt. Bruno’s cackle drifts over, and Reese barks at me again to pick up the goddamn pace. All I keep thinking is waspwaspwaspwasp.
The rest is predictable, if you’re acquainted with the inevitable horror that is me. The evil-genius wasp takes flight. It circles me once, lazily. Then it flies. UP. MY. SKIRT. An earsplitting yelp escapes my lips. The entire bar stills. I stumble the last steps toward our table and trip over my own feet.
Hot soup. Wasp. Tray. Floor. And…oh, God.
Desperate not to spill the food all over the bar, I try to keep the tray level. I do. By some miracle, I do. There’s that, at least.
But the rest…
The tray lands upright with me hurtling on top of it at Callum’s feet. My left breast, covered in Leigh’s nonexistent bikini, lands in the scalding soup. My next scream is louder. Piercing. Instinct takes over. Not logic.
I spring to my feet, knocking Callum and his plastic white chair on the floor. Dying to ease the blistering sensation on my boob, I pull at the bikini top to separate it from my skin. I do this while reaching for any form of liquid. It’s hard to say at which precise moment my boob pops out of my bikini top. It could be when I knock Reese’s drink on her lap, or when I pour Brianne’s cocktail over my aching chest like a girl-gone-wild exhibitionist, or maybe it’s when Leigh holds up her phone to capture the moment, a grin the size of Canada stretching her face. Whatever the timing, it happens.
Laughter assaults my ears. Tears prick my eyes.
Someone at my left shouts, “Holy shit, it’s that girl,” and I know right away they’ve seen the Public Speaking Video. Like I needed this moment to suck more.
I cover my exposed self as quickly as possible, but my alcohol-soaked breast will undoubtedly hit the YouTube circuit in a matter of minutes. The words “fucking freak” hit me in the chest, Reese’s voice thick with loathing.
I run to the washroom a sobbing mess as the evil-genius wasp buzzes off, giddy with delight, thrilled it could create mad havoc without so much as a sting.
Seven
Sam
Nothing is going as planned. I should be having a blast, banging chicks and slinging shots. Living it up. Instead, I’m limping around Pahia like a wounded dog, obsessing over the one girl I should forget. Fucking Nina. I didn’t take this trip to meet a girl like her.
That first night at the hostel, I knew I could have Reese in a second, but Nina was different. Maybe it was the challenge of it. Maybe it was that ass of hers she displayed on the plane, or that hot, glazed look she gets. Whatever the reason, I couldn’t let it go. When our eyes met while sitting at the table, colliding for one brief moment, I knew I was done for. Can’t say why it was then, at that moment, and not on the plane or by the cab. But right then, my vision went sideways.
I spent most of the night wide awake, stewing. I thought a lot about my folks. They had one of those relationships that had my sister and me groaning in disgust for most of our childhood. They’d touch and kiss and flirt like newlyweds, provoking the usual, “Oh, my God, I’m going blind,” from my little sister, Abby, and, “Ugh, get a room,” from a horrified me. They’d ignore our dramatic efforts to curb their PDA, and we’d pretend we didn’t secretly think it was awesome.
As I got older, I paid more attention to my friends’ parents. If they hadn’t divorced already, most couples were careful around each other at best. Practiced. None of the soft touches or intimate moments my folks shared. Until the accident.
All it took was one drunk driver to ruin my legs and take Mom from us forever. I miss her. So much it hurts. My throat still closes at the briefest memory, the pressure in my chest suffocating. She came to every football game, sent me care packages at college to make sure I was eating right, and gave me shit to keep my ass in line. Drove me nuts at times with her nagging, but I knew she loved Abby and me.
Yeah, I miss her so much it’s painful, but Dad is destroyed. Obliterated.