with a messenger service, you know?” he snaps.
“Come on, do me a solid,” I say, gritting my teeth to stop myself from yelling at him.
"Fine, but I doubt she’s coming back,” he says. “She looked like a woman with places to be, if you know what I mean.”
I actually don’t know what he means, and I don’t want to. Just the fact that he was checking her out is making me see red. She’s supposed to be mine, goddamn it!
All the positivity I managed to scrape up by having some breakfast and acting on Blaze’s brilliant idea has gone down the drain again. Now I’m in a killing mood, which I guess works since that’s what we’re here for. Lucky star, my ass.
8
Brenda
I walked for ages, sweat flowing down my neck, face, and back in the heat and my legs getting progressively heavier, before I finally met another walker who told me the closest mall was actually in the other direction. And that there’s a frequent bus that goes to it.
She pointed out the bus stop, and I thanked her profusely like an idiot, explaining all about how I’m not from these parts, how I desperately need some lighter clothes for this weather, and how I wasn’t actually made for the heat. She nodded along but looked more and more alarmed the longer I spoke. I had all of that long wait for the bus and the long bus ride to the mall to wallow in my own weirdness and stupidity. By the time I finally reached it, I wasn’t sure I wanted to go in at all. I felt like a homeless person in my dirty clothes, which were now soaked through with fresh sweat.
The mall is wonderfully cold and I sit in one of the lounging areas, the fake leather cooling my legs even through the jeans I’m wearing. I’m sharing the circular sofa with three guys of varying ages, the husbands and boyfriends forced to accompany their better halves here. They were all playing with their phones when I approached, but now they’re giving me lasting sideways glances. Getting noticed by men used to fill me with joy and made me feel good. But after my stint with the Sinners, I’m finding I’d rather just blend back into the background. At least until I can get the world back under my feet.
The mall is packed, new, and very upscale. Most of the stores are the expensive ones, the kinds I used to shop at when I had Monarch to pay for all of it. But I’ll only spend $50 and no more. I have to think about that bus ticket to Vegas. But do I even want to go home? What’s waiting for me there? Pissed off Monarch? All those other guys that me being with would piss off Monarch even more? My mom?
Homesickness and tears well up in my chest as I think of her and I can have none of that. She hasn’t been a real mom to me for more than fifteen years, she couldn’t be, because of her sickness, but still. Yet I want my mommy right now, so I better get shopping before I start crying for real.
Just like every mall anywhere, this one must have a cheap store or two. I’m an expert at finding nice things for cheap, that’s how I grew up. And I’m a pro at getting up after I fall. I’ve had to do that a bunch of times too.
Maybe I shouldn’t put any hopes in Colt coming back for me like he promised. Maybe I should do it all on my own. I have some practice in that too.
But that kiss…I’ve heard of kisses that send sparks of electricity through your whole body, and of kisses that flood you with rivers of soft sweetness like honey, but I’ve never actually experienced either of those things when getting kissed, or anything similar to them for that matter. I did always try to imagine I did, pretend I did. But that was all a lie. This morning, it wasn’t a lie.
Plus, he rode to my rescue like a real-life prince in shining armor…or on a shining steed, or however that saying goes.
Just the memory of those two things brings a smile to my face and makes all my other problems seem so much less than they really are.
That’s why I told him I’ll stay and wait for him. Because I want to know if it’s real. If it’s