food than we can possibly eat. There are burgers and onion rings and chicken wings and regular fries and, yes, cheese fries, which Gray immediately slides out of my reach.
I huff and grab one of the burgers; it’s about the size of my head and oozing BBQ sauce. “Everything’s great.”
“And Dad?” She shoves a cheese fry in her mouth.
“Is great too. He seems glad I’m here.” Gray is the queen of seeing what she wants to see, has been forever, so I know she won’t catch the lie. The truth is, I still can’t really tell what he thinks, and I spend most of the time staring at my phone, waiting for Peak to text.
Gray wipes her hands on a napkin, her mouth pinching in thought. “I know it’s been . . . complicated between you guys, but I’m glad it’s going good. This could be a chance for you guys to reconnect. It’s been a long time.”
She says it like that’s normal, like being seventeen and still not having a connection with your dad is a regular thing. Maybe it is. I don’t know. But I know that she and Dad—and she and Mom, for that matter—are practically best friends, so it seems a little bit like bullshit to me. My parents used to joke that Gray and I were so far apart in age that they had two “only children.” But that always just felt like a nicer way of saying all they had was a daughter and the accident that came after her.
“Hey.” She pulls a small box out of her bag and tosses it into my lap. “I’m really glad you’re here.”
I pick it up, my fingers tracing over the silver letters stamped into the side of the black box. “What’s this?”
“Open it.” She shrugs, taking another bite.
I pull the box apart, my forehead crinkling when I realize it’s a watch. A very nice, very expensive watch, to be exact. “Gray . . .”
“Consider it a good-luck gift.”
I run my hands over the silver face. “This is too much.”
“Nah,” she says, grabbing a chicken wing. “You deserve it. I’m proud of you for stepping up for this job. It could be a fresh start for you, for all of us, really. Besides, I never get to do stuff like this with you hiding out in Washington, so consider this me making up for lost time.”
I bite my lip, my eyes feeling a little watery as I slide the watch onto my wrist and mess with the band.
“Okay, that’s enough sappy shit for one night, though,” Gray says. “Since this is your first time on a street team, I thought we’d talk strategy.”
I want to roll my eyes at her, because it’s a little bit insulting that she doesn’t think I can hang out at a shitty comic store and watch what’s going on without screwing it up . . . but she’s probably right.
The street team is basically a euphemism anyway. Usually when you call people a street team, they’re, like, out there promoting your brand, spreading the word and talking it up, that kind of thing. My dad’s street team is the opposite. They’re lurking quietly in the shadows of the industry, trying to tear stuff down or make it their own. Sure, some of it is innocent, but anything having to do with Vera Flores probably won’t be. He doesn’t want to re-create what she’s doing; he wants to own her and everything she makes, and he wants revenge for making him look like a fool. Suddenly, I feel a little warm, a little out of my league, a little—
whatthefuckiswrongwithme
“Rid, you okay?” And I hate when she asks me that because I know what she’s really asking: Are you going to fall apart again?
“Yeah, I’m great.” I shove an onion ring in my mouth whole and chew with it open. Gray gags and throws a cheese fry at me, which sticks to my shirt. “And you said you wouldn’t share,” I say, biting into it with a flourish. She laughs, and it feels like a victory.