Two guys walked into the diner, both in their late teens. Joking and chatting, they stood at the PLEASE WAIT TO BE SEATED sign and only looked at Amber when she smiled and said “Hi!” in her perkiest voice. “Welcome to the Firebird. Can I show you to your booth?”
“Don’t see why not,” said the first guy.
She smiled again and turned on her heel, making sure to keep the smile in place. She wasn’t pretty like Sally, wasn’t tall like Sally, wasn’t captivating like Sally and certainly did not look as good in her yellow shorts as Sally did, but, even so, there were so many mirrors in the diner that to lose a smile at any point could mean a drastic loss in tips. She stood by the booth in the corner and her two customers slid in on opposite sides of the table.
“My name’s Amber,” she said, taking her notepad from her back pocket, “and I’ll be your waitress this evening.”
“Hi, Amber,” the first guy said. “My name’s Dan, this is Brandon, and we’ll be your customers.”
Amber gave a little laugh. “What can I get you?”
“We’re keeping it simple today. We’ll take your cheeseburger deals. The whole shebang.”
Amber marked the orders down. “Two cheeseburgers with the works, two fries. No problem at all. And to drink?”
“Coke,” said Dan.
“Coke it is.”
“Actually, no,” said Dan, “I’ll have a strawberry milkshake instead.”
“One strawberry milkshake, gotcha. And for you?”
Brandon didn’t look up from the menu. “Do you have 7-Up?”
“We have Sprite,” Amber said.
“That’s nice,” Brandon said, raising his eyes to her slowly, “but I didn’t ask if you had Sprite. I asked if you had 7-Up.”
Amber’s headache started to spike again, but she kept her smile and smothered her words. She needed this job. The Dark Places convention was in a few months and tickets were not cheap.
“I’m really sorry, we don’t have 7-Up,” she said brightly, like she’d just been told she’d won a bunny in a raffle. “Would you like Sprite instead?”
Brandon took off his glasses and cleaned them. “If I had wanted Sprite, I’d have asked for Sprite, now wouldn’t I?”
“Please excuse Brandon,” Dan said, grinning. “He’s in one of his moods. Brandon, out of all of the drinks that they have here, which one do you want?”
Brandon let out a heavy sigh. “I suppose I’ll have a milkshake.”
“Okay then,” Amber said, pencil at the ready. “What flavour?”
“Well, I don’t know. What flavour do you recommend?”
“I’ve always loved chocolate.”
“Then I’ll have vanilla,” Brandon said, and put his glasses back on.
Dan was trying not to laugh at the antics of his buddy. Amber stood there and smiled. “Sure thing,” she said. “Can I get you guys anything else?”
“If we think of anything,” said Dan, “we’ll be sure to ask.”
Amber smiled and left them, fighting a swirling tide of nausea. She got through the swinging doors to the kitchen and leaned against the wall for a moment, waiting for the feeling to subside. When she was sure that she wasn’t going to pass out or puke, she gave in the order and stood beside Sally, both of them making milkshakes.
“What are your guys like?” Amber asked, ignoring her surging headache.
“Two businessmen,” Sally said, “slumming it, flirting really badly with me and destined to end up with sauce splattered down their shirts. What about yours? The one in the glasses looks cute.”
“He’s a tool.”
“But not that cute,” Sally said quickly. “In fact, if you had let me finish before interrupting, you would have heard me say he looks cute, but, on closer inspection, he’s obviously a tool.”
Amber grinned. “You were going to say that?”
Sally nodded. “If you had just let me finish, instead of babbling on like you always do.”
“I am a babbler.”
“Yes, you are.”
Amber placed the milkshakes on a tray, took a deep breath, and went back out.
Brandon watched her walk over, and Amber tried for a smile. It wasn’t convincing, but it’d do. She didn’t care about the tip anymore – all she wanted was for these two guys to leave, to take their bad vibes with them, and allow her to wallow in whatever sickly unpleasantness had been threatening to engulf her all day.
“Now then—” she started, but the headache sent fresh needles of pain straight to the back of her eyes and she winced, and the tray overbalanced and the milkshakes slid sideways, toppling off the edge and smashing to the ground.
The sound of breaking glass swept the headache away, and as Amber’s vision cleared she could see that the milkshakes had gone everywhere. They’d drenched her sneakers and splattered the cuffs of Brandon’s jeans.
Dan howled with laughter, but Brandon glared at her, heat rising in his face.
“Oh my God,” Amber said. “I am so sorry. I am so incredibly sorry.”
“You …”
“I’ll get this cleaned up. I am so sorry.”
“You stupid fat pig.”
Amber froze.
“You clumsy, ugly little troll,” Brandon said. “You did that on purpose.”
“I didn’t, I swear—”
“You dumped it over me on purpose.”
“It was an accident.”
Sally hurried over, mop already in hand. “It’s okay, no big deal, we’ll get this—”
Brandon jabbed a finger at Amber. “She did it on purpose.”
Sally laughed. “I’m sure it was just—”
“I want her fired.”
Sally stopped mopping, and her laugh turned to a bemused smile. “She’s not going to be fired for dropping a tray, all right? It happens all the time. How about this? Your meal is on the house.”
“Our meal is on the floor,” Brandon said. “Where’s the manager? I want to speak to the manager. I want this fat pig fired.”
Sally’s face turned to stone. “Get out,” she said. “Both of you. Out. You’re not welcome here.”
Dan held up his hands in mock-innocence. “I didn’t do anything,” he said. “I was just sitting here. What did I do wrong?”
“You picked the wrong friend,” said Sally. “Go on. Out.”
Brandon kept his gaze fixed on Amber. His face had gone pale and rigid, like he was about to dive at her. Dan had to practically drag him to the door.
Sally stood there with her hands on her hips. “Wow,” she said when they had gone. “What a couple of tools. You okay, honey?”
“I’m fine.”
Sally patted her shoulder. “They’re morons. Don’t listen to a word they say.”
Sally helped Amber clean up the mess. The two businessmen sneaked glances whenever they could, and Amber couldn’t blame them. Even mopping the floor, Sally was pretty. She didn’t get red-faced with the exertion like Amber did, and her hair didn’t fall out of its ponytail, like Amber’s did. She even looked good in the Firebird T-shirt.
Amber tried her very best not to look at her own reflection in the mirrors, though. She was in a bad enough mood already.
The rest of her shift dragged by. When it ended, she pulled on a fresh T-shirt and shorts that weren’t yellow, said goodbye to the cook and to Sally, and stepped out on to the sidewalk. It was already getting dark, but the heat was waiting for her, and her forehead prickled with sweat as her lungs filled with warm air. She’d spent her whole life in Florida, been born and raised in Orlando, and she still reacted to the heat like a tourist. It was why, despite having a big, two-storey house to call home, her bedroom was on the first floor, where the air was fractionally cooler, especially on a day like today, when the clouds were gathering. Rain was on its way. Lightning, too, most likely.
Amber had a fifteen-minute walk home. Other kids would probably have been able to call Mom or Dad for a ride, but Bill and Betty had very firm ideas about what
independence meant. Amber was used to it by now. If she was lucky, she’d get to the front door before she got drenched.
She crossed the street and slipped down the narrow lane that led to the dance studio she had hated as a child. Too uncoordinated, that was her problem. That and the fact that the dance teacher had hated her with startling venom. Amber was never going to be as pretty as the pretty girls or as graceful as the graceful girls, and she had come to terms with that, even as a kid. Her dance teacher, however, seemed to take issue with it.
Amber got to the badly painted sign of the ballerina and the curiously eighties hip-hop dancer, and Dan and Brandon turned the corner in front of her.
They were talking about something – Dan was chiding Brandon and Brandon was looking pissed off – but when they saw Amber they went quiet. Amber stood there, her legs stiff and suddenly uncooperative, and another headache started somewhere behind her eyes.
Brandon grinned. There was nothing friendly in it.
Amber forced her legs to work again, and she took the lane to her left. They walked after her. She quickened her pace through the growing gloom.
“Oink, oink, little piggy,” Brandon said from behind her.
Amber broke into a run.
They laughed, and gave chase.
She plunged out of the lane and cut across the road, slipping between the back of a laundromat and an attorney’s office. Immediately, Amber realised this was a mistake. She should have headed towards the pizzeria where there would have been people, and light, and noise. Instead, she was running across an empty lot and finding herself out of breath. A hand closed around her jacket and she cried out, twisted, got tangled in Dan’s legs, and they both went down.
She landed heavily, painfully, with Dan sprawling over her.
“Oww,” he laughed, rolling over. “Owww, that hurt.”
Amber got up and backed off, rubbing her hands where she had skinned them as she fell. The headache was a thunder cloud inside her skull. Goosebumps rippled. Her stomach churned.
Dan stood, panting, and Brandon jogged up to them, taking his time.
“This isn’t funny,” Amber said.
“It’s not meant to be,” said Brandon.
“Why’d you run?” Dan chuckled. “We wouldn’t have run if you hadn’t run. Why’d you run?”
“Let me go,” said Amber.
Dan swept his arm wide. “We’re not stopping you from going anywhere. Go right ahead.”
Amber hesitated, then stepped between them. They loomed over her on either side. She took another step, started walking away, but the moment her back was turned Dan was right behind her, on her heels.
She spun, her vision blurring for a moment. “Stop following me.”
“You can’t tell me where to go and where not to go,” Dan said, suddenly angry. “This is America. Land of the free. Don’t you know that?”
She could taste copper in the back of her mouth. “Leave me alone,” she said dully.
“We’re not doing anything!” Dan yelled, right in her face. She flinched away from him.
“Admit what you did, little piggy,” said Brandon, circling her. “Admit that you spilled that milkshake on me on purpose.”
“I swear, it was an accident.”
“If you admit that you did it on purpose,” said Dan, the reasonable one once again, “then we’ll go away.”
He was right in front of her as he spoke, but he sounded a hundred miles away. She had to end this now, at once, before the blackness at the edge of her vision overpowered her and she collapsed.
“Okay,” Amber said, “okay, I did it on purpose.”
They nodded, like they had known all along. But they didn’t leave.
“You made me look like a liar,” said Brandon.
Amber tried focusing on Dan. “You said you’d go away.”
“Jesus,” he said, making a face. “Don’t be so frikkin’ rude.”
“Okay,” she said, “I shouldn’t have done it. I’m sorry. It was stupid. I’m very sorry. Please let me go home.”
“For the last time,” said Dan, “we’re not stopping you. We’re not stopping you from doing anything. Why is that so hard for you to understand? Are you really that dumb? Are you really that stupid? Stop treating us like we’re the bad guys here, okay? You’re the one who threw that milkshake on my friend. You’re the one who got us kicked out. You’re the one who ran. You’re the one who made me fall over. My knee is bleeding, did you know that? But am I complaining about it? Am I making a fuss? No, I am not. But you? You won’t stop turning this whole thing into some big frikkin’ drama.”
“I don’t …”
“What? What was that?”
“I don’t feel well.”
Her knees started to buckle and she reached out to steady herself, grabbing the front of Dan’s shirt. He grimaced and pushed her hand away and she stumbled, and then Brandon was there, grabbing her, straightening her up—
—and then he hit her.
The pain was nothing compared to the violent storm in her head, but his fist rocked her, sharpened her, and she saw him look at his own knuckles, like he was surprised that he had done it, and then everything was moving very quickly and when she felt a hand on her face she bit down hard and heard a howl.
Her vision cleared. Brandon’s horrified face swam into view. She hit him back, as hard as she could, and his jaw came apart around her fist.
A moment stretched to eternity.
She watched her fist.
It was weird – in this gloom, her skin almost looked red.
A deeper red than the blood, though, the blood that exploded in glorious slow motion from the wreckage that had been Brandon’s face. Was she doing this? Was this happening? In that moment, that luxurious moment, Amber found the time to wonder if she was imagining this part. Surely this was some sort of bizarre hallucination, brought about by adrenaline and those increasingly painful headaches.
There was no headache now, though. There was no pain of any sort. Instead, she felt … wonderful. She felt free. She felt …
Powerful.
Time started to speed up again. Blood splattered her T-shirt and Brandon hit the ground and, now that she could perceive normal sound once more, Amber registered his gargled screaming. Both hands were at his face and he was crawling frantically away, leaving a trail of blood as he went. Dan backed off, staring at her, his face white and his eyes wide and utterly, utterly terrified.
She had done that. The blood and the screaming and the shattered bones. It had been no hallucination. She had done that.
She raised her blood-speckled hand. Normal skin again. That was good. Normal was good.
Something in her mouth. Something that tasted of copper. She spat. Brandon’s finger hit the ground.
Amber turned and ran.
THERE WAS BLOOD ON HER HANDS.
Not in a metaphorical, figurative sense, although of course there was that, too, but in an actual, physical sense, there was actual blood on her actual hands, and it was proving surprisingly difficult to wash off. Amber scrubbed furiously, looked at the result, and then scrubbed again. It occurred to her, not for the first time, that her hands were quite small. If the rest of her body could have been in proportion with her hands, then maybe she wouldn’t have been such a target. These were the thoughts that occurred to her as she was scrubbing the blood away.
“Amber?” came her mother’s voice from beyond the bathroom door.
Amber looked up at herself in the mirror above the sink – wild-eyed and panicked. “Yes?” she called, keeping her voice as steady as possible.
“Is everything okay?”
“Everything’s fine,” Amber said. “I’ll be out in a minute.”
Amber listened to her mother hesitate, then walk away down the hall.
She turned off the faucet and examined her hands. For one ridiculous moment, she thought they were still bloodstained, but then she closed her eyes and shook her head. The frantic scrubbing h
ad turned them both red-raw, that’s all it was. No need for her imagination to be going into overdrive on this one. There was enough to freak out about as it was.
She put the toilet seat down and sat, taking deep breaths, and examined the facts. Yes, she had seriously injured that guy, but she had been acting in self-defence and she had been outnumbered. She really couldn’t see how the cops wouldn’t be on her side about this – if only she hadn’t injured him quite so dramatically.
Amber frowned. What was his name? The name of the guy whose face she’d destroyed?
Brandon, that was it. She was glad she remembered it. For some reason, it felt important that she remember his name after what she’d done to him.
She hadn’t meant to do it, and she hadn’t a clue how it had happened. She’d heard stories about adrenaline, about what it could do to the human body. Mothers lifting cars off toddlers and stuff. It was, she supposed, possible that adrenaline had granted her the sheer strength to shatter bones on contact, and anyway how much strength would it really take to bite through a finger?
The very thought made her want to throw up again.
She stood, and examined herself in the mirror. Her skin was pale and blotchy and her hair was a tangled, frizzy mess. Her eyes – hazel, with flecks of gold, and the only part of herself she didn’t hate – were red-rimmed from crying.
She went to her room, changed her blood-splattered T-shirt for a top that the lady in the store had said would flatter her figure. Amber wasn’t so sure she believed her, but it was a nice top, even if it didn’t look especially good on her. She realised her hands were trembling.
She sat on the edge of the bed. Of course they were trembling. She was in shock. She needed help. Advice. Comfort.
For the first time since she was a kid, she needed her parents.
“Ah hell,” she muttered. It was worth a try.
She heard them in the kitchen, putting the finishing touches to dinner. Amber crossed the hall, walking with heavy, leaden feet. The house was filled with the aroma of duck, cooked to perfection, and usually this would have her belly rumbling. But the only thing her belly was doing now was housing a whole load of fluttering butterflies. She tried to remember the last time she’d talked to her parents about anything important. Or the last time she’d talked to them about anything.