Contradictions

  Thanks to Cameo’s early-morning-vacuuming wake-up call, I managed to arrive not only on time, but actually early to work. I sat in my Jeep trying to coax what little heat I could out of the vents while I waited for Larry to arrive and open the doors to Javalotta. I warily pulled my phone out of my pocket while I waited. My phone, which had been my life-force practically from the day my parents had gotten me one for my fifteenth birthday, was something I tried to avoid lately. I had yet to log on to my Instagram or Facebook accounts since the accident two weeks ago. I debated whether I was ready to face social media again or if I should text Trent. Neither were very appealing choices.

  After a night of rest and with no booze flowing through my veins to cloud my judgment, I was hyperaware of what almost happened before Cameo stormed in. I tried to tell myself it was a fluke. I mean, from a guy’s perspective, his timing was perfect. It had been ages since I had hooked up with anyone, and I had to admit, I was beginning to feel the urge. It could have been any guy standing there. Of course, what did that mean for our date? It would finally make my friends shut up, but I owed Trent a kiss too, and I’ve never welched on a dare or a bet. How the hell did I let this happen? It was like I was going on this date as a favor to Brittni and to pay off my bet to Trent. The only one not getting anything out of it was me.

  Despite feeling like I’d somehow been hustled, I sent a text to Trent. He answered immediately, which was a little shocking since he never seemed to have his phone on him whenever I was with him. Our texting conversation went pretty much how I expected.

  Hey

  Hey. How’s your roommate?

  She’s better.

  That’s good. I’ll pick you up tonight? No beating around the bush. I swear, he could stand to take some texting etiquette classes.

  I work until nine.

  That’s fine. How about I pick you up at your place at nine thirty?

  Fine

  See you then

  And that was how we set up our date. Not in the mood to deal with social media, I stowed my phone in my pocket and turned up my radio to a near-deafening decibel. The bass vibrated through the metal floorboards of my Jeep, traveling up my legs until my entire body felt like it was a part of the song.

  I was so lost in the music I didn’t notice my boss Larry had arrived until he rapped against the window. Jumping, I turned to look out the window. I pulled my stomach out of my throat and turned off my car.

  “You scared the crap out of me,” I complained, opening my door. A blast of northern wind cut through my double layer of clothes, making me swear. It was mother-sucking cold. Why did I love Maine so much? I bet my friend Ashton was lying on the beach in Florida drinking margaritas while I froze my nips off.

  “I’m surprised you heard me. Your music was so loud I could see your Jeep rocking from across the parking lot. Loud music is bad for your hearing,” Larry said, pulling his keys out of his pocket so he could unlock the back door of the coffeehouse.

  I shrugged my shoulders. “Isn’t that just an old person’s scare tactic because they’re out of touch with the superior generation?” I scooted past him, chuckling. It was common knowledge that the owners of Javalotta considered themselves hip and in touch with the youth. Teasing them about being old was always a surefire way to keep things interesting at work.

  Today was no exception. Larry turned up the volume on the coffeehouse speakers a couple notches louder than usual. I bit back a grin as I readied Javalotta for the day. He was almost too easy.

  Reanna, another part-timer, came in ten minutes later, apologizing to Larry for being late. He gave her his classic warning, but let it go since she was technically only a few minutes late. Tardiness was frowned upon, but as long as you didn’t make a habit of it, Larry was pretty cool about it.

  Reanna joined me behind the counter where I was filling the industrial-sized coffee makers and espresso machines. She looked flustered as she tied her apron on.

  “What’s up?” I asked, nudging her with my hip.

  “I hit another damn mailbox. My dad is going to have a fit.”

  I had to laugh at her. Reanna was singularly the worst driver I had ever met. During normal driving conditions, she was known to hit a few obstacles. Add in some bad weather and she was a total terror on the road. “Whose was it this time?”

  “My nitpicking old bag of a neighbor. She’s always complaining about something. Me hitting her mailbox will not go unnoticed when I get home.”

  “Did she see you hit it?”

  “Yeah, go figure. She was outside picking up her paper, which is why I hit it in the first place. She distracted me and I didn’t see the patch of ice. I turned the wheel a little too hard and wound up jumping the curb.” Reanna gave me a pained look before continuing. “She was yelling and hollering that I had tried to run her over on purpose.”

  “Why would she think that?”

  “Because she knows I’ve disliked her since she ratted on me senior year when Tommy Heckler and I were just about ready to do the deed in the front seat of his pickup truck. Nothing like trying to get everything in the right place only to look up and see some old lady’s face squished against the window. Talk about things going flat.”

  I nodded my head knowingly. There was nothing like those moments when a parent or other adult walked in on you. Jackson and I had had our share of mishaps with his mom.

  “Anyway, she went screaming over to my house that I was trying to kill her, so I did the only thing I could.”

  “You really did run her over?” I teased, still laughing. I bent over to check the mini fridges under the counter to make sure the whipped cream and milk jugs were filled. Saturdays were notoriously busy at Javalotta, and nothing sucked more than having to run to the stockroom for supplies midway through a rush. It was never good to make coffee lovers wait for their next caffeine fix.

  “Funny. I should have run her ass over. No, I peeled off down the road like I had no idea what was going on.”

  “Okay, so it’s your word against hers,” I joked.

  “Sadly, she has proof,” she said, looking embarrassed as she filled the napkin dispensers.

  “What did she do? Snap a picture?”

  “Um, no. Her mailbox—well, it’s sorta wedged under the back bumper of my car.”

  I looked at her, waiting for her to continue, while trying not to laugh since she looked so distressed.

  “See, when I hit it at first, it sorta flew into the road from the momentum of the crash. I panicked because she was screaming like a lunatic, so I tried to speed away, and I ran it over on my way down the street. It somehow got wedged up under my car.”

  There was no way I could suppress my laughter anymore.

  “The funny part was the god-awful noise it made as I was driving here,” she said, joining in on my laughter over the story. I was wiping away tears when Carl, one of the other employees, joined us.

  “What’s so funny?” he asked, placing a till in one of the registers.

  “She, sh-sh,” I tried to explain, but I dissolved into more laughter. I held my side, trying to ease the stitch from laughing so hard.

  Carl looked at Reanna to elaborate. “It’s not as funny as she’s making it,” she said, trying not to laugh as she stacked cups in one of the dispensers.

  Her comment made me laugh again. I left her to explain it to Carl while I went to Larry’s office to retrieve my own till.

  “What’s going on out there? Sounds like someone let in a pack of hyenas.”

  “You’ll have to ask Reanna. I’m not sure I could get through the story,” I said, laughing again.

  The story of Reanna’s mishap ran through the entire coffeehouse as the day progressed. We began to make bets on which customers would comment on the car that had a mailbox stuck under it. I cleaned up. The informers were easy to spot. They were the ones who walked in the door backward since they were busy gaping at the mailbox like it was roadkill. In a way, it was.

  At three o’clock
, the next shift of employees showed up, and Reanna left with a grinding noise as she drove off with the mailbox still attached. We all watched from the window to see the fountain of sparks coming up behind her car from the metal mailbox rubbing against the asphalt. The morning crew laughed before heading out, leaving the afternoon crew and me feeling bereft now that our source of entertainment was gone.

  The steady stream of customers that was typical for a Saturday continued all afternoon and into the evening. The time was flying by, even though I found myself checking my phone more often than normal. I had to give credit to Liz and Larry for putting together a great crew. We ran like a well-oiled machine.

  “You seem pretty antsy tonight,” Heather observed as I pulled my phone out to check the clock for the umpteenth time in the last hour. “Is there some killer party I need to know about?”

  “Not that I know of,” I answered offhandedly, hoping she’d drop it. I stepped up to the counter so I could ring up the energy drink a pimply kid had plunked on the counter. I handed him back his change.

  “Tressa, Queen of All Parties, doesn’t know if there’s anything going on tonight? Are you holding out on me?”

  I sighed. That really was my reputation. How sad my college legacy would be. “I have a date,” I said, trying to save face, even though I had intended to keep my date with Trent on the down low.

  “Oh, even better. Spill.” She leaned against the counter with sudden interest.

  Seeing no out, I gave her an abridged version of my impending date. Her questions made it easy since she was all about the physical stuff. It was easy to describe Trent’s physique in great detail. Heather sighed with pleasure as I talked about his abs and of course his eyes, which were his best feature. By the time I finished talking, I felt like everything in me was a puddle of liquid heat. Being sexually deprived was muddling my brain.

  14.

  Trent, who normally couldn’t keep track of time to save his life, showed up at my apartment at nine thirty on the nose. I was in the middle of trying to squeeze into my favorite skinny jeans when he knocked on the front door. Derek and Cameo weren’t home yet, which meant I had to bounce my way to the door to get my jeans pulled up over my hips, which have always been on the curvy side. After I managed to shimmy my jeans on and button them up, I smoothed my shirt down and opened the door.

  “You’re early. Come on in,” I stated, backing up toward my room for my long socks and boots.

  He looked at his watch as he stepped through the doorway. “I said I’d be here at nine thirty.” I thought that was funny. It seemed like no one wore watches anymore. I remembered thinking I was cool when my older cousin, Jamie, had bought me a Relic watch when I was fourteen. I never touched it again after my parents gave me my cell phone.

  “Yeah, but you’re always late,” I answered as I ducked into my room to get the rest of my stuff.

  His answer was muddled but pretty much sounded like a denial. I pulled on my socks and boots and then headed to my bathroom to spray perfume and touch up my makeup. I wasn’t sure where Trent planned to take me. Probably some comic book store.

  I threw on my jacket and we headed out. I was wrong about the comic book store, but where we ended up wasn’t much better.

  “This is where you decided to take me?” I don’t think I could have guessed the Halloween megastore if I had been given ten chances, but there we were nonetheless.

  “Sure. I know you don’t have a costume. Tonight’s as good a night as any to get yours,” he said, opening his car door.

  “How do you know I don’t have one?” I climbed from the car and into the cool night temperatures.

  “You mentioned it Monday when we saw that kid wearing a wolf mask outside the library.” He started walking toward the brightly lit Halloween store.

  “So? I don’t need one. I’m not going to any parties this year.” I wasn’t overly sad about missing the campus parties. Last year I had gotten completely wasted after the third party of the night. Waking up in the living room of some frat house with vomit that you’re not entirely sure is yours is not the best feeling.

  “I thought you said you were going to Woodfalls for the festival.” He opened the door of the store and a blast of warm air enveloped us as we walked in.

  I didn’t answer him right away since I was awestruck. I’d never seen so many costumes. Aisles and aisles of them. I wondered why Cameo and I had felt the need to slave over making our own costumes when a store like this existed.

  “You are going, right?”

  “Huh?” I asked, running my fingers over a black wig that would have been perfect for my Cleopatra costume last year. Instead, I used temporary dye for my hair, which ended up dyeing my neck too.

  Trent stepped in front of me, cutting off my view of the costume wonderland in front of me. “Halloween festival. Woodfalls?”

  “I guess I’m going, but I didn’t intend to dress up.”

  “You have to dress up,” he said, grabbing me by the wrist and leading me down one of the endless rows of outfits. “How about this one?” He reached into the rack and pulled out a short beer maiden’s costume.

  “Did it two years ago, except my skirt was shorter.”

  “Uh, of course it was,” he said, adjusting his glasses. I smirked at his reaction. His responses to some of my comments were flattering.

  “How about this?” I asked, pulling on a mask from a popular slasher film franchise. Brittni and I had watched all the movies when we were freshmen. For months afterward, I would call her up and ask her in a creepy voice if she liked scary movies.

  “The first movie wasn’t bad, but the rest were pretty ridiculous,” Trent said, handing me a fake butcher knife so I could get the full effect in a mirror at the end of our row.

  “My mom probably wouldn’t be thrilled if I showed up to the festival wearing this.”

  “No, but you’d get cool points from your brother.”

  “Maybe I should get it for the snot runt.” I pulled the mask off and patted my hair back in place.

  We rounded the corner into a new row that looked like Disney princesses had puked in it. “Wow, talk about princess fetishes.” I’d somehow been lucky enough to escape the love affair every girl seemed to have with wanting to be a princess.

  Trent held up a yellow monstrosity of a dress. “What, you never wanted to be Belle?”

  “No, thanks,” I answered disdainfully, leaving the aisle behind.

  The next aisle was much more my speed. It was like a blast from cartoon heaven. Trent and I spent a good thirty minutes in the cartoon aisle trying on different masks and headgear. I couldn’t resist pulling out my phone and snapping a picture for Brittni of Trent wearing a Johnny Bravo mask. Johnny Bravo held a special place in our hearts. I posted the picture on Instagram also. I ignored the message section that showed I had more than a thousand comments on pictures I had posted.

  The next few aisles were kid costumes, so Trent and I skipped over them. I couldn’t help giggling when he dragged me down a superhero aisle like a kid who had just spotted Santa Claus. His major geek came out when he picked up a Green Lantern ring and quoted something that sounded like a pledge.

  “Do I even want to know how you knew that entire thing?” My attitude changed when I spotted a Princess Leia costume, complete with a freaking cinnamon roll–looking wig. I wasn’t much of a sci-fi nut, but I’d always been obsessed with Han Solo. Mom told me that when I was little they dug out my dad’s collection of action figures from when he was a kid and I instantly zoned in on the Han Solo and Princess Leia figures. I was like three at the time. I recently saw a movie with the guy who played Han Solo and he’s totally some old dude now. I can’t believe I had crushed on him so hard.

  I held up the costume, which was completely impractical for Maine since the belly was bare and all, but I wanted it. Bad.

  “That’s the costume you like?” Trent asked in a strangled voice.

  I turned my attention away from the costume
in my hand to eye him, wondering what the big deal was. “Yeah. Why?” His eyes were practically bugging out.

  “You know that’s from a major ‘geek movie,’ as you like to put it, right? Maybe you’d like one of the costumes over there,” he said, pointing to a nurse costume.

  “I know which movie this comes from,” I said, clutching it to my chest. “What’s your deal? You wanted me to pick a costume, and now you’re going to get all judgmental? What, you don’t like Star Wars or something?”

  “Are you kidding? It’s the biggest cinematic movie of its generation. It revolutionized how movies were being made.”

  “Okay, so what’s your deal with Princess Leia? Let me guess, you hated that a woman got to kick some ass? That’s a pretty sexist attitude,” I said, stalking off to one of the mirrors so I could try on the wig.

  “I don’t have a problem with Princess Leia,” he said as he came up behind me, looking embarrassed.

  It took a minute for the pieces to click into place. “Ah, I see. You have a thing for Princess Leia. You don’t think I’ll make a good one?” I didn’t know if I should be pissed or hurt.

  “That’s not it,” he said, looking uncomfortable.

  “Then what is it?” I pressed, stepping closer to him. He took a step back, hitting the rack behind him. A couple wigs fell at his feet, but he didn’t notice.

  “Well?” I asked, stepping even closer. This was the first time I had invaded his space and it felt oddly invigorating.

  He mumbled under his breath, looking at a loss for words.

  “I didn’t catch that,” I said, running my finger up his arm. There was a special place in hell for me for messing with him, but I couldn’t seem to stop myself.

  He turned the tables on me when he placed his hands on my hips, stopping me from stepping closer. His hands resting intimately on the curves of my hips evoked a feeling of want that was so strong I wanted to crush myself against him. I wanted to feel those hands guiding me with a whole lot less clothing on.