Chapter Two
As two lucky lovesick idiots swap saliva while hovering over a melting ice cream cone, I ponder why God gives his toughest battles to his strongest soldiers.
I mean, I’ve done my time, haven’t I? I’ve used more dating apps than cats apparently have lives.
Gone on so many first dates that I’ve had dinner with three—no joke, three—different men named Marrion Chad.
(And not just Chad or Marrion. Marrion Chad!) I’ve learned to play the banjo to appease a bluegrass musician, gone halal and kosher, and joined fantasy football leagues and Dungeons his eyebrows are just really thick.) For a while there, he scared off all my potential friends and suitors.
Not even by doing anything, really—he’s just so damn tall, and those thick brows are always furrowed in a way that makes him look angry.
He’s working on that, though. Apparently, scaring away strangers is bad for business.
And ever since Tey took over Kabobs ’n’ Bits, he’s been taking customer service very seriously.
I guess that’s the third reason I don’t feel suffocated here: Once my parents reached retirement age, they decided to sell our childhood home and live on a houseboat.
They didn’t consult us kids first, just sent us a text demanding we pack up our remaining possessions in the house and say goodbye to sentimentality.
That’s life in the diaspora for you: Once your parents have had to pack up and go several times, they won’t hesitate to do it again.
And they might even pass on that same underlying panic to you.
I inherited all that and more from my mom and dad: furry eyebrows, thin lips, and generational trauma.
But I didn’t get the short end of the stick in the same way Tey did.
They all but tossed him the keys to Kabobs ’n’ Bits before motoring off in the direction of Maine.
Not that Tey seemed to mind all that much.
He studied business at the local state school and likes the responsibility.
Classic firstborn, golden-child stuff. Now my parents communicate with us only via a WhatsApp group, where they send selfies from the high seas.
Who knows when we’ll next see them. Probably Nowruz, if I had to guess.
I usually text the group distasteful jokes that I know will piss my parents off, partly because it’s funny and partly because, as the baby of the family, I’m entitled to seek attention.
Tey always tells me to can it, though. He doesn’t like getting in hot water, pun intended.
See? Despite the Bigfoot stature and the scary-ass stare, once you get to know him, he’s an absolute muffin.
Speaking of muffins, I turn my attention back to the pastry I’m nibbling on and the hot apple cider smell that’s wafting out of the back room of Sift.
With freshly baked goods each morning and a line that’s often out the door, Sift boasts the title of best bakery in town, if not the state.
I love that only a panel of glass separates customers from the kitchen so we can watch the maestros work their magic.
My mouth salivates as one chef uses a tiny pointed instrument to impregnate a flaky puff pastry with some sort of milky filling.
Fuck. My body often confuses hunger with horniness. I shake it off. I need to snap out of the delusion before my date arrives. The last thing I need is to be sporting rock-hard nipples under my fuzzy striped sweater and scare him off before he’s even ordered a beverage.
I look at the time in the corner of my laptop screen.
This dude still has fifteen minutes to show before I send him a passive-aggressive text and never contact him again.
The employees at Sift would take my side.
After all, I’m one of their best customers.
Plus, every time I reach the register, I do, like, five minutes of free improvised stand-up comedy.
And I’m moderately hot! The general manager would probably kick my date’s ass on my behalf.
My Google Doc word count stares me down, reminding me that I’m still no closer to my goal than yesterday.
When I’m not writing fanfic (or flip-flop, as Job called it), I pay the rent by copywriting, both for local businesses and virtual clients.
Right now, I’m attempting to come up with a slogan for a suppository company.
So far, the best I’ve been able to muster is “VIPussy” and “Put the But! in Butthole,” both of which, I think, are a little bit too rock ’n’ roll for my sixty-year-old white conservative clientele.