Chapter Sixteen
Mira
I hadn’t really needed to use the washroom.
It was an excuse my fragile mind had made up to discover for myself the reasons Caleb had led Becca to the private hallway at the far end of the shop.
Stupid mind and stupid excuses. I wish I could sear that vision of them together out of my brain for good. I’d do it with little remorse.
I splashed cold water across my face and patted it dry with a paper towel.
A pale, shaken girl stared back at me through the mirror, and I turned my back in disgust. Weak.
That man made me feel weak. Shoot a hundred and forty pound predatory grizzly with basically a water pistol and no fear of the consequences?
No problem. See a nice boy canoodling with my arch nemesis?
Crazy Mira falls to pieces. I chucked the paper towel into the trash bin like it had been the one to betray me.
Caleb got to me. Didn’t mean he deserved to see how badly.
Opal gave me a steady gaze over the top of her glasses when I slipped back behind the counter. “Food’s ready for the big top. You mind taking it over to them?”
Caleb was staring at me. I could feel it so I didn’t venture to look their way. “Can’t we just call them up like we do with everyone else?” I whispered.
Opal arched her eyebrow. “If I’m not mistaken, I’d say there is a McCreedy or two at that table, and we need their shining endorsement.
Now scat. You’re harshing my mellow with your cloud of emo lovesickness.
Your aura looks awful.” She waved her hand in my direction like she was scattering fog and went back to slicing deli meat.
I opened my mouth with a ready denial but clicked my teeth back together again.
She was right. I was full of emo-whatever-she-had-called-it.
I shook my hands like coach was about to put me in the game and stretched my neck to the side until it popped.
I could do this. They were just men. He was just a man.
He was the man, but whatever. People had done far more difficult things.
I mentally chanted those as I toted the giant tray of food over to their table.
Climbed Mount Everest.
Made a public speech.
Had more than fourteen seconds of conversation with Evan Dirty-Mouth McCreedy.
All much harder than I was about to do, really.
“Food’s ready.” My voice cracked, and I bit my lip when six pair of eyes swung my way. I could imagine the shade my face was turning.
Most of the boys kept talking, but Caleb had gone still and watchful. Evan moved gallantly out of the way so I could set the tray on their table.
“Evan,” Caleb warned, a half second before I felt a firm squeeze on my left butt cheek.
“Told you she was a hot piece of ass,” Evan sneered.
I gasped in shock as the force of his hand pushed me forward until I lay awkwardly on the table. I tried to right myself, but no one was looking at me anymore. Everyone’s attention was riveted to the flurry of fists and violent motion that were making their way to the door.
I watched the raw fury on Caleb’s face as he fought with Evan.
Their friends herded them outside, but I could still see everything from my vantage point by the window.
Caleb was beautiful. Vengeful. So graceful, he couldn’t pass as human.
Potent. I couldn’t take my eyes off his agility as he pummeled his older brother with immoveable focus.
I had to stop them. This was over me, and I would never be able to live with myself if either really hurt each other.
I threw open the front door. “Stop! Stop them,” I pleaded with their friends.
They only stood back with half smiles. Two of them were taking bets.
I lurched forward and grabbed onto Caleb’s arm.
He saw enough of me that his tension eased, and he stepped back. His eyes were going to be impossible to hide if the gold in them kept spreading. “Mira—”
I saw it a split second before Caleb did. Evan wasn’t as good a fighter, but the man made up for it by fighting dirty. “Watch out,” I screamed just before his fist came flying in my direction.
Caleb yelled out. He pushed me behind him and took a hit directly to his face. Unbalanced and surprised by his strength, I fell backward into the crowd, the cement under me an unforgiving assailant.
“Hey,” one of their friends said in disapproval as they held Evan back. “Not cool, man.”
Caleb glanced back at me with worry etched into his bright eyes and blood trickling down his split lip.
“What do you care if I feel up the waitress, anyway,” Evan spat. “Is she your girlfriend? Huh? Do you want to date her? Tell me! Do you have any claim on Crazy Mira at all?”
The street grew quiet as Caleb’s shoulders hunched. I wished I could run away before the words left his lips. Caleb refused to look at me. “No,” he said softly.
I nodded my head slowly. Of course. Why would I have expected a different answer from him?
His need for a solid reputation hadn’t changed since the last time we’d seen each other.
Since the dinner with his father. Since ever.
He was going to be someone. Maybe the biggest someone this sleepy little town had ever produced.
I would be an anchor around his neck. Or if not me, the town’s idea of Crazy Mira would be the brick that dragged him beneath his potential.
The only thing that could have made the situation worse came to fruition when I looked down to see my apron had come loose and sagged to the side. My shirt was disheveled and one still emaciated and angrily scarred hipbone stuck out for all to see.
“Freak,” I heard someone murmur from the crowd.
My feet couldn’t move fast enough as I scrambled for the safety of the pie shop. I sought my refuge in the inventory room.
Eventually, Opal ambled in and leaned against the doorframe to the tiny room. “You want to talk about it?”
My arms rested on my knees and my head on those. I shook my head slightly. My eyes were dry. I just didn’t want to face the world quite yet.
“I’ll be with you in a moment,” she told a customer. Sitting beside me, she patted my arm. “At least tell me where you got the scars, Mira. That stuff is no good all bottled up. Tell one person and get it out of you. You can never move on if you keep that kind of darkness inside.”
I couldn’t bring myself to utter the words. Time dragged on, and I found the admission more and more difficult. When Opal stood to leave, I rushed the words, “I got them from being hungry.”
Opal leaned her back against a row of shelves and waited.
“When I was so hungry I thought I would die, I had trouble getting around. I ran into things. Table. Bathroom sink. Dresser. Everything was right at the height of my hips. My bones stuck out so much and my skin was thin as rice paper. When I hit something, it would split me open, and I was too young to know how to stitch myself up yet.”
Opal didn’t offer advice or make sympathetic mewling sounds. She listened quietly with her hands clasped in front of her. “Go on home. Your shift is almost over, anyway, and the lunch rush has died down.”
I stood and rubbed my sore bum.
“And Mira?”
I turned.
“The next time a man squeezes your ass without permission, lay him out. You understand?”
I laughed shakily. “Wouldn’t that be bad for business?”
“Like hiring the town witch with a punch-happy throng of admirers following her around?”
I untied my apron and hung it on the hook. “Fair enough. Lay them out. Got it.”
Opal sent me home with two sandwiches. I tried to refuse on account I didn’t work the full day and hadn’t earned either of them.
She said my scars earned them for me. I could have sworn I saw her wipe moisture away from her eyes when she came out of the inventory room, but I’ve been known to be wrong before.
The oil workers had taken their lunch to go and headed back to the rig before I left the pie shop.
Thank goodness for small blessings. If I never saw Evan McCreedy again for the rest of my life, it would be too soon.
And Caleb? Well, I couldn’t see the man soon enough but stilled my traitorous heart.
I would just have to get used to the ache as I had done with everything else in my life.
****
“T minus five minutes and counting until the first float hits Main Street,” Opal yelled over the street noise outside. “You girls lock up, and I’ll take our food upstairs.”
“You got it Ms. Opal,” Sadey said. She snatched the keys from me and raced to the front door. “I win.”
I rolled my eyes and tried not to smile. “Fine, race to the top floor.” Even if she wasn’t fumbling with the lock, I was much closer to the stairs and at an advantage.
“Cheater,” she accused when she plopped down beside me at the table in the very middle of the balcony.
Opal was already divvying up our lunch, and the raucous crowd below was enough to provide plenty of entertainment for a curious people-watcher like myself.
The whole town had shown up. I don’t know why I was surprised.
Everybody knew everybody, and this was the social event of the season.
How much I had missed while sitting in my lonely tower on Dark Corner Road.
Sadey opened wide to shove a huge bite into her mouth in a very anaconda-like fashion but stopped mid-strike. “Caleb is on the seventh float.”
I squinted at her as she delved into her ham and Swiss on rye. “Why would you think I need to know that?”
“Wait, wait, wait,” Opal said. “Is Caleb the boy from the other day? Fists of fury?”
Sadey gulped. It was a miracle she didn’t choke.
“Sure is. I heard about the whole thing not ten minutes after it happened. Pretty sure the whole town did. I tried to call Caleb and get details, but he said he didn’t want to talk about it and hung up on me.
Lame. So then I thought about calling Evan, but you really can’t believe a word that comes out of his mouth, so I called Caleb’s friend, Joseph Reyes, instead, and he told me everything.
Well, as much as he could tell me while riding in the bed of Caleb’s pickup truck going sixty. ”