Broken Girl(14)

“I think I’d remember meeting you.”

I struggled to keep from smiling. A pleased grin spread across Shane’s face, the stick of his sucker danced in circles, his eyes gleaming with realization. Noticing my answer came out different than I wanted it to, I tried to pull back the energy swirling between us. And that same ol’ voice came out in my head. ‘You know, Rose, this can’t work’. I took a deep breath and came up with words that would drive the conversation in a different direction.

“Well, maybe you saw me at the grocery store. Do you shop over at the Whole Foods on California?” I answered, looking away as I fed the vending machine flat crisp dollar bills. What the hell? Really? Whole Foods, Rose? I pushed F7 and let a small overpriced box of soap fall off the row it dangled.

“Sometimes, but that’s not it . . . You ever waitress at Boxing Room?” he asked as he pulled my soap from the space it landed.

“The Cajun place on Grove?”

“Yeah, best food in the Hayes,” he answered, holding out the small box of laundry soap in one hand and his sucker in the other.

“No, I’ve never waitressed in my life,” I answered, grabbing the soap from him and tossing it in my basket. I flattened a collection of bills on the edge of the vending machine and fed it enough dollars to get a small pack of dryer softener sheets too.

“Well, now I hope I didn’t offend you with the waitress comment. I know plenty of women that make an honest living as a waitress,” he responded, pointing and poking the shrunken sucker in my direction.

Little did he know that my appearance of being annoyed was far from the reasons he perceived. Great, now it would be a matter of minutes before it clicked in his head where he had seen me. It was inevitable, he was going to remember seeing me in the alley and that my type of service wasn’t bringing people food.

“Far from offended, Shane.”

“That’s one good thing I have going for me.” His half-tilted smile melted my heart.

“What, that I haven’t waitressed before?”

“No, that you don’t get offended easy.”

Shane caught the sucker between his teeth and bit down on the little part that still clung to the stick. He smiled again causing my insides to tangle up with his charm. A noticeable pause hung between us, as if we were both waiting for the other to make a move. I liked hanging out with him, he was damn hot and I was attracted to him, but I can’t pay my rent with flirty conversations and silly girl crushes. I had to get to my apartment and change into my come-f*ck-me-heels and peek-a-boo panties. Unfortunately, I was behind the eight-ball this week, time was money and I didn’t have any extra minutes to spare. Pressure built in the back of my throat as I knew what I had to do.

“Well, I’d better get to my laundry. It’s not going to do itself.” The words flew from my mouth as I started to separate my whites from my darks and delicates.

“Yeah, well, I can take a hint, but using the excuse of laundry, really?” He teased with a magnetic smile.

“Hah, very funny, Shane. Thanks for saving me from the industrial washers.” I responded in a low tone as I collected my dark clothes from the rolling basket and pushed them into the large washer he was leaning against.

“It was my pleasure saving you, Little Clumsy Rose,” he answered as he caught one of my socks that tried to escape.

“Hey, now! Well, I guess I earned that name today.”

He handed me my sock. Thank God it wasn’t a pair of my crotchless panties. I scooped up a pile of ten quarters I stacked in preparation of washing my clothes.

“Yeah, you sure did.”

“Little Clumsy Rose huh?” I asked, filling the laundry detergent compartment and feeding the quarters into the machine.

“Yeah, and I think you should come back on Thursday.”

“Thursday?”

“We’ll see if the name sticks. From what I understand this laundromat is world renowned for its suckers.” He pulled out a yellow sucker from his back pocket. “I’ll see you this Thursday let’s say around five thirty? Don’t be late, or a stranger.” He smiled and emphasized each word by pointing the sucker at me. I grabbed the candy, he lowered his eyes to the floor before he pushed up from leaning against the washer, buried his hands in his front pockets and wandered to the back door. His manly swagger automatically caught my eye and caused my entire body to tingle and crave his weight. He pushed open the back door, gave me a short, intentional smile then left.

Little Clumsy Rose, huh? We’ll see. I pulled open the sucker and pushed it into my mouth.

That was the first day we actually spoke and he learned my name. Sure, I’d say he was super charming and I was totally giddy but I didn’t see him again until I showed up with the same sack of clean clothes three days later, on Thursday at six o’clock at night. Maybe he’ll add fashionably late, to my new title, Little Clumsy Rose.





I JUST HAD the three longest nights in the history of my six squares of sidewalk ever! Dealing with cheap-ass pricks along with stingy f*cks who tried to get a push and pull for half price truly exhausted me. Not even the act of taking on a trick had used the amount of energy I spent haggling with these cheap ass dickweeds. And let me just say, language barriers didn’t count when the foreign f*cks were trying to purchase my *. They had no problem communicating what the hell they wanted from me with universal hand gestures. And to top off my mood, my feet were killing me from the piece-of-shit snake skin stilettos I bought from the tiny consignment shop around the corner from my apartment.