Not Today, But Someday(16)

“Do you have any friends here? Someone’s house you can go to?” She shakes her head.

“You’re the only person who’s talked to me.”

“Well, you were a little intimidating at school,” I tell her, remembering how closed-off she seemed yesterday.

“I’m really not,” she says.

“I see that now,” I agree. “My car’s two blocks from here by the coffee shop. Walk with me, I’ll get you another latte, and we’ll figure out somewhere you can go.”

“Okay,” she agrees, standing from the table when I do and following me back out into the street.





CHAPTER 7 - EMI





“You mind if I smoke?” Nate asks me as we turn the corner on our way to the coffee house where his car is parked. I crinkle my nose at him in disapproval, but shake my head.

“I don’t care.”

“Cool. Want one?” he asks as he takes off his gloves, putting them in his pocket.

“No, thanks,” I tell him as he lights up. He holds the cigarette in the hand farthest away from me, and blows his smoke in the opposite direction.

“So, I take it you’re staying with your dad?”

“No. My mom.” The ground slick, one of my shoes slides precariously on the ice. I grab onto Nate’s arm for support. “Sorry.”

“It’s fine,” he says kindly, allowing me to hold on to him. “What’d she do to make you so mad? Your dad’s the cheater. Why don’t you want to go home?”

“I just hate it there. It’s a tiny apartment. My room barely fits my new twin-size bed. I have to share a bathroom with Chris. Nothing has a proper place. And when I left there tonight, my sister was there with her new boyfriend who’s going to marry her because she’s pregnant, and she slapped me–”

“She slapped you?”

I touch my left cheek and nod.

“Why?”

“I called her a whore.” He chuckles a little. “She called me a bitch first. And of course I can’t hit her back because she’s cooking a baby–”

Nate starts to cough, small puffs of smoke and hot air escaping his lips as he laughs heartily at what I said. “Cooking?”

“Yeah,” I grin.

“Nice visual. So you don’t want to go to your Mom’s. Is your Dad’s house an option?”

“Aside from the fact that he lives an hour away, I don’t ever want to see him again. So, no.” He’s silent, and his brows are furrowed as if he’s deep in thought. “I know I didn’t think this through.”

“Yeah, what exactly was your plan?”

“Make them worry about me. That was the plan.”

“Well, then I think you’ve done that.” He opens the door to the coffee house for me, but I wait for him to lead the way to the counter. I’ve never been in a place like this before, and after reading the menu, I have no idea what any of it means. “What do you want?”

“I’ll get that drink you gave me,” I tell him. “I liked it.”

“Two chai lattes, no foam,” he says. I start to get money out of my purse until I see the stack of bills tucked under a money clip that he pulls from his back pocket. It looks like he can afford this more than I can.

“No foam?” I ask him, putting my wallet away. I’ve never heard my parents talk about foam with coffee.

“I just like it better like that. Did you want it?”

“I don’t even know what that is.”

“Give her foam,” he instructs the man making our drinks. “It makes it milkier.”

“But it’s not chocolate.”

“No. Is this an allergy or something? Because I can’t guarantee that the spoons they use haven’t come into contact with chocolate or anything. Your throat’s not gonna swell up, is it?”

“No, it’s not an allergy.” We get our drinks and head back out to the street toward his car. It’s a black SUV with dark windows. “This is nice,” I tell him as he opens the door for me. Once inside, I look at all the buttons and knobs on the dashboard. This car has everything. Glancing down, I even notice a phone in the center console. Who has a phone in their car? “Are you a drug dealer?” I blurt out as soon as he sits down behind the wheel, before I can even consider what I’m asking. My heart’s racing in panic, and I put my fingers around the handle, ready to escape. Why am I getting in the car with him?

“A drug dealer?” he asks. “Why would you think that?”

“I saw all that money,” I explain, scooting a few inches away from him until my body is pressed against the door. He puts the keys in a cup-holder, as if assuring me we’re not going anywhere yet. I start to take a few breaths as I explain my rationale. “And then you have these dark windows, and a car phone, and you smoke.”

He presses his lips together, suppressing his laughter, I guess.

“This is our family car. I took it because it’s safer to drive in this weather than my car. Mom’s very active in a lot of organizations, and likes to be available at all times, even when people are driving her around. I do smoke – cigarettes, that’s all- and ‘all that money’ was only about a hundred-sixty. That’s not drug money.” He watches for my reaction, and when all I can do is stare back, he leans over the seat to unwrap my fingers from the handle. “Where do you want me to take you?”