Remembrance (The Mediator #7)(21)

“Jesse says he loves me the way I am.” I shoved two dollars into the already stuffed tip jar. “And shouldn’t you be working instead of eavesdropping on my private conversation?”

“Yeah,” Gina said, waving a hand at the whimsically painted café tables. Aunt Pru was big on whimsy. “Because it’s so packed in here.”

“It’ll pick up after six,” CeeCee said. “The after-work caffeine hounds.”

“Getting back to Kelly?” I nudged.

“Oh,” CeeCee said. “Right.” She glanced back down at the laptop screen. “Apparently things didn’t work out with the degree, since she moved home with Mom last year.”

“Whoa. Debbie never mentioned that.” I slid back into my seat. “Probably Kelly never posted about it on Instagram.”

“You guys suck,” Gina said. “What’s wrong with fashion merchandising? And do I need to point out that both of you are college graduates who moved back to your hometown? You shouldn’t be making fun of this poor Kelly girl for doing the same thing.”

“Um, first of all,” I said, “if I were to make fun of her, it wouldn’t be for her choice of degree or for moving back home, it would be because Kelly is a really mean, terrible person. Did you know she used to refer to CeeCee as ‘the freak’? To her face.”

Gina threw CeeCee a quick glance—quick enough to catch the way CeeCee’s scalp, plainly visible beneath the white strands of her hair, turned a deeper shade of pink with embarrassment at the reminder.

“Oh, CeeCee,” Gina said, laying a brown-skinned hand across CeeCee’s almost translucently pale one. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t know.”

“It’s okay.” CeeCee reached for her latte and took a big gulp. “It’s cool to be a freak now. Even if I do still live at home.”

Gina bit her lip. “I’m sorry I said that, too. And you’re not a freak. It’s just . . . I can relate to Kelly’s not being able to hack it in the big city. That’s why I’m here, sleeping on Suze’s couch.”

“That’s totally different,” I pointed out quickly. “You’re from New York, like me. You’re used to public transportation. Navigating all those freeways in LA had to suck. And you’re only taking a break from the Hollywood thing until you have some money saved up and your shit together—”

Both CeeCee and Gina pointed at the “swear” jar, which I’d intended for them to do. I’d sworn on purpose, to lighten the mood. Whenever Gina began to dwell on why she’d taken a detour from her dream of movie stardom, and ended up in my apartment in Carmel, her voice caught, and her eyes filled. She’d been crashing at my place for several months, though none of us—not even Jesse, who was the most soothing of souls—had learned why, except that life in Hollywood had been harder than she’d expected.

“For now,” Jesse had advised, after one late-night chat by the backyard fire pit at the house he and my stepbrother Jake shared had left her looking particularly pensive, “leave it alone. She’ll tell you what happened when she’s ready. Just let her heal.”

So Gina was healing on my futon couch and earning minimum wage, plus tips, at the Happy Medium.

Getting up to stuff another dollar in the “swear” jar, I went on, “I don’t think Kelly’s changed much since high school.”

Becca’s new stepmother had barely glanced at Sister Ernestine as she’d explained why she’d called.

“So it was just another one of Becca’s accidents?” Kelly had asked. “She’s so clumsy.” Her tone suggested, So why do you people keep calling me?

The fact that Becca had had more than one of these kinds of “accidents” alarmed me—this family seemed to dwell a lot on the word accident.

But before I could say anything, Sister Ernestine butted in.

“Well, yes, Mrs. Walters, but this time you may want to take Becca to see her pediatrician. Miss Simon and I aren’t trained medical professionals, and as you can see by Becca’s uniform, there was quite a lot of blood—”

“Becca, you keep a spare shirt in your locker for PE, don’t you?” Kelly asked.

Becca nodded, looking cowed by her glamazon of a stepmother.

“Great,” Kelly said. “No need for me to take her home then.” She’d given us one of her patented Kelly Prescott Look-at-me, I’m-a-real-California-blonde, capped-teeth-and-all smiles. “Well, thanks for calling, Sister. Suze, it was, uh, good to see you again. Buh-bye.”

“Not so fast, Kelly,” I’d called just as she’d spun around on a red-soled Louboutin, her long, honey-gold curls leaving behind the delicate odor of burnt hair that had spent too long in a curling iron. “I’d definitely have a doctor look at your stepdaughter. In fact, I’d take her over to the emergency room at St. Francis in Monterey right now and ask for a Dr. Jesse de Silva. He’s excellent. Here, let me write it down for you.”

I’d scrounged around for a pen and notepad, which hadn’t looked too professional, since all the pens and notepads had been flung to the floor by Becca’s still-absent guardian angel.

“The ER?” Kelly had pushed her sunglasses up onto her forehead. “You can’t be serious. It was just a cut. She says she’s got an extra shirt. She’s fine.”