12
CORA
I’ll never take panties for granted again.
Even working the early shift at Quintaño's with a horribly hungover Jorden can’t bring me down. I’m clothed and far, far away from the influence of Ivan Pushkin.
Life is good.
“How is there more gum under this table?” Jorden is doubled over, head under booth thirteen. “I just cleaned it, like, two days ago.”
“Middle schoolers,” I call.
A regular group of scrawny middle-school boys always claim that booth on Sunday mornings. They buy nothing but soda and one appetizer to share and they always tip in pennies. I wouldn’t mind so much if they didn’t also leave their chewing gum plastered under the table.
Jorden stamps her foot. “I’m not letting them in today. They can find somewhere else to eat.”
“Right,” I say, sarcasm thick. “And you’ll say that even when they tell you you’re the prettiest waitress they’ve ever seen? Or when they ask for your phone number and slip you little love notes on the back of their napkins?”
Jorden smirks. “Maybe I wouldn’t be so starved for attention if you hadn’t dragged me away from Hot Athlete.”
“The fact that you’re calling him ‘Hot Athlete’ instead of a name doesn’t bode well for the strength of that relationship.”
“Screw the ‘strength of the relationship,’” Jorden says. “He was an athlete. That means stamina, Cora. Power. Flexibility. Are you hearing me? Are you understanding?”
I wrinkle my nose. “Everyone understands. You’re gross.”
“Says the skank who came home in nothing but a man’s suit jacket!”
I hiss and spin towards the swinging kitchen doors. They’re still closed and I can hear the kitchen staff clanging pots around, so Francia probably can’t hear us. But still—better safe than sorry.
I whirl back to face Jorden. “We’re not talking about that,” I say through gritted teeth. “I’m going to repair that very expensive dress and get it back to Francia. No one will ever know it happened.”
That’s the plan, anyway. I shoved the dress in my purse before I left Ivan’s office. By the time I got home last night, I was too wound up to think about it. Then I woke up and came right into work today. I’ll check the damage when I get back to my apartment after my shift.
“So what happened? Did it just rip or—”
“I told you: that drunk guy grabbed me.”
She snaps her fingers. “I do remember you saying that. I think. It’s hazy.”
“Because you were barely conscious on the ride home last night.”
“No judgment,” she reminds me with a scolding finger. “We were having fun. I wouldn’t have seemed so drunk if you’d also been drinking.”
I hold up my hands in surrender. “You’re right. No judgment. But that goes both ways.”
Jorden considers, her mouth twisted to one side as she cleans off the six-top in the middle of the dining room. “Okay, but…”
“No exceptions!”
She winces. “Okay—except you came home with no panties, so I want to know—”
“La la la la la! I can’t heaaar you!” I sing over her, drowning out her voice.
Jorden groans. “Fine! Don’t tell me. You probably hooked up with a bazillionaire, but why would I want to hear that story? It’s only my entire life goal.”
“Dating a guy like that is not your life goal.”
“You’re right,” she deadpans. “My goal is to be a waitress here until I die. Because I’ll never make enough to retire. Pension? Who needs it! I’ll pay for a nursing home with my middle-school boy tips and $2.13 an hour.”
I replace the salt and pepper shakers on the tables with fresh ones and check the clock hanging above the fake ivy wreath. We open for the brunch crowd in ten minutes. Joy, oh joy.
“No thanks,” Jorden says, continuing her rant. “I plan to find me a sweet little sugar daddy. That party was chock full of them.”
If Jorden knew what having a “sugar daddy” was really like, she wouldn’t want it so bad.
I could tell her. I could walk her through my mom’s life. Through what was supposed to be my life. But I didn’t run away just to dive back into that cesspool again.
Clean break. That’s what I want. Which means I can’t tell Jorden that I’ve seen her fantasy up close and personal, and it doesn’t look anything like the advertisements.
“Guys like the ones from last night want girls in ballgowns who are eternally tipsy on champagne. They aren't interested in working class girls like us,” I say. “And it’s their loss! We’re awesome.”
“I never would have thought of you as a snob, Cora.”
“I’m not a snob! I just…”
“You just judge people based on how much money they have.” She smiles and shrugs when I turn to look at her. “It’s fine. Be a snob if you want. I’ll still love you even when I’m rich beyond belief.”
I throw a damp towel over my shoulder and lean against the corner of the booth. “It’s not that they have money. It’s that none of them know what it’s like to work for it. They look down on people who don’t have money and they think they should be in charge of them just because they were born with a perfect credit score and a trust fund.”
Jorden wrinkles her nose. “Sorry, babe. But I’ve been working for as long as I can remember. If a man with deep pockets wants to take me away from all of this gum scraping, then I’ll gladly let him.”
“You want to be dependent on a man?”
“If it means I can finally breathe, then yeah.” Jorden winks as she passes, bumping my hip with hers. “But until then, I’ll sign on for the brunch shift with you and accept compliments from middle schoolers.”
Just then, Francia swings through the kitchen door with a heavy sigh. “We have got to hire more kitchen staff. I’m not getting paid enough for this.” Her hair is frizzed out around her face and her cheeks are red.
“Just tell Dino you won’t help him with the pastries anymore. It’s his job,” I tell her.
She puffs out a breath, blowing her bangs off of her forehead. “I know. I will. It’s just that, when I don’t help him, we run out of pastries. And you know who customers yell at when I don’t bring them a cinnamon roll? I’ll give you a hint: it isn’t Dino.”
“In a perfect world, customers wouldn’t yell at anyone. But if they have to,” I say, mulling over the way Dino swats at waitresses’ asses with his dishtowel, “it should always be Dino.”
Francia brightens. “Speaking of a perfect world, how was last night?”
Jorden squeals. “Girl, you missed out. That place was wall to wall with beefcakes.”
“Ew.” I wrinkle my nose. “I don’t remember seeing any beefcakes.”
“You probably just remember seeing one.” She wags her brows. “You were all over—”
“The snack table!” I interject. “There was a croquembouche.”
Jorden stares at me blankly. “A what?”
“A tower of cream puffs with caramel. It’s a French dessert. They’re like—”
“Boring!” Jorden blares. Her hangover is still lingering, so she winces at the sound of her own voice. “I didn’t eat a thing.”
“Hence the drunken stupor when I dragged you out of there.”
She looks at Francia and rolls her eyes. “She’s exaggerating. It was so much fun. I met this amazing guy. He’s an athlete and—”
Jorden rambles on. I listen in only so far as I need to make sure she doesn’t mention Ivan.
“—biceps like you wouldn’t believe.” Jorden is still talking a mile a minute. “He picked me up and carried me like I was nothing. I felt like I was on the cover of one of those historical romance novel covers. You know, with the ripped bodices and flowing hair? It was hella romantic.”
Francia turns to me the moment there’s a break in the conversation. “Who did you talk to, Cor? These things can be kind of snobby. Hopefully, everyone was nice.”
Jorden snorts. “Oh, they were more than nice. Cora was busy entertaining all night.”
I’ll kill her. I swear to God I will. I love her, but I’ll kill her.
“Entertaining who?” Francia asks.
I smile and wave her away. “Jorden was enjoying the free champagne too much to know what was going on. I just wandered around and observed.”
“You had to have talked to someone,” she presses. “Did anyone ask who invited you? What did you tell them?”
She seems oddly interested in my evening. But she’s probably just wondering what she missed.
“I only had to tell the security at the gate your name. Otherwise, no one asked,” I lie.
She frowns, her mouth opening to say something. But the bells above the front door jangle, cutting her off.
“Oh!” Jorden spins around and looks at the clock. “Wow. We are open already.”
I hurry and finish wiping down the last two tables while Francia slides all the chairs onto the floor.
“Come on in, boys,” Jorden calls to our customers. “We just opened, so give us a second to get ourselves sorted.” She plucks the rag out of my hand and slaps a stack of menus against my chest. “I need some more concealer and a vat of coffee before I can serve that table.”
I’m not sure what she means until I turn around.
“Brawny” doesn’t begin to cover it. The men at the table are huge in every direction. Thick necks, even thicker biceps. Three of them are decked out in all black like they’re stopping for a bite to eat before they continue on to their day jobs as top secret ninjas.
Except one man with his back to me. He’s narrower than the others, leaner in a way that I’ve always found more appealing. I can’t determine much from the back of his head, though.
The pull of attraction brings with it a thread of guilt. As if I owe the man I spent last night with at least twenty-four hours of emotional monogamy. It’s ridiculous, of course; I can guarantee Ivan Pushkin isn’t thinking about me right now. So I can be attracted to the back of whoever’s head I damn well please.
With that, I plaster on my best people-facing smile and slide menus across the tacky surface of their just-washed table.
“Welcome to Quintaño's. We’re serving brunch right now, so you lucky gentlemen get our full breakfast and lunch menu. Let me know what you’re in the mood for and I can point you to the right page in the—”
I’m halfway through my spiel before I even look up at the men.
My mouth falls open in what has to be a very unattractive gape. But I can’t summon the energy to close it.
All of my energy is directed at remaining standing.
At not turning and fleeing into the kitchen.
At not throwing myself directly into Dino’s fresh vat of frying oil.
Because a set of molten amber eyes I never thought I’d see again are blinking up at me. There’s not a single drop of surprise in the rest of his granite expression.
“Good morning, solnishka,” Ivan Pushkin says. “Did you miss me?”