Slow Twitch - Реинхардт Лиз (читать книги онлайн без сокращений TXT) 📗

I kind of wish I hadn’t screwed things up with Jake, because I had some serious shit to ask him. Like what it felt like when he saw Brenna, when he hung out with her, and when he couldn’t be around her. I wanted to ask him what he felt when he thought they might not be together anymore.

Because Jake had fallen in love with Brenna.

Not that I was close to love! Good Lord, I wasn’t a total and complete masochistic moron. This was just more than lust. Less than love. More than like.

I had no fucking idea what it was.

Which was doubly pathetic when you considered the fact that we had never had one real conversation, never exchanged one word that was better than barely civil, never touched, and never hung out. I knew I sounded like a wanker when I explained it, but it was what I felt. Whether I like it or not. And I really, really didn’t like it.

So I felt like a pretty intense fool when I found myself getting excited about the prospect of working with her. And maybe being a waiter wouldn’t suck too much.

I could sense when she finally came to see me, later that night. She walked up to the sink where I was still spraying chunks of chili sauce off metal spoons.

“Hey, Crackhead.” She popped one hip against the gleaming, damp side of the sink and crossed her arms tight over her chest. “Mom told me I have to show you the ropes tonight so you don’t screw up tomorrow.” Her voice told me with no doubt that the whole idea pissed her off royally. “You need to come with me. Will can finish your dishes.” She snapped at Will and he ran over all eager, as if she hadn’t just called him over like a dog.

She set everything up like she owned the place…oh, wait, she did. When she was satisfied with the dishwasher stuff, she led me to the basement.

“What do we need down here?” I stuck my hands in my pockets and followed her down the steep staircase.

“You’re not going to be a back-dweller anymore.” Her black ponytail swished as she took the stairs two at a time. “You need a uniform. And, obviously, you need your skates.”

I stopped suddenly, knowing damn well what she had said, but willing myself to imagine that her voice was full of humor. Haha. Big joke.

She glared back up at me, her eyes slits. “What the hell are you waiting for? I still have a shitload of cleaning to do. Stop stalling, Crackhead.” Then she muttered to herself in what sounded like Spanish. And I only know that because I’m fairly multilingual when you only count obscenities.

“I can’t do that.” I popped my hands up and shook my head, ready to stand my ass right in front of those shitty, sweltering sinks for another long jump of shifts. “Be on roller skates,” I clarified, barely able to say the words.

Roller skates?

She couldn’t be serious. I had put a lot of my pride into the shitter when I took this piece of shit job, but I wasn’t about to be a buffoon on skates for the entire world to take shots at. I had some small shred of self-respect left, and I wanted to keep it intact.

“If you need me to, I’ll show you how to skate. Jesus, don’t they have roller skating down on the farm? I mean, they have cocaine.” Her green eyes crackled.

What did I like about her so much? It wasn’t just that she was pretty or smart or sure of herself. It was like I was fascinated by her. I wanted to know more about her. And it was definitely beyond my control. Because if I could have turned it off, I would have in a second. Who would want to deal with this constant ridicule and never-ending shitty mood? I could talk myself out of obsessing over her with logic so firm it would have convinced anyone but a total idiot.

Call me a total idiot.

“Yeah, we have hard drugs and skating rinks.” My voice was more pissed off than I wanted to let on. “I canskate. Like if you held a gun to my head and said I had to skate or get my brains blown out, then technically, yes I can skate.” I glared back at her.

She stomped back up the stairs, until she was just one below me, and she jabbed her finger at my chest. “Well there is a gun at your head, asshole. It’s called ‘keeping this restaurant from tanking.’ Every weekend we don’t meet out mortgage goal, my mother and father get this much closer to bankruptcy.” She held her finger and thumb and inch apart. “And if we go down, your family’s precious cash cow is gone. Is that a scary enough gun, rich boy?”

And I wanted to shake her up, even though what she just told me made me realize that part of her crappy personality was probably due to the strain of knowing her parents’ investment could take a nosedive depending on the whims of its teenage workforce. But sympathy had never been my strong suit, and my lack of caring didn’t fail me this time either.

“Did it ever occur to you, Cadence, that my family has more money than Oprah could fucking dream of? This restaurant is so meaningless it took them almost a week to remember that we had it so they could send me here to rot. If this place goes down, yourfamily is the only one on a sinking ship.” I kept my voice even and cold, not letting her see how riled up I was.

She kept her chin jutted up and out, but I saw her bottom lip wobble and she blinked fast. Then she was down the stairs, lost in the maze of shelves and boxes that clogged the basement floor.

I made her cry.

And I pretty immediately felt like a huge, gaping asshole.

I ran down the rest of the stairs calling her name, hoping that she would punch me in the face or kick me in the balls when I found her. Otherwise, I wasn’t really sure how to handle the situation.

I wove in and out of boxes listening to the wet, choking sounds that were spilling out of her throat. When I found her, she was sitting on the floor, her knees drawn up, her arms resting on them, her forehead against her arms. She was a tight little ball of misery, and even though I knew I hadn’t made the misery, I had unleashed it just by being myself.

Typical.

“Do you want to take a swing?” I asked the little huddled ball of Cadence. “I deserve it. C’mon. Hit me.”

“You’re not worth it, Crackhead,” she croaked, not looking up. Then she hiccupped.

I knelt down in front of her, my hands reaching out but not actually touching her. I was fairly sure she would be pissed to have me touch her. “What I said is true. But I was a jerkoff for saying it.”

She looked up then, her eyes red and puffy and said exactly what I would have predicted she would say. “Fuck you, Saxon.”

I thought when she started using my name instead of just calling me ‘Crackhead’, it would be a good thing, but I had been overly optimistic.

“What I said…” I began, but she didn’t even look up at me. “What I said, I said to get a reaction out of you, okay?”

Now she looked up. Her mascara was ringed under her eyes in black half moons and her lips looked pale and dry. “But it’s true. Don’t feel like you told me something I didn’t already know. Good God, Saxon, I’m not a moron. This place,” she looked around wearily, “was my parents’ dream. Their stupid, stupid dream. And we’re stuck here. Pammy and Jimmy and even Sullie. And me.”

“You’re what? A junior? College will be here in no time,” I said, grasping for straws.

Her eyes were so green they looked like sea glass; cold, angry sea glass.

“Have you been listening, half-wit?” she snapped. “They hardly make the mortgage every month. Where the hell are they going to pull money for college? I’ll be lucky if I get enough time away from this shithole to get to community college classes.” Little wispy pieces of her hair were stuck all over her forehead and cheeks. She looked really young suddenly.

“Don’t give up on it yet.” I knelt right next to her. “Teach me how to skate. I promise you, I’ll bring business in.”

She snorted. “How?”

“Because I’m so fucking fine,” I said, and felt so good when she smiled a tiny, insignificant smile that it made my chest ache a little. “And I’m fast as hell. And if I put a fraction of my rotten brain to it, I’ll be the best waiter your parents have ever seen.”