Home > Audrey, Wait!(43)

Audrey, Wait!(43)
Author: Robin Benway

And they brought their cameras with them.

In the first hour of work, I had my picture taken with two babies, someone’s rat terrier, four ten-year-old girls with braces, three guys who were dared by someone’s older brother, and at least five girls around my age and their mothers. “We drove two hours to come here!” one mother said as she fanned herself with a copy of the magazine. “She”—she pointed to her daughter—“read on the Internet that you worked here and she was so excited to meet you! This is her birthday present!”

I looked to the girl, who was blushing. “Mom! Shut up!”

“Can we get a picture?”

“Um, sure, of course.” I stood shoulder-to-shoulder next to the girl and smiled so wide that my face hurt.

We were both shaking from nerves when the flash went off.

And if that wasn’t enough, these girls brought me gifts. Like, actual gifts. Arm huggies, stuffed animals, jingly balls for Bendomolena—someone must have leaked Bendomolena’s name on a website or message board or something—nail polish, homemade vegan cookies, etc. One girl even brought in a picture she drew of me in her art class and it was actually good. “My mom,” I told her, “is going to love this.” (And she did. She ended up having it matted and framed and now it hangs in her office at work.)

James was in the background in probably half of the shots, his hair falling over his face as he scooped and wiped down the counters and generally did all the work. In between photo ops, I crouched behind the counter and restocked the napkin holders, desperate to avoid all the people who kept walking past and staring. “So what happened?” James asked as I crammed a wad of napkins into a holder.

“With what?”

“Outside the principal’s office.”

“Oh, that.”

“Are you suspend—oh, crap.” He dropped a scoop of Root Beer Barrel on the floor and I passed him some napkins. “Thanks. Are you suspended?”

“No. But get this. I have to do all my schoolwork in the office. I’m not allowed in class anymore.”

“Really?” James knelt down and tried to sop up the mess. “Is it like solitary confinement?”

“I don’t know. I guess I’m disrupting everyone’s learning process, or they’re disturbing mine. Whatever.”

“That’s pretty stupid.”

“Thank you!” For once, someone was on my side. “They might as well just start sewing scarlet letter A’s on all my shirts.”

James smiled. His eyes got all crinkly in the corners when he really smiled. When he was doing his fake-customer smile, only his mouth moved. Like I said, I’m an observant person. “Or F’s,” he said.

“F’s?”

“Y’know. For ‘Famous’?”

“I’m not famous.” I said it too quickly to be believable.

There was a pause for a minute. The napkins were slack in my hand. “I’m not famous,” I said again. “At least … I don’t want to be.”

He nodded and cleared his throat. “Before work, I, uh, I went online and saw that video? The one with you and, um, that guy?”

Why did I feel like I had cheated? James and I weren’t even dating, but it was like I had been caught.

“Do you like him?” James continued.

“You mean Simon?”

“Yeah. Simon.”

It felt like there was a shimmery spiderweb thread between me and James, like if one of us did or said the wrong thing, it’d snap and melt away. My heart was ricocheting against my ribs and I pressed my hands against the cool metal of napkin holder. “At the time,” I replied, “I thought I did. But he was—”

James looked up and his gaze was the kind that makes you understand how elliptical orbits occur, how one thing can pull you in so tight that you can’t break away. My breath got shallow. “I don’t like him,” I whispered. “I didn’t know him. It just happened. Sort of like an accident.”

“Good.” James didn’t break eye contact. “’Cause I really hate him.”

“Yeah. I hate him too.”

“I know. But I hate him for kissing you.”

Ding-dong! The automatic door chime told us we had customers.

Both James and I stood up so fast that I got a little dizzy from the head rush. His cheeks were flaming and I could feel the hotness in my own. The napkins were damp from being clenched so tight in my hand and there were beads of sweat on the back of my neck, almost like chills. I was either going to throw up or start dancing around—I wasn’t sure which. What I needed was a time-stopper so I could figure things out. What did James mean by that? Did he want to kiss me? Would he have? Would our first kiss have been surrounded by melting ice cream and recycled paper napkins? Were we saved by the bell? Was his heart beating as fast as mine? Did he want a time-stopper too?

“Hi, welcome to the Scooper Dooper!” James called out to our new customers, that fake smile returning with lightning speed. I had never heard him quite so boisterous. “Can we interest you in a free sample?”

But the customers who had interrupted us were no ordinary customers. They were our store’s owner, Ron, and some guy in a suit who was beaming from ear to ear. Ron didn’t really show up too much; owning this branch of the Scooper Dooper was just a retirement thing, a way to stay busy and make cash, but ever since he hired James, Employee Extraordinaire, he really didn’t have to do much. He had the glowing orange look of someone who spent a lot of time on a boat and had never heard of SPF.

   
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