Dumplin' (17 page)

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

..................................................................

One week turns into two, and I realize that Mitch and I have begun to spend lunches and almost every moment not dedicated to work or the pageant together. I almost even tell him about the drag show at the Hideaway, but it's like trying to explain your favorite part of a movie to someone who's never seen it—you'll never do it justice.

We both settle into an easy type of routine where I come over and watch him play video games, even taking the controls myself a few times. I stay for dinner one night, but it feels too much like trespassing.

From what I gather, Mitch and his mom eat dinner together every night while his dad takes his meal on a TV tray in front of his recliner. I watch him walk in from work, grab a beer, and wait in the living room for his food to be brought to him.

The three of us eat at the dinner table in total silence as our silverware scratches against plates. I want to ask Mitch about it, but it feels like a secret I'm not meant to know.

A few days later, we sit at lunch, talking about what we want to do after graduation when he brings it up all on his own.

“I don't know if I can leave my mom,” he says. “I mean, he doesn't, like, hit her or anything. But they don't talk. Not at all. And I kind of hope that maybe it's me who's the problem, so that if I do leave, it'll get better.”

“Why don't they get divorced?” A single-parent home is all I've ever known, and Lucy more than made up for some deadbeat dad. My real dad was some guy passing through town. He stuck around for a while, but not long enough to be more than some guy. He's in Ohio or Idaho. Wherever the potatoes come from.

He smiles in a broken kind of way. “My mom doesn't believe in divorce. She gets really upset every time I mention it.”

Just as I'm about to respond, Tim walks right past us. “Hang on a sec,” I say as I'm already leaving to follow him. “Tim!” I look around for any sign of Ellen as I follow him up to the lunch line.

I cut past three freshmen to squeeze in behind Tim. “Tim, come on. Talk to me.”

He reaches for a tray and so do I.

“We're friends, too, ya know,” I remind him.

He takes one of the bowls of mac and cheese from beneath the heat lamps. “I know that, Will.”

I check over my shoulder once more for El even though I didn't see her in second period.

“She's sick today,” he says.

The lunch lady tries to offer me a plate of chicken-fried steak, but I wave her off.

“You've got to get her to talk to me.”

He shakes his head. “When has anyone ever had any luck making Ellen do anything?”

He has a point. “Come on, Tim. Something. I can meet you guys one day in the parking lot or maybe you can tell her you want to meet her in the gym and I'll show up instead.”

“I'm not tricking her into talking to you. I don't wanna get in the middle of this.”

Tim pays for his food as the lunch lady eyes my empty tray. I take a bowl of green Jell-O and hand her a few dollars without waiting for my change. “You can't tell me she's not miserable without me.”

“Listen, I'll try, but I just don't see how I can make something happen.”

I nod my head like a madwoman and pretend he didn't say that second half. “Thank you. Thank you so much.”

“I really hate that Callie girl,” he says.

Relief floods my chest. “No stronger bond than a common enemy.”

I hurry back over to the table where I left Mitch. “I am so sorry,” I tell him.

He's unfazed. “Can't beat a Jell-O craving.”

I shove a spoonful in my mouth. I could have at least gone for the red bowl.

“Hey,” Mitch says. “Not to put you on the spot, but my mom's been talking about making you a homecoming
mum, and I wanted to make sure that wouldn't be awkward or anything.”

I smile. “No, that wouldn't be awkward or anything.”

The door chime at the Chili Bowl so rarely rings, which means I always find myself startled when it does.

Ron, my former boss, walks in. Because of the log cabin interior and maroon accents, he looks like a candy cane in the middle of a lumberyard with his red-and-white-striped shirt and white pants.

“Ron,” I whisper, circling around the counter. “What are you doing here?”

“Maybe I want chili,” he says, a little too loudly.

I cross my arms over my chest and give him the best cut-the-shit stare I can muster.

“All right.” His voice drops a few degrees. “Listen, we're desperate and super shorthanded. I've got Lydia working sixty-hour weeks covering your old shift because everyone we hire leaves when they find something better. She's threatening to quit on me and I can't afford to see her go.”

My head's shaking before he can even finish.

“Hear me out.” He puts one hand up. “You left in an awful hurry. I may be old, but I'm not dumb. I don't know what happened, but whatever it was, I promise the boys will be on their best behavior. I grilled each of them—Marcus and Bo—after you left, and I got nothing.” He shakes his head, and I see the lines of exhaustion crowded around his mouth and eyes. “Give us a second chance. I'm
begging you, Will.”

I open my mouth to say no, but nothing comes out. Ron's always been so kind to me, and I think I owe it to him to at least pretend that I'll think about it. “I'll let you know by the end of the week. I'm going to have to think on it.”

He holds his hands up. “Fair enough. Fair enough.” He pulls his wallet from his back pocket. “I'll take a cup of chili.”

I only see a few more customers for the rest of the night, which gives me far too much time to think. At first, I'm logical.
You don't make nearly as much money as you used to at Harpy's and your car's stuck in the shop. At least Harpy's is busy enough to make the time go by faster.

Then I remember how lonely these last few weeks have felt. Millie, Hannah, Amanda, and Mitch, too, are okay—great even. But they're no Ellen. The thought of going back to Harpy's feels like comfort food. And not just because of Bo. I miss Marcus and Ron, too.

Bo was the reason I quit. The reason why I couldn't bear to work there anymore. But now that anger I've trained myself to feel seems false. Like a pretense of what I thought it should be. And it's pretty obvious he's over me, too. I don't know for sure, but I've heard whispers about him and Bekah. And if I don't think about what it felt like to kiss him, then I can tell myself that they're cute together. That they match. And maybe the burning that could only be jealousy will go away.

Before leaving work, I scrub everything down and refill the already stuffed condiment bar.
I'm still thinking
, I tell myself.
I haven't made up my mind
. I say good night to Alejandro and get in my mom's car.

Rather than turning left out of the the Chili Bowl, my foot presses against the gas pedal, almost flying across the street and into the parking lot of Harpy's. I have crossed the line in the sand.

The dining room doors are locked, but I bang on them anyway.

Marcus turns the lock and lets me in. “Whoa. Hey! What's going on, Will? You smell like onions.”

Bo watches me from behind the counter with wide eyes and a twitching jaw.

I can't look away. “Ron in his office?” I ask Marcus.

If Marcus would look up from the lock instead of fiddling with his huge ring of keys, he'd see everything that happened between Bo and me because in this moment it is so obvious. So open. So public. It's all right there, splayed out like an open-heart surgery.

“Yeah, I think so.” He locks the door behind me, finally. “But you still haven't said what you're doing here.”

I don't answer him. The butterflies in my stomach carry me through the break room and to Ron's office. I knock on the open door.

Lydia is sitting in front of his desk on a crate. She turns at the sound of me. “Oh, thank Christ. The prodigal cashier has returned.” She stands and takes her pack of cigarettes
from his desk. “I'll leave you to it.” And once her back is turned to him, she gives me the tiniest smile as she closes the door.

Without bothering to sit, I turn to Ron. “I want a raise. And I'm going to need a couple days off for . . . for this thing I have.”

Without hesitating, Ron says, “I can do a seventy-five cent raise. And I'll work with you on your schedule. We'll figure it out.”

“Okay.” I didn't expect that to be so simple. “Well, then it's a deal.”

“You're back?”

I nod. “I'm back.”

“That chili was really bad. I tried to eat it, but Lydia kept gagging every time she walked by my office. I think she was kidding, but still.”

“It's pretty horrible.”

He chuckles. “I'm glad to have you back.” He stands and walks me through the kitchen to the front. We pass Bo and his eyes follow us all the way to the door. “Are you okay to start on Monday?”

“I'll be there.”

He holds his hand out for me to shake, and I do.

I walk to my car as Bo's gaze follows me; the feeling of it starts as a ball of heat in my chest and spreads like a sunrise.

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

..................................................................

I gave Alejandro my notice, and he kind of looked at me like,
What took you so long?
He promised me that I'd always have a job at the Chili Bowl and asked me to give Ellen his number. I slipped the folded scrap of paper in my pocket and swore to forget about it. I was all nerves when I told Mitch I was going back to Harpy's, but he shrugged it off and kept playing his video game. It occurred to me then that he had no reason to be upset. For the first time, not telling him about my history with Bo felt like a lie.

My first night back at Harpy's is quiet. Marcus berates me with endless questions about the Chili Bowl, like, “Who makes the chili?” or “Is it true you guys don't wash the pots?”

Bo keeps to himself in the kitchen, but we play a game of Catch Me If You Can with our eyes over the heat lamp counters. When Bo's on his break, Marcus leans over and says, “He almost got fired a couple weeks after you left.”

“What?” The way Ron made it seem, he couldn't afford to fire anyone, so I can't imagine what Bo could've done
that was bad enough to get fired.

“Ron had Bo up on the front counter while he worked the kitchen, which was a bad idea to begin with, and these guys from his old school came in, and Bo refused to serve them. Just flat-out told them they weren't welcome. The dudes made a big deal about it. Even their parents made a big deal about it, and basically the only way Bo could keep his job was if Ron only kept him in the kitchen.”

“Whoa.”

“He's one crazy dude. I feel like he's either going to murder everyone or be, like, a movie star. There's no in between for that guy.”

I like that about Bo. You were either for him or against him.

Marcus goes off on a tangent about different schools that his girlfriend, Tiffanie, is looking at and how he's going to a community college near whatever school she chooses. He doesn't really pause to ask me a question or get my take on any of it, but he seems to take comfort in talking without someone lecturing him on why he shouldn't be planning his life around a girl. I don't know. Maybe Tiffanie and Marcus will go off to school and graduate and get married and live happily ever after. But I don't want to be the asshole he worked with at a fast-food restaurant who planted a seed of doubt in his head.

After cleanup, I take my bag out of my locker and find a red sucker there. I try not to smile as I slide it into my purse.

Bo says nothing. He doesn't even make eye contact with me. But as we're all walking out the door, I unwrap the sucker and pop it in my mouth.

It's a cherry-flavored olive branch.

When I get home from work, I find my mom on her knees with Lacey Sanders standing on a step stool in a formal gown and Bekah Cotter on my couch, tapping away on her cell phone.

“Hi, Dumplin',” says Mom through the straight pins between her teeth. “Lacey, how's this hemline, dear? You can't go any higher on those heels, you hear?”

Lacey smacks her gum and blows a bubble. “Roger that.”

Lots of things happen around pageant season, but Mom altering dresses in the middle of our living room is not one of them. There's also the fact that with Bekah sitting here in my house, my brain is going into high-alert mode like one of Mitch's video games. Red letters flash above Bekah's head. TARGET. TARGET.

I feel weird going upstairs with all of them down here, so I sit on the couch and lightly click my tongue until Riot comes out of hiding.

Bekah glances up from her phone and turns to me. “Oh, hey. You work at Harpy's. You must know Bo.” She doesn't even know to be threatened by me because why would she?

Lacey spins around and I see the terror on my mother's face. “Lacey, honey, you have got to stay still.”

“Sorry, Miss D.” She blows another bubble.

I glance down at my uniform. “Well, I did over the summer, and I just started back there again today. Why?” My tone is sharp, but Bekah doesn't seem to notice.

“He's a strange one,” says Lacey.

“He's my escort,” says Bekah. “For the pageant. Well, I haven't asked him. But he's going to be. I think.”

“Hey,” says Lacey. “He might be quiet”—
as shit
, she mouths—“but at least he'll look good in a tux. Maybe he'll let you twirl his baton?”

I could barf. On her shoes.

“Girls!” my mother shrieks.

Bekah grins. “We went to Sadie Hawkins together,” she says by way of explanation.

Against his protests, I tuck Riot beneath my arm and stand to go upstairs. “Nice dress, Lacey.”

I sit on my bed, still dressed in my uniform and compose texts to Ellen that I'll never send. I check for messages from Tim I might have accidentally missed. Anytime I see him at school, I look for some kind of meaningful eye contact, but the best he's given me is a curt headshake.

After a while, my mom knocks on the door and enters without waiting for my permission.

“I'm doing some alterations this year for extra cash.” She pulls the elastic out of her hair and combs her fingers through.

“You could have told me.” Bekah Cotter. On my couch. I'm not even safe in my own house. But then I notice the deep circles beneath my mom's eyes. “I'm sorry,” I say.

She nods. “You missed Ellen. She was here with her mom.”

“She was here?” My eyes are immediately thick with tears waiting to spill.

“Only gettin' her hem fixed. You know that girl. Can buy a darn formal straight off the rack and it fits like a dream.”

“Yeah.” I don't even know what she's wearing for the pageant. Or what her talent will be. Or if she's started on her prop for the opening number.

“What's going on with the two of you anyway?”

“Me and El?” I shrug. “Just having a difference of opinion, I guess.”

“Y'all will figure things out. Me and Luce always did.” She comes in a little further and sits at the foot of my bed. I try to picture the last time I saw her perched there, but nothing comes to mind and it's like one of those memories you tell yourself is real, but it's not. You just wanted it to be. “Have you thought any about your wardrobe for the pageant?”

“Uh, no. Not really.” I bite down on the skin around my thumbnail. “Mom, do you miss her?”

“Miss who?”

It kills me that she doesn't instinctively know. “Lucy.”

“Luce,” she says and it comes out like breath. “Yeah. Of course. All the time.”

We're both quiet for a moment.

“The year I won Miss Teen, she stayed up all night sewing sequins on my dress. I bought the thing at a consignment
shop. I told her no one would notice a few missing sequins, but she wouldn't have any of it. ‘The difference between winning and losing is all in the details,' she said.”

So much of my memory is filled with their arguments that I sometimes forget that more than anything else, they loved each other.

She stands up. “The dresses from Cindy's are pretty pricey and she'd have to order something for you, but maybe we can put something together ourselves.”

I want to appreciate this, that she can take off her former Miss Teen Blue Bonnet hat and be my mom. But it doesn't feel like enough.

“Sometimes,” I say, “I think I can't miss Lucy any more than I already do, but then something like dress shopping comes up, and I remember all the things she won't be here to see.”

For the first time in a very long time, my mom says nothing. I never realized how much was lacking from my relationship with her until Lucy wasn't here to fill in the gaps. It's the two of us now, fumbling around in the dark.