The XOXO New Adult Collection: 16 Full Length New Adult Stories (177 page)

“What do you mean by that?” I ignored her and stared on into the refrigerator.

“Do we have any yogurt? The kind with the chocolate pieces? Or if we have M&M’s I could just add—”

“Don’t you change the subject young lady. Did you study at all this weekend? With the money your father and I spend on your education we expect you to make an effort.”

I didn’t find any yogurt, but I did find some organic eggs and whole wheat flour. Newly inspired, I decided on making some homemade pancakes... with lots and lots of syrup. If nothing else, that would stall me from calling William for a solid half an hour.

“I know that Mom” Even to myself I sounded absentminded. “But there are only a few weeks left in this term anyway. After that, it won’t matter.”

“Won’t matter?” I put the eggs on the counter and tried not to enjoy the smoke that came out of her ears. “What in the world are you talking about?”

“I’m leaving college” I said simply enough. “I’ve sent in applications to a few culinary schools and I hope to start as soon as the summer.”

Mom sighed, crossed and recrossed her legs. “For God’s sake Charlotte we’ve talked about this.”

“No. You talked
at
me about this. I want to learn how to cook so that’s what I’m going to do.” It felt good to speak my desires out loud and begin the reality of my life with words. Frankly, it didn’t matter what culinary program I got into, or whether I went full or part time, or if I even went right away—I would complete my education the way I wanted to. No amount of nagging would convince me otherwise.

“What has gotten into you?” Mom shook her head. “Are you doing drugs?”

I laughed and cracked my first egg. “No Mom, I’m not doing drugs. I guess I just got a wakeup call that’s all.”

She stood up, nearly knocking the chair back behind her. “What in the world is
that
supposed to mean?

“My new friends say—”

“Your new friends?” Mom scoffed and sat back down. “Great, you’ve finally gone and made some friends and they’re a bunch of morons.”

I added water to the mix and reminded myself to confront my feelings. “They aren’t morons Mom. They’re good people. William and Tabby support me in what I want to do—”

Once again, she cut me off. “Have you joined a cult?”

I just laughed. If William were around I imaged we would have come up with some hilarious cult slogans. “You and Dad know I’ve wanted to go to culinary school instead of college since I was in middle school. William doesn’t really have anything to do—”

“I should have known” She sighed as she rolled her eyes. “Didn’t you learn the first time about how manipulative men can be?”

“Not just men” I mumbled.

She resorted to tapping her acrylic nails on the table. “Excuse me?”

“I’m not up for fighting with you Mom, okay? Really, I’m not. I’ve made my decision, and I don’t want to hear anymore about it.”

“Well if you expect any financial help from your father and I—”

“I know, I know. And that’s fine too. The food industry has a big turnover rate. I’m sure I won’t have a hard time finding a job wherever I end up going to school.”

Cursing as she kicked off her shoes, Mom mumbled something about me “just waiting until my father got home” before stomping out of the room. Of course, we both knew damn well, he wasn’t supposed to get home for another three days, so I hoped I could avoid her for at least the first half of the week. And once I heard the upstairs shower kick on, I knew I was probably safe for the rest of the day.

I finished making my pancakes, but even fresh and smothered with syrup the excitement kept a lump bungeed in my throat that made it difficult to swallow. I only ended up eating a couple of bites before I gave up and started looking at the clock again. Since the sound of water through pipes had stopped, retreating back to my room seemed like a strategically good idea.

The day was practically over, but I tried calling William again, my disappointment growing slightly when it went straight to voicemail. Still, when I remembered the success of the heist from the prior day I didn’t let it get to me. After all, I was the woman he had spent the night with and he was probably twice as busy with work than usual. There was no need for me to start getting pushy and possessive.

The real disappointment didn’t begin until the next day, slowly seeping into me like poison from a snake bite, I felt it creep into my veins clenching and cramping my muscles until it gradually became harder to breathe. Regardless, I made excuses for why William hadn’t called me back. I told myself that he was somehow still so preoccupied with work he couldn’t take 60 seconds to call me back, that maybe he had gotten a sudden bout of sickness, or was hungover from a night out with the guys... I made up exactly 22 excuses to avoid thinking about the most obvious one.

Still, as I sat in class all throughout Monday, images of jail cells and interrogation rooms flashed through my head. I was certain the only reason I wasn’t in any of them now was because the guys didn’t know my last name (or my first one for that matter) and if William had gotten into any sort of serious trouble there was no way he would ever give me up to save himself.

Though if it would spare him any time behind bars I would gladly wish he would.

Thoughts like these pestered me throughout the day, getting so bad, that I went ahead and made an additional appointment with my counselor for as soon as possible. Even if she couldn’t help me with my love life—or my slight criminal undertakings—then maybe she could keep me calm on my lack of culinary school responses.

Me
: Hey, I’m sorry about the other morning. Can we talk?

When night came, I lay in bed and waited for my phone to light up or chirp with some kind or response. Because I didn’t get what I wanted however, I started hoping childishly that William had lost or—ironically—had his phone stolen. I wasn’t sure at what point I started to cry, only that when I did, the tears tasting sour and sticking to my throat long after I fell asleep.

The sticky feeling was still there when I left for work Wednesday morning. Luckily, Mom left for the home office just before I did—a fight avoided for a few more hours. The bakery itself was a blessing in disguise, because although we weren’t terribly busy I had enough to do within that first hour or so to keep William distant in my thoughts, sparse until his image starting reappearing again.

I hadn’t heard from him in three days, and was admittedly, growing more agitated with each passing minute. Granted, this would be nothing to most girls. But considering he checked up on me every day, I worried intensely. What if my lack of response at his confession of love had offended him? I seriously doubly William was the kind of man whose wounded pride couldn’t be repaired. But what if it was worse than that? What if during the time to think he had realized he had just gotten caught up in the moment and he didn’t really love me at all? I was almost sure I couldn’t handle that—especially when I had
just
come to the conclusion that I loved him. Then again, how could I be sure of anything other than my love for him?

I worked slowly throughout the day, keeping myself busy with the mediocre tasks that I usually reserved for the end of the month. With the help of one of the illegals I emptied out the store room and cleaned up all the shelves, mopped the floor, and evacuated all the cobwebs from the high corners before putting everything away. My manager even gave me a compliment and “thanks” for the “hard work” but I was hardly aware of it, because once I was out of things to do my brain was rattled by William again.

In the unlikely event that he had lost his phone somehow, I showered quickly when I got home and went straight to his place. Even though his car wasn’t parked anywhere that I could see, I didn’t hesitate to step up to his door anyway.

“William?” My voice cracked and was way too soft to be heard over the ruckus of the restaurant, but I tried again anyway. “William? Are you home?”

I knocked several times before stepping back and trying again. I had never wished more that William had windows—real windows anyway. And though I considered walking over to the other side of the building and kneeling on the sidewalk to try and catch a glimpse inside, I settled instead for resting my ear against his front door and listening for signs of life. Concentrating as hard as I could, I could hear the sound of water pipes from the restaurant above, but nothing else. I waited a minute more before stepping back and knocking again. At my last twinge of desperation, I dialed his number and hit the send button.

Sure enough, there was nothing but silence.

From there, I called Tabby, more than distressed at this point but not knowing what to do about it. I even thought but the excuse of wanting to return her dress if the topic came up. But once again, there was no response and the phone rang for what felt like forever. When I couldn’t remember the name of the place where she worked, I even tried calling a couple of the gentlemen’s clubs in the area, the only ones I found a phone number for not having anyone named Frenchie or Tabby who worked there.

Admittedly by then, my worry evolved back into disappointment, and I relinquished myself to the possibilities that seemed endless in my imagination and consistently negative in my head. Eventually, after a few more hours of letting my imagination run wild, I decided to go ahead and see if my fears we at all accurate. Unfortunately, it didn’t take long to find out that they were.

Police Release Description of Carjacking Suspect

RIVERCITY, Calif. -

Rivercity police are investigating a carjacking that took place at the Mission Inn Hotel & Spa last Saturday. It happened around 9:40 p.m. on the north side of the parking lot.

Police say 12 vehicles whose worth ranged from $80,700 to $303,400 were stolen while security officials and other hotel officials were being distracted by two unidentified females. It is unknown if their presence was intentional.

Officials say a male suspect was seen near a commercial car carrier trailer before taking off in a white Chevrolet Chevelle off north Blossom Street.

The suspect has been identified as a white male with blond hair between the age of twenty and thirty. Several colorful tattoos on his arms were also identified.

Police ask if anyone has information regarding this incident to call 911.

That was it then, William had almost definitely left town. But why didn’t that make me feel much better than the alternative of him getting arrested? I ventured to guess, it was because he hadn’t asked me to go with him—if not for my own freedom than for the company. What hurt worse than that, was the fact that he hadn’t even bothered to tell me that he was leaving, hadn’t even bothered to say good-bye.

I put my hurt aside and considered the other possibilities. What if William had been arrested and the article was just a decoy to turn his accomplices against him? Worse yet, what if he had been on his way out of town somewhere and gotten hurt? Had he crashed Bloody Mary and didn’t even have his phone to call for help?

A day passed and then another with no word from William, Tabby, or even the police. And like the stalker in training I was, I passed by his apartment and the chop shop at least once a day in search of him. Sure enough, both places showed no signs of life. Other than that, I did my best to go about my routines, keeping my ears open for sirens and revving engines, and my eyes wide for pink hair and white muscle cars. By Friday night I gave in and started driving around looking for races. I spent three hours driving around southern California, even stopping outside a strip club and looking for Tabby’s car before I ended up turning around and heading back home. If Mom hadn’t been in town and my eyes hadn’t been so blurry, I might have continued. Hell, if my stomach hadn’t hurt so bad from missing William I might just have chugged a few energy drinks and driven straight through the night.

I was at work on Saturday when Dad came back. I hadn’t expected to see him until later in the day, so I was especially surprised to see him walk right into the bakery—an effort he hadn’t made since I first started working there.

“Hey Kiddo,” he nodded at me awkwardly before going to loosen his tie. “You got a minute?”

Though it was technically still morning, the warmer winter weather kept people out of the shop. I finished boxing up a box of cookies and handed them to the waiting customer before stepping out from behind the counter.

“Hi Dad.” I waved with only half my hand in the air. “You ah—want anything?”

“No thanks Kiddo. Why don’t you take a load off though?” He pointed to one of the bistros sets and smiled sadly. “You look beat. Have you been sleeping lately?”

I avoided the question entirely and took the seat offered to me. The truth was that I hadn’t been sleeping. I hadn’t been sleeping at all.

For a solid three minutes we sat in silence, looking away from each other every time we nearly made eye contact. I was certain about the minutes because I counted the seconds to keep my eyes from getting droopy.

“Dad, you know I really should get back—”

“Your mom says you two have been fighting all week.” His voice was meek, frightened even. Had she been calling him with daily updates? Informing him about every eye roll and slamming door?

I picked at a piece of paint on the storefront window. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m pretty sure you have to verbally communicate to fight—or throw punches.”

I wasn’t trying to be funny, but Dad still smiled. “Don’t tempt me.”

“Don’t take this the wrong way Dad, but I’d put my money on Mom.”

He hung his head in shame. “Yeah” he sighed. “I can’t blame you.”

I flicked the paint chip off my finger. “So did you come here to here to tell me to play nice or what?”

“That’s what your mom thinks. I told her I would try to convince you to stay at USC.”

I stared out the store front window and watched the clouds move across the sun. Was William watching shadows moving along the asphalt at this very same moment? Was he thinking about me too? Thinking about me at all?

“I’ve already made up my mind Dad.” Maybe it was thinking about William, but my voice didn’t sound nearly as decisive as I intended it to be.