“What?” I asked him, gesturing at the door.
“I want my change.”
“It’s customary to tip.”
“To—” His eyebrows escaped toward his hairline. “Totip? You think you’re getting, what, a five-dollar tip out of me? For what exactly?”
I shrugged. “I didn’t spit in your cup?”
“You—” He laughed, but it wasn’t a happy kind of laugh. It was more of a “I can’t believe this shit” laugh. “You’re fuckingcrazy.”
“And yet you keep coming back,” I said. “Seems like you’re the crazy one.”
He shook his head. “Nope. I swear, today I’m buying a coffee machine and you won’t see me again.”
It wasn’t the first time he’d said it.
“Good.” I grabbed the bill and carried it over to the register, because fuck opening the one at the coffee booth just for a single transaction. I rang up his purchases and slapped his change down.
“What’s this?”
“Danish, coffee, and the Doritos,” I said.
“I didn’t order the Doritos.”
“Well, you’re still holding them, dude, and I’m not a mind reader.”
“Fucking fine,” he said and swept the coins awkwardly into his palm as he juggled all his stuff. And then, because he was an asshole, he tipped all of his change into the charity box beside the rack of chewing gum and slid a single quarter back across the counter to me. “There you go. For your excellent customer service.”
I flipped him the bird again, and he stalked outside.
I hoped he choked on Dorito dust.
But I was laughing, just a little bit, as I shoved the quarter in my pocket and settled back down in my seat to try and catch some sleep before dawn.
Sleepingin the daytime washard. It didn’t matter how thick the blanket I’d hung over the curtain rail was—shards of light still got around it and stabbed me in the face, pulling me right back into wakefulness. The house was quiet during the day, which was the only good thing. Everyone was at work and Gracie was at school, but I still didn’t sleep well. I’d gotten a few hours this morning because Cash was on afternoon shifts, so he’d dozed beside me for a bit, but I’d woken up when he’d left, and now it was almost the evening again and all I’d done was just kind of prowl around the place aimlessly.
“Night work sucks,” Danny said as he stirred something in the pot on the stove. Maybe soup. It smelled great, at least. “Idon’t miss it.” He gave a wry twist of his mouth. “Of course, once I’m an EMT, I’ll get my fair share again.”
Gracie showed me her homework. It was some math puzzle about apples that she’d colored in.
“That’s good work,” I said, because I might have been an asshole to everyone else in the world, but never Gracie. “Where’s your dad?”
“He’s at Avery’s,” she said. “Mowing his lawn.”
“Is that what the kids are calling it?” I asked even though I could hear the lawnmower, and Gracie gave me a quizzical look.
“Hey, Gracie,” Danny said to distract her. “Can you help me cut these carrots up?”
We had kid-safe knives for the kitchen these days because Avery had trained Gracie up to be his little helper over at his place, and she loved to do the same here too. I hadn’t even known you could get knives that knew the difference between skin and vegetables, but Cash and I had spent ages trying to cut our thumbs open on them, and we couldn’t, so they worked.
“You want a nap before dinner?” Danny asked, and it took me way too long to realize he was asking me and not Gracie.
“Nah, I’m good,” I said, but I went and dozed in front of the TV for a while. I didn’t wake up until Wilder opened the front door.
“Where’s Avery?” I asked.
“He has some late meeting tonight,” he said. “You look like shit.”
