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Naomi looked sharply back at me. “I rolled my eyes at you not eating because of something we can sort out later.”
Stung, I grabbed for the menu again. “Fine. Whatever.” Okay, maybe I was a bit in the wrong, but damn it, so was she. Wasn’t she? I didn’t know what the protocol was for shit like this. My travel experience was zilch, right along with my friends-with-money experience and my how-to-embark-on-a-secret-mission experience.
“What the hell is wrong?” Naomi asked, a hair shy of demanding. Kyle and Philip exchanged glances but remained silent, obviously way too smart to get in the middle of this.
The last thing I wanted was to cause a scene—or more of a scene. With a jerk of my head toward the door, I stood and walked out, only realizing after I exited the restaurant that if she didn’t follow me I’d end up looking like a jackass. More of a jackass.
I walked to the car and leaned against it, and a few seconds later Naomi exited and crossed the parking lot toward me, though I wasn’t sure if I should be relieved. She stopped a few feet away and gave me an expectant look. Hell, I wasn’t sure how to explain all the shit going through my head.
Here goes nothing. “I know you don’t mean it,” I said, “but when you act as if my money problems are bullshit it makes me feel like you think I’m trying to get attention or that I’m making a big deal out of nothing. It’s not nothing to me.”
She blinked in surprise, then frowned. “Hold on one damn minute,” she replied. “I never said or implied your money problems are bullshit. However, it’s a solvable problem in the moment, and I don’t get why you have to do shit like not eat to prove whatever point you’re trying to prove.” She folded her arms over her chest and glowered. “I get it that the ATM didn’t work for you. What I don’t get is the rest of it. What’s your grand plan if the bank doesn’t get it sorted out? Not eat for the whole trip? Be a martyr scraping by on a dinner roll while the rest of us have steak? You think any of us are going to feel good about that? I got you covered, but why can’t you put your pride on the back burner for one minute?”
“It’s not pride,” I shot back, throat tight, but then I shook my head. “Shit. Maybe it is. When you don’t have anything else, sometimes pride is all that’s left. When you wear the same pair of jeans to school for a week all you can do is try and hold your head up when the girls are whispering behind your back. I just . . .” I trailed off and sighed. I didn’t even know anymore what point I was trying to make.
“I’m not making comments behind your back,” Naomi insisted, “and I sure as hell didn’t mean to make you feel bad. There’s tons of other stuff going on I can’t control, but this is something I can actually help with.”
I stuffed my hands in my pockets and kicked at the asphalt. “I’m not trying to be a martyr.”
She nodded. “All right, we’re clear that I’m not one of the high school girls, and that you don’t want to be a martyr.” She angled her head. “What can we do to fix this? You need to eat. And we all need more clothing and supplies. That’s part of the mission.”
I folded my arms in a mirror of her pose. “Could you stop getting annoyed with me when I ask to do something like mailing the phone, or stopping at an ATM? Cause you kind of have been, and it makes me not want to mention shit like ‘Oh, hey, I have two bucks to spend on breakfast.’”
“The phone thing annoyed me,” she admitted. “But I got over it after you said your piece.”
Sure didn’t act like you got over it, I thought, but she wasn’t finished speaking.
“And, it wasn’t asking about the ATM that annoyed me,” she continued. “It was refusing an easier alternative, and pushing it when it wasn’t necessary and when we weren’t planning a stop. It didn’t matter much in that particular situation, but jeez.”
My frustration rose. Pushing it? I’d asked once, and Kyle had okayed it. “Look, maybe you haven’t noticed, but I’m in way over my head,” I said. “I don’t know what the hell I’m doing, and I know damn well the only reason y’all are bringing me along is because you have to, for Philip. So maybe when I do something wrong or that you think is fucked up you could, I dunno, cut me some slack, since I don’t have training and experience and all that?”
She looked chagrined at that, and I knew it was at least partly because I’d hit the nail on the head about why I was coming along in the first place. “That’s not the only reason you’re along, but whatever,” she said. “I’ll do my best. But you also need to ditch the stubbornness about accepting help.”
I still wasn’t sure she understood the point I was trying to make, but it wasn’t worth fighting about anymore. Plus, I was getting hungry.
“Fine,” I said. “But if you roll your eyes at me again, I get to smack you.” I smiled to show I was teasing. Mostly.
“I smack back,” she warned with an answering smile.
“Yeah, but I heal faster,” I pointed out. “C’mon, enough of this shit. Let’s get waffles.”
“Hang on,” she said, expression abruptly serious. “So there’s no confusion between us, a few meals and some clothes doesn’t touch what I owe you.”
It took me a second to figure out what she meant. Oh, yeah, that whole saving her from Saberton baddies as well as helping Brian find a reason to avoid having to kill her outright. I sure as hell didn’t do any of that so she’d owe me, but I understood where she was coming from. Still, I made a point of rolling my eyes at her. “You don’t owe me shit.”
“Riiiiight,” she said with a laugh. “Whatever.”
I snorted. “C’mon. Waffles.” I hooked my arm through hers.
“I’m buying,” she stated as we headed back to the restaurant.
“Whatever.”
Chapter 14
Naomi took the wheel after breakfast. I joined her up front to let the boys take the backseat, and within less than a mile both were asleep. I tried to do the same, without much luck. The scenery was a bit more interesting during the daylight hours, but there was only so much staring out the window a body could do before crashing boredom set in.
“Are we there yet?” I whined. “How much faaarrrttthhher? I’m sooooo bored.”
