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“Mostly I want it because I can’t get it,” I admit. “I also want some Coldstone. And I’m having a weird craving for the awful Beef-a-roni they serve on alternate Thursdays at my school. Also … Never mind.”
“No, go on. I find it interesting. Knowing what you miss about normal life.”
I take a bite of sandwich and wash it down with a swig of sparkling water with lime.
“Okay. I miss Zachary’s. Best pizza in SF. I miss having to get ready for school, waiting at the bus stop—”
“You don’t have a limo?”
I make a face. “She’s offered. My mother, I mean.”
“But you don’t want to show up at school in a limo.”
“It kind of marks you as a douche.”
“Yep.”
“There are kids at my school who get dropped off in limos.”
“Private school?”
I laugh. “I tried once to get her to send me to a public school. I thought I’d like to meet some kids who don’t have maids but whose moms are maids.”
“Poor little rich girl,” Solo says.
Maybe I should take offense. But the cool breeze kind of drains the nasty from me. “I miss regular life. Or my version of it, anyway. School.”
“But you can’t leave because of your leg.”
What an interesting way he has of saying it. It’s not a question. It’s not quite a statement. It’s almost a challenge.
“How much does it hurt?” Solo asks.
“It … it doesn’t,” I say. “But that’s because of the pain meds, of course.”
He looks down at his food and chews. He has something to say, but he’s considering it. “Have you seen it without the bandages? I mean, have you seen the actual leg?”
I shake my head. “Not … no.” I frown at him, and he studies the placid water. How does he know I haven’t seen the wound? “I asked. They said it was still too bad. They didn’t want to upset me.”
A knowing smirk comes and goes. “Yeah.”
I push the sandwich aside. “Who the hell are you?” I demand.
“Solo Plissken.”
“I didn’t ask your name,” I say. “Who are you? Why are you here? You’re not old enough to be doing a full-time job at a place like Spiker.”
“Does it always take you this long to start asking obvious questions?”
My face burns. “I’m asking now.”
“I’m your mother’s ward. When my parents died six years ago she sort of, well, inherited me.”
The math is simple. And yet I’m sitting here, astounded. “She’s been your guardian for six years? And she’s never mentioned it to me?”
He looks at me straight, eye to eye. “I wonder why that is?”
Suddenly I am very uncomfortable. He knows things I don’t. He knows things he hasn’t told me. Why the hell am I finding things out about my mother from this guy?
