“How was your run?” he asks around a mouthful of meatball.
“Horrible,” I say before I can catch myself.
He frowns, concerned. I’ve never been super negative about my workouts before. “How so?”
“Some asshole teenagers tried to run me over,” I say. “Fucking teenage little shits.”
“You are a teenager.”
I roll my eyes. “Are you missing the larger point, here?”
“Did you get the license plate?”
“No, I was too shocked to do anything. She also got out of her car and shoved me into a fucking ditch and I sprained my wrist.” I stab a meatball viciously. “And now I’m going to have to work out around a fucking sprained wrist and I was just getting over my strained hamstring.”
“Where were you?”
“Crescent Hills. Apparently the place for rich people.”
“You know who it was?”
“Nooope,” I say, extending the word with irritation. I stab another meatball and fit the whole thing in my mouth. “Ah, ah, hot hot hot!” I chew with an open mouth and swallow the meat when I can. I take a gulp of milk. “But if it helps, she drove a flaming hot red Lamborghini.”
Brendan snorts around his beer. “A kid? Jesus, no kid needs such an expensive car. That insurance must be through the roof!”
Practical Brendan. Thinking about things in terms of money. “Like how much?”
“An insane amount. I know we spend 450 a year for you with your Good Student Discount. I can’t imagine adding a teenager to an insurance policy with a Lambo on it.”
There’s a rustling at the door, and Mom enters, carrying se
veral grocery bags.
“Ophelia,” she says, stumbling over to the counter. “There’s several more bags in the back.”
I grumble but oblige, heading outside in my stockinged feet. I grab the rest and let the door slam behind me.
“Ooh, meatballs,” I hear my mother say. “What’s the special occasion?”
“I figured Ophelia’s first day at school is celebration enough,” says Brendan. I enter right as they kiss, and hide my smile.
Brendan is huge. My mother is decidedly not. She’s full on Mexican-American – thick black hair, tanned skin and short. She passed on her light-brown eyes to me, though I inherited my height and athleticism from my wayward bio-dad. When my parents kiss, Brendan has to hunch to reach her lips.
I have always found it comical. With my mom barely reaching five foot and Brendan well over six-four, they’re quite a pair.
“Okay, okay,” I say, “Let’s eat. I almost got ran over today and I’m not feeling very in tune with the world right now and just want to eat my spaghetti.”
“What?” Mom rounds on me, her eyes widening in surprise. She’s still in her blue scrubs, and she rushes up to me. “Are you hurt?”
“Nope,” I say. She hugs me like I’m the last lifesaver in the ocean. “It’s fine. It was a one-time incident.”
It takes some time to convince Mom that yes, I’m unhurt, and yes, I’m not going to run through Crescent Hills again. She finally calms down enough so we can finish eating. I have to reheat my food in the microwave, piling on seconds. As I wait, my phone buzzes on the counter.
I look at the number.
Unknown. (617)-722-0000.
I watch it ring until it stops. It’s not from Massachusetts, but something nags me in the back of my brain. I frown.