Page 5 of Fake It Till You Break It
JAKE
INSTEAD OF ORDERING,the guy stood in front of the toppings station and pointed a stubby finger at me. His eyes narrowed as he leaned forward. “You look familiar. Are you on YouTube or something?”
“No, not at all.” I ducked my head down so the guy couldn’t look that closely at my face.
“Are you sure? ’Cause you really look like one of those dudes—”
Jeez, just order already.“Definitely sure. Now, how would you like this dressed?” My hand automatically reached for the lettuce because that was what people usually wanted on their sandwiches.
“Hmm.” He stared at me for another minute or two before shrugging. “Just mayo. And make sure it’s the fat-free kind. Do you know if it’s gluten-free?”
Freezing, I eyed the guy in front of me a little more closely. The huge sumo-wrestler-looking dude in front of me. His brown hair was slicked back off of his forehead with a navy headband. And his shirt looked like it was a size or two too small. Maybe I heard him wrong. “Uh, sorry, I just know that it’s low fat. So just the mayo?”
“Yeah, and make it a thin line.” He held up his beefy thumb and index finger that were pressed together like I didn’t know what the wordthinmeant.
“… okay.” I grabbed the mayo bottle and squeezed.
“Thinner.”
My hand slowed, and I released the pressure on the bottle.
Thin Mayo Dude scowled. “No, less—shit, don’t you know how to make a decent sandwich?”
Decent sandwich? This was barely worth standing in line for. And definitely not worth $8.95. God damn it, I hated working here sometimes. Correction. Most of the time.
Whatever. It’s his money he’s wasting.
Suppressing my sigh, I forced a smile on my face instead. “Sorry.” This time I spread a line so thin that you couldn’t even see the mayo.
“Finally.” He looked at the watch on his wrist. “And can you make it quick? I have to go. Just a Coke with very few ice cubes.”
“Sure thing, she’ll ring you up.” I wrapped up the sad excusefor a sandwich and thankfully passed it along to Rose. He was her problem now. I wouldn’t be surprised if the dude wanted to count the ice cubes in his drink.
She smiled brightly at him before turning to get his drink. Instantly, the dude’s grumpy frown made a complete 180 as he watched her. There were practically hearts shooting out of his eyes. Rose had that effect on a lot of people. Too bad they didn’t know that she was most likely thinking snarky thoughts about everyone. Her angelic face was the perfect cover-up. The only person who got to see her real side was her brother, Greg, and me. Benefits of being her best friend, I guess.
When Thin Mayo Dude finally left, Rose reached around me and pulled the piping hot trays of cookies out of the oven to cool. We were instantly surrounded with sweet sugary smells of chocolate and oatmeal. She popped in the new trays of wheat bread and set the timer.
Practically drooling since I hadn’t eaten dinner yet, I grabbed a double chocolate cookie for myself. It burned my hand a bit but was totally worth it as my teeth sank into the soft chocolate. The free fresh cookies made the low pay and irritating customers sting a little less.
Rose propped herself up to sit on the metal counter. The tip of her left green sneaker kicked at the wooden stool between us. “So I got the tickets and backstage passes for the Lakeshore music festival next month for Greg and me. Andit’s still not too late to sign up. I could talk to the coordinator on your behalf. It’s all new up-and-coming artists, so I’m sure we could get you a spot. We could even carpool.”
This was the fourth time she had brought up the festival this week. I swallowed the scalding hot cookie and shook my head. “Nah, Mom’s landscaping the backyard, and I promised I’d help her out. You know, with the rocks and trees and heavy-lifting stuff.”
Rose nodded and pulled out her phone. “Fine, I’ll let Greg convince you.”
I groaned. “Seriously? I thought we were friends.”
“We are. Best friends. I love you even more than my own brother. And that’s why I’m doing this for your own good.” She typed something on the screen before slipping the phone back into her pocket with a grin. “Done.”
Immediately, my phone started buzzing with messages. I didn’t need to look at the screen to know that it was probably being flooded with texts from Greg. He was like a hound dog. Never let anything go. And Rose knew it.
Just like she knew me. Helping Mom was a lame excuse. Hell, I was kind of embarrassed that I couldn’t think of something better.
I tossed my napkin at her and grabbed another cookie. “I’m going to cut some more veggies. We’re low on tomatoes. Watch the front for a bit.”
Rounding the corner, I went into the cooler in the back ofthe store. But instead of grabbing the box of tomatoes on the bottom shelf, I leaned back against the cold metal wall and sighed.
To be honest, the festival sounded like it could be fun. Rose had been planning on doing a webcast on the festival for ages. She made a bunch of them to bulk up her resume. Her dream was to travel and let everyone experience the world through her videos. Greg, on the other hand, probably just wanted to go to hook up with girls. Both plans sounded pretty awesome, though.
