Page 10 of The Tomorrows After You
“Hey, what do I owe you?”I called, holding up a few bills.
He stopped walking and turned his head to the side, so I only caught his profile. He paused a long beat, ignoring my question.
“Riot’s out of town all week. You should move on.”
I scowled at his back, stalking away.Yeah, no shit, Fuzzy Wuzzy.
If only it were that easy.
4
Riot
Katie sat on the edge of the front desk when I reentered the auto shop, her suspicious eyes fixed on something beyond me.
“Oh, my gosh! Was thatNicolette Parker?”she said with interested eyes.
“Who?”I asked, trying to sound uninterested.
“You remember Nicolette Parker. She was in my grade.”Katie pressed her face to the glass door, craning her neck to try to catch another glimpse of the bratty little witch.“She was always camped out in the broadcast journalism studio. She left right before senior year for some big fancy internship at a TV station in New York.”Katie rolled her eyes, feigning like she was unimpressed.
“I remember her getting busted for smoking weed at the water tower with Chelsea,”said Amber, our accountant, sauntering into the shop.
Katie turned her attention. Good, I was glad she had a partner for the gossip. I knew what it was like to be the subject of small-town chatter and didn’t care to partake.
Part of me had been itching to know who the blonde was since I caught her sleeping in her car this morning. But now that I had confirmation she was, in fact, a reporter, like I had guessed when she walked in here asking for Riot Asher, I wanted even less to do with her.
“I heard she was fired from the TV station for sleeping with her boss,”Amber hissed.“It was a whole big affair, like, ten years ago. The guy wasmarried. Had two little girls at the time.”She turned her nose up.
“How do you know?”Katie prattled on.
“Ladies,”I regarded them.“As much as I would love to hear all about Where Are They Now, I do have some quotes to write up.”I nodded to the desk Katie was sitting on. She gave me a flat expression and hopped off, following Amber into her back office.
“She’s been hosting some video podcasts in Easton. Like,howembarrassing!You used to be on TV.”Amber’s voice drifted off and Katie clucked her tongue.
I flipped on the radio to drown out their scandalmongering before scribbling on the quote sheets.
I don’t know why Nicolette Parker was back in Godot. But after the barrage of media my brother and I had faced over the past twelve years, I was too cynical to believe it had nothing to do with me. A knot formed in my stomach, picturing the stubborn way she stomped her foot and the bratty toss of her silky blonde hair.
The two exchanges with Nicolette had been brief, but they left an impression on me. The only vague memory I have of her from high school is when she interviewed me after a handful of big wins for the morning announcements. I was pretty cut off from the outside world after I went to prison, so I knew nothing of her career after high school.
My curiosity got the better of me and I pulled out my phone and searched for her name.
The first few articles and videos were all old stories from ten or eleven years ago. Most had been written by her for the former media conglomerate, The Independent American.
Sex Trafficking Suburban Nightmare Exposed
Guess Where the Charitable Donations Really Went
Hedge Fund Manager Dethroned for Embezzlement
Fuck,these were serious exposés. The knot in my stomach grew tighter.
A series of videos with a younger version of her behind a news desk were followed by more recent videos with lower production quality of Nicolette up close. She had hundreds of thousands of YouTube subscribers, but nothing had been posted in the last few months.
I kept scrolling until I spotted an old article that was from some women’s magazine.
IANN Investigative Journalist Wrongfully Terminated for Misconduct, Predatory Producers Strike Again
