Page 83 of Mistaken Identity
—Audric’s secret thoughts
AUDRIC
“No, look,” I said to Eedie. “This right here is why you wouldn’t want to do that particular set up with the pipes.”
I then went on to show her if she didn’t have the P-trap what would happen.
“Oh.” She frowned. “That makes sense.”
I winked at her and went back to work, stopping periodically to talk with a few of my employees I encountered as I moved through the area, inspecting the job that they’d done.
That was how I’d spent my entire morning, and I was just about to knock off for lunch when the prettiest sight in the world walked in with a bright pink hard hat on her head and a Cheshire grin on her face.
The smile that lit my face when I spotted her caused the men I was talking with pause in their conversation with me, looking over their shoulder to see what’d caught my attention.
“Shew,” one of my longest employees, Rod, whistled sharply. “She’s fucking hot.”
The whistle caught Eedie’s attention, and Eedie squealed. “Creole! Hey!”
Eedie hustled over to Creole, threw her arms around her, and said, “I’m so glad I got to see you. I missed you last time.”
The soft smile that overtook my face was alarming to my employees, too.
“Who is this girl?” Rod asked Dan, one of the newest employees. “I’ve never seen him smile before.”
I flipped him off. “Oh, fuck off. You know you have.”
Rod grinned. “Just glad to see you looking happy, my man. Haven’t seen you look like that in a long while.”
No, he hadn’t.
Because I hadn’t been happy in a really long time.
In fact, if I had to gander a guess, I’d say I hadn’t been happy since I was sixteen and walking in on my mom’s face half-hanging off.
Speaking of my mother, she chose to call me in that moment, making my happiness start to fade.
I contemplated not answering it, but realized that was the cowardly way out and excused myself to go stand in a deserted corner of the nearly finished corner apartment.
“Hey, Mom,” I said quietly.
I’d been ignoring her calls for a week now, unsure if I ever wanted to take another one.
But I wasn’t a coward.
“Hey, Audric,” my mother’s computer spoke for her. “Do you have time to meet with me and my therapist soon?”
I nearly said no.
But I wanted her to go to a therapist.
She hadn’t been to one ever.
She’d refused to ever even work with one.
The fact that she was willing to go made me agree, even though I didn’t want to.
“Sure,” I grimaced. “When?”
