Page 25 of Songbird: Black Kite
Blowing out a sigh, I gathered enough menus for the table and headed over, ready to face the music.
“Welcome to the Grand Rapids Diner. Can I get you started with something to drink?”
“Wren?” Denise asked, feigning surprise. “You still work here? I thought for sure you would have found something better by now?”
“Nope,” I said with a brittle smile. “Still here. Drinks?”
“I’ll take a beer,” Jason said, smirking at me.
“Can I see some ID?” I asked, knowing we had graduated together and we were both still nineteen.
Jason scowled and slumped farther into the booth. “Coke, then.”
The other girls at the table rattled off their drink orders until it was just Denise left. I turned to her expectantly, not loving the calculating look in her eye.
“I’ll take a chocolate milkshake.”
There was a pause at the table, like everyone was holding their breath. In all the years I’d known her, I’d never seen Denise consume anything that could even be considered unhealthy—unless you counted Jason Mason, which she had done with alarming regularity in the halls of our high school—so it was a shock to all of us that she would order what could only be described as diabetes in a cup.
When she didn’t change her mind, I nodded and turned away, busying myself with the drink order before returning to the table, my tray loaded with glasses.
“I’ll be right back to take your food orders,” I said after I had delivered the drinks and walked away, but froze when there was a loud crash behind me. Turning, I spotted Denise, leaned over Jason with a comical look of surprise on her face.
And on the floor, right beside their table, was the milkshake, smashed against the tiles and spreading like a chocolate blood stain between us.
“Oops,” she said, blinking at me, intentionally holding her left hand over her mouth so that she could flash her engagement ring. “Was that me?” I had never wanted to claw someone’s eyes out more than I did in that moment. “I’m just so clumsy tonight. You’d better clean that up.”
I stared at her, my anger bubbling in my chest as the people at her table—people I had known my entire life—laughed at my expense.
These people who had teased me relentlessly when my father had lost his job. When my clothes were all second-hand. When my shoes had holes in them.
These wretched humans, whose only boon in life had been being born to parents that were richer than mine, were currently snickering over the fact that I had to clean up their mess.
Someone wasalwayscleaning up their mess.
Gritting my teeth, I swallowed my rage and grabbed a bus pan and a stack of towels, setting them on the floor beside the chocolate puddle and lowered myself to my knees, needing to gather all the large shards of glass before I could bring out the mop from the back.
“Well,” came Denise’s saccharine voice. “Isn’t this a familiar sight. A Blackburn woman, on her knees, cleaning up after me.”
Jason snickered, stomping his foot at the comment and subsequently splashing the spilled chocolate milkshake all over my arms and face.
I hated them.
I hatedher.
I hated Denise McQueen and her whole fucking family with the burning passion of a thousand fiery suns.
For as long as I could remember, her family had been making my family’s life hell, in every way they possibly could.
Because they had always held all the power, and we had none.
And that didn’t appear like it was ever going to change.
So I did what I always did. I choked down my anger, swallowed that burning ball of rage, and I buried it deep inside. Later, when I was alone and I could examine those feelings without the risk of stabbing Denise with a soup spoon, I would use them. I would write them down and turn a lifetime of torment into something beautiful and purifying.
But for now, I lowered my head and finished cleaning up the mess.
Chapter fifteen
