Page 67 of Definitely (Maybe) Dating
“Sure.” A fib.
Piper lifted a brow, and Rebecca sighed. “Not really.”
“You like pizza?” Rebecca’s eyes lit. “I’ll take that as a yes. Why don’t you call and place an order for anything you want while I go and change? Number’s on the fridge.”
“I don’t need a handout,” Rebecca said, so much defensiveness in her tone that heartache fisted in Piper’s chest.
“No handouts here. Everyone pulls their own weight. Tonight, you can pay me back by putting the chili in Tupperware.” Piper opened the cupboard and set two glass mason jars on the counter.
Cautious surprise lit Rebecca’s face. “And tomorrow night?”
“We’re having chili.” Piper dropped two twenties on the table. “And the dishes are on you.”
Rebecca eyed the money, then Piper. Wanting to give the impression that Piper trusted her, Piper also dropped her camera on the table and turned to leave. “Be sure the pizza’s a large. Oh, and those cheesy bread sticks!” she called over her shoulder. “And dessert. Anything chocolate.” Whatever was left over, she could package up and send with Rebecca if she decided to ditch before breakfast.
By the time Piper showered and put on sweats, pizza was on the table, her kitchen was immaculate, and Rebecca was sitting on the couch watching television. Piper opened the box and there was still a fully formed pizza.
A nagging feeling washed over her. The coat on the hanger, waiting for everyone before digging in. Until recently, someone had cared for Rebecca. Piper wondered where they’d gone and how she’d ended up on the streets.
“How many slices?”
Rebecca said one, but Piper gave her two, which the girl inhaled, along with three cheesy bread sticks and another slice of pizza. When Piper was finished, Rebecca surprised her further by taking both their plates to the kitchen and doing the dishes.
Instead of slicing the chocolate lava cake, Piper grabbed two forks and set them on the coffee table, then ate a bite straight from the container.
“So good,” she groaned, and when Rebecca didn’t move for the utensil, Piper forked off a big bite and handed it to her. “Are you from Portland?”
“Is this the part where, because you fed me, I have to spill my guts?” Rebecca’s expression was a complete challenge. She was waiting for Piper to use her authoritative adult tone and demand answers.
“Just curious. I’m from Georgia,” she said. Maybe if she opened up, Rebecca might do the same. This was another show not tell moment. “I moved to Portland when I was about your age.”
Rebecca picked at the cake. “With your parents?”
“No, my mom and her boyfriend, who had octopus hands, are still in Georgia. I think.” Honestly, Piper hadn’t a clue. She’d lost contact with her mom the day after she’d arrived in Portland. “When I got here, I called to say I wanted to come home, and she said it wasn’t a good time for her.”
“Parents suck.”
“Some of them do.”
Rebecca appeared to disagree, and Piper didn’t blame her. Parents seemed to fall into two categories: amazing or awful. She knew where her mom landed on the spectrum, and she wondered what Rebecca would say about her own parents.
“My mom’s in jail. She killed my dad.”
Piper’s heart stalled, her lungs pinching painfully. “I am so sorry.
“Me too.” The way she said it, so matter of fact, as if it was buried so deep she couldn’t access it. “My dad was a drunk, a mean drunk. One night he came home and was swinging his gun at me. My mom grabbed the gun, and somehow it went off and—”
“Isn’t that self-defense?”
“She had a shitty lawyer. One of those appointed ones. But it was okay, I got to live with my grandma.”
Piper understood mean drunks first hand, as they seemed to be her mother’s man of choice. There was something about bullies that her mom gravitated toward. Piper wasn’t sure if her mom passed along her addiction gene, but she wasn’t taking any chances. Which was why she rarely if ever drank.
“My grandma was pretty cool,” Rebecca said into the silence. “She died in May.”
Rebecca’s entire lifeline had likely died with her. It explained the manners and seed of hope in the teen’s eyes. The longer kids were on the street, the more hardened they became, and the worse the decisions they racketed up—until eventually they were caught. Few of them by people like Skye.
“I’m sorry about your grandma. I didn’t really know mine. Were you close?”
