Page 1 of Hiss and Make Up
1
Sierra examined the bone in her palm. Stubby, twisted, and bulbous. A turtle humerus. Probably a red-eared slider.
Pocketing her treasure, she headed back to the Nature Station. Sunlight sprinkled on her through the canopy still filled with green leaves. A gorgeous early fall day. As much as she’d love to stay outside, Sierra had to meet twenty-five fourth graders—all high on the promise of woodsy freedom—in half an hour for their guided hike.
Thirty minutes. A whole lot of time to think about how she’d screwed over her own lifeandher best friend’s life this time.
On the way up the stairs, Sierra smacked a mosquito snacking on her neck. She couldn’t wait for a cold snap, but a decent one would be at least a couple months away.
The wood and screen door banged behind her. Laminated feathers danced in the A/C breeze above Dale’s head. He looked up from his ancient, dusty computer, set hisI heart anolesmug on the desk, and scratched his shaggy beard.
“What’s got you down?”
Sierra placed an elbow on the half-wall separating their office space from the rest of the room. “The restaurant fired me. I guess I can’t get any extra hours?”
He raised a bushy eyebrow. “What happened?”
“I salted a guy’s beer.”
Dale cleared his throat. “I’m sure you must have had a good reason.” He examined her, tilting his head. “Or not?”
“It wasn’t that much salt.”
He raised that eyebrow again.
“Fine. I dumped half a shaker in his bottle. But he was asking for it.”
“NowthatI believe.”
Sierra worked nights as a bartender for a local tourist restaurant and regularly complained about the self-entitled out-of-towners. They stop in looking for the full Cajun experience: live music, warm French bread, and a quick grope up their server’s leg. The place attracted a lot of jerks, so this wasn’t her first encounter.
The worst part was that she’d told Liz she had the mortgage covered this month. Liz had been covering for Sierra for the past two months while Sierra had unexpected car repairs and was out of work with bronchitis and a cracked rib. So when Liz’s daughter, Luna, was referred for expensive therapy sessions, Sierra insisted she could pay this month’s billandpay Liz back.
And she would have. She’d taken on every extra shift she could at the restaurant this month, and she almost had the money.
Almost.
Liz would never forgive her if she couldn’t come up with the money fast, and Sierra couldn’t blame her. If the world had proven one thing to Sierra, it was that second chances were nothing but false hope.
“Sorry, kiddo.” Dale averted his gaze and sifted through a stack of mail. He wore the same faded jeans and wrinkled, blue, button-down shirt every day. For the five years she’d worked here, his hair had remained the same length, color, and style—soft, curly mountain man chic with a beard that blanketed half his face. It had been that way ever since her dad used to take her to the station for hikes when she was a kid. “You know it’s not in the budget. Unless you can convince Kurt to hand over some of his shifts, I can’t do much for you.”
She did know. The budget for part-time naturalists shrank every few years. Sierra also knew she’d have to pry Kurt’s hours from his cold, lifeless fingers if she wanted them.
Dale smiled, a helpless, pitying smile, then said, “Oh, I almost forgot.” He dug in his pocket and handed her a scrap of paper with a name and phone number scribbled on it. “Found a message when I got in this morning. Mrs. Doucet’s class can’t make it today. Something about a drug dog and cough drops, so they’re stuck at the school and need to reschedule.”
Sierra took the paper. With no hike, she’d have more time to consider her options. Maybe she could even browse some job ads online or make a list of places to drop off her resume. Someone had to need a recently fired, bartending naturalist, right?
“And since you don’t have a class this morning, how do you feel about a field trip of your own?”
“A field trip?”
Dale moved aside and gestured at his dusty computer screen. “First email.”
She leaned over the desk to click the email and squint at the screen.
“What the hell happened to it?”
“A shovel, I imagine,” Dale said. “Can your eyes see anything mine can’t?”
