The first proof is the pathetic water pressure. And while the landlord said the hot water would come out for fifteen minutes, I’m quite certain it’s a lot less than that because it got cold before I was done rinsing the soap off my body yesterday.
As I towel off, it slowly hits me that L.A. is a much more dangerous place than Cincinnati. Sure, I haven’t been threatened by Roy…yet. But now I’ve had a flasher incident, which never happened to me before.
I should start carrying pepper spray. I haven’t bothered because it wouldn’t do a thing to keep me safe from Roy.
At the thought of “safe,” the image of the dog owner flashes in my mind. I gasp as a realization smacks me. Then I clutch my head and moan over the way I blew it so badly. How did I not see it sooner? He could’ve been the sign I asked for from the universe! It probably felt so awful after throwing me the flasher lemon that it gave me a guardian angel. Grumpy and maybe a little rude, but a guardian angel nonetheless. His dogs are vicious when attacking someone, but also very well behaved. They could keep Roy and his men away…
All it takes is another car barreling down the street, and those Dobermans are toast.
I flinch and hug myself, imagining one of those RN IF U CN cars hitting them. No matter how fast and well trained they are, they’re just dogs. They aren’t invulnerable. Roy isn’t one of those guys who has no problem hurting people but would spare an animal. His gift for my twentieth birthday shattered the tiny hope in my heart that he wasn’t purely evil.
The man who helped me is probably some kind of K-9 trainer. Maybe with the police? Something about him gave off a vaguely military vibe. But dog whisperer or not, your average cop isn’t going to be a match for Roy.
My mood starts sinking.
No, no. I shake myself. What happened sucks, but really, it ended okay. It’s gotta be a positive sign, the one I’ve been looking for. Normally, it would have ended with me having to deal with the flasher on my own.
Forcing optimism, I drive to Coffee Heaven downtown. The café isn’t close to my place, but I have another gig at a hotel not too far from here, so it works out.
The cool air inside is replete with the aroma of fresh coffee beans, cream and heated milk. To most it represents a caffeine boost, but to me, it’s a decent-paying job where I bring a fair amount of experience. I started working as a barista when I was eighteen, and I can do some mean latte art.
Our shift has three baristas—the other two are Sean and Eric, the manager’s son. I met them when I had my interview with the manager, Maggie, yesterday afternoon. Their chatter stops briefly as they look at me.
Sean’s a brown-haired, brown-eyed nineteen-year-old going to community college, which I’m envious of because I wish I could go, too. I had a few acceptance letters, but when my parents died my senior year—bankrupt—my dream became too expensive to afford. Maybe I could’ve gotten college loans, but I knew there was no point when Roy sent me a condolence gift, making it clear he was going to follow me to any campus I’d choose. Sometimes my right index finger aches, like it’s still sporting the surprisingly deep paper cut that I got when I tossed all those letters and brochures into the trash.
Eric tilts his chin upward once instead of a regular hello, his hazel eyes looking down at me. His smirk says he’s too cool for school. Of course, he wasn’t this cool when his mom was around yesterday. His golden hair glints as he moves, and I wonder if he practices how to position himself under the café lights for the effect.
“Hey, guys.”
“Angelika.” Sean waves with a small smile. The outer corners of his eyes droop slightly downward, and when you add that smile, he looks like a happy child who just woke up from a nap.
I go to the employee area in the back. After locking my purse in one of the empty metal lockers, I put on a green and brown apron with the café logo and enter my employee code into the system like Maggie showed me yesterday. This way, the accounting software knows I’m clocked in.
When I come out, Eric’s talking to Sean, eager and all-knowing. Neither seems to care that a customer just walked in. Sean hands me a name tag, giving me another slight smile.
Pinning it to my apron, I smile back, but only a little. I make sure to keep my expression slightly on the cool, polite side to signal I’m not interested. Roy has a habit of running people over, and I wouldn’t want to see that happen to Sean.
“I couldn’t believe he got my name wrong,” Eric is saying, “and acted like it’s no freakin’ deal. He was all like, ‘Who cares, man? It’s not like anybody but you notices.’ It’s like he doesn’t understand he just microaggressed the shit out of me. So I told him it wasn’t cool, then he acts like microaggression is a figment of my imagination! He wouldn’t just be an adult about it and admit that he was wrong and it hurts when he gets my name wrong.” Eric’s voice is loud enough that the man standing at the counter can hear him. “I can just hear it when people use the wrong letter. It’s in the way they say it. C is nothing like K.”
It’s ha
rd to refrain from an obvious snort. Eric and Erik sound exactly the same to me, and I suspect most people would agree. Not that I’m going to point that out. From the intense look in his eyes, he’ll argue till his dying breath, and it isn’t worth the energy.
“Totally,” Sean says with the enthusiasm of a child looking at a plateful of boiled cabbage.
“Just imagine how awful your life is when people constantly, like, nick you to death.”
From the way he’s acting, you’d think those nicks were knives plunged into his heart.
He continues, “How annoying is it when people constantly get your name wrong, right? It’s offensive as hell.”
Sean and Eric seem too engrossed in the terrible injustice Eric has suffered to do anything about the fact that the customer’s still standing there, waiting to have his order taken. Guess I need to step up.
I turn to the customer, then gasp with recognition. It’s Mr. Dog Whisperer from the jogging trail!
Now he’s in a black suit, no tie, his two top shirt buttons undone. He’s at least half a head taller than Eric, and is staring at the menu behind me with narrowed eyes, like he can’t decide and he’s annoyed by the fact that he can’t make up his mind.
Without the dogs and the pervert to distract me, I take some time to study the man more closely. He appears…different. Still in charge, but slightly more civilized. It’s probably the suit. Even Roy can look like a gentleman in a suit, although his eyes give him away.