“I thought everyone would have heard by now. I’ve been fired. Well, not fired. But almost.”
“I see. That’s hardly fair.”
“That’s what I thought. And Mark isn’t speaking to me. That’s why I threw the phone.”
“So when I ask, ‘How are you?’ the answer is, ‘Not good.’”
“I’m fine.” She said this through gritted teeth.
“Right. Is there anything I can do?”
She could scream and throw him out. But he was only trying to be nice. It was hard having him around when she didn’t want to talk about it. With him, she didn’t have to talk about it. He just knew, and while that was often convenient when she was trying to explain things to her parents, she didn’t need that now.
“I’ll be okay. I’ll let you know if I need anything.”
He started to turn, then hesitated. “What’s your plan B?”
“Plan B?”
“I don’t expect you to stay at home moping.”
“What do you expect me to do? My career is ruined. No one will hire me to pick up trash after this. My friends aren’t speaking to me. Maybe I can find a nice dry hole to bury myself in.” She rubbed her face, which was warm and flushed. “If I haven’t made up for what I did by now, what hope is there? Maybe I should just go be a criminal mastermind myself. Prove everyone right.”
“I know you don’t mean that.” And he did, because he could see it in her mind.
She probably wouldn’t make a very good criminal mastermind, either.
“Plan B, huh? What do you recommend?”
He shrugged. “Maybe stop trying to prove to everyone you’ve reformed, and just do what you think is right.”
“The old ‘ignore them’ ploy? How often does that work?”
“Just because everyone else is looking backward doesn’t mean you have to. Call me if you need anything.” He closed the door behind him on his way out.
Do what’s right, she thought. Maybe that was part of the problem—she was having trouble locating right, at the moment.
Her gut was tied up in too many knots right now for her to listen to it.
If she had to work this hard to prove that she had worth, that she wasn’t a bad person, maybe that said something about her. If she really were good, she wouldn’t have to work so hard. In the end, she hadn’t left the Destructor’s clutches of her own free will. The only reason she hadn’t stayed with him was because he’d abandoned her. Not because, deep down, she was good.
She’d been seventeen and out of her mind. Dr. Mentis said so.
She was still out of her mind.
At any rate, if she wanted more ice cream, she was going to have to leave the apartment.
She considered it a supreme act of will that she managed to put on real clothes and walk herself to the convenience store down the street to pick up ice cream and frozen burritos. Protein—she’d need her strength if she was going to keep eating all that ice cream. In her scruffy state—unbrushed hair, jeans, and a rumpled sweatshirt—she didn’t at all resemble the photos from the courtroom that some of the newspapers still had splashed on their front pages, so no one recognized her to give her any trouble.
The headline on The Commerce Eye drew her attention. That was what it was designed to do, bordered in red and filling the entire page. It didn’t matter how outrageous it was; if it screamed loud enough everyone would have to listen.
“Is the Destructor Controlling Crime Spree from Prison? Mayor Vows to Beef Up Police!”
The recent robberies cum kidnappings—even the Baxter Gang episode, which had the same MO—had all been planned by the same person. It didn’t follow that person had to be Simon Sito. But he’d been responsible for most of the crime sprees of the last twenty years. People had trouble pointing the finger in a different direction.
She couldn’t get away from the belief that Sito wasn’t responsible. If the press and general rumor kept talking about Sito, they deflected attention from who was really doing this.
It occurred to her that just because she didn’t have her job didn’t mean she couldn’t work.