The House Guests

by Emilie Richards

  “Even if it didn’t quite work out the way it should have,” Amber said.

  “Savannah got home safely, and you came home to keep your eye on things. Maybe two sets of eyes watching them will keep things on a more even keel.”

  “We can hope.”

  The conversation felt finished, and they ate the rest of their lunch, dividing the salad, and talking about nothing important until they were done, and Cassie dropped Amber back at the library.

  As she watched Amber heading to the parking lot, she made a decision. Instead of going home, she circled back to the Kouzina and parked in the spot she’d just vacated. This time she entered the restaurant through the back door.

  She wasn’t surprised to find her grandmother in the kitchen. Yiayia was sitting at the table, resting her face in her hands, and she looked exhausted. Everyone else was busy, but Cassie noticed that Buck was watching her with concern between preparing orders.

  A moment passed before Yiayia even realized Cassie was taking a chair across from her. She sat up straighter. “You enjoyed your lunch? Your friend did, too?”

  “It was delicious. Thank you for adding the salad and fries. We ate every bite.”

  “You can see I still know how to run a restaurant? Your food came quickly? You were seated quickly? The food was hot when it was supposed to be and cold when it was not?”

  Cassie knew a little truth was called for. “You will always know how to run a restaurant. No one can change that, but I know how to braid a little girl’s hair. That doesn’t mean I have to find a little girl to practice it on every day. Now I have more time for other things. You would, too, if you’d be a little easier on yourself and let others do more of the work.”

  “What would I do instead? This is what I know.”

  “Go home to Greece? Read a book, listen to music, knit a little. You used to love to knit. Remember the doll clothes you made me? When was the last time you made something?” Cassie gave a sly nod toward Buck, who was pretending not to listen. “Find a friend to enjoy your time with.”

  “I am happy just as I am.”

  Cassie didn’t want to risk alienating Yiayia. “Maria told me about Nani and the baby.”

  “We haven’t had time to find a replacement.”

  “Maria said she was only filling in today.”

  “Maria’s sister-in-law might want the job until Nani comes back, although she is clumsy and lazy. Maria says she is looking for a job where she can sit all day. But this is to help family, right?”

  Yiayia always hired family when she could. She never opened jobs to the general public, never advertised. Everything was done by word of mouth in family circles.

  “I have someone better.” She squeezed Yiayia’s hand again before she dropped it. “Someone who is experienced and smart.” She paused. “Amber.”

  “Your friend Amber?”

  Cassie nodded. “Dine Eclectic is closing. Did you know? Apparently they’re not doing enough business to stay open.”

  Yiayia put her hand over her heart. “A failure?” Cassie could almost read her mind. Her grandmother wanted to know exactly what failure meant. Because, despite everything she’d said, the Kouzina was in trouble.

  “Everyone who works at my restaurant is Greek. You’ve never noticed?”

  Cassie laughed, then she cast the line with the hook that would reel in her grandmother. “I do know she’s had a hard time, and this is just another blow. Didn’t the Greeks coin the word philanthropy? Isn’t this a good thing for her? Besides, you liked her the moment you met her.” She waited a moment for emphasis before she spoke again. “And she has a son to feed.”

  “You have been taking lessons in manipulation from Roxanne.”

  “They’re good lessons, but you have to pay attention while I practice.”

  “I will give it some thought.”

  Cassie stood and bent over the table to kiss her grandmother’s cheek. “You’ll call to let me know?”

  Yiayia waved her away. But the wave was for show. Both women knew what the answer would be. Cassie just wished her own job situation could be so easily fixed.

  15

  SAVANNAH HAD BEEN WRONG to assume Will had taken her bracelet. And she’d figured out the truth quickly, hadn’t she? But two weeks later he was still avoiding her.

  Part of the problem was that Will didn’t like Madeline, who she was hanging out with more and more. The day of the missing bracelet the heavens had opened just as Madeline pulled away from the high school curb. Two blocks away they’d passed Will, who was walking home without even a rain jacket, and Madeline had tooted her horn and zipped right by, making a point to splash him.

  Savannah hadn’t exactly apologized for the suspicions or the splashing, but ever since she had made a point of being more polite to him. If he’d seen the difference, he hadn’t responded. She doubted they had exchanged more than a dozen words since.

  Not that she had any reason to care.

  Today, before the last class of the day, Savannah noted the admiring looks of other girls as she and Madeline walked to the far end of the hallway. “I can’t believe you have to live with Will Blair,” Madeline said.

  “I hardly see him.”

  “We’re in a couple of AP classes together. He’s always asking questions. Of course he just does it because he wants teachers to think he’s something.”

  The old Savannah had asked questions, too, but never because she wanted to impress teachers. She had a feeling Will asked, as she had, because he was interested.

  “I guess Will makes good grades,” she said. “He sure studies enough.”

  “Yeah, he’s probably trying to get somebody else to pay his college expenses. The way poor kids always do.”

  Madeline’s opinions about the world and its problems were miles from Savannah’s own. Madeline didn’t like a lot of people, but wasn’t that her right? So far she had taken potshots at Helia and a few at Minh. The way she looked and acted, Helia might as well have a target drawn on her back, but Minh was pretty and nice to everyone, so it was harder to understand. Savannah was afraid that Madeline might not like Minh because she’d been born in Vietnam.

  They reached Savannah’s World History classroom, and Madeline stopped, too. “Look, you don’t like Miss Simmons, do you?”

  “What’s there to like?”

  “She’s giving Lolly trouble.”

  Lolly was Madeline’s best friend, a bra-busting, dimpled blonde, whose father owned car dealerships and had promised his daughter her pick from his lots when she turned sixteen.

  Savannah could see where Lolly might get in trouble with Miss Simmons. The assistant principal had a perpetual squint, as if she was trying to read what was going on inside every student’s head. Lolly was sassy and sure of her status at the school—especially with guys—and she knew how to make anybody feel lower than pond scum, even adults. She’d probably worked that magic on Simmons.

  “Simmons gives me trouble, too,” Savannah said. “She and my stepmother are on a first-name basis.”

  “You know Mr. Jordan’s her husband, right?” Madeline nodded toward the History classroom Savannah was about to enter.

  “I don’t know which of them I dislike more.”

  “Really? Well, I have an idea about that. Meet me at my house after school.” Madeline headed for her own classroom.

  For once Savannah had studied the assigned material and found it oddly absorbing. She wasn’t surprised when Mr. Jordan announced a quiz. She decided she might as well show him she could do the work, so she answered every question in detail. He gathered the papers and looked them over as one of the other students read a report he’d finished on a war that didn’t interest Savannah at all.

  After class Mr. Jordan crooked his finger in her direction. He waited until the other students were gone before he looked up again.
“Did you copy these answers from somebody or something?”

  She stared at him. “Like who or what?”

  “Another student? Your phone?”

  “Did anybody else have exactly the same answers?”

  He didn’t respond. He just continued to stare at her.

  She narrowed her eyes. “Did you see me take out my phone? Because, you know, I don’t have it with me, so that would be tough. Besides, how would I get the answers if I didn’t know what you’d be testing us on or even that you would be?”

  “This isn’t like any other quiz you’ve turned in.”

  “It won’t be like any other quiz I turn in for the rest of the year, either.” Furious, she flounced out of the room.

  Helia was leaning against a locker in the hall. “Wow, I heard you all the way out here.”

  “I hope they heard me in the office! Mr. Jordan just accused me of cheating.”

  She started down the corridor, and Helia joined her. “He said that?”

  Savannah was too upset to dissect the nuances. “He as much as said it.”

  “Maybe you just surprised him. I had him last year for another class. He’s not so bad.”

  Savannah thought about Madeline. “I’m not going to let him get away with it.”

  “You gonna go running to Mommy and make her stand up for you?”

  Savannah faced Helia. “No, I’m going to get even with him and that storm trooper he married. With the help of a friend. A real friend.”

  Helia didn’t look upset at the cut, but she did look troubled. “Look, Savannah, I’m the last person to butt in. I have enough problems, you know? But if you’re talking about Madeline Ritter, I’d be careful. She and her squad really like to mess with people and get them in trouble. Okay?”

  “She doesn’t say anything good about you, either.”

  “We went head-to-head in Jordan’s class last year, and I roasted her. Nothing she says matters to me because she’s total bad news, but she’s done a couple of things since then. I almost got kicked out of school for one of them.”

  Savannah tried to reconcile Helia’s story with what she knew about both girls. Madeline was from a wealthy family, pretty, popular and smart. She was Savannah’s entrée into a new circle of friends.

  Then there was Helia, who was generally snubbed or ridiculed by everybody. Helia was mostly in advanced placement classes, despite her difficult home life, but she could be snatched out of Coastal Winds at any moment and sent God knows where by an unfeeling foster care system. And where would that leave Savannah?

  The choice wasn’t hard. “I can manage my own life,” Savannah said. “Mad’s been great to me.”

  Helia didn’t look impressed. “Watch your back.” She turned and started down an intersecting corridor, and after a stop at her locker Savannah headed to the front of the school, where she was supposed to meet her stepmother.

  Will was already waiting when she joined him on the steps. Cassie hadn’t arrived, and Savannah was in no mood to talk to him.

  He glanced at her, then at his watch. If they wore watches, the guys at Winds wore smart watches, and sometimes stainless steel sport watches with fancy chronographs and subdials. Will’s watch, like everything else about him, was unassuming and plain, and knowing Amber, it had probably come from a garage sale.

  “Would you tell your mother I had to head for work?” he asked.

  “Stepmother!”

  He shook his head. “That’s all you got out of what I just said? I need to go into work early, but I didn’t want to leave Cassie waiting. Now that you’re here, can you tell her?”

  She lifted one shoulder, like she was too bored to treat him to a full shrug.

  He started down the steps, then he turned. “Your new friend said to remind you to come to her house.”

  She was surprised Madeline had even spoken to him. “I didn’t forget.”

  He chewed his bottom lip a moment. “You two are planning something big?”

  “Nothing you need to worry about.”

  At that, he did look worried. “She likes to play people one against the other.”

  “Yeah, you would know because the two of you are so close.”

  “Madeline Ritter isn’t someone I would be close to.”

  She twirled a finger in the air. “Because she would never let you near her. Is she too much competition?”

  “I don’t want to be good at the things Madeline Ritter is good at.” He started back down the steps. This time he kept going.

  Five minutes later Cassie pulled up, and Savannah got in beside her and buckled her seat belt. Today Cassie was in jeans and a red camp shirt. Her hair was combed but had needed a trim for weeks, and her nails had been cut short but not filed into any discernible shape. Cassie was nice to look at when she tried, which she didn’t anymore. For a moment Savannah felt sympathy, because when they had lived in New York, Cassie had always gotten regular haircuts and manicures, and she had worn attractive clothing that looked good on her.

  Then she remembered the fight she had walked in on the day her dad died. Sympathy vanished.

  She issued the Will report in one long breath. “Will’s walking to work. He has to be there early.”

  Cassie pulled into the street and asked the usual questions about her day, although Savannah usually answered with a grunt. Unfortunately today she needed her stepmother in a good mood so Cassie would allow her to go to Madeline’s house.

  She stared out the side window to hide her distaste. “School was okay. I think I did well on a History quiz.”

  “Did Will help you study?”

  She glared at Cassie. “Are you kidding? I don’t need Will to be my tutor.”

  “Sorry. I know History is one of his favorite subjects.”

  “I studied—” She caught herself before she could say “by myself,” because she had a better idea. “With Madeline. You know the girl who lives a few streets over? She had Mr. Jordan last year, so she knows what kinds of things he wants us to learn from the material he assigns. She was a big help.”

  “That’s great. It’s nice to have a friend nearby.”

  “She offered to study with me again this afternoon, if that’s okay. I’ll be home before dinner.”

  “That’s fine with me. And since I didn’t get any bad reports from school this week, how about if I give you back your phone? I don’t like you going places without it, in case you need to call in an emergency.”

  Savannah wondered if her stepmother had any idea how unlikely it was that she’d call her for any reason. But she said thank you, like good Savannah would have in New York.

  At home she dumped her books in her room except for a history text and a notebook, which looked like enough to pass inspection. Cassie was in the kitchen baking. Savannah remembered when she used to come home and their Manhattan condo had smelled like chocolate or cinnamon. Most afternoons she would sit to report what had happened at school, a cookie in one hand, a glass of milk or mug of tea in the other.

  “Would you like to take some of these to your friend’s house?” Cassie waved at the counter, where her special Greek butter cookies were cooling on a rack. She made them for Christmas every year. Savannah remembered they were called kourabiedes, because as a little girl she’d liked to say the word, and the cookies had been one of her father’s favorites. In those days when she’d helped Cassie bake, Savannah had been in charge of adding a thumbprint before they went into the oven and then coating them with powdered sugar when they emerged.

  Nostalgia warred with anger. “I don’t think so.”

  Cassie looked up, her expression sad. “I wasn’t sure whether to bother this year, but they’re part of our tradition. It’s getting so close to Christmas already, and we haven’t done anything to mark the holiday.”

  “I just want to forget about it.�
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  “I don’t think your father would want us to.”

  “How does anybody know what Daddy would want? He’s dead!”

  Cassie took a deep breath. “I know, Savannah. I wish none of this had happened. I wish we could go back three or four years and start up a different path. But now we have to figure out the best way to walk the one we’re on.”

  “Well, don’t include me on your Christmas path, okay?” Savannah started out of the kitchen, grabbing her phone as she left.

  Outside she stowed her book and notebook under the bushes by the driveway and walked to Madeline’s house empty-handed. The day was warm, and she wondered what the weather was like in New York. She thought about texting a friend to find out, but she might sound pathetic. She planned to move back to Manhattan as soon as she was legally allowed to, but she wondered who would be left? The girls she’d been closest to would be at universities somewhere else, and at the rate her grades were plummeting, she’d be lucky to make it into a community college herself.

  Madeline lived in the part of Sunset Vista where larger houses were set farther apart. Madeline’s car, a snappy blue-green MINI convertible with black trim, was parked in the circular driveway in front, and her new friend didn’t take long to answer the door.

  “Lolly’s already here. We’re ready to go.” Madeline winked. “I’ll tell you where in the car.”

  “I have to be home before dinner.”

  Lolly appeared from somewhere behind Madeline, and they both came out, slamming the door behind them.

  “We have to get an ice chest from the back,” Madeline said. “Let’s go.”

  Savannah wondered if they were off on a picnic, and the ice chest held beer. She knew better than to ask. Madeline obviously liked suspense. Lolly, who didn’t greet her, was still in her school clothes, a barely legal top cut in a sharp vee that plunged just to the top of her ample breasts and skintight shorts. Savannah wondered how she’d managed to sit through classes.

  The ice chest was only half-visible under shrubbery beside a small potting shed. Madeline grabbed a handle on the side and pulled. Once it was out, she motioned for Lolly and Savannah to carry it to the car. She was putting the top down when they arrived.