Perky

by Julia Kent

  He stands out.

  Polished and suave, he manages to stay very real and accessible while balancing that out with a model-hot body and a smile that makes your panties melt–whether you're pushing policy or a hotel room key into his hand.

  Throb. My head throbs.

  So does a distinct spot between my thighs. It remembers the coat closet.

  Fiona looks around. “You see ladies?”

  He gives a polite chuckle, then goes serious, looking at Mallory. “I wanted to apologize again for last night.”

  “I'm not the one you need to make amends with. We're good. I know Will talked to you again.”

  My head jerks up. “He did?”

  “I was going to tell you. After tacos.” Her attention moves to her taco, where I swear she's calculating the exact number of grams of cheese to get her perfect formula.

  Shoving my basket away, I give her a glare. “It's 'after' now.”

  “Will and Skip–er, Parker–went out last night. After the craziness of the choking incident. They talked it out.” One spoonful–just the tip!–of guacamole. Mal removes about one-third of the shredded lettuce. She pauses. She eyes it.

  She removes exactly one diced tomato.

  “Talked what out? The fact that Parker is a sleazy stalking dog who lied to his friend to weasel his way into the wedding party and make my life a living hell?” I demand.

  “I see you still have a way with words,” he says with a cough.

  “And I see you still have a way with getting exactly what you want, no matter who you hurt,” I toss at him, furious and feeling betrayed by everyone.

  Mallory puts her hand on my elbow, the other hand holding her taco like it's a Fabergé egg. “Will's not hurt.”

  “Are you?”

  One side of her mouth twists in contemplation. Auburn curls bounce as she shakes her head. “I was. I am on your behalf.”

  “Don't give me your vicarious pity.”

  “My... excuse me?” The taco moves closer to her body, like she's protecting a small child.

  “Vicarious pity.”

  “You think I enjoy feeling pity toward you?”

  “Isn't that what vicarious means?”

  She touches my forehead and looks deep into my eyes. “You're still drunk.”

  “God, no. This would be so much easier if I were.”

  “May I have a word with you?” Parker asks me, his own pity loud and clear in those bright brown-opal eyes. “Maybe our own table?”

  “How about I have my own table and you have your own table and Mallory gives you a grad school seminar on the perfect taco ratio?” I snap back.

  She brightens up, as if she's actually considering it.

  “Easy, girl,” Fiona whispers in her ear. “That was sarcasm.”

  “If that was sarcasm, then I'm the butt of the joke! Not Parker! Why am I being dragged into this mess?” Mallory protests. I'm pretty sure she's less upset about being made fun of and more upset at being deprived the opportunity to enlighten Parker on her ratio to enter the pearly gates of Taco Heaven.

  “Because feelings.”

  “That is not a valid reason.” Narrow eyes take in her taco again, like a painter on the Seine contemplating the aesthetics of sunlight bouncing off the water.

  “Feelings don't have to be valid.”

  “Maybe my feelings about tacos are hurt. That's valid.”

  “A great reason never, ever to come to Taco Cubed with such insensitive besties again,” Fiona says in a soothing, placating tone. “You are well within your rights never to forgive us. I sense a disconnect here, and–”

  Mallory's right eye twitches.

  Parker's hand lands on my shoulder. “One minute? Please?”

  “Parker?” A woman's voice goes up at the end as if she carries her own exclamation point in a pocket to pop into place.

  I go cold.

  His hand on my shoulder feels like a piece of stone.

  Then he squeezes me with a camaraderie I intensely appreciate.

  Because that's his mother, Jennifer Tanager Campbell, standing in line, two customers away from Pedro Jr. at the counter.

  “Not now,” he mutters under his breath.

  Not ever.

  “Why, Persephone,” she says, eyes like lasers taking me in, scanning like an X-ray machine at the airport, a faux-pas detector that always catches something. “How amusing to run into you here.”

  I make a sound that is supposed to be friendly but comes closer to a dying whale.

  “Hi, Jennifer,” I finally cough up. Parker and I were together for nine months, and Jennifer was part of eight of them. Once Parker told her we'd moved in together–after just a few months of dating, if you can call screwing like bunnies whenever he wasn't working “dating”–she practically moved in. Casually “stopped by.” Requested weekly lunches with us. Showed up to fundraisers and city events in the city where Parker and I were living, and made sure to generally insert herself into whatever we were doing.

  I now know why.

  Because I never measured up.

  When a weed finds its way into your perfect garden and starts to sprout, you remove it.

  Immediately.

  Roots and all.

  And if that doesn't work, you pull out the poison.

  “Are you all right, my dear? You look positively ill.” Her eyes narrow, mouth turning down and up at the same time, the expression intended to convey sympathy.

  “I think I let the wrong thing into my mouth yesterday,” I reply.

  Parker stiffens, his hand going still.

  It's a great comeback, but now all I can think about is the taste of his tongue against mine.

  While staring straight into the eyes of his mother.

  “Mmmm. Food poisoning?” Eyes darting about, she bends down. “You didn't eat here yesterday, did you? I've heard they have the best Mexican food in the region, so I decided to try some of the local flavor myself.”

  “Really? Like mother, like son.”

  Parker's whole body turns into a marble statue.

  Mallory spoons some salsa from her ramekin, digging in three different times to get just enough juice and chopped tomatoes. A cilantro shred tops the dollop. It pleases her.

  “What are you up to these days, Persephone? Are you a professional protester? You must have an arrest record longer than Parker's resume by now.”

  “It's not quite the size of your ego, Jennifer, but this isn't a competition, now, is it?”

  Her eyes go flat.

  “I work in the coffee business.”

  “Drive-thru or counter?” she asks sweetly, not blinking.

  “Actually,” Parker says, “you and Persephone have something in common.”

  “We do?” We answer in unison, equally disgusted.

  “Yes.” He bites his lower lip, trying not to laugh. “Mom’s in town to help plan her thirty-fifth Harvard reunion,” he starts.

  I pretend to count on my fingers. “Fifty-seven? Jennifer, you don't look that old.”

  “Thank you,” she says tightly.

  “–and,” Parker continues, as if I'd never interrupted, “Mom is working on literacy and education projects on coffee plantations in Central America. With Will's dad, actually. They're helping to promote a wide range of school initiatives for the children of coffee farm workers.” He turns to Jennifer. “You remember how Persephone and I met.”

  “What does that have to do with my literacy initiative?”

  “Persephone works for similar causes. Her efforts in the coffee industry come from an ethically driven approach. She donates to organizations that improve the lives of workers and promote fair trade.”

  One eyebrow arches. She's impressed, but doesn't want to be. “Good for you,” Jennifer grudgingly says to me.

  “No. Good for the kids.”

  She softens.

  But only for a second.

  “I saw the clip reel from yesterday, Parker,” she turns to him. “Impressive
.”

  “Clip reel?”

  She ignores me, but Parker doesn't. “It's a collection of all of my appearances on film,” he explains. “Gets sent to my office every day. Omaia makes sure.”

  “Omaia?” I ask.

  “My EA.”

  “Executive admin,” Jennifer says pointedly, as if I'm too stupid to know what EA means.

  “And you watch it?” Mallory asks Jennifer in that affable way that makes it seem like a compliment, but I know what she's really up to.

  “Of course! I'm so proud of my son.” She grins at him. “And you and Saoirse looked wonderful together.”

  Shrugging my shoulder, I make Parker's hand slip off as I scooch a little closer to Fiona.

  “She's a good journalist,” he says in a casual tone I know is covering up something.

  But what?

  Jennifer just winks. “She’s good at more than that, Parker,” she says before turning to me and winking.

  Again.

  The little bit of food I've managed to eat turns into a fidget spinner in my stomach. Am I being played? Are Parker and Saoirse together again and he's stalking me because he wants a piece of ass on the side? Does he get some weird cheap thrill out of tormenting me?

  Was my mom right? For a split second, everything I know dissolves in a paranoid soup. Mom's conspiracy theories skip through my mind until my face, hands, and feet are on fire, emotion converting into chemicals that race through my blood and bring the leftover alcohol back to my head.

  I'm woozy.

  Woozy, nauseated, and done. So, so done.

  Mallory's spoon hovers over the sour cream, the tip dipping in once, twice, three times–but it's the fourth that makes me stabby.

  Suddenly, the soft paper of the condiment cup is pliable under my fingers, the sour cream lifting up as I squeeze from the bottom. Flinging something so light with precision is harder than you'd think. Unwieldy, the unbalanced load veers to the right, nailing Parker's heart. A glop of sour cream slides down his chest, looking like shaving soap.

  Jennifer's face is a perfect O, her polished edges all raw.

  As I storm out, the last thing I hear is Mallory.

  Screaming, “YOU RUINED THE RATIO!”

  7

  See that guy over there, sitting at the table up against the giant fern by the picture window? He's about to get dumped.

  He has no idea. Poor sap.

  You spend enough time in coffee shops watching a barista serving up double-skim mochas and breve macchiatos to the sophisticated palates of coffee snobs who think the place that starts with an S is the McDonald's of coffee, and you become a romantic anthropologist. Not that I’m a romantic.

  Far from it.

  But I know a pending breakup when I see one.

  She walks into the store with a resolute look on her face, scanning the crowd for him, her shoulders hunched a little, spine straightening as she makes eye contact.

  He stands.

  He dumps his hot decaf chai all over his lap.

  This guy is having a bad day.

  And it’s about to get worse.

  “Reveling in other people's misery again, Perk?” Mallory asks as she comes around to my side of the counter and plucks a cup sleeve from the box of extras we keep. “And you're shirking your duties.”

  I look at the cream and sugar station–damn. They're out.

  Again.

  Cream and sugar are, too.

  Someone really should take care of that.

  “It's a fringe benefit,” I whisper, grabbing a handful of sleeves and shoving them in the empty slot on the counter where they go. Every so often, well-intentioned environmentalists complain that we're using too many paper products, but they're recycled and cut down on the energy use and detergent of washing, so it's a compromise.

  “You have a sickness.”

  “I'm innately curious about human nature. And coffee shops are the perfect environment for observing humans in their natural habitat.”

  “Overcaffeinated, wearing earbuds plugged into laptops, and camping at tables for hours without speaking to another soul?”

  “Welcome to the 2010s, Mallory.” I squint. “She's breaking up with him because...”

  This is an old game of ours. Stranger watching and guessing. No way to know whether we're right or not. It's just a harmless way to mock people we don't know, and the stakes are super low.

  “Because he punched one of the groomsmen at their wedding rehearsal rehearsal dinner.” Mallory clears her throat after that, as if exorcising some awful taste.

  Or a catty hairball.

  “What are the chances someone other than me would do that in the same week?”

  “Perky.”

  “You want to taaaalllllllk about it, don't you?”

  “Parker is here. You've been avoiding him. Will thinks he didn't do it, by the way.” She sips primly.

  “Didn't do what?”

  “Post that picture.”

  “WHAT?”

  “And she's really dumping that guy because he's an orgasm whinnier.” Mal nods in the direction of the dumper and the dumpee.

  “WHAT WHAT?”

  "I can't tell what you're whatting, Perky.”

  “I'm whatting every word out of your mouth, Mallory. What the hell are you talking about?”

  “Which what?”

  “What?”

  “You two are like those old black-and-white-tv comedians. The ones who do Who's on First,” a breathy voice chimes in.

  “Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis?” I ask, completely stumped as Fiona reaches for a honey straw and starts chewing on it.

  “You have to pay for those now. A buck each.” I reach into my back pocket and peel off a dollar. Fi just smiles a thanks and keeps chewing.

  Mallory sips her latte like she didn't just dump that big pile of horse manure into the conversation.

  “Fiona, what's an orgasm whinnier?” I ask, totally sure she'll be as shocked as I am.

  “A guy who makes that weird sound at the end. You know. Neiggghhhh.”

  Mal and Fi fall apart laughing.

  “It's like sleeping with Mr. Ed,” Fiona giggles.

  “Who's that?”

  “You don't know who he is? Some old black-and-white-television show featuring a horse.”

  “Owned by a guy named Ed?”

  “No. The horse is Mr. Ed.”

  “Who names a horse Mr. Ed? And how the hell would I know all this stuff from the black-and-white-tv era? And shut up. Mallory was just telling me about guys who are orgasm whinniers.”

  Fi nods and grimaces. “I've had one of those.” Her nose wrinkles. “He was also terrible in bed. Went down on me like he was eating an apple.”

  Now we all fall apart laughing.

  “I wonder if that's a tag on YouPorn,” I say aloud as Raul turns a corner. His father owns Beanerino, and Raul is a big, cuddly guy made of muscle and smoking-hot eyes the color of one-hundred-year-old Scotch that make you want to dip yourself in them. He has dreadlocks that go down to his hips unless he pulls them into a lazy ponytail. Not much of a talker, Raul has a deep presence that makes you feel grounded around him.

  But most of all, he loves coffee as much as I do, and he tolerates me, two character qualities in people I can never, ever get enough of.

  He holds up a palm. “No laptops. You're banned from bringing a laptop into the store, Perky. Dad said so.”

  “I know.”

  Mal and Fi exchange a look that says I'm about to get roasted.

  “Banned?”

  “After the porn incident last year. You know. Your porn?” I say to Mallory, who blushes.

  “It wasn't my porn! Beastman and Spatula were the ones who–”

  I grab my phone and pull up the famous photo of Mallory, on her knees with an oiled-up, naked porno star named Beastman behind her, her now-fiancé Will in front of her, her mouth in the shape of an O and a set of anal beads poking out from between her legs (but not, thankfully,
inserted).

  “At least I was having a great hair day.”

  “We could crop out the impromptu spit-roasting part and use it on social media.”

  “Don't you dare!”

  “Besides,” Fiona says as her teeth make quick work of the honey stick, “it's already been done.”

  “Someone's using my head as their picture on Insta?”

  “Not your head. Your ass. It looks like you're six beads in, Mal. Pretty sure if you make it to seven, you win free colonoscopies for life from some of the adult-film production companies.”

  “Those beads were never inside me! I was just sitting on them! I swear it's the camera angle!”

  “They all swear it's the camera angle,” I say with a snicker, knowing it'll drive her into a self-righteous frenzy.

  “Don't you have a nicotine patch you need to dissolve into a macchiato or something?” she mutters my way.

  “No, but we are experimenting with CBD-infused lattes. I'll add nicotine to the list of legal drugs we can blend into caffeinated abominations because someone wants to be trendy,” I counter, my voice rising loud enough for Raul to hear.

  “Hey,” he says with a shrug. “Can't be a purist to the point of not paying the bills.”

  “Coffee is meant to be enjoyed. Savored. Put on a pedestal and revered.”

  “You make it sound like a woman,” he says.

  “Or a really, really good vibrator,” Fiona whispers.

  Raul flinches. “I heard that.”

  The house phone rings. I'm on the clock, so I answer.

  “Beanerino! How may I caffeinate you?”

  “Um, hey–I'm looking for the booking manager? Perky?”

  “That's me.”

  The guy sounds like he's twelve. “Yeah, so, uh, I'm calling from Subterranean Paradigm Productions, and–”

  That's code for I Made a Studio in Mom's Basement.

  “–we're working on booking live shows for one of our bands.”

  “Yeah? What kind of music?”

  “Celtic ska.”

  “Okayyyyyy. Tell me more.”

  As the kid–who is probably actually twelve–describes this new three-person band, Mal and Fiona chat up Raul, who is giving Fiona googly eyes.

  Caramel, rich, strong googly eyes attached to a body that won't quit and a head of dreadlocks that are so sexy.