And then a click.
She stared at the screen for a moment before carefully and cautiously setting her phone down on the counter—the only other alternative was to throw it against a wall, and she didn’t need to add another big purchase to her credit card. She clutched the lip of the marble countertops, and leaned forward, trying to breathe deeply so she didn’t pass out.
Her phone dinged at her and without a thought, she did what Apple had trained her to do so well, and checked her notifications.
More trolls.
“RAAAAAAAH!” She grabbed a botched roll and threw it across the room. When it caused minimal damage and felt incredibly gratifying, she grabbed another and repeated the process, over and over again, shouting and throwing until only one roll with a burnt image of the back of her head remained on the tray and the rest were in odd locations around the condo.
A knock on the front door jolted her out of her rage.
Who was that? She wasn’t expecting anyone. Oh no, was it one of Jimmy’s white-clad freaks? Was it Eugene Thornton? No, that was unthinkable. Her eyes darted around, clarity sinking in. Rolls lay helter-skelter around her living room, or rather, the living room of whoever had offered her free room and board. And here she was ransacking it with baked goods.
Pull it together, Jess. You’re an adult now.
She tiptoed over to the door, looked out the peephole and spotted Jeremy.
“Oh boy…” She cracked open the door and tried to smile, but it didn’t work, and she was forced to quickly erase the snarl from her face when he jumped back a half step upon seeing it. “Hi, Jeremy.”
“Hi. Um. I just wanted to come check on you. I heard the distinct sounds of unbridled rage, and … well, everything in my brain told me to let it be, but you’re my neighbor. So here I am.”
It struck her as funny, so she laughed. And laughed.
And Jeremy giggled nervously along as she opened the door a little farther. “Yeah, I’m fine. Just ruined the rolls I was baking.”
His eyes darted to something behind her. “Is that why there’s one in that house plant? And one on the couch? Oh, and one on the window sill?”
She composed herself and nodded. “Yes. That’s why there are rolls everywhere.”
“Ah, okay.” He folded his arms high across his chest, pausing to rub the afternoon stubble on his chin. “Well, maybe next time you get that angry, you should … slow your roll, eh?” His serious expression broke, and he grinned at her. “Eh?”
She groaned, wiping a hand over her face but smiling all the same. “Jesus …”
“As long as you’re okay, though, I’ll leave you to it.” He stepped back to leave.
“Wait, Jeremy. Can I ask you something?”
“Of course.”
What was it that made her think he might be a good person to ask about this? Was it his lame jokes? The fact that she never saw other people coming in and out of his condo? Or maybe that his preferred daily wear was leather flip-flops, cargo shorts, and a black T-shirt with the name of some metal band blazing across the front in jagged lettering? Yes, it was probably all those things. “Do you ever have to deal with trolls?”
He squinted at her, confused. “Now did you mean to say trolls or are we still talking about rolls?”
“What? No. Trolls. Like internet trolls.”
“Oh. Okay. Um, no. I don’t get on social media. You really shouldn’t either, Jessica.” He stared at her gravely, his expression darkening.
She chuckled morosely, trying to lighten the mood. “Tell me about it.”
He nodded curtly. “Okay. The government is tracking each and every person who logs into any of the major social networks. But that’s not even the worst part. They’re working with the corporations, programming you to use the platforms as your main means of communication, then when corporations play the ‘private company’ card and start slowly restricting your freedom of speech, you begin to tolerate and accept that act of first-amendment suppression as okay, eventually creating enough space for the federal government to pass the constitutional amendment banning anti-government speech that they’ve been trying to impose for literally centuries now.”
Jessica and Jeremy stared at each other in silence.
He clasped his hands together and grinned. “Well, good luck with the baking.” With a quick wave, he turned and headed the short distance across the hall to his front door.
“Thanks,” Jessica replied, watching him go and deciding that she needed to talk to someone sane, and soon.
The sun set over the patio of the Chews, Stews, and Brews Bar & Grill as Jessica took the first sip of her beer and tried to enjoy it despite the day of failures. None of that mattered now, she reminded herself. All that mattered was that she had a crisp beer, a nice breeze was moving in, and her best friend had shown up at a moment’s notice.
Judging by the frizzy state of Miranda’s french braids, she hadn’t yet showered after softball practice, but she’d at least changed her clothes to avoid standing out.
“Despite the roll snafu and your neighbor being a strangely empathetic and kind-hearted psychopath, I actually envy you a little bit,” Miranda said before casually tossing back a queso-covered chip.
Jessica tried not to throw shade at her best friend in the whole world who, up until three seconds ago, she’d relied on as a constant source of common sense.
Miranda had the life Jessica had wanted since they were young, the life Jessica could’ve worked for and possibly attained had her father simply been a spoiled lacrosse player, like Miranda’s, rather than The Almighty Spoiler. “Why the hell would you envy me?”
Miranda casually spooned more queso onto a tortilla chip and then popped it into her mouth. “You’re out of school, you have a plan, and you’re working toward it. I’m a year away from graduating with a bachelor’s in psychology and four years of Division I softball under my belt. Considering there’s no professional softball league and a psychology degree is useless unless it’s a PhD, I don’t even have a semblance of a plan for what I’m going to do next.”
“Must be nice.” Jessica sipped her beer, inspecting Miranda carefully. “You can do whatever you want. Like, anything. In the world. No one expects you to do a specific thing. The world is yours.”
Miranda rolled her eyes. “Says the daughter of the one who created the world.”
Their server, who’d introduced himself as Racer earlier—or at least that’s what Jessica swore she heard him say—approached the table with a small bowl of guacamole. He stared down at Jessica and winked. “For you, Ms. McCloud. On me.”
Jessica smiled kindly and thanked him. But as soon as he left, she turned to Miranda. “Don’t eat that.”
“Wasn’t planning on it. Honestly, I’m surprised you even let other people prepare your food with the kind of social media shit you deal with on a daily basis.”
Miranda had a point, one Jessica had long since dismissed with logic that, when applied to anyone else was actually illogic. But when applied to Jessica, it made perfect sense.
And since she happened to love guacamole, she applied it to this scenario, scooping some onto a chip and popping it into her mouth. “Unless my entire existence is a result of some weird vendetta against the Avocado Farmers of America, God won’t let someone poison me with guacamole.”
“But would He let you get a raging case of the shits?”
Jessica paused, another guacamole chip only inches away from her lips. She stared down at it. “I know from past experience that he would.” She set the chip down on her appetizer plate and stared forlornly at it before deciding, what the hell, and tossing it back anyway.
“Suit yourself,” Miranda said. “How’s the loan process coming?”
“Hmm?”
“The loan process so you can open the bakery.” She narrowed her eyes at Jessica, tapping a fingertip to her lips. “You weren’t aware you had to get a loan, were you?”
“Of course I know I had to do that! I j
ust, uh, didn’t know what specifically you were talking about. And I haven’t really gotten to that part yet.” She decided not to elaborate on her strategy of ignoring all business aspects and hoping someone else—namely Dr. Bell or another financially inclined angel—would swoop in and do it for her.
Opening a bakery had seemed so simple when she was learning the basics in her business classes, but once she stepped off campus and into her life in Austin, all useful knowledge and confidence had vanished into thin air. “I’m still working on my recipes, and clearly that’s not going great, so I don’t want to spread myself too thin.”
Miranda leaned back in her cast-iron patio chair. “Girl, you know I love you and support whatever you do, but you have got to get your ass in gear on this.”
Jessica frowned and hung her head. “Yeah, Jesus said the same thing.”
“What? Jesus told you to get your ass in gear and you’re not listening? I know your respect for him isn’t tip-top, but has he ever led you astray?”
“I know you both have a point, but—” But what? An underlying issue had been nagging at her, a despair she hadn’t articulated even to herself. But as soon as she searched for the answer, it surfaced like it’d been anxiously awaiting a summons. “Part of me wonders why I should keep pressing forward when I know Jimmy is just going to find a way to ruin it all.”
“Uh-uh. No, no, no, nope.” Miranda leaned forward over the table. “You are not using Jimmy as an excuse. The man is a megadouche, and if you live your life trying to anticipate the next move of megadouches, you’ll never get anywhere.”
“Miranda, you’ve seen what he does. You were there at White Light when he faked his resurrection—he always wins! And now this book. In the foreword, he claims—”
“I know what he claims in the foreword, because I read the book in the first forty-eight hours after its release so that at least one of us would have an idea what we’re up against. Therefore, when I say he’s a megadouche, part of that is informed by his awful memoir, which I assume you haven’t finished yet.”
Jess’s mouth fell open, so she exploited that to shovel guacamole into her gullet and buy herself additional time to brainstorm a response to Miranda’s spot on—though still slightly offensive—assumption.
“Don’t worry,” Miranda added, “I downloaded a pirated copy so he didn’t get a cent.”
“You read the whole book already?”
“Yeah, girl. It’s not that long.” Miranda didn’t bother disguising her judgment. “It’s like, two hundred pages. You could finish it in a single sitting.” She shook her head, changing direction. “Doesn’t matter. The point is that I finished it and however bad you think it is, it’s worse. Because, believe it or not, he actually comes off as a normal human being in it. Well, not normal normal, but not the piece of crap we both know him to be. Maybe a little full of himself, but not more than any other politician or megachurch leader.” She downed a queso chip with a sip of her beer. “I can see a lot of people suddenly liking him because of it, which is just balls-out infuriating.”
“How could Jimmy seem likable?”
“Enough about him, okay? You really need to stop focusing on that ass munch and start focusing on your plan.”
But Jessica wasn’t yet ready to let it go. How could Miranda not see what a big factor Jimmy was in Jessica’s everyday life? Miranda was there when Jimmy faked his resurrection, and she’d heard all the stories of his shenanigans in San Marcos and back in Midland. Hell, she’d even read his book, which should have made her more informed on the subject. So, Jess continued to plead her case. “But what if I start working on the plan, and it works and I’m successful and Jimmy ruins it again like he always does?”
Miranda rolled her shoulders and sighed heavily. “I’d say that’s still better than moping around until Jimmy figures out how to make things worse anyway.”
Dammit. I hate Jimmy. “Yeah, I guess you’re right.”
“Duh. Now what’s the next step? You obviously need to master chocolate-filled cupcakes, but what about the business side?”
“I guess I need to get approved for a loan, but I don’t know how.”
“That’s no big deal.”
“No?”
“Of course not. You don’t have to know how to do everything, Jess. You just have to know people who know how to do things. What about that professor of yours? You hit her up lately?”
Guilt pulsed through Jessica’s gut. Or maybe it was the guacamole. “No, not lately.” She stared down at her pint, which she rotated slowly on the table. “Add that to the list of people I haven’t kept up with.”
Miranda reached across the table and set a hand on Jessica’s elbow. “Hey, I don’t mean to get down on you. Moving to a big city is hard, starting a business is hard, long distance relationships are hard. To do all that while a silver-tongued fanatic with more personality disorders than even I can name tries to pilfer the power God gave you is more than any one person should have to deal with. And you have to deal with it anyway.” She grabbed her pint and raised it. “How about we talk about something else for the next hour?”
Jessica raised her glass and nodded. “Sounds good.”
As she allowed herself a lungful of humid evening air, Miranda changed the subject with, “Do you think Quentin and Chris have an unhealthy bromance going on?”
“Probably. Why?”
A crease formed between Miranda’s brows. “Because I accidentally saw a message from Chris on Quentin’s phone the other day, and he called him ‘angel bro,’ which seems a little homoerotic, even for Chris.” She laughed. “I dunno with those two sometimes.”
Jessica forced a laugh. “Ha! Yeah, crazy.”
Oh boy. Miranda still didn’t know about Quentin.
Note to self: don’t out him.
Another note to self: urge Quentin to come out so you don’t accidentally out him first.
Most important note to self: remind Chris not to accidentally out Quentin.
“How are things with Chris? You two talk about what happens once he graduates?”
Jessica tucked away her mental notepad, which was quickly filling up, and refocused on the physical world. “Huh? What do you mean?”
“I mean, you know. Have y’all talked moving in together? Marriage?”
Jessica’s mouth fell open but she was quicker about filling it with guacamole this time. “No, we haven’t talked about … that. Marriage.”
Miranda eyed her skeptically. “I figured it’d be the first thing y’all talked about when you got back together, seeing as how it’s your ticket to sex.”
Jess shook her head vaguely. “Just because we’re back together doesn’t mean we have to get married now. Plus, dream sex is pretty great.”
“Oh right. I forget y’all have that. Man, I wish Quentin and I could try that sometime, but alas, neither of us are demigods. Just two boring, fully human people.”
Jessica stared off to her right, avoiding Miranda’s eye. “Yep. So human …”
Either guilt or guac jabbed at her gut—perhaps in an hour she’d know for sure which, though she suspected it was a little of each.
Chapter Four
Bat-Ass Brew was unusually quiet for a Friday morning. Considering it was the first week of the fall semester at UT, the lack of warm, over-caffeinated bodies was difficult to attribute to anything short of good luck … which always made Jessica nervous, because luck was even more unreliable than her Father, who could, if nothing else, be relied upon to show up when she least wanted him.
“Hey, welcome to Bat-Ass Brew. How’s your day going?”
“Hi, Rebel,” she said, turning her attention to the menu.
Despite their many encounters over the past month, he said, “You know my name?”
“Yep.” She leaned forward to get a good look at the daily specials scribbled onto a small chalkboard on the counter. “What’s in the Dark Knight?”
“It’s just black coffee. With dark chocolate.”<
br />
“Then why isn’t it called the Mocha Dark Knight?”
Rebel blinked slowly, possibly even higher than she’d seen him on her many recent visits. “Because that doesn’t make any sense.”
“Okay, you know what? Just get me a Lugosi rabid. Actually, an extra shot of rabies.”
“Wait, you want the Rabies Shot?”
“No, I want the Lugosi with two shots of rabies.”
He chuckled. “Right on. Hey, back to you knowing my name, though. I feel like we’ve met, but I can’t remember you. Did we bone?”
“Ew. No, I promise we never did.”
He nodded slowly, a lecherous grin sneaking onto his plump lips while his gaze ran up and down her torso. “Then why am I having such an easy time imagining you naked?”
“Dude. Just put in the order.” She flicked her credit card at him and turned her back to the counter, scanning the tables again to make sure she hadn’t overlooked Dr. Bell.
Once her drink was up, she grabbed it without a word to Rebel and hurried over to an open table before the bro in flip-flops and a neon sleeveless tank, who was clearly scoping it out, could beat her to it.
THIS MEETING DOES NOT NEED TO BE.
Yes, it does.
She set her tote and notebook on the table by her drink, spreading out as much as possible to avoid any lunatic asking to share the table.
YOU NEEDN’T RELY ON BANKS TO GIVE YOU MONEY.
Yes, I do.
WHY EVEN HAVE A CHILD IF SHE WILL NOT ALLOW ME TO BESTOW FINANCIAL BLESSINGS UPON HER?
I cannot stress enough how unnerving it is when you ask hypothetical questions. But also, I have a literal answer to that: you shouldn’t have had me.
YOU MUST LEARN TO ACCEPT HELP, CHILD.
What do you think I’m doing here? I’m asking for financial help. Just not from you. Or anyone I know personally.
THE LORD GIVES HELP WHEN ASKED WITHOUT EXPECTING IN RETURN.
How am I ever supposed to learn how to live my own life if I just run back to daddy every time I need a couple hundred thousand dollars?
It is Risen Page 4
