My face was still scrunched up. “And that’s why I didn’t tell you. You’d want to help.”
She scoffed. “Damn straight, I’d want to help. I’m on about a billion dollars a year now that I’m Lead, and owing me money is a hell of a lot better than owing it to a pack of seasoned scumbags.” She looked up at Henry and jerked her thumb at me. “Can you believe this one?”
Her reaction made him smile. “We all make mistakes,” he said mildly.
Sarah made a disgusted noise. “Ugh, no wonder the interns love you,” she muttered. The machine began to alarm again. She turned sharply to it. “Okay, okay, that’s it. You know what?” She grabbed big fistfuls of the leads and yanked them all off her so they were dangling by their cords. “There. Are you happy now?” she asked it as she reset it one last time and then looked back at me. “The docs will probably clear me to go soon, and you’re going to come with me to the bank so we can get a cheque to pay those bastards out. I’ll figure out some way you can pay me back afterwards.”
Like I’d ever let her do that for me. “Thanks, but I should be okay now that Henry gave me this,” I waved the receipt, “Assuming they’ll give me back the ring so I can return it, that is.”
Henry was right—the receipt did cheer me up. It didn’t make me feel better about Mum, but it did make me feel better about the smoking crater my life had recently turned into. It was nice to feel like there might be a way out of the hole I’d dug for myself, and having something to do was infinitely better than wandering around the hospital feeling sorry for myself.
I’d been planning on walking back to the city—it couldn’t be that far, right?—but Henry insisted on driving me to the pawn shop since he was headed back to work for the afternoon anyway.
Seung stood when I marched in, pulling off his cap and backing nervously against the wall. He tried to correct his stance to be more casual as I got up to the desk. “Hi,” I said, also casually. “I’m going to need my ring.”
He sounded convincing enough. “Yeah, well, you should have made your payments.”
“I’m going to, but I can’t without the ring.” I took the receipt out and held it perhaps a little aggressively in front of his face until I was sure he’d read it. “See? You can get all your precious money.”
He swallowed. Now there was doubt visible on his face. “How can I be sure you’d even come back?”
I had to argue with him to get him to hand it over—which he reluctantly did in the end, conceding cash was easier for him than trying to find a buyer for my stolen Lexus—and then Henry and I fed the parking metre and walked up to the jewellers. I knew Henry wasn’t looking forward to returning it, so I hovered around outside the shop and gave him some privacy while he did, and in less than five minutes he walked out with a receipt and a thoughtful expression. “That wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be,” he confessed, and then we walked back down to the pawn store via Henry’s bank.
Seung jumped when I interrupted whatever he was doing on his mobile by smacking a wad of cash on the counter. “Here.”
He smoothed his hair back, taking a steadying breath. “That doesn’t look like $20,000.”
What the fucking— “That’s because it’s $12,000.”
He sat back. “$320 a week for a year is $16,660. Plus who’s going to pay the tow truck guys?”
I probably argued with that fucker until steam was coming out of my ears, but in the end, he wouldn’t budge on $18,000. I was just so sick of the whole nightmare I agreed to pay him that as long as he immediately got my car delivered to the dealership that offered to settle everything for $8,000. Then, after I’d phoned the dealership to organise it, Henry and I made another awkward trip into the bank to take out another whole stack of money while the teller stared at us like we were criminals.
I came back one last time to give it to him, and then glared daggers at his forehead while he counted it. How could anyone justify screwing people like he did, seriously? And to think I’d liked him when I first met him… “Tell me, how do you sleep at night?”
He didn’t even look up. “I pay my bills on time.” I think the moment he said that he knew I was about five seconds away from just trashing his store, so he sighed and sat back to answer me properly. “Look,” he said, “you really needed the cash and you said you were good for it. I specifically asked you like three times if you could afford it or not. You knew what you were getting into.”
“You showed up at my house the day a payment was due. I was two days late when you took my car,” I reminded him. “How could anyone expect that sort of crap?”
He didn’t answer me, he just waved the money. “Well, this is $6,000. That’s it, we’re done.” When it didn’t look like he was going to say anything else, I shook my head roughly and turned to leave again.
On my way out, he called out to me. “I’m sorry, man. I probably would have given you extra time if it was just me, but this place isn’t even mine. It’s my dad’s. He makes the rules.”
I had to turn around again for that one. “Yeah. But you’re behind the register,” I pointed out, and then left.
Henry was counting the last of the cash as I climbed back into the passenger seat, and when I closed the door, he dropped a wad of notes in my lap and then went to put his seat belt on. I gave him a strange look; there had to be more than a thousand there. “Um.”
“It’s the last of the money from the ring,” he said. “Yours.”
I rolled my eyes. “It was your money that bought the ring in the first place,” I argued, gathering the notes and trying to stuff them into his suit pocket. He accelerated suddenly from the kerb, knocking me back in my seat so I couldn’t. Then, he grinned at me.
I sighed. “Come on, Henry, it’s your money.”
He looked unaffected. “My net position from this morning is still zero if I give it to you,” he said, and when I went to protest again, he stopped me. “Come on, Min. I’m a millionaire. Your credit card is still maxed and you’re unemployed. Take the money.”
He had a point, so I carefully tucked the notes into my wallet, feeling uncomfortable. After I’d put it back in my pocket, I spent a few moments watching him while he drove back up George Street towards Frost. Why was he helping me so much and spending so much time with me? What was in it for him when we weren’t even going out anymore? I mean, he was nice, but…
“Why are you doing all this for me?” I asked him eventually as we turned off under Frost HQ into the car park. “Is it because of Mum? Do you feel sorry for me?”
He pulled into his assigned parking spot, set the handbrake, and gave me a weird look as the engine went quiet. “Um,” he said, pulling his mobile off the dock and putting it into his pocket. “I suppose there is an element of that, yes.”
“An element? What else is it, then?”
He leant back in his seat. “Why are you suddenly suspicious of my motives? I thought we’d sorted all this out last night.”
I exhaled. “I don’t know,” I said honestly. “We just broke up, that’s all. You’re being really nice to someone you’re not even with...”
Something clicked, and he smiled a little. “And naturally as your only value to anyone is as a girlfriend and a wife, there couldn’t possibly be any other good reason I’d be nice to you.” He got me right in the guts with that one, and as I smarted from it, he touched my forearm in apology. “I know why you feel that way, I do. And I know you’re only used to receiving generosity when there’s a hidden barb of obligation behind it. But I’m not trying to sleep with you,” he told me, smothering a grin as he gave me the three-fingered salute. “Scout’s honour.”
I had to laugh at that. He did, too, giving my arm one last squeeze before he took the keys out of the ignition and opened the door. “Are you going to be alright?” he asked as we got out of his car. “Because I can find a good reason to not be in the office this afternoon if you need company. We can go back to my place and finish the game we started last night. What d
o you say? Nothing more relaxing than simulated warfare.” He had a completely straight face.
I chuckled, giving him a hug. “Thanks,” I said, meaning it. “But you’re in enough trouble at work, and I’ll be okay.”
He held me at arms’ length for a moment to make sure I wasn’t hiding how I really felt, and then nodded. “Well, I’ll email you my number—make sure you give me your new one when you get it,” he told me as he got his briefcase out of the boot. “Call me day or night. I’ll leave my volume up for you until you feel better.” He briefly hugged me again, locked his car, and then walked over to the lift, giving me a little wave as the doors closed.
I had a smile on my face all the way out of the Frost carpark, and since I was close to where I used to live and I had a few hours to kill, I went to the telco shop I always used to go to and got them to organise a new phone number for me.
A few hours to kill before what? I wondered as I sat and waited for the guy to come back with a newly activated SIM card; I wasn’t working anymore, I had nothing that I needed to do. I answered myself: I’d been inadvertently counting down to when Bree finished school like she was coming home. That made my smile fade. She wasn’t coming home tonight. I wanted her to, though, didn’t I? At some point what had happened today was going to hit me, and when it did, I wanted her to be there with her arms around me.
Then you’re going to have to apologise to her, Min, I realised. But how did I do that when I had no way of reaching her, except through someone else?
I was thinking on that as I fit the new SIM card into my phone on the way out, and as soon as I turned my phone on, it went off in my hands and surprised me.
For once in my whole fucking life, I wasn’t terrified of who it would be. I checked straight away. It was an email notification from Sarah; her home email, not her work one. “I have an amazing idea,” the subject line read. There were a couple of attachments; one of them was a standard form Frost used for hiring contractor services, and the other one was a long prospectus for the project she was doing. I understood why she was sending me these from her home email, now. She wasn’t supposed to be giving it out. I went back to the email message.
“I am brilliant,” it began, and I rolled my eyes. “Since you left Frost, no one on the team has graphics skills beyond the basics and so we have to put the graphics out to tender for this project. So here’s what I’m thinking: start a business, and call it a name that sounds nothing like ‘Min Lee’, and then bid on the tender. I’ll tell you what the lowest bid is so you can make sure you undercut them. That way when they choose you, even if they find out who you are in the long run, it won’t look like nepotism. It will look like the natural choice.” There was a line break. “…You know, supposing you’re interested…”
I stared at it.
Was she fucking serious? Was I interested in getting money to do art, without all of the bullshit of actually working for Frost? I could barely dial her number fast enough.
She answered immediately. “Sarah Presti.”
“It’s me.”
“Oh,” she said, laughing. “Right, new phone number. Did you get my email? Genius, right? I was trying to think of some way I could help you without your pesky pride getting in the way.”
I ignored that comment. “Is that actually something I can do, though? Bid on a Frost tender?”
“Uh huh,” she said, sounding smug. “It’s a big job, though, and the deadlines are insane—not that I don’t 100% know you can make them—but Min,” she said in a sing-song voice, “it’s lots of ca-ash.”
I was scared to ask. “What do you think I’ll net?”
I could hear the smile in her voice. “The lowest bid is $28,000 at the moment, with probably $10,000 to $12,000 worth of materials in that, and between you and me? The quality of their stuff is crap, you can do way better. So I’m thinking you can probably clear twelve grand, easy, and the job will be finished by October, with maybe some on-call support as required.”
“By October…” I said, realising what that meant.
“Isn’t that when your classes start?” Sarah asked innocently, knowing the answer. She let it hang in the air for a second before speaking again. “Anyway, you’re welcome. Put together a killer submission—you know what Frost looks for—and knock ‘em dead. And when you nail it, there will be heaps more work in the future, too. It’s totally perfect, right? It’ll be great kind of having you on the team again,” she finished triumphantly, and then hung up before I could either refuse or burst into tears and thank her.
I stood there in the street, staring at my phone. I felt like someone had stepped in front of me and parted the raging seas, and I could finally see my way through them to dry land on the other side.
In the space of a day, I could finally see my way through.
And I had to wipe my eyes on my sleeves again, because I never would have expected a day that started out like it did to end up like this. I just had such wonderful friends who did wonderful things for me exactly when I really needed them most.
THIRTY-SEVEN
After I’d wiped my eyes and checked the clock on my phone, I knew exactly where I wanted to go next.
It was 1pm; early enough in the afternoon to give me just enough time to take a train back to Sarah’s, shower and change into comfy clothes, and then hopefully meet Bree as she came out of Cloverfield at three.
I rushed so I wouldn’t be late and miss her and, as a result, ended up at Cloverfield quite early. It gave me the opportunity to catch my breath and find somewhere outside the gate to sit and wait for her. When the school bell finally rang, students poured out of their classrooms all clustered together in their peach and white uniforms, chatting as they spilt out onto the footpath. I stood up, scanning their heads for Bree’s tell-tale curls—and because I was looking for those, I nearly missed her completely.
When Bree came out of the gate, her curls weren’t free like they usually were; she’d pulled them tightly back off her face in a low, neat ponytail. Her top button was done up, too, and despite the fact all the other girls were walking together in twos and threes, she was alone and withdrawn, her eyes on her feet as she began her trip to the station. I hardly recognised her at all.
Once she was away from the crowd, I called out to her. “Bree!”
She turned, spotting me on the other side of the road. She didn’t look very happy to see me. There was enough anger mixed in with her surprise that I didn’t really know how to approach her. I took a few steps towards the road, worried she’d just tell me to get lost. She didn’t. She was just staring at me with a chilly expression, waiting for something.
I took a breath. “I’m sorry.”
She was silent for a moment, considering me. A couple of girls walked past her and down the road before she spoke. “How long have you been waiting there?”
“A bit under an hour.”
One of her eyebrows twitched. “You’re sitting waiting for me outside my school?” I nodded, and she scoffed. “You used to hate it when I waited outside your work.”
“Yeah, well,” I said, letting a car pass and then walking across the road to her, “I’m a hypocrite.” I gave her a faint grin, but she didn’t return it.
She looked so different with her hair tied back. Older, maybe. I wondered why she’d done it. Her shirt was also a bit small, too, and having the top button done up and her tie nestled in it made the collar look like it was cutting into her neck and strangling her. I felt a twinge of guilt I’d been pressuring her to keep it done up like that, so I reached up to undo the button for her.
She leant away from my hand. “It’s okay. Leave it.” She noticed my expression. “Mr Preston said he’d tell the Principal if I didn’t wear my uniform properly. And, yeah,” she touched her low ponytail. “Apparently ‘crazy curls’ aren’t in the school dress code, either.”
That made me bristle. I’d begun to think about what an asshole that guy was when I remembered I’d been telling her to follow th
e dress code, too. I felt the knife twist in my chest.
She looked right back up at me. She was still waiting.
“Anyway, you were right,” I told her quietly. “I did do exactly what my Mum always does.”
She swallowed, still listening.
That wasn’t enough? I wasn’t sure what else I could say. “And I know it means absolutely nothing that I thought I was doing the right thing, but—”
“That’s exactly it, Min,” she said suddenly, emotion finally seeping into her voice. I must have touched a nerve, because her face crumpled and she stepped forward to take a handful of my hoodie. “Why? Why would you think that was the right thing? Like, I can’t figure it out. You’re the person who knows me the best in the world, and yet you do all this and somehow think it’s the right thing?”
It sounded so stupid to me even as I tried to explain it. “You were so excited about your marks. I didn’t want you to feel like you’d done all that work and had done so well only to have them tell you to pay up or get out.”
She shrugged in defeat. “But I did,” she said. “And they did, and making me wait to find that out didn’t make it better. It made it a million, billion times worse. I was happy about something that wasn’t true. It was this horrible false victory where I thought my marks were good enough and I was good enough, but I wasn’t.” Her voice wavered on the last word. It hurt to hear it.
I brushed my fingertips against her arm. “That’s exactly how I didn’t want you to feel,” I told her. “I wanted you to see that you can do well, I wanted to show you that you are smart, and—”
“But you did the exact opposite, Min,” she told me, her hand tightening around her fistful of my hoodie. “How do you think it makes me feel knowing my boyfriend thinks I’m too fragile to cope with bad news? That I’m so fragile, he’ll pay some huge sum of money and sacrifice his future for an extra three months of not telling me the truth?” She let her hand drop, shaking her head. “And how you didn’t even ask me what I want and just made the decision without me? Is that supposed to make me feel like you think I’m smart?”
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