Page 14 of Turn

The back room wasn’t really in bad shape. There were some tools left out that would need to be sterilized and it could be assumed that Zach hadn’t bothered to wipe down the chair. Zach struck me as kind of a careless worker but from what I’d seen his results were spectacular, which was why I believed him when he proudly told me his appointments were always in high demand. The dude had skills. I wouldn’t mind getting some ink from him if I had the money and the skin to spare. Deck and Cord probably put up with a few quirks here and there because he was such a fantastic artist.

I’d just finished replacing all the newly sterilized tools in the back room when Freya walked in and told me Cord had asked her to let me observe her doing piercings for the rest of the morning. Freya had purple hair that stuck out in twenty directions, a shade perfectly matched to her thick eyeglass frames. She talked about her girlfriend, Hallie, whenever there was a free moment. Since it was the middle of the week and appointments were light, a lot of free moments popped up.

Hallie’s favorite color was powder blue.

Hallie read a book a day, sometimes two.

Hallie really wanted to buy a cabin in Vermont and live off the grid.

In between my education in all things Hallie I managed to learn a thing or two that would actually be useful. Freya was patient when it came to explaining each step in her work and she was meticulous about carefully sterilizing all instruments.

“You won’t be able to try any piercings yourself until you have a few months of apprenticeship under your belt,” she said as she fastened a belly button ring. “But after that you’ll get more hands on experience.”

“Cord also mentioned that it would be a good idea to take a blood born pathogens class,” I said. “I heard the Red Cross offers them.”

Freya sat back and admired her work. She smiled. “Hallie volunteers with the Red Cross. Did I mention that already?”

“Not yet,” I said.

At ten minutes after noon Freya said farewell to a newly tongue-pierced young musician, noted the time and gasped because she was late meeting Hallie for lunch. I told her to go on ahead and I’d get everything cleaned up.

“You’re a peach,” Freya said and skipped off to her Hallie rendezvous.

Most of the staff took lunch from noon until one. Since I didn’t have big plans other than heading into the break room at some point and reuniting with my gas station burrito, I took my time about cleaning up and running a broom across the floor. I may have dropped the ball in a few areas of my life but I’d always been a neat freak.

By half past twelve my stomach was rumbling so I took a lunch break, glad that there was a soda machine in there so I wouldn’t have to leave the building to find something to drink.

Cassie was sitting at the reception desk but she was wearing ear buds and had a plate of something that looked like bird food in front of her. She didn’t notice me, or at least she pretended not to.

The break room was empty. After selecting a Mountain Dew from the vending machine I opened the fridge and stared at the empty shelf where my burrito ought to be. There was nothing there, not even the wedge of plastic-wrapped cheese that had been hibernating in a corner. I searched the drawers and even the freezer just in case some clown had seen fit to relocate my food. I found nothing. Just a vacant, immaculate appliance.

I closed the door, scowling. I couldn’t imagine that anyone would have been tempted enough to steal a limp burrito wrapped in brown napkins.

The shuffle of nearby footsteps made me turn around.

“Oh,” said Cassie. “I didn’t see you come in here.”

“And yet here I am,” I said, closing the fridge.

Now that Cassie was standing in front of me I had a tough time trying not to notice her body. It was nice.

Cassie grabbed a paper towel and nodded to the can in my hand. “That your lunch?”

I looked at the Mountain Dew. “I guess so. I did have a burrito in the fridge but it has apparently evaporated.”

Cassie froze. Her eyes widened. Her mouth puckered into a little pink pout of distress. “Damn. That was yours?”

I just stared at her, struggling to understand the meaning behind the question. I had a hard time believing Cassie Gentry would raid the employee fridge and devour the contents.

“I thought no one ever used the fridge and it looked like it hadn’t been cleaned in months,” she said, talking quickly as she twisted a strand of blonde hair around one finger. “Plus I was bored. So I cleaned it.”

“You cleaned it?”

“From top to bottom.”

“And what did you do with my burrito?”

She winced and dropped her hair. “I really thought it was old.”

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