Page 3 of Bite Marks

Kaylee sighed. “So treat yourself to a coffee and apply for something else while sitting downstairs for a bit. Shame to waste a full face of makeup, right?”

It was only a little pathetic that I’d had so little reason to get ready lately that she’d noticed I put it on in the first place.

I groaned. “Fine, point taken. I will leave the house today.”

“Good,” she praised, grabbing her keys from the stylish dish atop the little wooden credenza by the door. “I’m half worried that if you don’t move your butt soon, you’ll start growing mushrooms or something.”

“Asshole,” I sing-songed after her.

“Guilty,” she sang back, opening the door. “I gotta run by the garage and then have rehearsal; have a good day, okay?”

“Yeah, you too. Don’t let the horny vamps bite,” I teased in the same cadence of the old nursery rhyme, offering a wave.

“Not more than I want them to,” she returned with a wink, the door swinging shut cutting off her warm, familiar laugh.

I snapped my laptop shut, setting it onto the black-and-brass vintage steamer trunk Kaylee used as a coffee table, and peeled myself off the couch to get dressed.

As much as I hated to admit it, she had a point: the longer I’d been unemployed, the more reclusive I’d become. The only reason I even went to the gym anymore was because my sibling worked there and scored me a free membership. But even I couldn't call fighting for my life in my twice-weekly kickboxing classsocialising.

More like obligatory visitation. If my sibling, Danny, didn’t see me a couple of times a week, they’d call Mom, and then Momwould worry, and it’d be a whole mess that I’d just have to clean up anyway. Besides, a girl could only watch so many reality TV reruns.

Maybe a coffee and a quick walk around the block were exactly what I needed.

I didn’t consider my lack of urgency in hauling my butt down four flights of stairs meant that by the time I was opening the door to The Drip, it was in the middle of the lunch rush.

From the outside, the café that took up the ground floor of my temporary home wasn’t anything special. Grey cinder-block siding and blacked-out windows made it look more like a dispensary than a coffee shop. Not that windows in the Lower City would offer any sunlight anyway, it was still something to get used to, the choice to not have any at all. Especially since in the last few weeks, I’d become pretty fond of the neon lights dotting the skyline like stars.

But it was hard to care about what the outside looked like once you were inside the café. Beyond the blacked-out front door, it was like something out of an influencer’s wet dream. Concrete floors and walls were expertly paired with medium-toned wood and chrome accents provided by the open ducting overhead, interspersed with plants hanging from the ceiling or tucked into massive terracotta pots in the corners of the cozy seating area. Yellow metal chairs lined tables for two, with long wooden benches and counters along the ‘windows’—electronic panels engineered to look like the street outside if it was cast in mid-afternoon sunlight.

They were the real highlight of the place. For a minute, it was like being in the Upper City again.

Normal. Or at least my normal.

Behind the counter, the barista, a man with a shaved head that I’d seen working every time I’d been in here, was pulling espresso shots. I got in line, half people-watching as I waited for my turn. Busy business professionals who worked in the highrises just a block over and mingling with students from the nearby computer college—well, mingling was a little far. More like they lived in a state of stressed symbiosis as they hunched over laptops and sipped lattes.

My phone buzzed where I’d tucked it into the pocket of my jacket, and I pulled it out, rolling my eyes as I silenced the ringer.

The bank.

They’d been calling me non-fucking-stop for weeks. But if I had to choose between credit card minimums or my mom’s pills? Yeah, I’d choose the pills every fucking time.

It wasn’t long until I was at the front of the line, just as many people behind me as I’d had ahead of me as I came in. I’d get my drink and disappear back upstairs, the café too noisy to really focus on anything.

Not that I had any insanely important work that needed doing anyway. Pressingapplyreally was less involved than just about, well,anything.

The barista grinned as I stepped up to the register, waving his coworker over to trade places with him so he could take my order. I must’ve left a good impression, since he’d remembered my name from the first time I’d come in.

I really should’ve put in more effort to remember his.

Tom? No that wasn’t quite right..

It felt good, being a regular somewhere. Comfortable. Even if this place would only temporarily be my coffee shop. Soon I’d be employed and back on the sunny side of town where I belonged. Leaving behind the endless darkness of the Lower Cityfor sunshine, and if I was lucky, the ability to wear my favourite foundation again.

I hoped. The damn stuff was like sixty-five bucks a bottle and me dropping into a new, even paler shade range wasn’t doing me any favours.

“Back again already?” the barista asked with a grin that showed off his slightly crooked—and dull—human teeth.

My eyes dipped to his name tag with a soft laugh, fishing in my bag for my bank card. “Well, when you make a flat white like that, how am I supposed to stay away, Todd?”

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