Page 2 of Slots & Sticks
I refuse to repeat what my mom’s nicknames are. There are too many of them anyway.
The next day, I haul out the table again. Fewer glitter tubes this time, more duct tape. I tell myself it’s about pride, but really, I just need to prove I can build something that’s mine.
I tape the new sign across the front of the table.Dot’s Lemonade Reboot.It’s dumb, and maybe not all that marketable, but I like it.
I’ve just finished pouring the first cup when I hear them again.
Laughter. That thick, jeering kind that slides between your ribs.
I freeze.
There are three of them again. Same boys. Same sneers.
“Show us your tits, and we won’t steal your money.”
My ten-year-old face heats as another one laughs and says, “Oh, that’s right. You’re flat as a piece of moldy cardboard.”
I stay still, eyes on the lemonade as if I don’t move, they’ll get bored.
One of them walks right up and slaps the cup from my hand.
It shatters against the pavement—plastic cracking, lemon and ice spraying my legs. I flinch but don’t run. Running makes it worse.
“Should’ve brought a pole to dance on,” another says. “Bet you’d make more tips.”
They laugh. One pops a wheelie on his bike and says, “She’s so ugly, she’d look better dancing on a broomstick. Bet you’d be good at those upside-down splits, freak.”
The tall one crouches next to my coin jar like it’s a prize. He doesn’t even have to steal it—he just takes it. Like it was always his.
My throat burns. I can’t yell. I can’t move. I don’t even cry.
I just stand there, heart pounding.
Then something changes.
The air feels different.
I turn my head, and a boy is standing at the edge of the sidewalk.
Not one of them.
He’s skinny. Rumpled. His shirt is two sizes too big, and his hair looks like it hasn’t been cut in months. His sneakers are worn in as if he’s walked miles in them. One’s got a stain on the toe.
He doesn’t say anything.
He just walks up—calm, like he belongs there—and stops between me and the boys.
Like a wall.
“What’s this?” The tall one laughs. “You bring backup?”
The new kid doesn’t answer.
The smallest of the three high school boys steps forward, puffed up like he wants a fight. “You deaf or just stupid?”
Still no answer.
Just… stillness.
