Page 11 of Lies and Other Drugs

I made my way to the front door, knowing that it was no use for me to stay. Samuel was loyal to Youngblood, and Youngblood was loyal to himself. The only person I was loyal to was dead, which meant I had all the time in the world to figure it out. And just before I left, one more clue clicked into place. Samuel spoke under his breath. "I bet you were withher."

Chapter 7

Mrs. Mulberry passed peacefully in her sleep last night. Or at least, that's what I was telling myself. For all I knew, it could have been fucking painful. She could have been alone and paralyzed on the cusp of eternity. Did she call for me in her last moments?Couldshe call for me? When I awoke for work in the morning, I was surprised to find that she wasn't perched at her usual spot in the living room, screaming at the TV while putting on lace stockings for her visit with Mr. Nordstrom, always with the lace stockings. She told me that he liked to pull them from her body with his teeth. Kinky motherfucker.

I made my way to her bedroom to check on the old broad, and when I saw her grey, sunken-in skin and her hair feathered out over her pillow, I slowly backed away from the door. I didn’t cry. Didn’t go check her pulse. I knew she was dead. The light was gone from Mrs. Mulberry. Guess the bitch she was running from finally claimed her after all.

After a moment of debating on what to do, I made myself her usual breakfast: eggs over easy with two slices of bacon and whole wheat toast. I sat down at the table and stared at her vacant seat. I guess I thought if I looked hard enough, maybe she’d magically appear, and we could go back to politely tolerating each other in that comfortable way we did. I barely stomached a bite of breakfast. I never really enjoyed it before; I’ve always been a pancake woman myself. But without Mrs. Mulberry, it was just ash in my mouth. The lime green kitchen walls looked beige now, too. Nothing about this apartment felt the same, and I was spiraling. Spiraling. Falling. Feeling.

I then went to work. Anticlimactic, huh? Just letting her corpse rot in her bedroom as I questioned the meaning of life on my commute to work. Spoiler alert, there was no meaning. We had no purpose. We’re just a collection of cells that age and reproduce and then die.

I mean, what the hell was I supposed to do? What did anyone usually do in these situations? She was there, live and vibrant and okay. And then she wasn't. I was finding my version of okay, and then I wasn’t. I was finding family, and then finding myself all alone in the world once again.

Samuel was sitting in my section when I arrived, looking smug. I knew that the bastard was hoping to catch me off guard. We were playing that stupid game of cat and mouse, a gameIinitiated. But today, I wasn’t the cat—or even the mouse. I was the pissed off trap. So when I didn't even flinch at his perfect face, his smile faltered, the right corner of his mouth dipping ever so slightly. I went behind the counter and pulled out a big coffee cup before setting it down. With shaky hands, I poured myself a hot mug and immediately took a giant gulp, letting it burn all the way down to the pit of my stomach.

My boss, a burly man whose name I could never remember, gave me a stern look. This diner was all he had. He got too worked up about napkins and coffee grounds. He had nothing else interesting in his life, so he took whatever excitement he could by bullying us. He looked like a Bob. Simple and gruff. "You're late," he said.

"Sorry." I wasn’t sorry.

I tied my white apron around my hips and made my way over to my section, refilling drinks and taking the orders of everyone else before stopping at Samuel last. Ah. There was that smile again. "Pretty far from the Upper East Side, don't you think?" I asked while tapping my pen against my notepad.

"I hear the pancakes here are shitty. Wanted to test them out for myself," was his smooth answer. It was like he fucking planned it, and I pictured him practicing in the mirror this morning as he shaved his face. "For someone so determined to get answers, you sure did leave in a hurry." I wasn’t in the mood to be confronted or called out. I wasn’t in the mood to work, or sleep, or hide, or eat.

"So you want pancakes?” I asked while writing nonsense on my pad. Swirling lines on paper I’d never deliver to the cook. “Anything else?" I wanted to sound bored, or at the very least uninterested. However, for some reason, my throat felt like it was closing up and something that felt like tears were filling my eyes. But it couldn't possibly be tears. I wasn't crying. Nope, not me. Samuel's eyes widened, and he stood up. He looked around then grabbed my elbow, guiding me to the small bathroom on the other side of the diner. I was sure my boss, whatever his name was—Bob, or Bruno, or Bernadette—was somewhere frowning at the world while touching himself through the pocket in his jeans, but I was too shocked by the fact that I was crying to care.

"What's wrong? Did something happen to you?" Samuel grabbed tissues and handed them over to me. I guess now my tears were freely falling. I was doing that ugly cry thing, you know the kind. Where snot formed on your upper lip and your eyes went red. Was that a sob that just escaped my chest?

I sat there, crying in a bathroom that smelled like shit and syrup while standing between Samuel and a trashcan full of bloody tampons. It wasn't pretty. My phone started ringing in my pocket, and I answered it without checking the caller ID, hoping for a distraction.

"Hello?" My voice was a strangled sob, echoing off the tiled walls of the bathroom.

"Octavia? Are you crying?" It was Noah. Oh Noah.AlwaysNoah.

I sniffled. “Are you day drinking? You never call during the day.” Leave it to me to deflect his concern with a punch to the fucking gut.

Noah breathed into the phone. “What happened? And no, I’m not day drinking.”

My cheeks were so wet from my tears that I had to pull the phone away and put him on speaker. Samuel went and did the thoughtful thing again, grabbing another tissue and handing it to me so that I could wipe my face. His movements were practiced, like he studied how to comfort a weepy girl at his fancy private school. Samuel even had that look of sympathy on his face, laced with a hint of guilt, a pinch of uncertainty. Even here, in this damn bathroom, he looked like the pretty boy he was, and I kind of hated him a little for it.

How could I possibly say out loud what I saw this morning, how I’d walked away without a care?

This wasn’t happening. No, no, no.

“Octavia, is this about him? You didn’t actually kill anyone, did you?” Noah asked. I looked up through glassy eyes to see Samuel’s expression. Now it was my turn to be disappointed at his lack of a reaction. Nothing, not a thing. He didn’t even flinch. Either he didn’t think I was capable of committing murder, or he didn’t care. For some reason, I was leaning towards the latter.

“What, are you wanting me to be surprised? Run away while you cry here in this nasty ass bathroom?” Samuel asked, that damn cocky smile on his face. He looked kinda hot, all assuming and helpful.

“Who’s that?” Noah asked. “Octavia?” I knew Noah pretty well. I could sense when he was on the verge of needing a drink, and that anxious lift to his voice was making me giddy.

Samuel’s grin grew wider, and I predicted the words from his lips before he even said them. He was all about stirring that flirty pot. “You should’ve told me you have a boyfriend, Octavia. I’m no homewrecker. But with a body like yours, I guess I can make an exception.”

“Octavia. Please talk to me,” Noah sounded miserable, his voice tired and pleading.

I let out a shaky breath, my tears from before trading themselves in for a manic laugh. Was this really happening?

“Noah?”

“Yeah?”

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