Girl in Pieces
: Part 2 – Chapter 20

A few days later, over the rumbling sound of the dishwasher, Riley calls out, “I hear the boyfriend’s going to roadie for that band on a big West Coast roll. Won’t you be lonely for the next few months!”

I yank the lever down on the machine. “What?” I blow steam away from my face. The swamp cooler in the kitchen is broken and it’s apocalyptically hot outside, which means it’s even hotter by the dishwasher and fryer and the grill. Riley says this heat is unusual for June. There are box fans set up and Riley’s got a fan jerry-rigged to the wall, but his face is slicked with sweat and pocked with red blotches by his nose and hairline. He’s hiding a sweating can of beer under the counter and smoking a cigarette, the ashes sinking to the floor. He sweeps them away with his boot.

He pretends to choke on a sip of the beer. “Oops. Did I spill beans that weren’t ready to be spilled yet? Looks like Michael’s in the doghouse.”

I blink. “Mikey?”

“Michael. He’s a man, call him by his man’s name, girl.”

I wonder if he’s taking Bunny on the trip. I wonder if he’s told Bunny.

I practically just got here, I think, morosely dunking plastic water glasses in the soapy sludge of water. And he’s leaving already.

But then I remember what Mikey said: It’s not going to be like it was, and I think, It doesn’t matter anyway. My one friend: gone, already.

Riley scrapes a block of hash browns across the grill, twirling the spatula in his hand. His cigarette rests on the lip of his beer can. Julie is away for the next week. “In Ouray,” Linus said this morning. “Learning about her doshas.” It seems like Riley is being even more careless than usual about drinking at work since she’s gone.

Riley finishes his cigarette and drops it in the can. He stands up, lobbing the can over my head and into the trash bin. “And stop wearing those long-sleeved shirts, Charlie Girl. You make me hotter just looking at you in those things. Buy some goddamn T-shirts or something.”

I don’t answer him. Instead, I dump some food on top of his beer can in the trash.