I glanced at her. “Can I help you?”
“What is this garbage?”
“A chocolate shake.”
“It’s gross,” she said and thrust the open drink at me to see.
It looked fine to me. I had no idea what she was talking about, but the customer came first. “I can make you another one if you’d like.”
Then, to my abject horror, she flung the shake at me. I gasped, reeling backward on my skates, as the chocolate exploded all over my uniform. Only years of skating kept me on my feet instead of sailing backward on my ass to add to my humiliation.
And it was humiliating.
Everyone laughed. I didn’t look up to meet anyone’s eyes, but I could hear their laughter at my benefit. Only Campbell didn’t join them.
“Jill,” he admonished, jumping up to grab a few napkins. “Come on.”
She just set her shake down, as if she’d done nothing wrong, and said, “Get it right the first time.”
I was shaking with rage. There was fire in my eyes. I wanted to rip her limb from limb. But I couldn’t. I couldn’t do anything.
I turned and fled. I hadn’t accepted the napkins from Campbell. I hadn’t done anything. I just needed to escape this horrible circumstance. I was still supposed to work for another hour, and I couldn’t do it. I didn’t have a spare uniform on me, and this one was unsalvageable.
I almost made it inside, where I could cry and scream obscenities in peace, when I felt a tug on my arm. “Hey.”
I whipped around on my skates. My eyes were red with unshed tears. My hands trembling. “Can I help you?” I forced out.
“No,” he said slowly. “No. I just wanted to apologize. That should never have happened. I can’t believe she did that.”
“Okay.” Because it seemed right up her alley. I didn’t know what he saw in her. How could he not see she was vile?
“Can I help in any way?” He offered up a fistful of napkins.
“No.” And my voice was forceful and mean. It was savage. It could have cut glass with the ferocity.
For a second, as we stood there in a Sonic parking lot, something shifted. I suddenly wasn’t invisible anymore. Campbell Abbey looked at me with all my fury and saw me. He saw the real me that I hid behind a dark brown bob and bangs. That I hid from everyone.
“You’re…Blaire, right?”
I gawped at him. How the hell did he know my name? “Yes?” It came out as more of a question.
“We had Spanish together last year, right?”
“Yes,” I whispered. He’d slept through half the class and never once looked my way.
“I remember you.”
And everything tipped over at those words. They shouldn’t have meant anything at all. This was Campbell Abbey. He was dating the most popular, bitchiest girl in school. He shouldn’t have remembered who I was. He shouldn’t have been looking at me right now, covered in chocolate shake, humiliated and close to tears, with…interest. I definitely shouldn’t have been looking back.
But it all changed then.
He and Jill broke up that night.
Campbell started coming to Sonic every afternoon for a whole different reason. And at first, we hid what was happening because of the wrath of Jill Patton. Not even Campbell wanted on her bad side. I sure didn’t. But then it became so private, so intimate, that sharing it with anyone else felt like giving up a piece of it. And I wanted all of him to myself.
Apparently, I still did.
Campbell finished his song and burst out of the recording room. “Hey, you made it.”
“I did,” I whispered with a smile. “It’s later than I thought it would be. I was on the phone with English all morning. She said to tell you hi.”
“Oh, great. That all worked out?”
I nodded. “Signed with her yesterday, and we worked out all the things she’s going to handle today. She mentioned talking to LA contacts about a possible documentary or biopic of Cosmere using my footage. Obviously, I’d want your consent before going that route.”
Campbell looked thoughtful. “I hadn’t considered that.”
“She thought the angle could be a making of your new album. Lots of artists have been doing them for Netflix recently.”
“I’ll talk to the band. I’m down if you are,” Campbell said.
I smiled and nodded. “There’s nothing certain, but if I’m taking footage anyway…”
“Exactly.” He turned to Weston. “Could you talk Michael through the keys section on ‘Invisible Girl’ again? He keeps missing something, and I’m not sure what it is.”
Weston grimaced. “Uh, sure.”
Then, he disappeared with a backward glance that said, Save me.
“Trouble?” I asked as I pulled equipment out of my bag and set up to record some test shots.
“Nah. Michael is just pissed we’re here. He doesn’t want to take direction. Once we’re back in LA, recording, he’ll be fine.”
“And how long does that take?” I asked, hoping I kept the discomfort out of my voice.