Reckless

“Hunter, your car is still running, aren’t you worried someone’s going to take it?” I asked.

“Why? The most desirable thing in this parking lot is right here in front of me. I’d rather someone snatch my car instead of you.”

Groan. Was it time to shout rape? He was never going to quit.

Fortunately, I saw my VW a short distance away.

Hunter kept pace with me. “I’ll just walk you to your car. Keep an eye on you.”

I stopped and faced him. “Hunter, I don’t want you to walk me to my car. Can you please just go get your car before you get a ticket or something?”

“I don’t care about getting a ticket. I only care about you.”

Why did that nauseate me? “Hunter, please leave.”

He smiled, completely undeterred. I had a moment to notice that he was amazingly handsome. But I didn’t really care. He would find someone else, I was sure. I turned on my heel and continued to my VW.

“All right,” he said casually as he caught up to me again. “No worries. I’ll see you in class next time.”

I was so surprised, I almost stopped, but managed to keep moving. “Huh? We have a different model every time.”

“Not in Bittinger’s class. She hired me to work the entire term.”

My eyes goggled. I made a vomit face as I thought about how the next ten weeks with Hunter and Marjorie going at me in sculpting class were going to drive me nuts.

Thankfully, I made it to my VW. I slipped inside before Hunter could propose marriage.

In my rearview mirror, I watched him wave at me as I drove off.

At least he didn’t sprint to his Porsche and stalk me all the way to Christos’ place.

As far as I knew, that was.

Double groan!

SAMANTHA

Christos made me dinner, as promised. We sat at his kitchen table chatting long after we finished eating dinner. I didn’t notice the time until it was late, and made my way home. Christos couldn’t come with me because he had plenty of extra work to do around the studio with all the new demand for his paintings. That was okay because I still had homework and a job search to contend with.

I guessed our Honeymoon was over.

Whatever. I still loved Christos with all my heart.

I hit the books the minute I got in the door at my apartment. When my eyes were swimming from pouring over my History and Sociology readings two hours later, I decided it was time to close my books and take a break. I needed a moment to regroup, but I immediately felt the lurching pull of my crumbling financial situation.

With a pathetic groan, I opened my web browser and checked some of the job websites. Doing a search based on location, I discovered that, surprise, the very first jobs on the list were for accounting positions.

My lips curled as I imagined both my parents clasping their hands together while smiling innocently at me with “we told you so” looks all over their faces.

Screw them. I wasn’t giving up. I tried searching by job type rather than location. Maybe I’d find something that way. When the list came up, I scrolled down it further and further. And further.

Almost every single job was somehow related to moving money around or computers. I took a moment to lean back, raise both my middle fingers, and launched both birds at my monitor.

But I still wasn’t giving up. I did notice several jobs for long-haul truckers. Maybe I could do that? Wasn’t there something sexy about a woman who drove a big rig and had dinner at truck stops nation wide? Some of those truck stops even had showers for the truckers. How awesome was that?

Uhhhh, no.

Besides, I needed something part time. And it turned out, most of the jobs were full time.

I did find one company that wanted to hire tutors for high school students. The subject they most needed, and for which I was best qualified, was math. Groan.

“We told you so,” rang through my mind.

I dropped my head back against my couch, grabbed the nearest pillow, squished my face into it, and screamed.

That felt good.

I did it again.

I lowered my pillow and sighed.

As much as I hated to do it, I filled out the online application for math tutors. Couldn’t the tutoring company have been seeking art tutors instead? Not that I was qualified, but why did it have to be math?

We told you so!

:-)

SHUT UP!!!!!!

I filled in the fields asking for my ACT and SAT scores were. Thanks to my parents, I’d taken both, and scored well on both.

After filling out all the remaining information, I clicked SUBMIT and prayed that my age and inexperience would put me at the bottom of the application pile.

I spent another hour combing through job listings. There were absolutely zero jobs related to art.

We told you so!

:-D

A knot had formed in my stomach over the course of the hour. I started to wonder if my parents were right. Based on the jobs I’d found online, it sure seemed that way. But I reminded myself that I did have the museum job. That was art. And Christos’ whole family made money selling art. Heck, I’d made $150 on my crayon painting.

Was it possible to sell ten crayon paintings a month? That would be $1,500, which combined with the $400 from working at the museum, would probably be enough for all my bills. I certainly had time to draw that many.

But would I be able to sell all of my crayon paintings, month after month? Or would I end up sitting down on the boardwalk with stacks of crayon paintings laid out on one of those knitted blankets from Tijuana, and a sign that said “Prices reduced!” and the number “$150” would be Xed out, along with the numbers $125, $100, $75, $50, $25, $10, $5, $1.99, etc., all the way down to “FREE! Please take one!”

It seemed all too likely.

I needed to find a job with a paycheck while I still had a roof over my head.

I ended up submitting a few other applications that I doubted would turn into anything because the jobs actually sounded cool and paid well.

Was it time for me to hit the bricks tomorrow and follow in the time-honored American tradition of working for a fast-food chain restaurant?

We told you so!

Shudder.

I texted Madison to see if she was awake. When I didn’t hear back from her, I called Christos. No answer from him, either.

I did have ice cream in the freezer.

I walked into my kitchen and opened the door. It was like a winter wonderland inside. Icicles everywhere, surrounding creamy, sugary escape. I could spare the calories. I’d been good. I’d barely had any ice cream in weeks. And I didn’t think I’d had a single spoonful over Winter Break with Christos.

I opened up the container of Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough. There was hardly any ice cream left inside. I mean, it was almost half gone. Or some amount less than half-gone, but nowhere near a full pint. Because two good spoonfuls already gone was at least a half pint, according to my math. Anyway, it was going to get freezer burn sooner or later, then it would go to waste, and I was not one to waste food. Not when there were children in third world countries who never got to eat ice cream. Ever.

I would eat it for their sake.

I swear I would’ve shared, had any of those children been present in my apartment. I sort of wished they were, because I think the joy on their faces would’ve filled me up better than the ice cream. But I was all alone,