So she let time go on as it always did in the mall: slow and grueling.
Around 2:30 p.m., Danny Harris from Auntie Anne’s Pretzel, across from Sephora, threw a frisbee at Maria. She had been sitting there, playing Twenty-One Questions with Sherlock, when she saw the disc whirling through the air, accompanied by Danny’s, “Heads up!”
Maria caught it and looked at it as if it were a UFO.
“Throw it back, bozo,” Claire said. She stood outside of Sephora. She wasn’t handing out samples because there was no one to hand samples out to.
Maria smiled and let the frisbee fly. It soared through the vacant air. Danny caught it with ease. “You ready, Claire?” he shouted.
Claire jumped up and down and yelled, “Hit me!”
The pass was a little high. Claire missed it, and the frisbee clattered across the glass makeup counter with an uproarious sound. Maria cringed, thinking about broken glass and other possible damage Claire would have to pay for out of her paycheck, but when she came back with the smile still on her face, all those thoughts went out the window.
Claire passed it to Maria, who was now laughing and jumping, and then Maria to Danny. They even got the workers from Journeys shoe store in on it, though they only threw it a few times before a customer had to come and spoil the fun.
Sherlock complained, This is not fair. We never throw the frisbee.
“Because you’re too fat to go chase it,” Maria said. “No offense.”
Offense! Offense has been taken! Sherlock huffed and went back to eating old popcorn kernels from under the ice chest.
“See?” Maria said under her breath.
The frisbee game went on for about fifteen minutes.
Then Maria heard a voice like a wicked lash of lightning. It was Ted, her boss.
“Maria Apple!” he scolded. “What in the good holy heavens are you doing?”
Maria smiled sheepishly.
Ted’s eyes flickered to the blue frisbee in her hand. She quickly hid it behind her back, but the damage had already been done.
Ted isn’t supposed to be in today; he’s supposed to be attending to family matters in Cleveland. But Maria was slowly realizing that there were no family matters in Cleveland. He had lied in the hopes of catching her doing something wrong, and what do you know? He did.
“You are supposed to be one of my best workers. I am supposed to be able to trust you!” Ted said. “How can I trust you when you play games instead of see to your work?”
“Mr. Gund, everything’s done, and there haven’t been any cus—” Maria started.
“Because they’re too afraid of getting their head lopped off by your damn devil disc!”
All eyes were focused on the Popcorn Palace. Maria could feel them. She could also feel the anger welling up inside of her.
In all of Ted’s upheaval, he hadn’t noticed Sherlock. He probably would have continued to not notice Sherlock, if the Bloodhound hadn’t lifted his leg just then and marked Ted’s brown loafers.
“What the fu—” Ted bellowed.
A steady trickling hit the floor, and Ted shook his foot. Inside, his socks made the sounds of feet squelching in mud.
The anger left Maria now, and it was replaced with an odd sort of humor. She moved the frisbee in front of her face, to cover her red cheeks and laughing grin.
Serves you right, asshole, Sherlock was saying. You’re lucky that’s all I have in the tank.
“Out!” Ted said. “Out NOW! You’re FIRED!”
“Fired?” Maria said softly. She looked over her shoulder at Claire, who was covering her face with both hands, possibly on the verge of tears.
“Yes, fired. Get out of my sight. I never want to see you again.”
“Wow, Ted. I thought you’d forgotten about my birthday, but I’m fired, and that’s the greatest gift I’ve ever gotten!”
Ted was shaking. He looked like he was about to explode.
Maria walked past him, a smile on her face. “C’mon, Sherlock. Let’s get out of here.”
Sherlock barked in approval and trotted behind her.
Maria turned around and flung the frisbee toward Ted. It didn’t hit him, but it scared him fiercely. He jumped and almost lost his balance.
She hadn’t bothered saying, ‘heads up’.
Chapter Eleven
Outside, the day was nice. Sun lit the trees in golden light, and there was a light breeze that took the edge off of the heat.
Not long after Maria heard the front doors shutter closed (she was technically not allowed to go through the Employee Only door anymore), Claire’s heeled shoes came up behind her.
“That was…AWESOME!” Claire said. “You should’ve seen the look on Ted’s face.”
“If I never see Ted’s face again, I’ll be perfectly fine,” Maria replied. “Besides, he may be a total douchebag, but we were throwing around a frisbee, and I did have a dog in the kiosk with me. Imagine if the health inspector had shown up, or something. They would’ve condemned the whole place.”
“I don’t care. Rules are meant to be broken; insert rebel yell here…Wueeeee, as your grandpa might say. And it was still fucking cool as hell.” Claire patted Maria on the back. “I’m starting to look up to you. Normally, the friend who has the car is the cool one, but you are just turning into something else.”
Maria’s smile melted, her features going serious. She grabbed Claire by both wrists and said in a low voice, “You don’t even know the half of it.”
Claire, sensing something wrong, arched an eyebrow. “What do you mean?”
“It’s a long story, and I know you don’t have much time before you get in trouble with your own boss…”
Claire rolled her eyes. “You know, you actually inspired me. Maybe I should quit next; then we can get Tabby to quit her job at the dry cleaners. We just have to come up with something as badass as having a dog
