Read Online Eye to Eye by Grace Carol - Free Book Online

Charlie.
    â€œYou let me worry about Earl,” I say. “You worry about Charlie.” It’s a snarky thing to blurt out and I’m already sorry about it. Bita is silent on the other end. “Listen. I’ll come by later this week,” I say softly. “Okay?” She’s still silent. “Hello?”
    â€œI’m nodding,” Bita says.
    â€œWell, I can’t see that.” I laugh.
    â€œI don’t know what’s wrong with me,” she says, and I hear her crunching ice again.
    â€œNext week. For sure,” I promise.
    When I get off the phone, I decide to take a walk down to Echo Park to try to get at this Katie and Earl stuff that keeps bothering me. I find a piece of paper and a pen, and I write Earl a note:
    Dear Earl,
    You’ve been neglecting your duties at home, not earning your keep. So I’m off to the lake. The dudes down there know how to treat a gal.
    :)
    Love,
Veronica
    I sign off “Veronica,” because Earl always says that it’s my sexy name, and that “Ronnie” is my everyday, “gettin’ around town” name. I’m almost out the door when the phone rings. Maybe it’s Bita again. Or Earl.
    â€œYep?” I don’t here anything on the other end. “Yep, yep, aww yeah, ” I say again. That always made Bita laugh. It was my Vanilla Ice impersonation. He was always saying that as filler. I think it was code for “I’m being very black right now.”
    â€œYou sound insane. Drinking already? It’s barely happy hour your time.”
    â€œD. Oh my God, I miss you. If you were here, we would already be hammered by now.”
    â€œExactly,” Doris says. “I’m beating you, though. Two hours ahead of you and already on my first glass of wine.”
    I sigh.
    â€œWhat?” Doris asks. “No wine in the house?”
    â€œNo. I mean, yes, there is…it’s not that.”
    â€œUh, oh,” Doris says. “What?”
    I pause and consider not telling Doris. I’m always putting on a brave front whenever something’s getting to me. And things with Earl are good. It’s jerky to complain given he’s come all the way to L.A., and when I know that Doris is having a hard time with Zach and finding somebody to run around with in Atlanta. “I think I’m jealous of that chick down at the bar.”
    â€œYou’ve got to be kidding me.”
    â€œI wish I were.”
    â€œOkay. Is this, like, some reverse-psychology tactic or something? Because I was all set to pour and rant for two hours.”
    â€œI’m sure it’s nothing.” I dangle one of my flip-flops off my big toe and jiggle my leg. “What kind of wine are you drinking?”
    â€œThe kind that works. Talk.”
    â€œNothing to say, really. I’m just feeling this weird, I don’t know, dread or something. I saw Katie hug Earl at the bar the other night, and I got scared.”
    â€œReally?” Doris asks, and I can see her wrinkled nose and squinting eyes that say, “ You’ve really gone round the bend now.” “You don’t get scared, not of skinny blondes, anyway.”
    â€œI know. I know. Maybe it’s just the stress of moving back home, and money, dealing with that horrifying child, being worried that Earl’s okay—”
    â€œHuh,” Doris says. I hear her take another sip of wine, and then she let’s me have it. “YOU HAVE GOT TO SNAP THE HELL OUT OF IT.”
    â€œBut—”
    â€œHELL TO THE NO,” Doris yells, mimicking Whitney Houston’s now-infamous catchphrase during her reality TV meltdown. That shit was hilarious—in hindsight—now that Whitney’s drug free and clear of Bobby Brown.
    I’m laughing, but still trying to make my point. “Doris, seriously—”
    â€œYou cannot, and I repeat cannot start any of this horse shite,” she insists. “All that