Read Online Tiffany Tumbles: Book One of the Interim Fates by Kristine Grayson - Free Book Online
Authors: Kristine Grayson
Tags: Fiction
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into that much-needed cookie.
I shrug.
“Or are you waiting for someone?”
“My mom,” I say.
He nods. “You must be important for someone to fly in for you. I thought you were from some European place or something, not L.A.”
“Greece,” I say. “But I spent the summer in L.A.”
“And your therapist flies in just for you?” He leans back in the chair and cradles his coffee cup. “You must be special.”
No, just different. I shake my head.
“I’m sorry,” he says. “This’s all personal, right? And I’m being nosy. I don’t mean to.”
“It’s okay,” I say, but my voice comes out really small.
“Let’s start over,” he says. “I’m Josh and I just got off work at this wonderful” (he says that really sarcastic) “coffee shop and I’m wondering if you’d like to walk to the river with me.”
“I’d like to.” I glance at the clock. I got a half an hour, maybe less if I want to look settled back in the waiting room. “But I gotta meet my mom.”
“Now?”
“Twenty minutes,” I say, so I have time.
“So this must be different from Greece, huh?” Josh says.
I nod.
“Do you like it?”
Why does everyone ask me that? I eat my cookie and decide I don’t want to answer it. In fact, I’m never answering that question again.
Instead, I lean forward, and say, “How long have you been here?”
“In the coffee shop?” he asks. “Since ten.”
I brush crumbs off the table. I must really be dumb. I don’t even understand simple answers to simple questions.
“You mean in Eugene?” he asks, his voice different, like he’s trying to be nice now. “I was born here.”
I try to imagine what it’d be like to be born in a place like this. Births are religious at my home. I mean, everyone’s there, and the baby goes through some great ceremony (unless it rises out of the sea foam like my Aunt Aphrodite [who was a grown woman when she did it] or emerges from my father’s forehead like my sister Athena). But the ceremony is really cool, with the baby at the center. There’s bubbles and sacred animals bowing down and lots of feathers and—
I shake it off. I can’t think about home. Not the home of Brittany and Crystal, and not Mount Olympus either. Right now, Eugene is home.
“Then you stayed here?” I ask.
“Like I have a choice,” Josh says. “My dad teaches at the U of O.”
“So does my mom,” I say, and he grins at me. “Only I didn’t grow up with her.”
“Harsh,” he says. And then he tells me that his dad teaches chemistry and everybody expects Josh to be good at science and he couldn’t care less and he’s gonna be an artist someday, but he has to get into art school, which is hard without someone supporting him—like a teacher or something—but the school cut art a long time ago and his folks won’t fork out for extra classes at the U because his parents don’t think artists can make any money.
“Who do they think does all the drawing for ads and comic books and storyboards for movies and games and stuff? That’s like the largest industry in the world right now.”
I nod. I get about half of what he’s saying. Mostly I get his tone, all peeved (like me with Daddy when Megan finally got me to let go), and kinda wanty at the same time.
Wanty, not needy. There is a difference.
“So that’s your dream?” I ask him. “To be an artist?”
He nods.
“Is that your goal, too?”
He frowns, like I just asked something weird.
“I mean, my therapist says I gotta have dreams and goals and I’m not sure they’re different.”
“Oh.” Josh’s frown leaves and he sips from that coffee again.
I haven’t even touched mine, but I don’t really want it.
“I think they are different,” he says. “My older brother, he wants to be an actor, but that’s another thing my folks think is a waste of time, and he accepts that, so he thinks he’ll get a degree in drama and teach it, and then act in his spare time.”
Now I’m
I shrug.
“Or are you waiting for someone?”
“My mom,” I say.
He nods. “You must be important for someone to fly in for you. I thought you were from some European place or something, not L.A.”
“Greece,” I say. “But I spent the summer in L.A.”
“And your therapist flies in just for you?” He leans back in the chair and cradles his coffee cup. “You must be special.”
No, just different. I shake my head.
“I’m sorry,” he says. “This’s all personal, right? And I’m being nosy. I don’t mean to.”
“It’s okay,” I say, but my voice comes out really small.
“Let’s start over,” he says. “I’m Josh and I just got off work at this wonderful” (he says that really sarcastic) “coffee shop and I’m wondering if you’d like to walk to the river with me.”
“I’d like to.” I glance at the clock. I got a half an hour, maybe less if I want to look settled back in the waiting room. “But I gotta meet my mom.”
“Now?”
“Twenty minutes,” I say, so I have time.
“So this must be different from Greece, huh?” Josh says.
I nod.
“Do you like it?”
Why does everyone ask me that? I eat my cookie and decide I don’t want to answer it. In fact, I’m never answering that question again.
Instead, I lean forward, and say, “How long have you been here?”
“In the coffee shop?” he asks. “Since ten.”
I brush crumbs off the table. I must really be dumb. I don’t even understand simple answers to simple questions.
“You mean in Eugene?” he asks, his voice different, like he’s trying to be nice now. “I was born here.”
I try to imagine what it’d be like to be born in a place like this. Births are religious at my home. I mean, everyone’s there, and the baby goes through some great ceremony (unless it rises out of the sea foam like my Aunt Aphrodite [who was a grown woman when she did it] or emerges from my father’s forehead like my sister Athena). But the ceremony is really cool, with the baby at the center. There’s bubbles and sacred animals bowing down and lots of feathers and—
I shake it off. I can’t think about home. Not the home of Brittany and Crystal, and not Mount Olympus either. Right now, Eugene is home.
“Then you stayed here?” I ask.
“Like I have a choice,” Josh says. “My dad teaches at the U of O.”
“So does my mom,” I say, and he grins at me. “Only I didn’t grow up with her.”
“Harsh,” he says. And then he tells me that his dad teaches chemistry and everybody expects Josh to be good at science and he couldn’t care less and he’s gonna be an artist someday, but he has to get into art school, which is hard without someone supporting him—like a teacher or something—but the school cut art a long time ago and his folks won’t fork out for extra classes at the U because his parents don’t think artists can make any money.
“Who do they think does all the drawing for ads and comic books and storyboards for movies and games and stuff? That’s like the largest industry in the world right now.”
I nod. I get about half of what he’s saying. Mostly I get his tone, all peeved (like me with Daddy when Megan finally got me to let go), and kinda wanty at the same time.
Wanty, not needy. There is a difference.
“So that’s your dream?” I ask him. “To be an artist?”
He nods.
“Is that your goal, too?”
He frowns, like I just asked something weird.
“I mean, my therapist says I gotta have dreams and goals and I’m not sure they’re different.”
“Oh.” Josh’s frown leaves and he sips from that coffee again.
I haven’t even touched mine, but I don’t really want it.
“I think they are different,” he says. “My older brother, he wants to be an actor, but that’s another thing my folks think is a waste of time, and he accepts that, so he thinks he’ll get a degree in drama and teach it, and then act in his spare time.”
Now I’m
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