Read Online What Happens to Goodbye by Sarah Dessen - Free Book Online Page B

think of him that way.”
    “Also, she only dates dirtbags,” Heather told me.
    Riley sighed. “True. It’s a sickness.”
    Heather gave her a sympathetic look before reaching over, patting her back the same way I’d watched her do earlier from a distance. Then she looked at me. “So, you going to sit down or what? You’re making me nervous, just standing there.”
    I glanced back at Deb, alone under her tree, and then the random groups, as intricately divided as genuses in the animal kingdom, spread out between us. “Sure,” I said, stuffing my welcome bag into my backpack. “Why not.”

    After school, I took a bus to Luna Blu, then cut down the alley to the kitchen entrance. I found my dad in the cramped office—a converted supply closet, by the looks of it—sitting at a desk. There were papers spread out all around him, and he had his phone to his ear.
    “Hey, Chuckles. It’s Gus,” he was saying. “So, look, it’s not as bad as you feared. That said, though, it’s far from good.”
    Charles Dover was the owner of EAT INC. A former DB and NBA player, he was over six seven and built like a Mack truck, the last person anyone would ever want to call a name like Chuckles. My dad, though, had been one of his best friends since his own glory days riding the Defriese bench. Now Chuckles was a TV commentator and a multimillionaire. He traveled around the country a lot for the network, and he loved to eat, which is how he’d ended up owning a company that bought up and rehabbed restaurants before selling them off to new owners. Mariposa had been his favorite restaurant whenever he was in town for Defriese games, and now that he’d lured my dad away from there, he worked him hard. But he also paid well and took very good care of us.
    I dropped my backpack on the floor of the office, not wating to disturb them, then headed out into the restaurant proper. It was empty except for Opal, who was standing by the front door, surrounded by a stack of cardboard boxes. The UPS man, who was parked outside, was in the process of wheeling in even more.
    “Are you sure there hasn’t been some kind of mistake?” she asked him as he put another one by the hostess stand. “This is a lot more than I was expecting.”
    He glanced at a clipboard that was balanced on the top box. “Thirty out of thirty cartons,” he said, then handed it to her. “All here and accounted for.”
    Opal signed the sheet and gave it back to him. She was in a cotton long-sleeved shirt printed with cowboys and horses, a black miniskirt, and bright red boots that came up past her knees. I hadn’t figured out yet if her look was punk or retro. Maybe petro.
    “You know,” she said to the UPS guy, “it’s pathetic what a person has to do to secure ample parking in this town. Pathetic .”
    “Can’t fight city hall,” he replied, ripping off a sheet and handing it to her. “Hey, you got any more of those fried pickles lying around? Those I got here the other day were wicked good.”
    Opal sighed. “ Et tu , Jonathan?” she said sadly. “I thought you loved our rolls!”
    He shrugged. “They were good, for sure. But those pickles? Crispy and crunchy, and, you know, pickly? Damn! They’re just beyond.”
    “Beyond,” Opal repeated, her voice flat. “Fine. Go back and ask Leo to throw a few in for you.”
    “Thanks, doll.”
    He walked past me, nodding, and I nodded back. Opal put her hands on her hips, surveying the boxes, then added over her shoulder, “And tell him to send someone out here to help me carry these upstairs, would you?”
    “Will do,” the delivery guy said, pushing into the kitchen, the door swinging out, then back again behind him. I watched as Opal bent down over one of the cartons, examining it, then pushed herself back to her feet, rubbing her back.
    “I’ll help you, if you want,” I said.
    She spun around, startled, her face relaxing—a bit—when she saw me. “Oh, thank you. The last thing I need is for Gus