Peter
“It’s your lucky day!” I say as I walk into the bakery. Danny follows behind me begrudgingly, hands in the pocket of his hoodie.
“It is? Why?” Mr. Vorhees asks. He puts his newspaper down on the counter.
“I picked up Danny from school on my break. Think he could learn something from a hard day’s work. Now you’ll have an extra hand around here for free!”
Danny stomps his feet into the ground and turns around in circles looking up at the ceiling.
“Knock it off, Daniel,” I say, turning to look at him. “Sorry… He’s going through a phase or something. Teenagers.”
“So, this is the Danny I’ve been hearing all about?” Mr. Vorhees asks. He stands, smiles, and puts his hand out.
Danny side-eyes me, but then walks toward the counter. He grabs Mr. Vorhees’ hand.
“Strong grip! You’ll be great at kneading dough!” Vorhees says, with a laugh.
“Yes, That’s him!” I say and pat Danny on the back. “He’ll be here with us for the rest of the evening.”
“What am I even gonna do here? I don’t know how to bake anything.”
“Peter’s been doing a good job managing the place, so he’ll tell you what to do. I’m just supervising.”
I smile halfway and lean on the counter. It’s true, he hardly does anything around here.
“HE’S THE MANAGER?!” Danny yells out.
“Why is that so incredible to you, Danny?”
“Oh my God, no wonder this place has no freakin’ customers.”
“It had no customers before I started managing it!” Wait… That was a fucking stupid thing to say. Mr. Vorhees just stares at me. Yikes. “I didn’t mean it like that, I just— Hey, Danny, there’s a broom in the back. Start sweeping up the front of the house.”
“Why? Is it closing time?”
“No, but there’s crumbs on the floor.”
He only rolls his eyes at me for a wee bit before he heads to the back of the shop.
“It’s not that there’s no customers,” I say to Mr. Vorhees. He’s already returned to his stool and his newspaper.
“Boy’s right, there’s not many left,” he says, peering over the newspaper.
“Maybe put out a Yelp coupon or something,” Danny says, returning to the front.
“A Yelp coupon?” Vorhees asks.
“Yeah, like a coupon…On Yelp?” Danny starts flipping the broom around like he’s spinning a rifle on the drill team.
“I’m sorry, what’s Yelp?” Mr. Vorhees turns to me for guidance.
“It’s a website where people post reviews of restaurants,” I answer.
“What do people say about us?”
“You don’t want to know,” Danny says, diving to catch the broom as he almost drops it.
“Jesus Christ, Mary, and St. Joseph, knock it off!” I snap. Danny grips the broom and pushes the bristles down into the floor. I turn back to Mr. Vorhees. “This place isn’t on Yelp.”
“YES IT IS!” Danny interjects, throwing the broom down. He approaches and slaps his phone down on the countertop. “SEE!”
He’s right. It is… And there’s a two-star rating. I slowly look up at Vorhees’ face. He looks quite disappointed. Leave it to Danny to look up the fucking ratings of the place where I work. God, I wonder if he ever looked up McAlister’s. I tend to work at…Well, shitholes.
“Young people,” Vorhees says, shaking his head. “Can’t seem to appeal to them here.”
“Yeah. That rating sucks!” Danny says, ripping his phone off the counter and shoving it back in his pocket. “You should do a coupon.”
I’m very embarrassed by the way Danny is acting. I’m about to pull him outside, but just in time, he picks up the broom and actually begins sweeping the floor. I take a deep breath.
“Maybe he’s right,” Mr. Vorhees says.
“He’s not, like I said, he’s a teenager. Teenagers are never right.”
“The coupon though, it’s a good idea. Maybe it will get some young people in here.”
“Young people are not looking for bakery coupons, Mr. Vorhees. You need something else.”
“Like what?”
“Have you ever thought of doing events? There’s always something going on around Patchogue. You know what millennials like? Breweries. We like breweries. Who doesn’t want to have some cookies after a long night of drinking?”
“Like the bar you used to work at?”
“God no, not that place… How about I ask around?”
“Sure. Why not give it a try?”
Great. Now I put something else on my to do list. Why do I do this to myself?
“Brilliant.” I walk behind the counter and grab my apron off the hook. “Any orders come in today?”
“Just one birthday cake for this weekend. Obviously, no need to start on it now.”
“I’ll just start on the bread dough for the morning then.”
Before I can even tie my apron around my waist, Danny starts blasting Break Stuff by Limp Bizkit. “Excuse me just one moment,” I say to Mr. Vorhees. Then I head to the front of the store, grab Danny by the arm, and lead him out the door. We walk around the corner of the building, so that Mr. Vorhees won’t see me scold him.
Danny
We don’t even live far from the bakery, but Peter has to drive Mr. Vorhees home. I’m in the backseat of the car, which isn’t even fair. I’m taller than both Peter and the old guy, and I still get shoved back here just because I’m the youngest and don’t have a driver’s license. I know I’d be a better driver than Peter. He can hardly see over the steering wheel!
My phone lights up and I smile. I haven’t told Peter yet, but… there’s this girl. We met in English class. I got her phone number because the teacher said we should exchange contact information in case anyone has questions about the reading assignments, and well, I kinda had a lot of questions that night.
The parade? Is this like a date? Aren’t boys supposed to ask girls on dates, not the other way around? Forget it! This is the perfect opportunity! The Patchogue Christmas parade is always really cold at night, and girls never wear enough warm stuff… I can give her my jacket. That usually works!
“Peter, I’m going to the parade this Saturday.”
“OK, sure.”
“The parade is this Saturday?” Mr. Vorhees asks.
“Yeah. It’s always the Saturday after Thanksgiving.”
“This Thursday is Thanksgiving?”
Peter pulls into the driveway and parks his car.
“Yes… I thought you knew that?”
“I guess I did… Must have slipped my mind.”
“Won’t you be spending it with the family?”
“No, no… Just a quiet night at home.”
Oh, no… Peter, don’t.
“In that case, would you like to spend it with Danny and I?”
PEEEEEEETTEEEEERRRRRRRRRR!!!!!
“No, no,” Mr. Vorhees says, opening the car door. “I’ll be fine here. You’re already helping out so much. Don’t want to impinge on your holiday too.”
“Why not? We’re going to be working in the morning anyway. Instead of driving you home, you can just come back to our place. I even have a completely empty bedroom until next week. You could stay the night.”
Oh my God I hate Peter so much sometimes! I was looking forward to my last weekend without any annoying people in our apartment! I unlock my phone, and lock it ten times. I’m really hoping that Mr. Vorhees will keep arguing and not accept the offer. The even number of locks might help.
“No, no. I really couldn’t. Thank you for inviting me.”
Phew. I wipe the imaginary sweat from my forehead. Mr. Vorhees finally gets out of the car and Peter follows him up to the door. I jump into the passenger seat and watch Peter like a hawk. You never know if some random person will see a small guy outside in the dark and try to mug him or something. He looks like an easy target.
Peter gets back in the driver seat. He looks at me.
“Seatbelt.”
“Fine,” I say and buckle up. “Why do you always invite people to the apartment without asking me first?”
“I’m sorry. Does that upset you?” He pulls out of the driveway.
“Kinda.” I look back at my phone.
“I understand. I won’t do that anymore.”
“Thank you…”
Selena still hasn’t texted back. I put my phone back in my pocket.
“How about we bring dinner to him?”
“What?”
“We can eat dinner at our place together, and then later, we can bring Mr. Vorhees some leftovers. He’s all alone, Danny. His wife and son died.”
That’s kinda sad…
“Oh.”
“Yeah. So would that be OK with you?”
“Yeah, OK.”
It’s not often that Peter and I agree on something lately, but I’m actually OK with that. Most of the car ride we are pretty quiet. Peter has his music playing. It’s OK. I don’t mind the stuff he listens to.
“So what time does the parade start?” he lowers the volume.
“Oh, I don’t know.”
“I thought you wanted us to go?”
I sink lower into the passenger seat.
“I was hoping you could just drop me off.”
“Oh! Yeah, of course! No big deal!”
“Sorry, I thought you—”
“It’s fine. I don’t want to stand out there and freeze my balls off anyway. Does Matt need a ride too?”
“No! No Matt.”
“Who are you going with?”
This is really stupid, but I feel like if I have a girlfriend, Peter will think he can have one too, and he can’t. I don’t want him to. I don’t want him to think he can get all lovey-dovey with this random girl that’s moving in next week. He has horrible taste in women.
“A new friend.”
“That’s great!”
“Yeah, it’s really great.”
“Just figure out when you have to be there.”
“Yep…”
When we finally get home, I walk to my bedroom and close my door. It’s not that I don’t want to talk to Peter, it’s just that I want to talk to Selena more… and I can’t talk to both of them at the same time. I don’t think he minds much though. I’m pretty sure he’s tired from work anyway.