Page 6 of Scoring Eden

The door slams behind me as I step into my one-bedroom, one-bathroom apartment in downtown Seattle, and lean my back against it with a sigh.

Anderson made me stay late to scrub the floor of the reception area until he could see the evil in his eyes reflected back at him in 4K. Meanwhile, I was subjected to the harrowing sound of him and Angela going at it in his office, if the contrived porn-star noises shaking the walls were anything to go by.

Thankfully, he never lasts very long, which isn’t an ideal piece of information to have about my boss, but it’s one that I’m grateful for, nonetheless.

“Shit day?” My younger sister looks up at me from where she’s curled on the futon, a fuchsia throw blanket wrinkled on her lap. The sun wanes through the mesh drapes behind her, casting a halo around the back of her head.

“What’s worse than shit?” I toss my bag toward the tiny, circular dining table. It skids right across the surface and tumbles to the floor on the other side.

“Bullshit?”

“That works.”

I lose my coat next, just shuck it off and kick it toward the front door, then fall to the futon beside Aspen with a sigh of despair and self-pity.

“Jesus.” She fakes a cough, thumping her chest. “The vibes in this room are so bleak I could choke.”

That earns her a death glare.

“I’m kidding.” She holds her hands up in surrender, her eyes softening. “Well, sort of. Wanna tell me what happened?”

I pull my knees to my chest and rest my chin on them, tilting my face to look at her. “Anderson is cutting my pay by fifteen percent.”

“What?”

“And he threatened to fire me.”

“WHAT?”

She vaults off the futon and starts to pace. Here we go. Aspen pacing tends to lead to colorful threats of physical violence that, despite her enthusiasm, hardly ever come to fruition. Except that one time she crushed a laxative in my ex-husband’s drink and made him shit his pants on the drive back to his place (Macon told us). Oh, and that time in middle school when she punched a boy in the dick for stealing my cardigan. (I was in middle school. She was seven.)

Where I am ice, my little sister is fire.

I like to solve problems with calm, well-guided conversation, whereas she will choose violence every single time.

“I will slice off that man’s dick while he’s sleeping and feed it to him for breakfast.” She rolls up her sleeves, as if preparing to perform the surgery. “Scratch that. I will cut a tiny hole in his testicles, string him up to a tree and drain him like a cow.”

Gross.

“As much as I appreciate the sentiment, you can’t murder my boss. I need him to sign my paychecks.”

The wildness in her eyes dims a little at that. Folding herself back onto the futon beside me, she huffs in disappointment. “I’ll curse him with a long, relentless cold, then. One that forces him to breathe through his mouth, so he’ll spend the rest of his days regretting ever taking for granted what it’s like to have clear, unobstructed nostrils.”

“How do you plan on doing that?”

She shrugs, pulling the blanket back over her legs. “There'll be a spell for it on Etsy, I’m sure.”

“Well, can we figure it out another day? I’m too tired for hexes right now.” Stretching behind me, I flick on the wicker lamp resting on a side table that I thrifted from a market and painted pastel pink. It sits beside a faux bonsai tree and a candle shaped like a Highland cow.

I’ve gone to a lot of effort to turn my measly apartment into something that feels like home—for Macon’s sake more than my own. The pastels, maximalist details, and warm lighting usually do something to keep my spirits high, but tonight, even my cheese plant looks dejected.

Any other day, I could push the bleakness of my job to one side, but Macon’s dad will be coming by soon to pick him up for his court-ordered one weekend a month. And if there’s anything worse than being apart from Macon for two days, it’s knowing how much he hates it more.

But I don’t have the money to hire a lawyer and contest the agreement. Besides, as much as I can’t stand it, I’d never get in the way of Macon spending time with his dad, even if, right now, he doesn’t want to.

The point is that he might want to one day. And I want to be able to tell him that I supported it from the very start.

Where is the little guy anyway?