Taking Chances | Marco Peña (On hold)

Chapter 13

It was a nice day out in Los Angeles, the nicest it had been since it had been raining non-stop past week. I found myself able to enjoy the nice weather.

I am at work, giving customers their tokens for them to play their games. I wave happily at them, "Have fun!" I opened the drawer where we keep our money and store the rest in it, then I went back to sitting down and doing absolutely nothing at all.

My head perked up at the sound of a small thud coming from the DDM Machine. It looked like Elle fell from Lee's grasp. I automatically winced. Ouch, that must've hurt. Those two were dancing again, this time with... team T-shirts. Are they competing for something? Hm. Oh whatever, it's none of my business, to be more specific, watching Keep It Up With The Kardashians on my phone while eating snickers.

I shook my head and took a bite as I watched. "And I thought my life was craz-"

"Hey, lady!"  A voice cut me off from finishing my sentence.

I look up from my screen to see who it is, only to find no one in front of me. It's only when I cast my eyes downward that a chubby life form came into view. Unfortunately, I knew the kid.

"Uno kid?" I question aloud, using my own very creative nickname that I made up for him, I don't even know his real name.

"Sup, lady?" He gives a little nod like they do in the movies, "and the name's Rickey... Rickey Morty."

He did not just-

I groaned. "Oh for the love of-"

"Now now, no bad words in front of the child." Taylor intervened from beside me.

I sighed internally, I wasn't even gonna say a bad word. "What do ya want, Robert?"

"Rickey." He corrected.

"Robin."

"Rickey."

"Robot - whatever."

"Lora, I know we have about an hour left until we get off but we're not allowed to be rude to customers, you know that," Taylor told me.

"I wasn't-" I stopped talking when she gave me the eye look. I sighed aloud. "Fine. I'm sorry, Tay." I ignored the fact that Rupert is blatantly eavesdropping on our conversation. She waved off the matter and continued counting the money we got for today.

I glanced back towards Rowan who is stifling his laughter behind his chubby fist as if he's trying not to laugh.

"What are you laughing at, Ryan?" I questioned, irritated.

"My name is Rickey Morty!" The Uno kid corrected me.

I raised an eyebrow at him skeptically.

"I'm serious," He defends himself.

I stare at him curiously and when he doesn't budge I realize that he's telling the truth. It's my turn to hold back my laughter. "Makes sense," I giggled as I eye his form and link it to his name, "Your parents knew what they were doing."

I don't care how much younger he is than me, but obviously, Taylor does because she gave me a disapproving glance.

"What?" I huffed innocently,

I received a you-know-what stare in return.

I broke under the pressure of her gaze. "Come on, Taylor, if he wants to hiss with the poisonous snakes, then he's got to stop pissing the snakelets."

Taylor merely shook her head. "You'll never grow up."

"Never," I confirmed her theory.

She laughed before her eyes widen after we heard a loud thud as if someone had tripped and fallen hard on the ground. She stopped laughing and emotions over to the DDM Machine. Lee was lying on the ground.