whale on the Island

~What was his name again?~

"Turn right here" JJ instructs, pointing towards the small parking lot of Heyward's Seafood. "I know the GPS tells me the same thing you know" I reply as I turn into the parking lot. I reach for my phone to take it off the dashboard when I hear my phone chime.

"Great she's doing that here too?" Scarlet scuffs as she gets the same notification on her phone. It was Mom marking Heyward's seafood place on the tracker app. "She's not going to change her ways just because we moved Lil"

JJ places a hand on the edge of each seat sliding forward, joining our conversation. "Who? What?"

Scarlet just scuffs hating the feeling of invasion. "Whatever. it's your fault she's like this. You just let her do, do, do. If you told her how you really feel about it she might drop it." Scarlet spits.

"Oh like I haven't fucking tried?" I say in disbelief. "Every time I try talking to her about it she just tells me it's to help with her anxiety. What do you want me to do about that Scarlet? Give Mom a heart attack the moment I turn off my location because you want to be a Callejera!" I argue.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. You lost me at the end there. What's a Callega?" JJ inserts himself into the conversation.

"Callejera. It means someone who likes being in the streets in Spanish" I explain.

"I am not?" Scarlet defends. "Yes you are bro" I sigh, opening the door of my car not wanting to deal with the argument escalating any further. Scarlet and JJ file out of my car trailing behind me.

"Pope!" JJ shouts as he opens the front doors of Hayward's seafood. I follow closely behind JJ since somehow he picked up his pace out of nowhere. JJ leans his arm on the cashier counter.

"What do you want JJ I'm kinda busy here" Pope says as he unboxes some products. "Are you guys hiring by any chance?" JJ asks pope with a charming smile.

Pope just stares at JJ with a 'are you kidding me' look. "Nope not a chance" Pope shakes his head. "Listen dude it's not for me" JJ grabs the collar of Pope shirt to face him in my direction. I give a small awkward wave and smile. "Who's the chick?" Pope asks JJ.

"Oh she just ran me over with her car"

I elbow JJ in the ribs quickly. He grunts, placing a hand on his new injury. "You said you would drop it Remember" I say to JJ through my teeth, keeping my sweet innocent smile at Pope.

"D-did I say that? I don't think I remember that plum" JJ says slightly out of breath keeping his hand on his injured area. "It was literally just a tap! No one will hire me if you introduce me as the girl who hit you with my car!" I finally look at JJ. The fact that he called me plum went straight over my head.

"Oh I the hell sure will." I hear an older man's voice walking in through a different opening. "The name is Hayward" he pulls off the thick khaki glove from one hand. He Holds it out for a handshake.

"Avalon Rodriguez, nice to meet you sir" I shake his hand with a smile. After a very short but well informed discussion about what I would need to do plus scheduling. Heyward tosses a brown apron at me. "Can you start right now?"

I fumble trying to grab the apron mid-air. I'm not really good at catching things. "Um right now?"

The faster I start working the faster I gain money. But knowing Mom she won't like to hear that news. On top of the fact that Scarlet is here with me. I look over to my right to see Scarlet dropping things that she touches. "Lil!" I grit through my teeth. Scarlet quickly places the fallen items back onto the shelf patting it afterwards.

After a lot of back and forth with Mom on the phone I started following Pope around. He shows me what needs to be done and ect. However, not even an hour into my shift I see Scarlet talking to some random guy. "Sorry one sec" I throw Pope a quick apology before walking through the back doors of heywards where the dock is. "Lil?" I get Scarlet attention.