Now There's Drama

55

Christie watched as Marc ran through the doors of Claythorne's diner, holding a piece of paper over his head. Christie would have met him but according to her father "work took priority".

"Brielle can you take this to table three?" Christie said, holding up a plate of eggs.

"Why can't you?" Brielle said, looking at a reflective plate, checking her hair.

"You and I signed a contract and it's not my fault that Dad forgot to remove all the signs that weren't multiples of five. Anything that is not a multiple of five I'm not in control of"

"Fine but never again, I'm destroying the contract."

Brielle took the plate out of Christie's hand and waltzed off to the table of private school boys. Christie watched while groping around the bottom drawer under the cash register for a notepad and a pen. She wrote the number five on it and stuck it onto one of the table numbers which read four.

Marc pulled up in front of Christie, grabbing the counter to stop himself. He threw the fifty dollar bills onto the counter. "We need to talk," he said.

"If you want to me to make out with you I want more money," Christie said. Even trying to lighten the mood made her stomach feel queasy when it came to physical contact.

"Hypothetically how much would it cost to get you to make out with me?" Marc said, leaning onto the counter.

"Don't objectify me, Marc."

"Order for table twenty-five," the chef said from behind the counter.

Christie took the three plates of fries from the heated display behind her. "Follow me," she said to Marc, as she sidestepped the counter.

"I found these in Kip's drawer and there was a wad of them. I also found a list of names in an empty drawer, which is in my pocket," Marc said, holding up the money.

Christie deposited the plates onto the table of some Year 7 girls. "Enjoy," she said with a smile. She took a few steps back and spun around to face Marc. "Give me that list, we finally have a lead," she said.

Marc extracted it from his pocket and placed it on the table. Christie scrunched up her face as she read it. Six names. "Geez Kip couldn't you have been nice to at least one person on this list," Christie muttered. "Marc I'll be off in twenty minutes, sit there and look at the money it has to mean something."

Marc took a seat next to where they were previously sitting, sinking into the plush fabric of the booth. He was next to a bunch of rowdy private school boys who refused to stop talking about the soccer game from the night before. As an avid AFL fan Marc tuned out of the conversation.

Christie returned and put her tray down on the wooden table. She leant against the divider and crossed her arms and legs. "Anything?" she asked.

"Tina is that you?" a boy asked from the private school table asked.

"How are you Michael?" Christie said dryly.

She whipped around to come face to face with Michael Flemming, the one person she never wanted to see again, almost seconded to Kip and the multitude of psychologists she's seen. Just when she had escaped the memory of that night he returned. 

"Long time no see," he said.

"Yeah how long has it been...six months?" Christie said.

"I've been meaning to get in touch but I haven't been able to track you down," he said, flicking his chestnut fringe out of his hazel eyes.

Christie laughed falsely, "I disabled all of my social media accounts last year and I don't give my phone number to just anyone."

Out of the corner of her eye Christie noticed Marc climb out of the booth. She held out a hand to stop him. Michael's eyes narrowed as he saw Marc, as the latter was about five three inches taller and twice his width.