Riverside

Chapter 7

Chapter 7

While I did enjoy working too much, I was honestly a bit glad that I could work more hours now that I wasn't on the cheerleader squad. I wanted to try earning my more rather than relying on my parents. I knew many teenagers my age weren't so fortunate and had to work for their own money.

Unfortunately, Peggy also used it as an opportunity to act like a complete jerk towards me. She rarely went to the movies right after school, so I was surprised to see her and a few other cheerleaders show up shortly after my shift began.

However, I did have to deal with people worst than here while working here, so it wouldn't be too bad. Hopefully.

They got to the front of the line for the concession stand and Peggy gave me a fake smile. "Oh, hi, Arden!" she said. "I totally forgot that you work here. What a coincidence, us being where you work."

"Yeah," I said. "So, what can I get you?"

All at once, they began giving me their orders. I wasn't even going to bother trying to compete with Peggy at the moment. I knew she was doing this to irritate me, but there was no way she was going to get through to me.

She had no idea what I was capable of and I knew at the end, it was going to be her as the irritated one.

I wrote down only the orders I heard over all the talking and once they finished, I read it back to them. I was bound to miss a few, which only got them to talk over each other again, frustrated that their order was missed. So I, once again, wrote the ones I heard.

We went back and forth like that until I got all the orders, but I knew it wasn't going to be the end of them trying to irritate me. Once I handed them their popcorn, Peggy looked at hers with a scoff. "I believe I wanted extra butter," she said.

"Oh, sorry," I said. "That will be an extra eighty-cents."

"What?" she asked. "No no. I ordered extra butter, right, girls?" Everyone behind her nodded.

"Really?" I asked. "Okay, let me just read back the whole order, which I did twice. And nowhere on your receipt does it say extra butter. If you really wanted it, you would have corrected me the first two times I read it out to you."

Peggy glared at me, but she knew I was right so she pulled out eight-cents out of her wallet and handed it over to me. I took the coins and placed them in the cash register before closing it, then adding extra the extra butter onto it.

When I handed it to her, she peered into the bag. "That is way too much butter," she said.

"That's the amount we always put on for extra butter," I said. "Maybe you should have stuck with your original order."

She handed it back to me. "I can't eat this. I want another bag, extra butter, but not that much."

"Sure thing," I said and I was honestly trying my best to keep cool. I did have three things on my mind to keep me motivated to stay calm. One, she was going to be holding up the line and that would only get the other customers mad at her and not me. Two, me not getting mad would only make her mad. And three, if she kept this up, she was going to be late for the movie.

"So, Arden," Peggy said while I was filling up another bag of popcorn. "How does it feel trying to get a criminal out of prison."

"Oh, it feels great," I said, smiling to top it off. "Yeah, I'm getting him out of prison just so he could do my evil bidding." After adding the butter, I handed her the bag. "You know nothing about him, so I suggest you stop talking trash about him."

"Or what?" Peggy asked.

I couldn't really say anything since I was on shift and getting mad at her would only reflect poorly on my job.

So I went with something that killed me inside, knowing that she would only think she won this argument. "I hope you enjoy the movie."

Peggy smirked at me before walking towards one of the theaters with the girls following. Oh, how I wanted to roll my eyes so desperately, but there were some other people in the line and I really didn't want them thinking negatively of me.

I continued my shift with ease now that Peggy and the others were watching the movie, but once it ended, chaos began once again. They started laughing quite loudly as they walked out, throwing their garbage beside the bin. That's right, not in but beside.

It wasn't even my job to clean the messes made since I was only working at the concession stand. Someone else had to clean up their mess because they were too obnoxious to throw away their own trash.

I even apologized to my co-worker that had to clean the mess, telling him it was my ex-friend who was being a jerk just because she felt like it.

When my shift ended around seven, I decided to head to the prison to talk to River before the first hearing tomorrow.

I got to the visiting area of the prison and waited for River to sit on the other side of me. Once he did, I picked up the phone hanging on the wall and he did the same. "Hey," I said. "How are you feeling?"

"Nervous," he said. "I'm really worried they're just going to find my guilty tomorrow and that's it."

"No, they won't," I said. "They need solid evidence that it was you, and the only one they have, which isn't even that solid, is you being the only one in the home. The police didn't get there too fast that it would have made it impossible for you to escape. But you have to promise me that you'll give your statement tomorrow. I know you don't like talking too much, but you need to tell them what really happened."

"Yeah, I will," River said. "Will you be there tomorrow? I could use some moral support and you're the only person I can really trust. I know Marilyn is even a bit doubtful of me."

"Don't worry, I'll be there," I said.

________________

Someone explain to me why universities don't get snow days when high schools and elementary schools do? All my siblings had the day off but I didn't even though the university is literally across the street from the high school. -.-

So, aside from that, is there any guesses as to if River is actually guilty or not, and if he's innocent, who did it? (if you're reading this on Radish, shhhhhh.....)