“Right, well nice to meet you, Cheese and Cheese’s new guardian,” I said quickly. “I’m Phoebe-Bobbi, and this is my long-lost twin, Jay. We’re looking to take on some contracts to make a name for ourselves. So, if you find any details about that contract, let a girl know, okay?”
“PB and Jay?” Paul whispered.
“Yeah,” I muttered. “Well, nice meetin’ ya, but we’re gonna go hunt down that contract now. See if we can earn the green and some respect around here.”
“Okay.”
Well, not exactly the most informative meeting, but hey, I got to give advice on kitten rearing. Hudson would be proud of me.
“Come on, Jay. Let’s go.”
We strode away, and relief rushed through me when Paul put an icy energy drink into my hand. It was the same brand I bought from the corner store whenever I forgot to stock up.
“Oh, thank God!”
“In the future, I would appreciate if you consulted me before going off on your own into this literal cesspool.”
“It’s notliteral,” I objected under my breath, knowing he could hear me. “I don’t see any cess or pools anywhere.”
“I’m serious, Cherry. I was reluctant to risk you like this, and if you’re going to be?—”
He continued lecturing me, but I stopped listening—partially because I just didn’t want to, and partially because a swirling miasma of emotions far under the canopy of the beer garden caught my attention. Cracking open my can, I chugged the entire thing in three gulps, then handed it to Paul.
“This way,” I said, marching toward the swirl of feelings.
Was it subtle? No. But subtle had never been my thing, so I sat across from the person under all the mish-mashed colors.
“What’re ya drinking?” I asked, taking in the sight of a small, thin woman cross-stitching furiously.
“Fuck off.”
Clearly, the doorman’s manners were contagious.
“Aw, sorry if I’m interrupting,” I said quickly. “But I just noticed that you’re using one strand of Kreinik and one strand of regular floss for your backstitching, and I had to see how it was working out.”
The woman looked up from her craft, her emotions all melting downward into a mess at her feet. “You know cross-stitching?” she asked slowly.
“I dabble from time to time. I’m more of a yarn work girlie, but occasionally, when I want to get really into the knitty-gritty—pun entirely intended—and test my skill, I cross-stitch.Usually guided, of course. So, I really admire anyone who can just freewheel it like you are. Do you, like, do tutorials?”
The woman put down her work, then studied me in a way I was getting used to. “I have a TikTok account full of them.”
Ah, modern America, where anybody could have a craft channel if they wanted. “No shit? Can I follow you?”
That seemed to crack the crust, because suddenly she smiled broadly. “Sure! We can be mutuals.”
Only in the year of our Lord 2026 would this be possible.
“Oh man.” I flipped through some of her shorts. “I’ve had my eye on a Japanese garden set like the one you’ve got here, but I need to get some cheddar before I splurge on that. You know any contracts I could grab up on the fly?”
“What kind of contracts?” Two out of two people asking that meant I needed to be more specific from the get-go. Too bad the rolodex of info in my brain didn’t have the proper vocab I needed. Was there slang for an assassination request beyond a ‘hit’?
“Eh, anything really. But preferably with more bang for my buck.”
“Sorry, I work as a professional honeypot for some of the card sharks around here. So, unless either of you are looking to be dolled up, I don’t know shit.” She glanced at Paul. “You’d probably be great at it, if you’re interested.”
“We’re good, thank you,” Paul said, gripping my arm gently to urge me back on my feet.
“I’ll DM you later,” I whispered to her before he hauled me away.