✽ Mandy ✽
I walked into Clover & Steel with my nerves raw. The diner smelled like coffee and fryer oil, the kind of normal that usually soothed me. Today it didn’t. Rosa spotted me the second I stepped inside. She didn’t even pretend to be subtle. She marched up, grabbed my wrist, and pulled me toward the server station.
“Tell me you didn’t sleep there last night,” she said.
“I didn’t,” I admitted. Her eyes widened.
“Where, then?”
“With Jason,” I said, and then I hurriedly explained. “I slept on his couch, he slept in his bedroom,” Rosa slowly shook her head as she released a long breath.
“Mandy. No,”
“Look, I know Jason isn’t your favorite person, but someone broke into my apartment. They trashed the place. I couldn’t…I wouldn’t…I didn’t…”
“I get it. I do. But you could have com
