Page 22 of Vandal Unbound

Havoc has his phone to his ear. “You sure you don’t want to come join us?” he says.

So I start with Knox, who takes the Cuban sandwich, Sunny takes the chili, and Reaper orders a chicken salad.

“One sec, Van,” Havoc says when it gets to him, and my heart flips. He could be talking to anyone, but often the obvious answer is the right one. Van…short for Vandal. “I’ll get a burger, extra cheese, extra onions, and substitute the fries for onion rings, please, Daisy.”

I bite back a smile at his order. Annie was so right. “No worries, I’ll get that right to you all.”

I head to the bar to punch the order into the system.

“Daisy, wait up a sec,” Havoc shouts.

I turn back to him. “You need something else?”

“Yeah,” he says. “Double the burger order.”

Those four words, without context, shouldn’t have the ability to set my pulse racing.

But in less than two seconds, I’ve built a whole narrative where Vandal heard my name and decided he was coming to the bar and?—

We do not need a fixer-upper.

I feel like I should get that tattooed somewhere visible. Like on my wrist, beneath my bracelets. Just the initials.

WDNNAFU.

“You got it,” I say, trying to keep my voice on an even keel.

But the next fifteen minutes are arduous. Every time someone walks in, I look up to see if it’s him. I take orders, deliver drinks, and hustle back to the kitchen when I hear the food service bell and my name called.

I have a million conversations in my head. Reminding myself how red and bloodshot his eyes were. And how he smelled somewhere between a brewery and old, worn socks.

But in between brutal assessments is the sight of Elsie hugging a man.

Elsie, who has been so terrified of men because of deep-seated memories she can’t actually recall. Men who shout and scream and demand subservience once they have you situated in a golden prison.

Yet she ran up to Vandal and hugged him. Gave him a gold star, even. Simply being around him made her feel better. And this morning before school, it was “Vandal this…” and “Vandal that...”

“Those are the two beers for the two suits over there,” Annie says when I collect the tray. “They came to the bar to order. Told ’em you’d be right over with them.”

They stand out because they don’t look like most people around here.

South Florida has a split personality. You’ve got the coolness of Miami, where appearances matter, especially wealth and influence. There’s even a joke in Miami that you have to look sexy at a funeral. And then there’s the gothic weirdness of the swamp towns where people embrace their uniqueness.

Just as I get close to their table, the unevenness of the old and warped wooden flooring catches me out, and I trip. The tray falls out of my hands, the beers go up in the air, and I fall forward, watching in horror as beer splashes one of the men.

Thankfully, it only catches the lower half of his trouser leg, but the pale gray fabric grows darker as it spreads.

I throw out my wrists to save my face from hitting the wood floor and land with an awful bounce.

It’s unclear what’s worse. The pain or the humiliation.

“You stupid bitch,” the man calls out, jumping up and shaking his leg like I just peed on him. He flails around so much that drops from his shoe hit my face and T-shirt.

I climb to my knees. “I’m so sorry. I’ll get a?—”

He glares at me. “You’ll get a what? A new suit so I don’t have to turn up to my meeting stinking of booze?”

Memories of being yelled at take over, and the shaking starts.