Page 11 of Defensive Indifference

A few more patrons visit, offering condolences, but the rushes have significantly declined this week. I can’t help but notice we’re not running out of the favorite flavors, and the pick-up order screen is empty. People are already getting adjusted, finding new things, forgetting about their donut routines.

I join Annie in the back for cleanup, my heart aching again.

Neither of us mentions the slow morning or how my bakery showed up on every news station from here to the west coast, including lovely images of me standing, staring at him with my mouth open. Then the donuts falling in slow motion like a steaming, sticky rain of confetti, because why not slow it down and replay it a dozen times? Honestly, it should be criminal for slow motion to even exist. Or video recording at all. What happened to the days when a person could make a mistake and it wasn’t international news within an hour?

“Lina, things will cool off and we’ll figure this thing out. You’re stuck with me to the bitter end, okay?” Annie shoulder nudges me and forces a smile we both know is fake, but we pretend it’s not so we can get through the day with real smiles for our customers. It’s just us now. The teens quit because why not? Why be responsible and work through the last thirty days when you can go work for a brand-new bakery a few streets over that guarantees a paycheck after the end of the month?

Yeah, okay, that makes sense. Still, the fact that Annie and I will have to run this place on our own for a month makes my heart race. In fact, it makes me consider closing up shop today and applying for a waitressing job at that new bakery.

Annie disappears into the back to clean up while I pretend I’m actually getting anything besides worrying done up front. The door chimes, reminding me we are still open, but when my gaze drifts up to the patron who entered, I can’t help but wish I’d turned that closed sign around and given up for the day.

Koa stops midstride when his gaze catches mine. I didn’t have a staring contest on my to-do list for the day, but it appears it must be on his, since all we manage to accomplish in the first thirty seconds is intense, frustrated eye contact. I raise my brow, the only thing I can muster in the way of can I help you?

“I…” He blinks but says nothing more.

“You?” Dropping my rag so I can cross my arms seems like a good idea, especially when he won’t stop staring at me.

“I…came to…” He shakes his head and saunters up to the counter. “I came to apologize for yesterday afternoon. I realize I was a complete jerk who made assumptions about you I had no business making. I should have known Andrew wouldn’t be friends with someone who would sell a person out for a few bucks or attention.”

My cheeks burn, which I can only assume shows as a red-hot blush of anger. “You didn’t just make assumptions. You verbally attacked my character on what became national television.”

He stands straighter, back rigid the same way he did yesterday right before everything went all wrong. “I realize that, and I’m here to try to apologize to you.”

I cross my arms tighter. “Unfortunately for Andrew, I happen to think his choice in friends is a little suspect. After all, you’re his friend.”

Koa narrows his eyes, and the left side of his lips quirks up. “Are you trying to say you are the sort of person who would sell out someone for a buck? Because that’s sort of the argument you’re making right now.”

“No!” I thrust my arms down to my sides, hands balled into fists. “I was merely stating that where I’m concerned, he made a good choice, but you tarnish his record, clearly.”

“You don’t know anything about me!” His voice elevates.

“I know you’re a rich daddy’s boy who doesn’t think about how his actions might impact others who are just trying to make enough to care for their families. You turned my bakery into a three-ring circus yesterday, then had the audacity to show up today with a half-hearted apology.”

“You won’t let me apologize, but I’m really starting to wonder if drama is your thing.”

“Are…you…I never—”

“Somehow, I doubt you never.” He snickers and looks around the bakery. “Listen, I only came to apologize and try to offer some explanation for my behavior. I can’t make you hear it.” Raising his hands, he steps back from the counter and heads for the door.

Okay, it’s possible I overreacted to his initial apology, but he’s still a jerk…right? Who comes to issue an apology with a backhanded statement like assuming my character? Without knowing anything about me? At all?

The truth is, I should let it go. Just let the rich kid waltz out of here feeling superior because he tried to apologize and I got mad again. I should…but I don’t.

“Is that it? That’s your apology? Restating what you thought of my character before claiming I like drama?”

He pivots on his heel and throws his hands in the air. “I started with the apology. You chose to laser in on the reason and took offense to it. I said I was wrong.”

“You did not!” I round the counter and stop in front of the bakery case where Annie left two trays of donuts.

“You decided to interrupt me rather than listen with your ears.” He points to his ears as if I’m some kind of idiot that needs everything spelled out for me.

At that, the heat in my cheeks spreads down my neck and right out those ears he seems to think I don’t use. All composure flies out the window, and I grab the nearest thing I can get my hands on—donuts—and throw them at him. The first one, he catches…because, of course. But the second, third, and fourth come at him so fast he can’t manage them all. One hits him square in the face. The fifth and sixth land on his chest, sticking to his shirt, thanks to the frosting and sprinkles.

His face reddens as he peels the donuts free and throws them back at me with a speed I did not think a donut could move. Getting into a throwing match with a baseball player was a horrible idea, but now that I’m in the thick of it, there’s no going back.

“I said—I was—sorry!” Koa shouts between throws. I’m pummeled with three donuts.

“No—you—didn’t!” I manage to get my hands on more ammo and hurl them at him. At this point, he merely dodges my throws and hurls them back at me.