Rio is a boy, just ask and she'll tell you it's true
Rio's Bargain
by Lulu Martine
Rio's androgynous beauty complicates his life. His friends think he'd be better off accepting the role of a girl that keeps being thrust on him. Then someone offers to solve most of his other problems....
Rio's Bargain
1. Another Conquest
by Lulu Martine
"Thank you, miss," said the beaky, dark-skinned fellow.
I'd just handed him his large caramel French-roast, and I'd already seen his change go into the tip-jar, so I smiled and said, "Thank you, sir." If he thought I was a girl, it didn't do me any harm. I got that a lot working the counter at SvensKafe, and my co-workers teased me about it.
"Another conquest, Rio," said Julie, the shift manager. "He's still watching you."
I didn't look to check, that only seemed to encourage them. "Crap," I said.
Davey, the other peon on the evening shift, laughed. "You make good tips for us, guy, with your hair and eyes and perky smile."
"Crap," I said again. I have unusual coloring, and I needed a haircut. Very fair skin, golden curls to my collar, and bright blue eyes that some say are almost turquoise. I'm short and skinny, too, at five-three and only 92 pounds. My voice is no help; because of illness in my early teens, I basically missed out on puberty.
"This one looks rich," Julie commented. "That's probably a two thousand dollar suit he's wearing. If you flirt a little, maybe he'll ask you out."
"Gah," I said, but I laughed, and so did the other two. It was kind of funny. My big round glasses were not at all masculine-looking either, but I found them in a thrift shop for next-to-nothing, and they were almost exactly my prescription.
I'm a senior in high school, but having had to take the eighth grade twice because of my health problems, I'll be nineteen in January--and yet, I look and sound like a middle-schooler. So, too cute to live by most measures. I'm kind of used to it.
I think I scooted under the radar of most bullies in high school since I didn't have to take P.E.--again because of my health problems. Getting hot and sweaty causes me to break out in a bloody rash for one. And the bullies may have thought I was a girl, some of my teachers did.
I did get asked out on dates, but I turned them all down, boys and girls. I had no interest in dating, another consequence of having missed puberty: very low to non-existent libido.
Some people had left a mess in one of the booths, and I grabbed spray and towels to go clean it up. Davey usually bussed tables, but he had gone on break.
I had to pass by the middle-eastern-looking guy on the way, and he spoke to me. "Miss Ree-orr-dahn, is that how you pronounce your name?" He'd read my name tag.
I wished for a moment I had used the nickname most people who knew me used, Rio. "It's Riordan, Rearden." I picked up trash off the table and carried it to the container by the door then returned to the messy booth.
"That is a beautiful name," the man said, beaming at me.
I smiled back, "Thank you," I said.
"My name is Nader Rustami. I am of Persian ancestry. Where is your name from, Miss Rearden?"
The 'misses' were getting a little thick, and I could hear Julie chuckling behind the counter. "Ireland, originally," I said. I tried to make quick work of the job, but they had spilled stuff on the seats, too. It being one of the wide booths, I had to climb in to reach the far corners.
"Ireland," he said as if pronouncing the name of a magical place. "I've been to Dublin and Belfast on business. Have you ever seen the country? You are of Irish ancestry?"
I nodded, but I had my back to him, so I said, "Irish, Scots and English, and no, I've never been out of the States."
"Ah. Would you like to see the very green land of your ancestors, Miss Riordan?"
I looked back at him as I moved to the other bench. He was smiling, but with his dark countenance, it wasn't very reassuring. "Are you a travel agent, Mr. Rustami?"
He laughed. "No, no. I'm an agent, yes, and I do occasionally arrange travel for my employers, but my chief task is the acquisition of looked-for items."
"Huh?" I said, finishing up cleaning the booth. When I turned around, I got the feeling Mr. Rustami had been looking at my butt. Now that bothered me. I'm sensitive about the shape of my ass; it's almost the only part of me that has any extra flesh on it.
He made a hand motion I couldn't decipher. "You are wasted in such a menial position, Miss Riordan."
"I don't know about that!" I objected. "I'm lucky to have this job." Not too many places want to hire someone who looks as underage as I do. Julie's little sister, Monica, was a friend of mine from school and had got me the job when she quit to spend more Friday evenings with her boyfriend.
Mr. Rustami produced a business card and scribbled on it, but I just went back to my station behind the counter and put away the cleaning supplies. To be honest, I hid in the supply room to avoid him. It was almost time for my break, anyway.
I'd forgotten about Davey, sitting at the break table in the corner. When he spoke up, I made a squeaking noise.
"I'd ask you for a date," he said, "but you insist on being a boy."
"Yeah, well," I said. "I guess I'm just stubborn that way." I glanced at him. "I don't date women, either."
"Huh," he said. "No joy either way?"
I shrugged. "I guess I'm asexual if that's the term these days."
He laughed. "These days? What are you? Forty?" He stood up, "I'll go see if he's gone. Take a load off, and I'll come back and tell you when it's safe to rejoin the fray." He made as if to tousle my hair as he passed, but didn't actually touch me. He chuckled.
There were stale crullers in the breakroom snack box, so I heated half of one in the microwave and nibbled on it. I wasn't afraid or upset about what had happened, not even annoyed. I just wanted to avoid a situation.
*
When my shift ended at 10 pm, Julie handed me the card Mr. Rustami had left. "He wanted to be sure I gave this to you," she said.
"Mmm," I said, putting it away in my back pocket. "Oh, Davey. Can I get a ride from you? Mom's jalopy is in the shop."
"Jalopy, huh? You sure you're a teenager? Yeah, sure, Miss Riordan, I'd be happy to take you home."
"Knock it off," I warned him. "But, thanks."
Julie gave him a glare. "She could file a harassment complaint on you, Davey." I gave her a look, and Davey laughed.
"What?" she asked.
I just rolled my eyes, hung up my apron, and grabbed my coat from the back room. Early November can be cold in North Hollywood, and I'm kind of sensitive to temperatures at either end of the scale. The coat was brown corduroy with a fleece collar, most people would think it too warm for the weather, but it suited me.
The midnight shift guys were coming in, Paul and Geraldo, and Davey traded daps with his homeys. I just held up my hands in surrender. "I don't do that stuff," I said. "A poyson could get hoyt." I knew how, but Paul, in particular, tended to overdo the enthusiasm.
Dave's car was by the fence, but it wasn't a long walk. Before we got there, he beeped the doors open with his keyfob, but then he led the way and opened the passenger door for me. "It's heavy," he explained, "you always struggle with it."
I sighed, climbed in, and let him close it behind me. I couldn't deny it, my arms and legs are like twigs, and I've never been able to put on any muscle.
Dave dashed around to his side and climbed in, and we were soon taking the entrance north on the Hollywood Freeway. Mom, my sisters, and I lived in some dreary apartments near the Golden State, but Dave would have to come back this way because he lived on the edge of Burbank.
"I appreciate this," I said. "An Uber would cost me too much money, and the buses aren't running late enough on this route."
"No problem," he said. "Not even ten minutes out of the way."
It was more than that, but I let it slide.
"Is that how you're getting to work? You must have to change buses. How long does it take you? Half an hour?"
I nodded. "About that, if I hit the connection right. So I always leave early."
"Buses suck."
"Got that right," I agreed.
"Full of creeps, too."
I didn't dispute the observation. If there actually were a bus I could ride home after ten p.m., I probably wouldn't.
"Gangstas, prostitutes, homeless, drunks; drunk homeless gangsta prostitutes." He grinned across at me.
I made a noise to show appreciation for his wordplay.
He took the exit, went through a parking lot, and down an alleyway, to stop at the back gate to the complex.
"Want me to walk you to your door?" he offered.
"No-oo," I said, trying to get the door open.
"It sticks," he said. He shut off the engine, climbed out, and came around. The problem really was that he had parked on an incline with the right side of the car higher than the left, so I had to push the weight of the door uphill. I folded my arms and waited for him to open it.
At the last minute, I remembered to undo the seat belt. It was still uphill to climb out of his car, but I managed. Dave let the hand he'd offered drop. "Might as well walk to the door with you, now," he said.
"Thanks," I agreed. We skirted the dinky pool, closed at this time of year, even in Southern California. Mom, Colleen, Gabriela, and I lived on the second floor, near the front, but there was a shadow moving under the concrete and steel stairs.
"Rio," said my downstairs neighbor, out enjoying a smoke, which he wasn't supposed to do in the courtyard.
"Jenks," I said. Dave followed me up the stairs.
"Thank you," I said again, putting my key in the lock.
"I had a great time, baby," he said loudly. Then the asshole kissed his arm with a loud smack. "I'll call you, I promise," he said, winking.
"Clown," I muttered, but a giggle escaped, too. He was playing it so broadly.
I got inside, closed the door, and put the deadbolt on. I could hear him going down the stairs and Jenks asking him, "She your girlfriend?"
"Nah," said Dave. "She won't put out."
I rolled my eyes and decided that I no longer owed the idiot anything for the ride. He'd had his entertainment.
*
Mom, wearing a thrift-store robe, came out of her bedroom, which she actually shared with my two sisters. I slept in a corner of the living room, separated off from the rest by two painted screens we had liberated from someone's refuse.
"Who was that at the door?" she asked.
"Just Davey from work, clowning around. He gave me a ride," I explained. I went into the kitchen, and she followed. This was not normal. She had something she needed to tell me.
"Is he a nice boy?" she asked, and I took that to be a continuation of the sort of teasing Dave had been doing. "What I mean to say is," she went on, "does he have $473 he could give us?" She sat down heavily in one of the chrome and plastic chairs we'd found in the apartment when we moved in.
I pulled out a cheap packet of lemonade mix and the water pitcher from the refrigerator door. While I mixed up a drink for us, she told me the story.
"First," she said, "is the starter motor. $473 parts and labor they want, and that's not for a new motor but a rebuild."
"Seems like a lot," I said.
"Uh, huh," she agreed. "We might be able to scratch that up, or borrow it."
"There's more?" I spun a teaspoon through the water and drink mix.
She nodded. "The car needs a transmission rebuild, sooner rather than later. $1758."
"I don't think... I don't think the car is worth that much, Mom." I said.
While I poured lemonade into two glasses for us, Mom got up to put the water pitcher back in the door, then scooped up what must have been a few grains of the mix on the table with her hand, which she then dusted off over the sink.
"It wasn't worth that much when we got it," she said as she sat back down.
We sipped quietly. "Uncle Frank?" I asked. Really, my sisters' uncle, their father's brother.
She shook her head. "I called. Carina spent ten minutes telling me in detail why they couldn't 'bail us out again.'"
"Dad?" I suggested. The man who had abandoned us when I was a toddler wasn't a likely source, but suggesting him made Mom smile and snort.
"If I knew where he was, do you think he'd have any money?"
"No," I agreed. Dad was a charming nincompoop, full of get-rich schemes when he wasn't full of cheap tequila. I loved him because he was my Dad, but he was useless as a resource. "What then?" I asked.
"I can get an advance on my pay for a down, and we buy a working car from a used car lot."
I winced. The financing on some deal like that would be murderous. And she'd basically be short a paycheck, setting it up. Mom ran a crew of cleaners for a guy who was the next thing to a slumlord, except he owned motels and offices instead of homes. The cleaners were all immigrants without papers, and Mom's Spanish made her job possible.
"I get paid Friday," I said. Two weeks' worth of my part-time hours would come to less than $300.
"That'll help," she agreed. "We'll make it, Rio, honey," she said. "We always do."
*
Later, after she went back to bed to get up at 3:30 so she could catch a ride with one of her crew, I assembled my sleeping pad in the corner. A futon, some blankets, and a pillow were luxury compared to places I'd had to sleep in.
I got undressed and removed things from my pockets by pure habit. That's when I found the business card Mr. Rustami had left for me. I dug out my glasses so I could read it. On one side, it identified him by name as being a "Logistics Coordinator" for "Pearl East Import Export" with an address on Figueroa and a downtown phone number.
On the other side, a handwritten message read,
Miss Riordan,
If you would like a job that pays $1000 per week, call this number and leave a message where you can be reached.
Nader
No mention of what kind of job. But the word week was crowded in over another word that had been crossed out: night.
Rio is a boy, just ask and she'll tell you it's true
Rio's Bargain
2. Muppet Homeroom
by Lulu Martine
I finished getting ready for bed, taking a trip to the bathroom to wash-up, unwrapping and rewrapping my chest while I was at it. A little medical miscalculation during an attempt to restart my puberty had left me with small but definitely girly breasts. Seems my body produces an excess of something called aromatase, which turns male hormones into female ones.
They discontinued the treatment when the blood tests showed what was happening, but that took ten weeks, and I kind of started through girl puberty instead. Fortunately, that stopped when they stopped giving me injections. Except, lately, it seemed something was happening there.
I wrap them to avoid having pointy nipples poking my shirt, I do not need that, but I have to unwrap them to wash. And I rewrap to sleep; otherwise, they itch like crazy. They seemed especially tender this week.
I washed my groin, too. I don't have any hair down there, or anywhere else below my neck, but I still have a penis. It's small with a funny bend in it, but it qualifies me as a boy. I've got testicles, too, all shriveled up, not really working, and hard to find. At least, I think they're still there.
Compared to my sensitivity to direct sunlight, eye problems, general enervation, and diet restrictions, my genital oddities are not even nuisance-level worries. I have no sex drive worth mentioning, so if it doesn't matter to me, why should it concern anyone else?
I crawled between clean sheets--an everyday necessity, not a luxury for me--and lay awake for some time, wondering what kind of job could pay as much as a thousand dollars a night. I could only think of a few.
Of course, my dreaming self imagined me cleaning block-long warehouses, delousing giants, and killing snakes using only one of those little cocktail swords.
*
Anyone seeing my sisters and I together for the first time could be forgiven for not realizing we were related. They had their father's coloring, and my step-dad, Art Jimenez, had been a very dark Latino from El Salvador.
Colleen was eight, as feisty and ready to make trouble as any eight-year-old could be who had not already been strangled. She reminded me of Mom. It didn't surprise me to be woken up with Colleen's knee in my middle.
"No sleeping!" she announced. "Time to get up." She emphasized her point by shifting her weight enough to provoke grunts from me and very nearly an accident when she pressed on my bladder. I made it to the bathroom after a tussle. It's embarrassing when your little sister can kick your ass.
Gabriela was more like her dad, Art, quiet and smiling. She'd started kindergarten this year, and going to school still filled her with giggles. So did seeing her sister bully me.
Mom had left for work in the middle of the night, so I made breakfast for the girls, got them into school clothes, packed their lunches, and walked them to their bus. Mom would get off work in time to pick Gaby up after her half-day, but I wasn't sure how she was going to do that without a car.
I debated skipping school myself, but I'm a senior, if I show up for homeroom, nobody cares if I ditch the rest of the day. I was already dressed, munching the other half of the banana I'd cut up into the girl's cereal, waiting for my own bus when Olivio Banderas pulled up at the curb.
The window on his old Cadillac went down, and he leaned across the seat toward me to ask, "You need a ride, chica?"
I bent my head sideways so I could see him. "I'm going to school," I said. "And, you're stopped in the bus lane."
He waved that away. "Focking bus take you half an hour to get to school-- get in."
It wasn't the first time he'd given me a ride. I managed to get the big door open and slide inside, but I couldn't pull it closed. "It's stuck," I said.
He goosed the accelerator, the big car jumped forward, and the door slammed itself shut. "Eep!" I looked at him, astonished that he'd done that.
He laughed. "Don't be scared, querida," he said. "I made sure your hands and feet were inside."
"You still scared the snot out of me," I complained, getting myself buckled in.
He just grinned. "Ah, I would never do anything to hurt mi novia."
"I'm not...." It was no use--Olivio had to know I wasn't a girl. He just said stuff to annoy me. Novia means girlfriend.
*
Olivio dropped me off in front of the school then drove off to find a berth for his land yacht. Monica, the sister of Julie from work, called me over to join a group of her other friends.
"Rio," she said. "You ditching?"
I shrugged.
"You didn't bring your backpack, and you're not wearing your glasses, I gotta assume you're planning to ditch." She and the other girls laughed. None of them had their backpacks, either, but I'd taken my glasses off, so I didn't have to see how Olivio was driving. I pulled them out of my jacket pocket and put them back on.
"I declare this day to be an official, unofficial ditch day," Gwen, one of the other girls, announced. "Let's meet here after homeroom, Naomi has her mom's van, we can get brunch somewhere fine and hit the malls after."
I didn't say anything, but everyone else seemed down with the plan and headed off toward their various homerooms. Gwen and I walked together since we shared the same homeroom and first period.
"I don't have any money I can spend," I said.
She shrugged. "You never do. You don't eat much--you can save me from some french fries." Gwen had a bit of a weight problem, but the opposite of mine.
It was a gray morning that would probably turn into a bright afternoon, and I was already squinting. I realized my dark glasses were in the backpack I had left at home. Maybe I could borrow a pair of sunglasses, otherwise, I would have a headache in about two hours.
Gwen cocked her head to look at me, sort of sideways. "Your face looks thinner, are you losing weight?"
"God, I hope not," I said with feeling. "There's not a lot of me to begin with."
She made a face. "What did you have for breakfast?" We made it to homeroom and found our seats.
I tried to think. "Half a banana?" I couldn't remember anything else. I often forget to eat because I just don't get hungry.
She scowled at me again. "You skinny girls make me sick."
"I'm not..." I started to say, but the bell starting homeroom rang. Gwen had to know I was a boy, didn't she?
We had a substitute today. Mrs. Phipps was back in Texas taking care of her mother and might not be back before end-of-term, so we'd had a lot of substitutes, but this guy was a new one. He ended up calling my name three times before I realized, "Rye-Organ" was supposed to be me.
"Here," I finally piped up.
He looked over his glasses, and his eyebrows went up. "Nice of you to let us know, Miss Russell," he said but not in a sarcastic way, just trying to be funny. The class did laugh, and I giggled. But, 'Rye-Organ?' Where did the 'g' come from?
"It's Rearden, sir," I said, kind of squeaky-like because speaking up in class to correct teachers is not something I do. "Not how you said it."
"Mm-hmm," he said, still looking over his glasses and smiling. "Stand up."
I stood, wondering why he wanted me to. "I didn't recognize it as my name, the way you said it," I ventured.
"Mm-hmm," he said again and went back to calling the role. I started to sit back down, but he looked at me and shook his head, so I stayed standing up, mystified. Gwen was sitting right in front of me, half-turned around with her hand stuffed in her mouth to stop her from laughing.
When he finished the roll, Mr. Substitute turned back to me. If I knew his name, I'd forgotten it. "Miss Russell?" he said.
I didn't know whether to answer or not! "Most people call me 'Rio,' sir," I said, dodging the gender trap. "It's easier to say."
"Mm-hmm," he said. "Rio? That means 'river' in Spanish."
"Yes, sir."
"You're not big enough to be a river, do you think? Perhaps you're more of a Brooke?" That got a general laugh, and I giggled in embarrassment. Short jokes never go out of style, apparently. Why was he doing this?
"Can I sit down? Sir?" I asked.
"Probably, but I haven't given you permission yet."
More laughs. Cute. Third-grade humor and I mean that in the quality sense, not the educational one. I sighed.
The bell rang for the end of the ten minute homeroom period. A few students who had scheduled classes elsewhere for first period got up to leave. Gwen and I were stuck with this guy, normally for World History, but he seemed to have a different course outline in mind: Torment Rio Russell.
He went to his desk and shuffled papers for a while. Whispered conversations broke out all over the room. It was warm in the classroom after the gloomy skies outside, and I started to take off my coat. Some moron in the back corner started a rhythm, da-da-da, da-da-da, da-da, d-da-da, da-da-da.
There couldn't be a less sexy garment to be removed than a corduroy coat! I got it off quick and hung it on the back of my desk chair, which meant turning my back on the teacher. When I turned back around, it was obvious where he had been looking.
I'm skinny, okay, but I have this little round butt that I'm kind of sensitive about. The girls in Gwen's group actually took everyone's measurements on one of our goofier get-togethers. Mine are 26-22-29. That's about a size 8 or 10 in boys' sizes, which is where I have to shop, except I'm too tall for most boy's clothes. Yes, five-three would be very tall for a 9-year-old boy.
My mind was wandering everywhere while Mr. Substitute went back to looking through his papers. I wanted to sit down, mostly, so I didn't keep feeling like everyone was watching me. At least the kid making the stripper music had stopped.
I decided to try to stealth a sit-down move, but in the middle of it, the teacher looked up and said. "Miss Russell, I'm terrified I'll never remember how to pronounce your name. How about if tomorrow, I just call you Brooke?"
I closed my eyes, unbelieving that this was happening. Titters, giggles, snickers, and chuckles traveled around the room. "You could call me Rio? Like I said?"
"I'm afraid that Rio sounds to me like a boy's name, and it just doesn't seem right. But if you'll agree to answer to 'Brooke' in this class, you can sit down."
I sat down as quickly as I could, conceding the name thing because what did it matter?
"Very well, Brooke," he said. "Now, I have some homework papers that have been graded to hand back." He started calling people to come up and get their papers, and I knew what was going to happen when he got to 'R.'
"Brooke Russell?" he called when he got to me. I went up to collect my paper, expecting to hear more laughter, but this time there was only one embarrassed giggle, which seemed to be coming from me.
"Eighty-eight is a B-plus, Brooke, very nice," he said. "You actually knew what countries made up the old Yugoslavia and who Marshall Tito was. I ought to give you extra credit."
He took the paper back, scribbled out the 88-B+ and wrote in 96-A. Then he handed it to me. "One for each country you named and one for Tito. Good work, Brooke," he said.
I couldn't believe it. Was I being rewarded for letting him torture me in front of the class? "Thank you, sir," I said.
When I got back to my seat, Gwen turned around and asked, "What'd you get, Brooke? I got a seventy-three."
"Uh, ninety-six," I said.
"Well, sure," she sniffed. "You're clearly teacher's pet. Mr. Hinson likes you, and he did the grading."
Hinson? That was his name? Well, he'd sure made me feel like a muppet.
*
We all met at the quad gate after first period. Turned out, Naomi had been waiting for us. "Where were you guys?" she complained.
"We had first-period class in homeroom," Gwen explained. "And Brooke here got promoted to Teacher's Pet."
I groaned.
"Brooke?" asked Monica. "Is that what Riordan means?"
"No, it means poet-king," I said, glaring at Gwen, who was doing her impression of one of those giggling coffeemakers we had at SvensKafe.
"I didn't stay for first-period," Naomi was still complaining. "I came here right after homeroom--like we said."
She waved her phone around with one hand, accusingly. She'd probably left messages on everyone's phone but, of course, being in class, they couldn't answer. You weren't even supposed to have your phone out on school grounds at all, so she was technically violating that rule by being just inside the gate.
"Well, you had P.E. First period, so you just walked away," Monica pointed out. She put her phone away, probably seeing that the messages she had were all from Naomi. "The rest of us were all in class and couldn't leave. Oh, by the way, shotgun!"
"I already called it," said Jennifer, the fifth member of our group. She was the tallest and always wanted to sit shotgun. She was also the only other driver in the group since Monica, Gwen, and I did not have licenses yet. She still had her phone out and was looking and poking at it while she walked.
"It doesn't count if no one heard you," said Monica. "Did anyone hear Jenny call shotgun?"
No one spoke up, but Jennifer said, "Naomi heard. I was the first one back after her, and I said 'Shotgun' first."
Monica asked Naomi, "Did you hear her call shotgun?"
"Who cares?" grumped Naomi. "You guys wasted like a whole fucking hour, getting back." She dumped her phone into her purse without even looking.
By this time, we were outside the gate where the security guard nodded at us, saying, "Have a good time ditching, girls," which made us all laugh and put Naomi in a better mood.
We headed toward the parking lot. Seniors are allowed to use the closest one if there are any spaces left after teachers and admin park. Naomi actually apologized to Jennifer. "I'm sorry, Jenny, I was so mad about everyone being late getting back that I didn't hear anything anyone said."
Gwen was the only one who hadn't pulled out her phone. Well, me, I didn't have one. "We weren't late," she protested. "Brooke and I were in class."
I knew she was calling me that on purpose, so I stuck out my tongue at her.
"Brooke? Who's Brooke?" asked Naomi. The other girls all pointed at me. Naomi laughed. "Cute. Hi, Brooke!"
I rolled my eyes.
"Shotgun disputes are settled by Roshambo!" announced Monica.
"I'm not going to ching with you!" Jennifer protested. "You cheat!"
"How can you cheat at Rock-Paper-Scissors?" asked Gwen.
"She's a mind reader!" Jennifer accused. "She always knows what I'm going to do!"
Monica did not deny this but just smiled. "Shotgun rules say disputes must be settled with RPS. There's no alternative. Isn't that right, Brooke?"
"Me!? Leave me out of this." She was right, though, but I was not going to confirm. Then I realized I had just answered to Brooke and I knew I was doomed.
Rio is a boy, just ask and she'll tell you it's true
Rio's Bargain
3. Roshambo, Mon Amour
by Lulu Martine
We finally found Naomi's van. She hadn't parked it in the near lot after all. Monica and Jennifer played Roshambo for who got shotgun, and Monica won, of course. She always wins that game. It's like she really can read minds or something.
Jennifer got in the back with Gwen and me, the two shorties, but she took the very back seat and sat sideways, pouting a bit. Still annoyed at losing the shotgun seat, I guessed. She pulled out her phone again, and from the sound of it was playing some bubble-bursting game on it.
Naomi maneuvered the van through the student lot, where people mostly parked wherever instead of there being lines drawn. Part of it wasn't even paved, but it wasn't raining, at least. "Why is it called Roshambo?" she asked. "Rock-Paper-Scissors makes sense as a name."
"It's from some old Japanese movie, 'Roshambo, Mon Amour.' It's about these two French guys on a desert island, and they have to decide who gets to eat who by playing the game," Monica told her. She had her phone out, too, but wasn't looking at it.
"Huh," said Naomi. "I never knew that."
"You still don't," I said.
"Shut up, Brooke," said Monica, then we all laughed, but I wasn't sure why I was.
"What's with 'Brooke?" Jennifer asked from the back seat. "I thought your nickname was Rio?"
"It is," I said, but Gwen talked over me.
"Rio means river in Spanish," she said, "and Mr. Finson--"
"Hinson," I said.
"--Mr. Hinson says she's not big enough to be a river--she'll have to be a Brooke."
More laughter.
"Ha, ha," I said.
"And she's got him, like, twisted around her fingers, cause he, like, changed her grade to give her an A on the assignment."
I couldn't deny that--well, the pronoun part, I could. But instead, I said, "He made me stand up for almost half the period, and he called me Miss Russell cause he can't say Riordan--which isn't hard to say, it's just hard to spell. And he's a pig cause I caught him staring at my ass!"
"Well, Brooke," said Monica, as if it were a perfectly reasonable thing to say. "You don't have any tits to stare at." And she used her phone to point at my chest.
"Argh!" I said while they all laughed again. I did have little boobies all wrapped up in a stretch bandage, but only my Mom and my doctors knew about those.
"You are pretty flat-chested, Brooke," said Jennifer. "Just saying--it ain't no bad thing."
"I'm a guy!" I protested. "Everybody keeps forgetting that." More laughs, like that might have been the funniest thing I had said all day.
But Jenny looked puzzled, and I remembered she was a late addition to our group and hadn't been with us all semester, so maybe she didn't know I was a boy. I poked Gwen, "Tell Jennifer I'm a guy," I said.
"Oh," said Gwen. "Brooke is totally a guy--I've seen her dong. It's like, huge!" Naomi stopped the van, she was laughing so hard.
"Argh!" I said again.
When they all stopped laughing, Monica put in, "No, my sister works with her at the Swedish coffee place. She really is a guy," she reached back over the seat and slapped me on the knee. "Aren't you, Brooksie?"
I nodded, then shook my head. Brooksie?
"Which is it?" asked Jennifer. "Are you one of those transboys, a girl who wants to be a guy?"
"No," I said. "I'm a boy, I just... It's not easy to explain."
"So you pee standing up? Hey, I've seen you in the girls' restroom."
Well, I didn't pee standing up--that would get messy because of my penis being short and kind of odd-shaped with pee coming out of it backward. But I wasn't going to mention that either.
"Look at her," said Gwen. "If she went into a boys' bathroom, what do you think would happen?"
Jenny answered right away. "They'd throw HER out or beat HIM up."
I'd actually been thrown out of more boys' bathrooms than I'd ever used at high school. I sighed. But I hadn't been beaten up even once. They laughed at me when I tried to tell them I was a boy and that hurt.
"Well, it's confusing, you guys keep saying 'she' and 'her,' and I'm not sure someone isn't pulling my leg," Jenny protested.
"It's just easier," said Naomi. "We don't want the guys to know she's not a girl."
"None of the guys know?" Jennifer asked.
She got four shrugs, including one from me, in answer.
Naomi had reached the street and was looking both ways. "Hey guys, where do we wanna go eat? I'm hungry."
"Uh," I said. "Can we go by my place? I need my dark glasses, and I left them in my backpack."
"C'mon, Brooke," said Monica. "You know you don't have enough food in your house to feed all five of us."
"I've got a pair of sunglasses you can borrow," said Jenny. "But, uh, you know you're wearing girls' glasses now?"
"They were practically free. Some charity keeps bins of them and an optician to sort them by prescription, so they gave me these for like, three dollars."
"They probably thought you were a girl, too," said Gwen.
"I guess," I admitted.
"So, Perky's okay with everyone?" Naomi asked. No one objected, and since Jenny was handing me a pair of dark glasses, I didn't really need to go by my house. Naomi pulled out and headed away from the freeway.
I took off my prescription glasses and put on the sunglasses Jenny offered. "Thanks," I said. "I get terrible headaches from the sun, even behind clouds." Now everything looked slightly blurry, but I felt safer. The glasses were cat's-eye shape with hot pink frames, but I refused to cringe. I put my other glasses in my coat pocket.
"They might get broken there," Jenny noted. "You ought to put them in your purse." She looked around. "Where is it?"
"I don't have a purse," I explained.
"You don't carry a purse? Why not?"
"I'm a guy, remember?"
"That's...ridiculous." She threw up her hands. "I give up."
*
Perky's is an all-day breakfast place and serves lunch stuff at breakfast, too. So everybody could get whatever they wanted. All I ordered was water, thinking about Mom having to buy a car, but it turned out I was the only one who had had any breakfast at all, even if it was only half a banana.
Everyone else ordered big meals, and when the food came, I ended up with a spare plate loaded with an odd assortment of things--some french fries, an onion ring, a slice of tomato, and a wedge of french toast. I wasn't sure I could eat all of it, but it smelled good, and I wanted to try.
Perky's onion rings are huge--six inches across and almost two inches thick, an order is only three of them--and they are best when they're hot, so I started on that first.
"How many people at school know Brooke's secret?" Jenny asked. Four shrugs, again including me. She sighed. "I can't believe I've been hanging with you guys for two months and did not know this."
"You're convinced now?" asked Gwen. We were in one of the big booths, Jenny and Naomi on one side and us three shorties on the other, me in the middle.
"I guess," Jenny admitted, looking at me.
"Aw," said Monica in a fake hillbilly accent. "We was just funnin' you."
We all laughed so hard the manager stared at us for a minute before deciding we were harmless. I waved at him, and he smiled at me.
Gwen poked me. "Look at her," she said to the others. "She just charmed that stuffed shirt over there with a smile. He must be forty."
Monica poked me on the other side. "Hey, leave some guys for us to flirt with, why don't you?"
"Stoppit, stoppit!" I said. "I'm ticklish!"
"We know," said Monica, but they only poked me once more each.
It took me a moment to catch my breath.
"So, look," said Jenny. "This is stupid."
Gwen nodded as if she understood what Jenny meant.
"I mean, look at yourself, Brooke," Jenny went on. "No one thinks you're a guy. I bet you get hit on as much as any of us. More because you really are pretty. And those eyes. You're a girl. You were obviously meant to be a girl."
"Huh?" I said with a piece of tomato in my mouth. I'd eaten half of the French toast wedge with syrup and wanted to get the sweetness out of my mouth.
"It doesn't seem to bother you most of the time. Everyone calls you 'she' and 'her' and 'Miss Russell' and now you've got a real girl's name--Brooke."
"Not my idea," I pointed out. The fries looked good, but I was kind of feeling full.
"I know, but you're not throwing a fit about it," she said. "You're not screaming at people or telling them you hate them for treating you like a girl."
"Huh?" I said. "Why would I do that?"
"Brooksie isn't like that at all," said Monica. "She's a sweet girl."
"Argh," I said, rolling my eyes. "Monica, you're not even trying to help."
"Help with what?" she countered.
"Look," said Jenny. "I'm just saying is all. I can't look at you and not see a girl."
"I'm wearing boy's clothes," I pointed out.
"I get that. I think I even get that you don't really want to be a girl, but I think that ship sailed."
I shrugged.
Gwen looked thoughtful. "Part of Brooke's problem is that she doesn't think she could afford to be a girl."
I looked at her suspiciously.
"She'd need a whole new wardrobe and everything."
"Hey! It's not like I don't know how to shop. If I wanted to be a girl, I could make it happen. But why? What one thing would I gain by being a girl?"
Jenny opened her mouth, but nothing came out.
"You've already got awesome friends," Monica pointed out.
"A boyfriend? I mean...." Jenny trailed off.
"Ppff! How many of you have boyfriends?" I asked.
"Well, I'm sure none of us have boyfriends because you are a much better flirt than any of us. And since you ain't available--you turn everyone down--they get discouraged and go away," Gwen explained it all.
"It's true, Brooke. You're a hell of a flirt," said Monica, looking around me at Gwen, apparently admiring a nice bit of snark.
I moved my head from one to the other--they were on either side of me. "I am not! I don't flirt, I just smile. That's not flirting.... Is it?"
Naomi started to laugh, and pretty soon, we had all broken up over the idea.
*
Of course, we went to the mall right after eating. Some of the stores were just opening up. It was barely eleven, so we had the whole place almost to ourselves. The wide tiled halls had a neat echo that made the place feel even emptier. I switched back to my own glasses, once we were inside, putting the dark ones Jenny had loaned me into a pocket.
The phones had all come out again, except Gwen still wasn't using hers, and she hadn't while we were eating either. It wasn't like her, mostly she acted like the thing was attached to her hand, so maybe she had forgotten it at home? I didn't ask, but I wondered. I hadn't heard it ring in her purse either.
We passed several shops and the girls admired things like mini-dresses, jewelry and shoes but we didn't go in anywhere, and no one seemed in a hurry to find something to buy. Maybe they were all broke too, but lunch had cost them twelve bucks each, since they split it evenly four ways, letting me freeload. I tried not to feel bad about that.
"I still don't have any money I can spend," I mentioned. "Mom has to buy a car, and we need groceries. I made my sisters butter-and-pickle sandwiches for their lunch bags today 'cause that is, like, almost the last food we have in the house."
Monica rubbed her thumb and index finger together close to her ear.
"Yeah, yeah," I said. "You guys didn't need to hear that. It just gets me down sometimes."
Jennifer angled over and hugged me around my shoulders. "You're so short!" she said. Jenny is like five-nine or ten.
"What's...what's that got to do with anything?"
"You're like one of my little sisters," Jenny said. "So cute!"
"Argh!"
"You should meet her little sister," said Monica. "She's like ten and as big as Brooke."
"Colleen's eight, and no, she's not as big as me."
"You said she was stronger."
"Well, she is that," I admitted. "She's a bully, too."
They all laughed.
"Seriously?" asked Jenny. "You get beat up by an eight-year-old?"
I put out my arm, made a fist and flexed. It made absolutely no difference. Giggling, everyone else copied my move. It turned out, only Naomi could make any real muscle.
"Jeez," she complained. "Now I'm like all self-conscious. Thanks a lot, guys!"
After we laughed at that, we stopped at a kiosk and looked at cheap jewelry. No one bought anything, but some of it was pretty cute.
"I've got an idea," said Jenny.
"Uh, oh," said Gwen. "Jenny's thinking again."
"We still haven't got the stains out from last time," said Monica.
"We should make it easier for Brooke to decide to be a girl," said Jenny ignoring them.
"Huh?" I said, realizing she was talking about me.
"She never has any money, so she really can't afford to change her wardrobe or buy cosmetics or jewelry."
"Wait a minute," I said. "Wait, wait...."
"I see where you're going with this," said Gwen. "But we ain't rich either."
"It doesn't have to be much. Each of us just spent twelve on lunch. Keep it to no more than that, huh?"
"No," I said. "I hate the idea."
"I could start it," offered Jenny. "Beginner's earrings with free piercing are on sale here for only nine dollars, and half price for a second set...someone else could go in...."
My hands flew to my earlobes. "No! Just no!"
They all laughed. Jenny shrugged. "Eh, it was just an idea. You'd look so cute with a pair of those red, heart-shaped studs."
"I'm too cute already," I complained. That got more laughs.
"Speaking of studs," said Naomi, indicating with a head tilt what direction she meant. "Take a look at the two shoe salesmen."
We all did. They were nice-looking guys, tall with wide shoulders, lean faces, and nice haircuts. They were well-dressed, too — California business casual, broadcloth shirts, and sweater vests. But guys or girls did nothing for me, so I just shrugged.
Monica and Jennifer made noises back in their throats, though, and headed that direction. "Let's look at some shoes," said Naomi, smirking and following the other two.
"We're going to look at shoes," said Gwen, taking my arm.
"Okay," I agreed. Why not? "I'm still broke, though."
"Eh," said Gwen. "Looking costs, like, nothing."
The two men--boys really, they might have been a year or two older than us, though I was the oldest in our group--the two sales guys were all smiles and greetings and calling us ladies and complimenting us on our looks or fashion sense.
"They're trying too hard," I remarked to Gwen. I was wearing baggy jeans, rundown sneakers, and my corduroy coat, hardly a fashion plate. Gwen nodded and sidestepped around them. We browsed along one wall where they had a lot of athletic shoes laid out.
I glanced down at my feet. My old sneaks were almost to the falling apart stage, one of them actually had a piece of duct tape holding two halves of the sole together. I usually had to shop in the boy's department for shoes, adult sizes of men's shoes not being small enough. Heck, I shopped there for almost everything.
But this was a women's shoe store. No men's or boy's shoes at all. Still, some of the athletic shoes looked like they might be small enough to fit, and not all the styles were super girly or even very girly at all. But they were still out of my reach, price-wise.
"Hey, Brooke," said Gwen. "Look at these." She had stopped at a display of suede hi-top sneakers, kind of handsomely clunky-looking, in several different colors from black, brown, and gray to red, blue, and green.
I shrugged. "Cute?" I suggested.
"They've got hidden wedge heels inside," she held a pair so I could see. "They add four inches to your height, and no one sees your wearing heels."
I gasped. I took one of the shoes to examine. It was a well-made shoe, and you could not tell it had a built-in high-heel. "Four inches taller!"
"You wanna try them on?" she asked. "What size do you wear?"
"Uh, a two or three in kids' sizes," I admitted.
"I think that's a four or five in women's shoes," she said. "The sales guy would know." She waved to attract one of them. "Hey, and they come in this bright aqua-blue, like your eyes."
"Gwen," I protested weakly. "They're fifty-five dollars a pair."
She pointed at the lower half of the sign. "Marked down to thirty-seven. If we all chipped in ten like Jenny was talking about, we could buy them for you."
The salesman came over. "Ladies? You want to try on some shoes?" He grinned at us.
"Brooke wants to know, do you have these in a four-and-a-half or five? The blue?"
"I believe so," he said, moving to the wall to look over the boxes.
I hadn't said anything because I couldn't talk without air. I wanted those shoes.
Rio is a boy, just ask and she'll tell you it's true
Rio's Bargain
4. Blue Suede Shoes
by Lulu Martine
"Try them on," Gwen urged when the salesman returned with two boxes.
"We do have those shoes in 4-1/2 and 5, in blue, miss," he said, smiling. He gestured that I should sit down, and I landed with a thump in one of the chrome and leather chairs while he pulled over one of the shoe-shop style stools. "I'm Tomas, and you're Brooke?" he added.
I shrugged. "My name is Rio," I said. It felt like a losing battle.
He looked up at me from opening boxes and grinned. "Oh, I get it. Rio is a river, and a Brooke is a small river. Cute."
I could hear Gwen telling the other girls that I'd found a pair of shoes I liked. I felt a bit numb, weirdly. I couldn't afford these shoes, why was I trying them on?
Tomas pulled off my ratty old sneaks. "These are a bit big," he noted, "what size are they?"
"Three, boys' sizes," I said.
"Mm. That's a 4-1/2 Women's, and this style doesn't come any smaller." He put the lid back on the box of 5s and glanced around the store. "In fact, hardly anything here comes any smaller. We can order some, maybe."
He wiped my right foot off with a rag and slipped a pair of sheer nylon socks on it. "Maybe you'll grow into a larger size," he suggested while he laced the shoes. The laces had come in a plastic bag instead of already being laced into the shoes. They were blue, too, and if they had never been used, no one else had ever tried these shoes on.
"I'm nineteen," I said. Well, I would be in two months.
"Really?" He chuckled. "Not gonna happen, huh?"
I shrugged.
Tomas slipped my right foot into the shoe, "How does that feel?" He tied the leather laces firmly. I smelled new leather and whatever product Tomas wore on his wavy, very black hair.
The girls had gathered around to watch. "Those are cute," said Naomi. "I mean, really cute."
Jenny had her phone out and took a picture of my foot in the bright blue shoe. "Blue suede shoes," she murmured.
"Don't you step on my—" Monica growled and Gwen giggled.
I wiggled my toes and put my foot down on the floor. I felt the hidden high heel wedge. I could feel my own grin, too. "Can I try walking in the pair?" I asked. But inside, I was beating myself up for wanting them. Not only were they girl's shoes, I couldn't afford any shoes, not even a pair of Walmart $2 thongs.
I pushed my glasses back up on my nose while Tomas took off my other sneaker, the one patched with duct tape, wiped my foot, put on the nylon sock and slipped my foot into the shoe. It tickled when he touched me, and my foot wiggled in reaction, making him laugh.
"This foot is more ticklish than the other one," he remarked, smiling up at me as he tied the laces in a wide bow.
I smiled back and saw his brown eyes get bigger.
"Oh, sh—, she's done it again," I heard Naomi say behind me.
"She's going for the free shoes," Monica put in, and I felt myself turning red.
Tomas laughed, looking around, "All the ladies think they can get free shoes by flirting with me. And it would work if I didn't need this job." He glanced back at me and winked. "Take a walk in them. See what you think."
I stood up, but when I put my weight on my heels, I almost pitched forward. "Oof?" I said. Tomas had caught me with his hands on my wrists. I looked up into those brown eyes again and forgot all about the shoes for a moment.
The collective, "Aww!" from the girls did not help.
"Careful," he said. "Remember the built-in heels."
I nodded. He led me out from the seating area into an open spot where I could walk around.
I looked down at Gwen and giggled. Normally, she's most of an inch taller than me, and often wears heels herself. Today, she was in flats. "Hey, shorty," I said.
"We've created a monster," said Monica.
Gwen laughed. "You okay up there?" she joked.
"Uh, huh," I said. "This is cool." It really wasn't hard to walk in the heels, they were wide and stable, not like stilettos or something.
But I still couldn't afford them.
Something in my expression must have clued Jenny into what I was thinking. "You're worried about how you can afford them?" she asked.
I nodded, and my misery must have been clear on my face.
"Those are seriously cute shoes," Naomi commented. "And they really suit you, Rio."
"Brooke," Monica corrected her.
"Brooke," she agreed with a giggle.
I didn't even glare at them. Naomi was not usually a giggler, but even that incongruity did not get a reaction from me. I felt numb. Why did I want those shoes so much? Just for the height they gave me?
"How much are the shoes?" Jenny asked.
Martin, the other salesman, punched some buttons on his tablet, "With tax, it's forty dollars, or near enough."
Tomas nodded. "They're one-third off right now. A real bargain."
I wanted to tell him to shut up, but I didn't. "I can't afford them," I said, heading back to the chairs to take them off, telling myself I was not going to cry about a pair of shoes.
Jenny opened her purse. "I'm in for ten," she said. "Just, Brooke, you've got to quit telling people you're a boy." Everyone laughed or giggled except me. Even the two salesmen laughed, but they probably thought I was really a girl, and it was just a running gag among a bunch of friends.
Gwen spoke up. "I'll put in ten, too." She paused. "If you keep answering to Brooke when you're wearing the shoes." I must have made a face because everyone laughed again.
"I've got ten I was just gonna spend on food I don't need," said Naomi. "But Brooksie, can you give me some lessons in flirting?" More laughter.
Monica frowned. "I could put in ten, I guess." Her features looked darker than usual. "But—I gave up my job for you and that rat Robbie Fuentes is dating Nina Pascal now." She had quit at SvensKafé so she could date on Friday nights, and now she didn't have a boyfriend.
"I—" I thought of the business card from Mr. Rustami. "I might have the offer of another job," I said.
She nodded. "Whatever, I'm in." She pulled out her billfold.
"Wait a minute," I protested. "I didn't ask anyone to buy me anything?"
"We know," said Gwen. "But we want to do this. You didn't see your face when you tried on those shoes." She held up her ten and took one from Jenny.
Naomi passed over another. "But I am serious about the flirting lessons. Maybe you can't teach me how, cause it's like magic, but you must have a clue."
Jenny put in her money and a comment, "I'm serious about the not-claiming-to-be-a-boy thing, too. It's ridiculous, and no one believes you anyway." Even I giggled, the way she said that.
Monica scowled and handed over her ten. "Get that other job if you can," she said.
Gwen handed me the cash. "We good, Brooke?" she asked.
I took the money, sniffling a bit. "You guys," I complained. But the shoes were going to be mine.
"No need to change back," Tomas assured me. "You can just wear the ones you have on. In fact, do you want me to toss these?" He held up the box now containing my ratty old sneakers.
"Uh," I said.
"Toss 'em," said Monica. "Be serious, Brooke, where would you wear those if you had these blue suede shoes in your closet?"
My head moved, so I must have nodded. The old shoes made a noise as they landed in the trash bin, a final sounding ka-chud.
Tomas smiled at me as I handed him the money at the register. "Are you sure you're nineteen?" he asked.
Confused, I nodded again. "I will be in January," I said.
"Good," he said. "I would have guessed no more than fifteen." He grinned, handing me three pennies with the receipt.
I blinked because he had managed to drag a finger down the back of my hand while doing that. Shivers went up and down my arms and my back. I stared at what I had in my hand. The receipt had a scribbled 'Tomas' and a phone number on it. I looked back up at his face. He smiled, and I felt myself smiling too.
I couldn't stop smiling.
Naomi was talking. "Did you see that? She dresses like a boy, and the guys are still stepping on their tongues. Did you give him your number, girl?" she asked.
"I don't have a phone," I said.
"I gotta learn how to do that shit," she complained.
We seemed to be heading out of the mall, maybe back to the van, but first, we had to pass the jewelry kiosk. "Wait. Wait." Jenny held up her arms to stop us when we were twenty feet away. "We're going to get Brooke's ears pierced, huh? Am I right?"
I whimpered.
"No excuses and especially not the lame one that you're a boy. You promised not to use that one again." She glared at me accusingly.
"Will it hurt?" I asked.
"Oh, yeah," said Monica. "Hurts like a bitch."
"Shut up," said Gwen. "It hurts a little, not much."
I shrugged. "Okay," I said.
Jenny haggled with the ladies in the booth and got a deal, three sets of piercings for $16. They made suggestions which they let me approve—a blue star, pink heart, and white pearl in each ear. It did hurt, but it was over fast.
"Why are you letting us do this now?" Gwen asked.
"That new job?" I said. "They want to hire a girl."
*
We didn't leave immediately but ended up in the food court where someone bought a couple of those huge soft pretzels and a cup of cheese sauce. We shared, tearing apart the pretzels in our hands while enjoying the smell of hot bread and that special plastic cheese they serve in those places. I even had a couple bites of the pretzel but no cheese. After eating, we bought a gigantic Diet Mountain Dew with five straws and shared that too.
"Lemme see those shoes again, Brooke," Monica said.
I stuck my feet out where everyone could see.
"And the earrings," she demanded.
I turned my head, holding my curls back.
"Damn," she said. "You look good, you spoiled, stuck-up brat."
Everyone laughed, and I blushed, smiling.
"Guys at three o'clock," said Naomi, and everyone looked in a different direction. "I mean, three guys by the clock," she corrected herself.
"Oh," we all said. I didn't look—I'd already seen them. I didn't want to be looking at guys, because.... Something was different.
"Anybody got a phone I can borrow?" I asked.
Gwen dug out hers and passed it over.
"I hadn't seen you using it today, thought maybe you'd forgotten it," I commented, noting that it was turned off.
"I'm trying not to use it so much," she admitted.
"You should get an unlimited plan," suggested Naomi.
"That one guy, the one with a beard, he's trying to look so gnarly," said Monica.
"Uh, huh," said Jenny. "Look where he's looking." They both turned to me.
"I have an unlimited plan, that's the problem," said Gwen. She took the phone back from me to punch in her security code to turn it on.
"What?" I said, realizing that Jenny, Monica and Naomi were glaring at me.
"She does it without even knowing she's doing it," Naomi complained.
"Who're you calling?" Monica asked. "Tow-maas? Wanna see when he gets off work?"
"What? No. He doesn't get off till six."
"How do you know that?" Naomi asked me then Jenny, "How does she know that?" Then to Gwen, "I didn't hear her ask him, how does she know?"
I'd found the business card Mr. Rustami had given me in my coat pocket instead of my jeans. I was beginning to think I hadn't brought it with me after all. I got up and moved away from the chatter.
Gwen explained to Naomi. "The store opened at eleven and closes at six. It was on a sign."
"He might get off early," Monica suggested.
"Probably not," said Jenny. "They want two people there all day. And on a Thursday, it wouldn't make sense to have someone came in for a short shift."
I walked to the railing above the courtyard in the middle. I started to punch in the number, but I realized all three of the guys near the clock were watching me. The new shoes and the earrings made me feel different about being watched. I realized I kind of liked it.
I looked through my hair at them, then turned my back and finished making my connection.
Someone answered on the first ring. "Pearl East. May I direct your call?"
"May I speak with Mr. Rustami. Nader Rustami, please?" I said.
"One moment."
A voice I recognized came on in less than half a minute. "Yes? This is Nader." Same Middle Eastern flavor with the slight over-careful pronunciation of someone who learned English in school.
"Mr. Rustami, this is Riordan. From the coffee shop."
"Miss Riordan!" He sounded pleased. "What synchronicity. I was just saying to my employers that I had someone for them to consider for a future opening when our need became immediate. And now you call."
"I—I want to know more about the job," I said.
"It is hosting at company affairs. Mostly looking pretty and pouring coffee," he said. "Both things you do excellently well, Miss Riordan," he chuckled.
"Um, th-that's all?"
"But of course," he said. "That is all that is required of you. It pays $200 per occasion, more if it goes more than four hours. We need you tonight. Do you have an evening gown?"
"Ah, no," I said.
"I'm sorry, a cocktail dress will do?"
"Not one of those either, Mr. Rustami." I'm giggling, why am I giggling?
"Mmm. What are your sizes? No, never mind. Can you be here by four p.m.?"
I turned around and looked at the clock. It showed ten minutes to three. "I think so," I said. "Six-oh-one Figueroa? Downtown LA?"
"Yes, there is shopping nearby. I'll have my secretary take you out to find something suitable."
"Mr. Rustami? I don't have money...."
"Don't worry." He laughed. "And please, call me Nader. Everyone in the office does."
"Um," I said. "M-my friends call me Brooke," I said. Well, it was true, but I had no idea why I said it.
"Brooke Riordan," he said. "It is a lovely name. Do you need a car to come pick you up? Can I send an Uber? What's the address?"
"Ah. I'm at the Panorama Mall on Van Nuys. West, west entrance."
I heard him repeat that to someone with instructions to send an Uber Black. A limo? I blinked.
"They say ten to twenty minutes, dear," Nader told me when he came back on. "It will be a black Infiniti QX80, the driver's name is Rodolfo. I'm sending that to your phone."
I got a beep of an incoming message and almost panicked because this was Gwen's phone. How did he know the number? Oh, yeah, caller ID.
"Copy the message into your Uber app, and you can track the car," he said. "You should be here in fifty minutes or less. Traffic can be horrible, so just relax."
"I have the job?" I squeaked.
"Of course!" he said. "I knew you were perfect when I saw you in the coffee shop. And your smile." He laughed. "Two to four evenings a week, sometimes a meeting in the afternoon. Six hundred to a thousand a week, and sometimes a trip out of town for double or treble pay. Eh?"
"Thank you," I said. I felt tears in my eyes. Mom would be able to afford a car now.
"I have to go now, Brooke, sweetie. The girl you're replacing tonight was in an accident, and I want to visit her in the hospital."
"I—what? An accident?"
"Nothing too serious, but she broke her ankle. She'll be out for weeks. I'll see you after your shopping trip with Sharon. The meeting is at eight, in the Intercontinental across the street, so you should have time for shopping and dinner first."
'Uh...."
"Goodbye, Brooke, honey." He hung up.
I pulled the phone away from my ear and stared at it. What had I got myself into? I looked down at my cute blue suede shoes and wiggled my toes inside them. "I just wanted to be taller," I whimpered.
Rio may be a boy, but she's not saying
Rio's Bargain
5. Uber Black
by Lulu Martine
I held the phone out to Gwen who was just walking up beside me at the railing. She looked me in the face, "You okay?" she asked.
I nodded. "I got the job," I said. "They need me tonight, so they're sending a limo to pick me up."
"A limo?" she repeated, looking around. The other girls had drifted nearer, and Monica overheard.
"You got the job? Who sends a limo to pick up a new hire? For that matter, who hires someone over the phone?" Monica wanted to know.
"I need you to go to work for me tonight. I'm on 4:45 to 10:30," I told her. "Call your sister and tell her."
Monica got her phone out. "Wow, if I catch her before she leaves, she can come pick me up." She dialed quickly. "Is this working for that asshole was hitting on you last night? Julie told me about him."
I didn't answer her because suddenly everyone was talking at me.
Jenny: "Good thing you got your new shoes. Are you going to be on your feet a lot?"
Naomi: "A limo? How cool is that! What the heck are you going to be doing?"
Gwen: "Why don't you keep the phone? Then I'll stay off it, and you can get it back to me, but you'll have a phone where we can get in touch?"
Me: "They're like high-end caterers, yeah, I'll be on my feet a lot. They have a dress code, but they'll loan me some money to get clothes, and probably shoes. I'm going in early so one of the office girls can take me shopping. And thanks, Gwen, I appreciate the loan of the phone."
Jenny and Naomi squealed, a startling thing since Naomi is a big girl, and Jenny is tall. Monica put a finger in her ear and moved away from the group, scowling.
Gwen just nodded at me with a murmured, "Uh, huh," and a grin.
"I've got to get to the west entrance where the Uber is coming," I said, putting the phone in a coat pocket, and heading for the escalator. We all started down with lots of chatter, but I wasn't paying much attention anymore. It felt like my stomach was filling up with spiders, chills ran down my arm and legs, and my face went numb.
"Hey, guys!" Monica squealed when she realized we had left the Food Court balcony without her. She caught up with us at the big doors to the parking lot, grabbing my arm. "Julie says the guy seemed sketchy to her, huh? She wants you to be careful."
I nodded. Because I'm small and don't look my age, my friends are all protective of me. It can be annoying, but mostly I appreciated their concern. Naomi and Jenny pushed the doors open, and a wind that seemed to have come off a frozen mountain somewhere grabbed at us.
"Whoa," Jenny said. "Someone tie Brooke down, so she doesn't blow away."
"How did it get so cold in the middle of the afternoon?" Naomi complained.
The clouds had thickened, but I still needed my borrowed sunglasses since we were facing west, and the hidden sun made a bright patch in the overcast. "Can I get these back to you tomorrow?" I asked Jenny.
"Yeah, sure," she agreed with a wave. "Does it look like it might rain to you?"
"Maybe, but it almost never rains in LA before Thanksgiving," Gwen said.
"Especially not in the middle of the Valley," added Monica. "But it's almost never this cold in early November either."
Everyone took their phones out to check the weather. No rain forecast and several sites reported the temperature as sixty-five degrees. "Sure feels colder than that," said Naomi with a scowl at her phone.
I had my borrowed one out, looking for the Uber app. "Okay if I download Uber on your phone?" I asked Gwen.
"Sure," she nodded. "Gonna check to see when the limo arrives?"
"Uh, huh," I said. My hands didn't look as if they were shaking, but my fingers felt like Jello noodles. We all huddled against the wall where the wind only hit us in gusts.
"They always measure the temperature at the airport or the city hall, someplace where no one lives," complained Monica. She didn't even have a sweater on, just a long-sleeve t-shirt.
I opened my coat wide, it was way too big for me, anyway. "Get in here," I said. "We can keep each other warm." Holding the phone in my left hand, I pulled my right arm out of the jacket sleeve, so Monica could have more of it.
Giggling, and Monica was usually another non-giggler, she snuggled in, wrapping the corduroy around her. "Cozy," she said, her face right next to mine.
The app was still downloading. I felt a little unreal. I was taking a job where my boss thought I was a girl and apparently expected me to dress like one. Had my life always been so strange?
Monica leaned even closer and rubbed her cheek against mine. "You are a girl, y'know. You've got like no whiskers, Brooksie."
"I know," I sighed. Her comment matched my own thinking. Maybe she was a mind reader.
I opened the app and started creating an account. I'd never used Uber before, so I set the new account name to Brooke Riordan. That be would be the name I intended to use at the new job.
Monica could see what I had typed and gave me a squeeze. "Welcome to the pink side," she whispered.
I rolled my eyes and giggled. Pasting the info from Nader's message into the Uber app showed that the car would arrive in less than ten minutes.
"If we don't freeze to death first," Monica complained when the wind came around the corner and tried to get into the corduroy coat with us.
With my new shoes on, I didn't need to stretch to kiss her behind the ear.
"Jeez!" she squealed. "Like I'm not cold enough, you did that on purpose just to give me chills."
"Yup," I said.
*
I called Mom while we waited. She was in the middle of wrangling my sisters and her crews; we couldn't talk long. I said I was going to be working a new job that probably paid better, but that I'd get my check from SvenKafé to her in the morning, and maybe we could figure a down payment.
"How late you going to be getting home?" she asked.
"I don't know yet," I told her. "Probably after eleven."
"School tomorrow," she mentioned.
I snorted, and she laughed. We both knew I already had enough credits to graduate. If I passed all my exams in December, I could get my diploma at the end of January.
"Gotta go," she warned me before hanging up.
I didn't tell her I was going to be working as a girl.
*
The big, black car arrived three minutes early. We had decided to wait for it just inside the mall doors, out of the wind, but the app beeped at me to let me know. "Driver's name is Rodolfo," it said, which agreed with what Nader had told me.
"It's here, guys," I said. I could see it pulling into the loading zone just outside the bollards around the mall entrance. I got kissed and hugged four times and given more advice but only Jenny and Gwen went with me outside. Naomi and Monica went back to chatting up the boys who had followed us down from the food court, eventually.
"Oh, em, gee," said Jenny. "Lookit the driver."
A large man in a California-style business suit got out of the car. His pants were black, his shirt creamy gold, and his jacket electric blue. No hat or tie. He had curly black hair styled in a blocky razor cut, and more of the same curls showed at the neck of his shirt. He looked like Antonio Banderas's kid brother, the one that works out a lot.
"Miss Riordan?" he asked, smiling at us.
I nodded, holding my hand up.
'I'm Rodolfo," he said. "It's probably going to take us half an hour to get back downtown. So we best get on our way." He had, not an accent, but a bit of a Latin flavor to his speech.
Jenny gave my arm a squeeze then pushed me forward.
Gwen made a noise and grabbed my hand, adding, "I've got an odd feeling about this job."
"So do I," I confessed.
"Do you want to sit up front or in the back, Miss Riordan," Rodolfo asked. "There's an entertainment center and a refreshment bar in back, though you can have refreshments up front, too. Just not alcohol."
"I'll sit up front," I said. The wind had died down a bit, but it was still cold.
He beamed at me and started around the car. I followed, still holding Gwen's hand I discovered. Jenny took up the rear, commenting, "Some car, it must take an hour to get it shining like that."
Rodolfo turned to smile at her. "It does," he agreed. "Most of an hour." Then he opened the front door for me, holding out his arm if I needed help balancing.
Gwen gave me a peck on the cheek then I imitated what I had seen my friends do so often getting into a tall car, step up, sit down, then bring both feet inside at once. Rodolfo's arm turned out to be handy; it was a higher step than it had looked.
After closing the door, he rushed around to the driver's side, sort of shooing Jenny and Gwen in front of him to get out of the way. But he was smiling. Maybe he said something because they laughed. He opened the driver's side door and slid into his seat. "This your first day working for Pearl East?" he asked.
I nodded, waving goodbye to my friends, just as Monica and Naomi came out of the mall to join Gwen and Jenny in waving back. "Yeah," I said, realizing he might not have seen me nod. "Do you work for them, too?"
"No, I'm a contract driver for Uber," he said. "But they pay me to be on call in the afternoons, so they know they will have a limo."
"Oh," I said. I wasn't sure how that would work. "Do you, uh, do you pick up, um, other girls to take them to work? At Pearl East?" Other girls? I suppressed a cringe.
"Sometimes," he agreed. "Or to the airport, the beach, the marina—wherever they need to go." He smiled, showing a surprising dimple in his cheek. "I do have one question for you, though," he said. "How old are you?"
"Oh," I said. "I get that a lot, I'll be nineteen in January."
He nodded, but I could tell he had a doubt. "This January? In two months?" He pulled out of the parking lot, taking Van Nuys back toward the freeway.
I laughed. "Six or seven weeks, actually."
"You look about fifteen, maybe...." He let that trail off.
"Maybe twelve?" I suggested.
"I'm sorry," He apologized. "When someone sits up front with me, I tend to get a bit nosy."
"I know what I look like," I told him. I glanced down at my chest. "Maybe I should pad my bra? Except I'm not wearing one." A giggle escaped. I really am flirting with this guy, I decided. Practice?
He turned as red as someone with his dark complexion can.
I decided I better stop teasing him. "How long have you been doing this job?" I asked.
"Driving for Uber? For Pearl East? Or just driving for a living?"
"Um? All of the above?"
"For Uber, about a year. For Pearl East, almost as long, ten or eleven months. But I've driven cabs, limos, or trucks almost since I got out of high school." He glanced at me sideways. "Do you drive, Miss Riordan?"
I shook my head. "Lessons aren't free, but if this job works out, maybe I'll learn."
"Oh," he said. "It's curious, but almost none of the Pearl East girls drive. I get to play chauffeur a lot."
I laughed again, and he chuckled. "I like driving," he said. "I especially like driving pretty girls around."
Yeah, I thought, now he's flirting with me.
*
After half an hour of thick traffic in the Cahuenga Pass, we pulled into a parking garage under the building on Figueroa and up to a sort of underground lobby entrance. A guy in a business suit stepped up to the car and opened the door for me.
"Take care, Miss Riordan," Rodolfo said, smiling.
"You too," I told him. "And thanks." I almost felt we had become friends. I smiled back at him, and he winked. I shook my head and laughed.
The valet, doorman, or concierge, whatever, offered me a hand to help me down, and I took it. The limo was really an SUV and a bit high off the ground for someone as short as me, even with my new shoes. Once on my feet, I looked around, but it was pretty unremarkable. It could have been any hotel or office building with an underground entrance.
"Is this your first time here, miss?" the man asked. I saw his name tag read Jacob and that he wore a wireless earbud-type phone.
"Yes, it is," I said. "Jacob," I added and smiled at him.
"Pearl East Reception is on the sixth floor," he said with his own smile. "They have that whole floor and the one above." He motioned that I should follow him toward a set of automatic doors. "Just take the elevator up, and you'll see the desk to the right as soon as you get out of the lift."
"Thank you," I said. "I guess you know where I'm going because of arriving in Rodolfo's limo?"
"Yes, miss," he said as we went through the electric doors. "But I always send pretty girls up to Pearl East, anyway." He grinned. "Besides, they called down to tell me to watch for you." He tapped his earphone.
I laughed but hurried toward the elevators because it was the second time in less than half an hour someone had called me a pretty girl. I know I look like a girl, but I'd be more likely to be considered scruffy than pretty, I thought.
The impressive lobby of the building had a multi-story atrium, marble floors and gleamed everywhere with metal and glass. I didn't spend time gawking though, but hurried through, feeling horribly underdressed in my school clothes.
*
I rode the lift to the sixth floor, trying not to feel nervous about what I was doing. I hadn't had any time alone to think about it. What if they found out I was really a boy? I'd probably lose out on the job, but I didn't see where anything terrible would happen. Judging from Jenny's reactions, and Nader's last night, I could pass for a girl without even trying.
Sort of depressing if I spent much time thinking about it, but also funny. Unlike a lot of males, I didn't have that macho ego thing. I knew I was never going to be a manly sort, and that didn't really bother me. But could I do this job? What had Nader said: pour coffee and look pretty?
I knew I could pour coffee, and apparently I looked pretty enough for him to offer me a job. Makeup would probably help, and Nader had asked me if I had a dress then offered to have his office girl take me shopping when I said I didn't. It would be weird to wear a dress, but my friends had teased me often enough about getting me into one that I did feel curious.
It occurred to me just before the elevator door opened that no one of them —Gwen, Jennifer, Monica, or Naomi— had tried to talk me out of this. Thanks a lot, guys, for keeping me from doing something stupid, I said to myself.
So, I was already smiling when I stepped out of the elevator and turned to my right. Sure enough, there was an entryway there with tall wooden doors, and out in front of them, a slender pretty woman with lots of curly blonde hair stood at a skimpy desk.
She wore an earbud phone, too, like Jacob downstairs, and had a tablet in her hands. Her skirt was business-like, short, black and slim. Her sleeveless blouse was frilly and pink, and cut low enough to show a tasteful amount of cleavage. Long earrings, multiple rings, necklaces, and bracelets showed an abundance of bling, but I didn't see any tattoos or odd piercings.
She smiled back at me, taking a step forward. "Hi," she said in a cowgirl drawl. "I'm Lou Ellen Briggs, and you must be Brooke Riordan."
"I am," I agreed. "Or a reasonable approximation, at least," hedging a bit since Brooke really wasn't my name.
She laughed a delighted giggle. "Aren't you just the cutest thing?" She actually said 'thang,' but I'm not going to try to spell her accent. We both put out our hands and touched fingertips; we didn't know each other well enough to hug. I was glad I remembered that girls almost never actually shake hands.
"Mmm, hmm," said Lou Ellen, looking me over. "It's going to be fun shopping for you."
"You mean it's going to be a challenge?" I suggested.
She laughed again then wrinkled her nose. "What I mean is, I like your shoes, but that corduroy jacket has got to go."
I opened the coat and looked at it. "This old thing?" I said, just as if she had complimented me on my sense of fashion.