Chapter 1
“Why do you want this job?”
As the question rang through the air, picking apart the silence that had settled over the room, I squirmed. Even with help of the chair legs — which bit into the material of my shoes, acting as an anchor — it wasn’t enough to contain the fidgeting.
Fighting the urge to sit on my hands, because they wanted to be naughty and poke the pencils that were clustered in a pot on the edge of the desk, I mentally scolded them instead. They had gained a life of their own, fingers pulling at the stuffing that leaked out of a hole in the chair beneath me.
A pile of it had been discreetly tossed to the floor. The telling off worked. My bad little hands submitted, curling around one another, settling in my lap.
Gaining control over 89% of my limbs and their renegade actions, I met the eyes of the man before me. Swallowed hard. Tried not to squirm. They scared me; his eyes were flat and lifeless, as though every ounce of joy had been siphoned from them. He regarded me the way that one would a bug. Cold and calculating, as though debating whether or not to crush me.
I swallowed again. Tried to ignore the way the hands of the clock behind his head seemed to be waving at me. Tried to block out the bird that had settled just outside the window in the far side of the room. Tried to ignore how rude of me it was to not say hello to it.
Focus, Asa, I chastised, reaching up to loosen the tie around my neck. It felt more like a noose than formal wear, but my sister had insisted that it made a good impression. I wasn’t sure how. She had made me wear a boring blue one instead of the one with the yellow ducks on that I had wanted to wear.
If I had worn that one, I would have agreed with the ‘making an impression’ part.
He cleared his throat. Lifted a greying eyebrow. Made it clear that he wasn’t willing to wait much longer for an answer.
I opened my mouth but snapped it right back shut. My teeth smacked together from the force. He wanted a specific kind of answer; he wanted the right kind of answer.
I wasn’t sure that telling him that I wanted to be able to afford a six-foot dinosaur soft toy was the answer he was looking for. The thing was humongous! It was taller than me and I knew that I needed it for my bedroom.
“It . . . seems like a good opportunity,” I coached myself, trying to remember the lines that my best friend, Quinn, had fed me. “It will help me become more responsible,” I added when his face remained impassive; age stole away at his youth, leaving behind a valley of wrinkles that formed a bulldog-like sag to his cheeks.
“It’s not easy work. It’s hard and it’s not for everyone. You’ll have to work a lot of weekends, and usually late shifts.”
“That - that’s okay,” I stuttered out. “I will try real hard. I’m a quick learner.”
The man blew out a deep sigh, shaking his head as he leaned back into his wheeled chair. He was wearing a suit. A single glance was all it took to imprint the certainty that it was more expensive than mine. Then again, when it had been bought, my sister, Nicky, had been on a shoe string budget, so it was hardly surprising.
“You seem like a nice kid, Asa. I’m just not sure that this is the best fit for you. You’d have to deal with drunken people yelling at you and insulting you. Could you deal with that?”
Neptune's was a club. It wasn’t as big a name as some of the ones in the neighboring cities but it still drew in a decent crowd every weekend. Working behind the bar didn’t seem that hard. At least, that was what I tried to convince myself.
I nodded slowly. I wasn’t sure if I could but I needed the job. I needed money and I needed a six-foot dino.
He didn’t believe me. I was sure he didn’t. I wasn’t surprised. I doubted that I would have believed me either.
“You can do a trial shift on Tuesday, how does that sound?” the man, Graham Jones, as he had introduced himself, said. “It’s quiet on Tuesday nights. I can have Kyle show you the ropes and see how you do.”
I forced myself not to squeal or clap. Something told me that it wouldn’t have impressed him. Instead, I nodded. Then watched as he scribbled something down on a piece of paper before handing it to me.
“This is the time you should be here,” he said quietly. His voice was strange. Rough and horse, like there was something caught in his throat, but it still managed to ring out clear. “Ask for Joel, okay? He’ll sort you out.”
Once outside of the building, a large structure that was wedged in between two other clubs, I cheered in victory. Had passer-byers sidestepping as I jumped up and down, punching my fists in the air.
“Super cuddly dino,” I yelled, “Here I come!”
The wide berth turned into peculiar looks but the surge of electricity, the sheer force of the bubbling excitement that churned in my gut, it had their judgment dulling to little more than a background irk.
It was a cold day
The sky was smothered by angry black clouds that threatened to burst at any moment. The wind was unfriendly, biting at my face as I stood in the harsh elements. Soft droplets hit my head, dampening the awesome dino spike that I had used half a tin of hairspray to keep in place. After sending a quick text to my sister, as she’d instructed me to do once I was done, I tried to stand as still as I could. As still as a statue. An awesome statute. A super awesome dinosaur statue.
Buuuut it was a hard game, and it got boring really fast. The only distraction from the wait was counting the cars and pulling faces at people’s backs once they’d turned passed. It didn’t take long for my feet to get happy and start to kick at the ground. Or for my knees to see how far they could bend.
The street I was on was long, and the sidewalk ran the length. It was inviting, tempting me to wander and peek in all the bright-lit buildings, but self control won out. Barely.
I didn’t know this area very well, and Nicky had warned me not to wander off when she came to fetch me. It wasn’t easy. I wanted to see how fast I could run down the street and back. And then I wanted to see if the street made a circle and if I ran all the way around, past where it bent into a corner, if I would eventually end up back in the same place.
I resisted the impulse, if only because of what had happened last time I had wandered off. I had stopped paying attention to the road and a truck had almost turned me into a pancake.
In my defense, I had been following the helicopter that had flown past. I just knew that I could keep up with it if I ran fast enough. I still believed it not for untied shoelaces and an unfortunate introduction to the sidewalk, I could have caught it.
Beat up and one bad day away from the junkyard in the sky, my sister’s rusty blue car pulled into view. It chugged to a stop alongside the curb, grizzling out an angry bang. I wasted no time in clambering in, shaking off like a wet dog.
“How was it?” was her first question.
“I did everything you and Quinn told me too,” I told her, bouncing a little in my seat, trying to decide between shutting the door and plugging in my seatbelt. “I didn’t touch anything. Cept for the chair. I had to touch that to sit on it. And the note he gave me. I had to touch that or I woulda been rude.”
“I meant did you get the job, Asa,” she said, rolling her eyes, reaching over me to slam the door shut. “Stop playing about and plug the belt in.”
“Oh.” I frowned, tongue poking out as I tried to shove the metal bit of the safety harness into the clicky-ima-hold-on-tight part of the seat belt. “Maybe. I got a trial on Tuesday. I have to go in and somebody named... I forgets their name but they’re gonna show me some rope. Not sure why. It sounds kind of boring. Are you proud of me, Nicks? Can I have ice cream now?”
She winced. Raised a finger to her lips in the way she always did when she found me too loud. A smile creased her face, transforming it from stern to super pretty, once I obliged.
“That depends,” she reasoned. “Are you going to finish tidying your room when we get back?”
I nodded eagerly. I probably wouldn’t, but if it got me ice cream then of course I was going to say yes. I wasn’t sure why she believed me. She’d always ask. I’d always agree. It wouldn’t happen. She wouldn’t cook me huge meatballs for dinner because I hadn’t upheld my end of the deal. Annnnd repeat.
But it was what made her the best! I lived with Nicky. Had done since I was fourteen. I was eighteen now and had never once regretted my decision. The alternative had been staying with my dad.
Nicky understood me. She knew how to deal with me when I got too hyper and she knew how to say things to me in a way that had me chilling out and listening. I knew how lucky that made me, having somebody like her in my corner. I’d been told a lot of times that I could be too much. Too tiring.
But she was lucky to have me too, because I was super duperty awesome. I taught her all the raptors names out of Jurassic World.
There was a small dessert shop on the corner of Fifth Avenue. A cute little unit that looked as though it had been yanked out of the ’80s and dumped in the middle of modern chaos. Mom had been taking us there since we were kids, and it was a tradition that Nicky and I still participated in, even after she had passed. The tradition bad been extended to Nicky’s little boy, Duncan, too.
He was eleven months old and a dino-in-training. I was trying to teach him how to roar. He was a bit dim and hadn’t gotten the hang of it yet. He wasn’t allowed an ice cream all to himself when we bought him with us yet, but Nicky let him slobber all over hers. She’d dip his pacifier into the creamy, saucy bits too for him too.
I loved him. He was my nephew and he was pretty great, but I was a selfish shellfish and I liked the times when I got my sister all to myself.
Maybe it was the weather, or maybe it was because it was late afternoon on a Sunday evening, but the shop was quite than I’d ever seen it. There wasn’t even a queue!
Which meant she couldn't complain when I wanted seconds because she wouldn't even have to wait for a bazillion years!
Nicky knew what I wanted before even asked. I always had the same: bubble-gum flavored ice cream with crumbled up cookies mixed in. She sent me to find a seat while she ordered. When she joined me, she had two heaped bowls in her hand. She never let me carry them because they were glass. I wasn’t even allowed to lift mine from the table. Not even to lick the stubborn bits of ice cream from the bottom when I was done.
“I think this job is going to be good for you, Asa,” Nicky said after she had sat down, spooning a mouthful of minty-madness into her yapper. “It might calm you down a little, especially if you’re working late shifts.”
I nodded a little. She often compared me to Duncan, and at times had even claimed he was easier to look after than me. Her boyfriend had joked that I was the equivalent of ten toddlers on a sugar rush. It should have hurt my feelings. It didn’t, but I did sometimes feel guilty. I wasn’t her responsibility but she had taken me on as though I were. I tried to be so good for her, but she still ended up telling me off most days.
“Yup.” I nodded. “Oops. It jumped from the spoon, Nicky,” I told her as I glanced down at where a scoop had fallen in my lap. I tried picking it up but it slid between my fingers, encouraging a tiny giggle.
“Use the napkin!” Nicky exclaimed, waving at them in exasperation. “Honestly, I can’t take you anywhere.”
I managed to get it up with the tissue. It left my trousers wet but they were black so at least it didn’t look like I had wet myself. I held the tissue out to Nicky, who shot me an annoyed look.
“Go and put it in the bin, dummy.”
“That’s not nice, Nick,” I told her, frowning. “I could call you monkey features, but I don’t, do I? You haves to be nice. You always tell me that so you have to be too.”
She closed her eyes. Sucked in a deep breath. We looked a lot alike. We both shared the same blond hair and the same sea-green eyes. Her hair had been braided into a French plait but little unruly wisps escaped, framing her face. She had a naturally round face and though my own was a little thinner, a little more defined with masculinity, it still held a strong resemblance to hers.
I liked that. It made me certain that we were related; she’d sometimes mutter under her breath that she swore I was adopted.
“Asa, button it. Put it in the bin, eat your ice cream and then we can go, okay?”
I nodded glumly. “Nasty pasty.”
I felt her glare as I shuffled over to the bin, dumping the wet napkin. The interior of the shop was quite small and there was only a brisk row of six tables available to customers. Only one other table was occupied. Two gossiping teen girls that glanced over at me as I passed them. The redhead smiled, a confident, dimpled thing that had me almost tripping over an untucked chair. I liked looking at pretty things.
I managed to eat the rest of my treat without spilling any more.
“Do you think I can buy a unicorn if I get paid a lot?” I asked Nicky as we made our way back to the car.
I had slipped the tie from around my neck, tightening it around my forehead so that I had a flippity floppity unicorn horn instead. It earned me a few odd looks from the people passing us but I didn’t mind. I knew that Nicky would go Incredible Hulk on them if anybody said anything.
My sister shot me a strange look; her eyes were shadowed by tiredness. She shook her head, muttering under her breath that she was taking me to see a shrink for my birthday before unlocking the car doors. Sliding off the irritating suit jacket, I climbed in. I shut the door first this time but accidentally trapped the jacket in it. I had to reopen it to get it out.
Sleep wasn’t something I planned. It was just something that happened. I remembered talking to my sister about how cool it would be to live in a kangaroo’s pouch. Then there was nothing except being shaken awake.
