Am I crazy? After you hear my story you might think so and I’ve decided to tell you—a stranger—all about it. But believe me I was a typical person. I had a home, went to school, and was even on the track team. But one thing can change it all.


I never had the chance to sleep late even on the weekends all my life. I wasn’t jealous of the kids who slept until noon because I got more done.

My mother, before I was born to tell her differently, bought a rundown restaurant and turned it into a sandwich shop when I was only one. I was her favorite employee who worked earlier and later than everyone else.

One thing that really makes it all worth it was the gigs. See, I’m a drummer and Mom let me play after rush hour. I got to play for like ten people. But ten is better than zero as I always said.

I had the same routine every day. Help Mom get the restaurant cleaned, open the doors, take orders, clean up messes, and at the end of it all, play on a drum set I found at a garbage dump.

So maybe my life wasn’t completely normal but you’ve gotta give me credit for working with little pay and doing homework and entertaining people.

After another day of serving sandwiches, I got up on stage and played on my set. The eyes staring at me, at first, kind of scared me but I get over fear quickly, you’ll learn.

I can’t really write down what I played but it was good I assure you. But midway I noticed one specific person walking into the restaurant.

She didn’t look special in any way. Her hair was long and braided and she wore a faded T-shirt underneath a Colombia jacket. She had something…different in her hand.

I only saw it for a second, but it looked like a staff but then it disappeared but she did shove something into her pocket.

I almost dropped my drumming stick so I wrapped up my solo quickly because you can’t trust people.


You’re probably wondering why a thirteen year old girl doesn’t trust anybody so I’ll tell you. My dad left me before I was even born.

Mom always told me how amazing he was and other compliments but I couldn’t help but wonder why he went away if he was so happy.

Then there was that day a couple months ago where a customer tried to sneak off without paying. Mom yelled for him to stop thinking he forgot but he never got out the door because I was standing in front of it.

See, my bravery and quick but not always so smart thinking get me in these situations. What girl would try to stop a man who could easily have something up his sleeve? My brain doesn’t really think that way.

The way I see it what man thinks he’s so much stronger than any girl? Why don’t I have a chance? But I’m getting off topic…


Anyways, I jumped off stage before the clapping stopped. Mom was wiping up the counter when the girl sat down and picked up a menu.

She looked slightly confused but tried to hide it, I could tell. (I can read people by how they react.) I did something stupid and sat next to her.

I kept my mouth shut since my mother was only a couple feet away. “Carrie,” she called. “Good job up there but I thought you played longer.”

I ignored her and focused on the girl next to me. She pretended not to notice my gaze. Finally, I said, “Hey. What do you want to eat?”

She looked at me thinking hard and then she touched her ear. “What?” she asked.

I acted like nothing happened. “I work here. What do you want?”

“For now, just a soda. Anything, please.”

I nodded and walked behind the counter. I never took my eyes off of her and she might’ve noticed. Mom always said I wasn’t very good at being discreet, or lying about test scores.

“Enjoy,” I said placing the glass in front of her. “My name is Carrie if you’re ready to order.”

She didn’t respond and only kept her eyes down.

Curiosity is very hard for me to ignore and I had to find out if I saw the staff or needed glasses. My curiousness has gotten me in some trouble too.

Mom tapped my shoulder. My parent is nothing like me. She has bright eyes, a perfect smile, and beautiful blonde hair; the exact opposite of me.

I have dark hair and eyes I used to love because they were dimmer than everyone else’s and I honestly do try to smile so I don’t look depressed but my smile is ugly, in my opinion.

“Carrie, give this check to table six,” she ordered like I really was an employee not her daughter. “I’ll take care of this girl.”

I was going to protest but Mom and the girl would hear so I did as I was told.

As I walked back, I noticed something…even more different about my target.

The girl had a hearing aid in her ear she touched before. Was she deaf? I didn’t know sign language at all. But it did explain why she didn’t hear me at first but not why she had a staff.

I acted like I saw nothing and decided to start a conversation with her.

She didn’t look like she was in a rush to leave. “Your name is Carrie, I’m guessing,” she said perfectly but a little cold too.

“Yeah, it is. What do you need?”

“It’s more of question really. Do you--?”

The girl was cut off by another customer who, for some reason, looked suspicious to me even though he didn’t have a weapon.

He sat next to the girl who, I could tell, knew him and rather not. “Hey Ivy,” he said not even glancing at me.

“You two know each other?” I cut in. “I’m Carrie.”

He looked at me like I was crazy. “Great. My name’s Travis, now shut up.”

I don’t have a ‘bad’ temper necessarily. I keep it inside thinking of horrible names for people.


But nobody was going to get away with telling me to shut up in my house (we lived above the restaurant).

On the outside, I just gave Travis a look and went to clean another table. But I couldn’t help but overhear their conversation.

“Why are you here?” Ivy demanded.

“To make sure you don’t fail. You should be thanking me now.”

“If you haven’t noticed, I had the situation completely under control. So you can go back and stare at yourself in a mirror.”

“If you’re so under control, why doesn’t the girl know who she is? Or do we have the wrong person again?” What’s that supposed to mean?

“She saw me with my staff I am positive. I think I’ve found the right person. I was about to talk to her when you stormed in here raising more suspicions.”

Travis snorted and looked around the restaurant. “Whose drum set?” he finally asked.

“Hers, I barely heard her play.”

“Duh, you probably didn’t have your dumb hearing aid in again.”

Ivy’s face turned a shade of scarlet out of embarrassment or anger, I couldn’t tell. “Get out before I kick you out.” Anger.

I really wanted to butt in.

“You can’t kick me out, Hermes.”

Hermes? I didn’t know what that was or why the two were talking about me (No one else played the drums. Hello!). But I couldn’t keep pretending to clean an already spotless table so I walked back to the counter as Ivy said, “You’re leaving now, Ares.”

“Why are you leaving so soon?” I asked.

Travis smirked. “Who would want to eat this food? You should play more to save these people from eating.”

Of course I snapped! People at my junior high used to make fun of my mom’s restaurant idea. I certainly wasn’t going to let it slide with that jerk.

So I grabbed Ivy’s glass and dumped the Diet Coke on his head.

“What the--?” exclaimed Travis shaking his head. He tried to grab me but I stepped back.

Ivy stopped him since everyone in the room was staring at us.

Mom hurried over apologizing. “I’m so sorry,” she said. “Carrie, why on earth did you do that to a customer?”

I shrugged and looked down. My mother would break if I told her what Travis said about our food. “He was…annoying?” The look she gave me was not one I like to remember.

“I’ll get you some napkins,” she said to Travis ignoring me.

Once she was gone Travis hissed at me, “You’ll pay for this,” and he stalked out.

Ivy hesitated and I could tell she was trying not to smile. “I’d better follow him. He can do some stupid things when he’s mad.”

“Or all the time,” I added.

She laughed quickly. “I’ll be sure to come here again, Carrie.”

My mother came back and focused on me since Diet Coke was all over the counter. “Explain,” she demanded.

“It’s not worth it, Mom,” I said trying to change the subject. “You should just be grateful I did that because he wasn’t going to buy anything. Are we done now?”

“You can’t go dumping soda on people, Carrie! I’ll figure out a punishment for you after we close.”


I took extra time to stack the chairs downstairs because Mom cools down as time passes. My curiosity doesn’t though. Ivy and Travis’s conversation was imprinted in my brain. They were talking about me. I had so many questions. Why’d you have a staff? Why do you have a hearing aid? Why are you (Travis) such a jerk?

My mother and I lived above our sandwich shop in an apartment. It’s not special in any way except for the old furniture Mom loved. She was sitting on the couch watching the news. Another storm was pounding the east coast.

“That’s depressing,” I commented sitting down. “So?”

Mom faced me. “Have you been ‘lashing out’ often Carrie?” she asked seriously.

Not exactly what I was expecting. “No… Where are you going with this?”

“Nowhere, I just thought to ask. Are you hungry?”

“Hungry? Aren’t you mad? I just sodaed a customer!”

“Sodaed? You’re making soda a verb? Would you like to be punished? I wouldn’t mind.”

“No, I guess not.”

“Good, I think I’ll be going to bed early tonight.”