"You're lying!" My seventeen-year-old voice trembled. "We want to get married."
"She's changed her mind."
"Let me speak to her."
"That's impossible," said the old woman. "She doesn't live here any longer. She left for school a little...earlier. She realizes how important her studies are, no doubt."
"I want to hear this from her."
"If she was here, she wouldn't even speak to you. She's made that much clear to me." She leaned forward in her chair and pushed the folded slip of paper closer to my hand. "She asked that I make sure and give this to you."
I unfolded it.
It was a check.
A big one.
Enough for the college tuition my parents couldn't even come close to affording.
I stared the dried-up old bitch straight in the eye. "You're behind this."
"You give me too much credit. DeeAnn has a future ahead of her. That future just simply doesn't include you."
I tried to send DeeAnn letters at Columbia.
They came back marked: "No one by this name. Return To Sender."
It was time for me to go to college.
I cried for a week.
I cashed the check.
"Hugo?"
Lost in thought, Jenn must have called my name a few times before I snapped to attention.
"Red Alert," she said. "The Pirahna just walked in."
Barbra, wearing her sharpest power red business suit, stood in the doorway of Mocha Daze, one hand on her hip, the other holding what looked like a roll of blueprints.
"She looks like a blood clot with legs," murmured Jenn.
"Steve!" said Barbra, loudly.
Steve, who'd been sitting at the window with a mocha and a book, turned and looked over his shoulder at her. A big smile crossed his face and he got out of the chair as she rushed over to meet him.
What the hell was this?
They embraced and kissed, intimately, and right away I knew that the world was going to come crashing down on top of me.
Barbra held up the rolled papers. "I brought the new plans!"
Steve turned to me, his arm around her shoulders. "Hugo, I'd like you to meet your new business partner, Barbra Lawrey."
