My Muted Love (Muted Hoplessness Book 1) Read online

  Rolling my eyes, I turned myself, placing my earbuds in to get through this shift with tunes. He was a strange human. A short one with a big belly and a long, curly beard. I wheeled the trash can out from behind the station to the general dining area. I’d been working as a kitchen staff for the largest station in the biggest cafeteria on campus for just over two weeks. BSU had six cafeterias and restaurants throughout the campus. There were small ones in close proximity of some of the dormitories, one fancy restaurant near the administrative office, another on the athletic campus, and I hadn’t seen or been told where the rest were.

  But the one Trisha got me a job at so happened to be the busiest one for students. It had twelve stations, all making different foods: American, Japanese, deli-style, soul food, Caribbean, Italian, French, desserts, fondue, ice cream, Cinnabon, Chinese, Pizza Hut—even a B-Way Burger station that tasted like the real deal. I worked the American, which was the biggest counter.

  BSU put loads of detail into the place. Each station was outfitted to represent the food it served. The tables included real plants next to them. Even at the BBQ station, a few tables in front were picnic style with the checkered pattern tablecloths. Thankfully, the set of tables I was responsible for cleaning today were pretty easy. There were used plates, cups, napkins, and such left behind by adult children who still thought they were eating from their momma’s kitchen. Ignoring my bad mood brought on by my period, I worked to get the tables cleared so I could move on to cleaning them.

  Humming while picking up a ball of chewed gum from the table, something across from me caught my attention. I glanced up to find my worst nightmare. The mean cheer girl Aivery, her awful human boyfriend, Ashton, and their goof crew were staring and snickering. I glared at them from left to right; the girl with long box braids, Andrea, was the only name I kind of knew from sharing the same dorm building. But the Ashton guy’s arm was over his petite girlfriend’s shoulder as she leaned into him giggling. Ashton’s hyena friends, who I’d seen around the athletic compound all annoyed me. I believed one played basketball, the light skinned one who thought he could dress. One of the other girls lived in my dorm, and the other I couldn’t recall seeing at all. But collectively, I knew the bad humans clique.

  If I were stupid, I’d wonder what they were laughing at. But I wasn’t. The moment I decided to continue with work, one of the girls made hand gestures around her head. Then Ashton mouthed something looking directly at me. I pulled out my earbuds to hear him, immediately regretting it.

  “Arrrrr-arrrrr! Arr-ru-ruuuuuu! Arrrrr-arrrrr! Arr-ru-ruuuuuu!” he continued to bark while his corny crew laughed.

  Aivery had tears rolling from her eyes, she laughed so hard. And Ashton kept going, bringing unneeded attention to me…on my job. A group of people walking my way caught on to the joke and began to snicker, too. A couple had the decency to cover their mouths and scatter on. Others didn’t.

  It was my hair. It looked a hot mess. I still hadn’t taken the tracks out. On most days, I wore a hat. But in instances like this one, I had to wear a sun visor. It was standard uniform for my job. My natural, unblended hair must have come through the opening.

  “Dog for sure!” a tall—extremely tall—light skinned guy with a curly fade shot from across the room. Dude had to be, at least, 6 feet and 6 inches. He was sure to pay homage—I mean, eye contact—to Ashton while stalking my way. “Hey, pooch, fetch this!” he shouted, then tossed his cup my way.

  I’d be damned if it didn’t miss the trash can right in front of me. It hit my chest on a dud, the lid separated from the cup, and milkshake spilled on my uniform shirt and pants, dripping down to my sneakers. When my head shot up, it seemed like the laughing volume grew to infuriating degrees.

  My body jerked and I was gliding over the table, target on this fuck boy’s head. In the backdrop of my fury was the laughing happening theater-style at a glaring level. I landed on my feet just as I saw the smile fade from his golden bumpy face. Then my fist jammed—actually, my arm. I yanked to cock it again, suddenly smelling something masculine that didn’t make me nauseous.

  “Don’t touch her, babe!” A feminine voice shouted hysterically. “She’s a fucking disease!”

  When I tried to turn to investigate why I couldn’t punch the shit out of the goofball, big arms gathered around me, lifting me in the air with a bear hug until I landed in a 180-degree angle.

  “Panthers don’t do that shit,” was muttered smooth like butter in my ear. Between the hard, throaty sounds and earthy smell, I was temporarily hypnotized. “Kill it.”

  My eyes widened and I pulled in the deepest breath to kill the trance trying to overtake me. I was able to gain my senses, and I snatched away from the thick grip with a few yanks of my torso.

  “Get the fuck off of me!” I broke loose and jumped to see who I had to knock the hell out to find the guy, Ashton.

  The glare in his eyes did nothing to the fury boiling in my belly. With wide nostrils and hard lips, he shot me a look I wanted to challenge. This guy was big…tall and thick, but I couldn’t give a shit. I’d fought all size boys before. Even the ones I lost to didn’t walk away without signs of my wrath. I was ready. The only problem was his energy wasn’t right. He wasn’t raging like me. Even the light-skinned, bumpy-faced, tree-height dude stayed at a distance with fear in his eyes. Ashton didn’t have fear, but the calm in his aura was non-negotiable.

  “Tori.”

  “WHAT?” I leaped in the air, doing a 90-degree turn this time. It was my supervisor, Rich.

  His fists pushed into his doughy waist as he postured himself to speak from authority. “You wanna keep your job, young lady?”

  The threat was loud and clear. And so was my answer. “Fuck no!” I tossed my visor to the ground and stomped off before I fractured a facial bone.

  I hated rich, Black Beverly Hills 90120 humans.

  With a fucking passion.

  For real.

  “I need shoes and stuff. I still ain’t got my cell phone,” I tried explaining in plain terms.

  “Well, whatchu do with ya check, Tori?”

  I rolled my eyes, blindly seeing the disorganization of Trisha’s office. “Ma, I only worked there for two weeks and a day, and you know I ain’t work every day or eight-hour shifts. If I’m lucky, the check I do get next week’ll be forty dollars. That ain’t gone help much.”

  “It ain’t like you gotta worry about food, Tori. They paying for everything. You ain’t got rent or gym dues. Shit.” Here we go. The fighting I was doing for my money. “You still act like the world revolves around you and boxing. But anyway, I’ll send it.”

  “When?” I barely let the last syllable drop from her mouth.

  “Damn, Tori! As soon as I can get a ride. You know I work.”

  “I know.” My eyes closed and I dropped my head into my hand over Trisha’s desk. “But, Ma, the money came the day after I left for school. It’s been four weeks. The next one’s coming soon, and I still ain’t got what I need for school.”

  I didn’t raise my voice, didn’t want to. Trisha was in the corner, watching videos of a Lady Panthers soccer match. She coached them and was in the middle of her workday when I asked if I could call home. I couldn’t make long distance calls from my room unless I paid and had nothing but worry to do that with.

  Even though Trisha was occupied, I didn’t want her to know just how little support I had in life. It was embarrassing. I knew my mother had her own shit to deal with. The trailer we lived in had a hole in the floor, and had it for so long, it was beginning to rot the flooring inside. The windows barely survived last winter, and the trifling park people still hadn’t cut down the tree growing so wild, it pushed into the trailer. And those were the issues I knew; I couldn’t imagine the ones I didn’t, like how she struggled with loneliness. But that wasn’t my fault or problem.

  I never really knew my father. He grew up a couple of blocks from our trailer park. Apparently, he and my mother had known each other for years
, but never dated. They’d see one another around the city and knew each other’s families, but they never paid either or any mind until they crossed paths at Cumberland County Community College. My father was two years older than my mother. So when she enrolled with half the commitment, her inspiration to see it through became my father, who had been on his way out and to a four-year university in Delaware.

  He hit on her, flirting, and my mother could never resist a man. So they started hanging out and she got pregnant. They never officially dated. It was a huge inconvenience because he was due to leave for school in Delaware soon, which was a stone’s throw away from Millville. More than that, my mother had started catching feelings for an old boyfriend she’d had. When my father’s parents were willing to keep him home so he could be around as a father, my mother told him to go. While that sounded noble, my grandmother said it was only to free my mother to date the old flame.

  My father went off to school in Delaware and didn’t return until he brought back a wife and children when I was four. He bought a house in Egg Harbor Township, a suburb of Atlantic City. My grandmother carried herself to his parents’ home on foot and wouldn’t leave until they worked out child support payments with my father. Margaret McNabb didn’t play. She had been laying low, taking care of me practically alone for four years. My mother could never keep jobs long. Well, she’d had enough.

  The child support payments were given straight to my grandmother from my father. Monthly—and faithfully—he’d meet her in Millville and shell out what grew to four hundred a month, which was one-hundred dollars a week. My grandmother, who I’d basically lived with more than my mother, would use it for clothes, food, school, and eventually boxing. That was until she passed away when I was twelve. While I was dealing with the loss of the most important person in the world to me, my father never reached out to propose a new plan.

  It was four years before my mother began receiving child support from my father, this time directly. My grandmother was smart enough to know my mother would mismanage the money, and she did. I’d always had to beg for my needs. And it wasn’t like I could call my father. That motherfucker moved not too long after my grandmother’s death and would never respond to my mother’s calls to his parents. That was the only way she knew to reach him. When that didn’t help, she filed for child support officially. It was the government that finally caught up to him and began to garnish his checks when I was sixteen. It seemed like the time to receive the money took time, too. I was almost seventeen when the money started coming.

  He was on back pay, so the amounts and length of payments were formulated. When I turned eighteen last year, the checks started coming in my name. But I had the funds directly deposited into a bank account I shared with my mother so she could use some of it for things around the house, although I was gone a lot, up in North Jersey training with Cut and fighting. My mother had the only debit card to the account, so I let her give me the amount I needed each month. That was supposed to continue, even the day after I left for Blakewood.

  “Tori, it ain’t like our bank is out there. If it was, I swear, I would just give you the card and leave that money all to you. Damn!” She was mad. “In between my shifts, I’ll figure out how to give it to you.”

  “Don’t Walgreens got a Western Union?” That was where she’d been working.

  “Wha— Huhn? I ‘on’t know, but I’ll find out on my next shift.”

  I rolled my eyes. She was throwing me off the phone.

  “Alright, Ma.”

  “Bye, Tori. I gotta go.”

  “Bye.”

  “Mmmhmm.” The line was cut.

  I hung the phone on the cradle and buried my face in my hands, letting out a long breath.

  “What do you need, Tori?” Trisha asked from across the small office. “You know it’s our job to make sure all your needs are met so your two focal points are your studies and fighting.”

  I rubbed my eyes. “Nothing. I’ll figure it out.”

  “You don’t have to.”

  Inhaling, I shared, “I need to find another job.”

  “I’d rather you not work, Tori. Your focus needs to be narrow. Get in shape for the first fight, then the next, then the next. But if you’re insistent on being stubborn, I can find you another one on campus.” I shook my head, dismissing that idea right away. But Trisha spoke louder. “At least, they’d be more amenable to students’ limitation to hours in a shift.”

  “I’m not working another job where I have to serve or be seen by these damn snobs. I could have broken that boy’s shit.”

  She cocked her head to the side and sighed, “And that wouldn’t have been wise.”

  I stood from her desk. “Neither is being broke.” After grabbing my book bag, I started out. “I’ll find something.”

  “Don’t forget about transportation,” she warned behind me.

  I shouted from the hall, “I’ll figure it out!”

  I pulled back my sleeve to check my TAG for the time. It had been close to twenty minutes since my last student left. I was grateful when the full hour had ended so I didn’t have to worry about one of his gazillion acne bumps bursting on me or my things. Shit. That dude needed a potent triple dose of benzoyl peroxide, salicylic acid…antibacterial soap, or some shit to melt the rocks and volcano craters on his face.

  The thought to check my email came to mind, so I pulled my laptop closer. Chewing on my thumbnail, I tapped in my login credentials on the BSU site and scrolled down my inbox.

  Shit.

  Shit.

  Shit.

  I made mental checks as I recognized the names of a few of this semester’s professors with yet another syllabus update. Their lack of preparation annoyed the fuck out of me. I scrolled until I came across an email from Aivery. It was sent early this morning. The link inside sent me to a greeting card site, where the page opened to a digital card writing out, “I miss you. Have a splendid day!”

  On another huff, I closed out of my school account and logged into my personal Hotmail one. The first unread email I saw had me rolling my eyes mentally.

  Porter, James

  Ashton,

  I’m just checking in to see if you’ve looked at the second quarter earnings report I sent back in July. The third quarter’s will be available before you know it next month. You really must be in the habit of reading them and asking the right question—

  I clicked out of the email right away, not finishing it.

  Blah, blah, blah, blah…

  “Eat a dick, Jimmy,” I whispered to myself. “I’m sure you still know how to.” I found that hilarious and chuckled.

  I didn’t fuck with him, and he knew it. If I had questions about money, my well-compensated attorney could have the answers to me in less than an hour. The door of the private study room opened, snatching my attention. In walked stiff shoulders, a baseball cap, and a silky plastic ponytail hanging behind her head. Her sneakers squeaked as she turned to close the door.

  Annoyed as fuck, I grabbed my clipboard to check the name again.

  What the fuck is the Tori broad doing here?

  As she pulled out the chair across from me, I choked out, “I got a girlfriend.”

  She scoffed, eyes rolled as she dumped herself into the wooden chair across from me at the small table. Then she sat back, swinging one arm over the back of the chair. “And I don’t. So?”

  My eyes narrowed and one cheeked raised in a leer. “You sure about that, tomboy?”

  “Sure am, toddler feet.” Then she straightened in her chair, sighing. “Can we get this over with?”

  “Get what over with? I told you, I have a girl.”

  What does she want?

  “This!” Her hand swept over my desk setup: writing pad, laptop, clipboard, textbooks, and writing implements.

  “I don’t take random students. The Office of Admissions assigns them, tomboy,” I emphasized.

  “Funny, because it’s their stupid fault that I’m getting tuto
ring in the first place.”

  I issued her an empty gape. “You needing help academically is the Office of Admissions’ fault?”

  “You heard what I said.” Growling lowly, she rolled her eyes again.

  She’s serious...

  I went to my laptop to cross-check the list I was sent via email against the printout I created for the sign-in sheet. When I was ready to spin my machine her way to show her how serious I was, something hit me.

  I reared my head, eyes narrowing with suspicion. “What’s your name?”

  “You know my name, man!” She was irritated.

  But what in the hell for? It was my time she was wasting, asking for help.

  I leaned over my laptop, over this bullshit already. “I only know of Tomboy Tori.”

  “Then you ain’t communicating with the Office of Admissions because the first ain’t my name at all, and you won’t find the second one on there either.”

  “What’s your name?” I exhaled, prepared to end this childish ass game.

  Her nose went north, mouth balled. “For the first and last damn time. KaToria McNabb,” she gritted out.

  My mouth dropped. That was too feminine a name for the beast before me. I wanted to ask for her ID, but doubted the girl could pull a scheme of this proportion out of her ass.

  Tomboy’s real name is KaToria?

  She sat back, huffing loudly. “I ain’t got all night. Some of us make the most of training—or practice, in your case.”

  My pissed-the-fuck-off-odometer was well past the restraint phase. I didn’t want to tutor tomboy here. I couldn’t spend any more time with her than I’d already been told I had to.

  I sat up again in my seat. “First of all, I have a zero tolerance for tardiness. My time, as a senior and leader of the Panthers amongst other things, is valuable to more people than just me. It won’t be wasted by ignorant asses like you.”

  Her eyes popped wide. “What makes me ignorant?”