“You thought you were better than me didn’t you?” We step foot into an elegant restaurant, advertised as five stars, decorated with puffy-cloud white cloth and collections of flowers and candles. His friends had said goodbye at the door and now it was just us. I assessed his statement and the fact that I did assume he was well, underprivileged, I felt a pang of guilt. “I mean like you thought I was some poor kid who pokes fun at others that don’t know the streets as well?” Yeah, that was a little too accurate. He made himself comfortable in a nearby booth like it was a crappy diner similar to the ones I had visited on my unsuccessful job hunt. “So that life story?”
“Why are you helping me, I shouldn’t even stay here, it was such a stupid decision to leave town. I just didn’t know what else to do.” I mumbled in a panic that I would have to tell him the whole truth. I was uncomfortable and more and more sure that even with his help, this was not the place for me.
“So you run away from your problems?” I frowned at that thought and he proceeded quickly. “Well you’re here now so you might as well follow through. If you don’t then I will officially label you a stupid country girl.” He was putting effort into helping me calm down,  I was beginning to relax in my seat and even chuckled a little at his stupid joke. This whole situation was becoming funny but I was trying not to laugh in fear that I may lose this opportunity for the only job I was going to get. Breadsticks were set on the table and the boy tore right in, my stomach growled at me to do the same but I didn't act on its request.
“What is your name?” I wanted the spotlight anywhere but on me and he seemed to be forgetting that I had offered to explain things on the street. Hopefully he didn’t even actually care.
“Matt.” he says in between chews, right before crushing my hopes. “Now tell me this story, you don’t get the job without the story.” He’s still chewing the breadstick which was making them, unfortunately for my hungry stomach, less appealing. In my head I threw options back and forth, I could leave this building and never tell what he wanted to know. So you run away from your problems? No. I could beg for the job without the story, oh but I would just be making a fool of myself. I could lie but besides for the true story the only thing that could have driven me this far from home was murder.
“I sold drugs back home.” He almost spit out all of that disgusting food and I took that has a signal to continue. “Like the kind you’d find in the medicine cabinet after your parents forget all about their surgery they got a few months ago or something. I would never take them, that’s not really my thing, but, I made enough money to support my shopping habit which was the only addiction I faced.” He put the rest of the bread stick down on the cloth, he was testing his limits before it all came out of his mouth and I had a feeling even he knew that was disgusting. His eyes wide he nodded for me to go on. “So obviously my family was going to find out at some point, I shouldn’t have been that dumb to think otherwise.” He shrugged, I kept pausing waiting for him to tell me I could stop at that was enough. Wait until he tells his dad about the drug dealer he feels they should hire.
“One day I get home from high school, it has to be one of my last days before summer, before the next fall when I was supposed to leave for college. I was committed to John Hopkins.” I chuckled at myself, a month ago, shopping for dorm accessories, full of excitement and money I shouldn’t even have.  “And my mom is furious with me she tells me all about how she has connected all the dots from the empty pill container in my bedroom garbage straight back to the Burberry jacket I was wearing. She told me she already called the police.” Now that I had gotten this far, there was no point in hoping he would let me stop.
“My life basically shattered into a million pieces around me. I told her I was going to go wait in my room until they came and I confronted my consequences but really I was planning my way out. In about a minute, I had to give up every dream of college, new friends and the law degree I hoped for to run away from everything I knew.” I looked down at my bag with the Burberry jacket still stuffed inside it like a forgotten blanket. “So, basically I got on a bus and left until I hit the city. Then I waited my lucky number, four stops, before getting off and seeing where the hell it took me.” I paused for a moment and looked around. “And here I am with an expensive jacket in an ugly shoulder bag and nothing but a desperate plea for a job.” I stare him down for a reaction, angry when there wasn’t much of one. He picks up his bread stick again and stuffs it in his mouth.
“You know I’ve definitely heard worse.” he says, barely audible from the carbs filling his mouth, I want to rip the food away from him, this was the worst. “But, do you honestly think you’re city material. Your ugly bag or whatever does not hide that you are full more of entitlement than fear.” I felt my eyes turn stone-cold as they poured into him. He didn’t even mind.
“So what if I feel entitled, I think anyone would avoid jail time no matter who they are. If they are some gross city boy or spoiled country girl, would you not?” I blurted out, intending on my words hurting him. The familiar sense of entitlement he was referring to washed over me like a wave and I finally gave in to the breadstick in front of me. He shrugs at me and signals the waiter for more.
“I mean, trouble like that, you can’t run away forever, what’s a little jail time, you think you have a chance at college still?” He took a hit back, I had never been and never will be so stunned by another person’s words again and I thought that was true when my mother told me she had called the police on me like I wasn’t her child. “Ex-drug dealer now pre-law! Nothing wrong with that statement to you?” He interrogated, my eyes followed his hands as the moved from bread basket to butter to knife to plate to plate to mouth and repeat, I have nothing to say.
“So your dad owns a restaurant and doesn't feed you?” I change the subject in a manner that was too obvious, I already know he’s too smart to let me dodge his questions. He shoves the basket over to me and leans back smirking.
“Oh, just trying to make you feel comfortable it’s obvious you haven’t eaten much in the past 24 hours. How much money did you even take with you? No way you’ll sell that stupid jacket.” I put my arm over my bag as if I’m trying to protect the jacket and regret the action before it’s even complete, dare I meet his eyes again his eyebrows will be raised in amusement, that stupid smirk. “Eat the damn bread and sell the jacket and then come back. If you can’t sell the jacket you need to go home and face the facts. I don’t recommend the jail cells around here they are much scarier than whatever is in your home town.” I don’t look him in the eyes again, I as well as he, already know I can’t sell the jacket, I as well as he know I am not in the right place. I eat the bread slowly before sliding my way out of my seat.
The fear in my stomach settles back at the bottom eating away at my insides. “Real city kids fess up to their dumb choices.” His smirk is going to be engraved into my memory, he analyzes my ashamed expression. “I guess I won’t be seeing you again?” I can’t get myself to answer, I felt so defeated by a boy I didn’t know. I smooth my skirt the material too expensive for my family to afford under my shaky fingers. All this, just to fit in. I suck in a breath and stare at my jacket still crumbled in a hidden ball on the seat.
“Take the jacket.” I tell him with a false sense of confidence, I straighten my shoulders and head towards the door to catch the next way back to my small home town.
“You know what you’re doing Alex Fare.” He cheers behind me but I cannot smile at his encouragement. “Maybe I’ll see you again city girl.” This time I smiled.