I can't say anything in the bookstore about the pictures because Billie gives me a latte that I can't afford and she wants me to drink it. So, I do and it burns my mouth.
I watch her staple miniature, naked Grace Pattins onto the notice board, flushed but glistening—kind of like a goldfish.
We sit in the back, sharing the stupid latte because it was too hot and too bitter, talking about nothing as if we had known one another all our lives, waiting for Grace. Somehow Billie knows she'll be here. Somehow people look at the little glistening goldfish girl stapled to the wall and sees Grace within her green eyes.
Everyone's red in the face from laughter and buzzing by the time Grace slips into the café. She doesn't make a scene like always. Instead, she's staring at her phone, her posé brainless zombies guiding her to the counter
Unknowing. Innocent.
But, I can see the storm, purple and angry, forming on her little face. I can see those pictures, naked like the girls on our pretend vision board, staring back at her with green eyes that belong to her. She stops breathing for a bit.
Billie notices. She smiles into the latte. It's cold and creating a brown froth mustache on her upper lip, but, somehow, Grace is the ridiculous one in this situation.
"Hello, Grace," she says, leaning back in her seat, staring at the noticeboard. There's a poison in her tone that burns my skin the way I imagine it burns Grace's skin, too.
Grace doesn't speak. Grace can't speak. Grace can't think. But, her body does. And even though she's already on everyone's social media, she rips the pictures from the noticeboard along with next week's menu and part-time job applications with a furiosity that peels back her manicured nails. There's blood where the pictures used to be. And all we can do is just stare. Billie stares, too. But, she's in awe. She's in awe of the beauty that she had created.