A Teeny Bit of Trouble by Michael Lee West

“How much longer can you boys wait?”
    The lobster guy frowned at his clipboard. “Fifteen minutes,” he said in a “be here or else” voice.
    “I’ll find Emerson,” Coop said. “Red, give me your keys.”
    Red handed him a key chain. Coop kissed my cheek and ran out the door. Lester sighed and lifted a box. “He’s not a hero. He’s just stupid.”
    I couldn’t hold back another second. “You’re more concerned about a hemorrhoid display than your missing daughter.”
    “Go ahead, cut me down. But I’m a decent person. I’m not having a ménage à trois at a peach farm. Like some people.”
    In the rear of the pharmacy, a door opened, showing a glimpse of a stock room, the shelves overflowing with Halloween merchandise. Plastic pumpkins, costumes, and fake tombstones. A petite girl with spiked black hair stepped through the door. She had pale, freckled skin, the kind that burned and never tanned. Pinned to her shirt was a plastic name tag: KENDALL MCCORMACK, CASHIER . The last time I’d seen her, she’d been Emerson’s age. I’d been her babysitter. Now Kendall had D-cup breasts and a frog tattoo on her right arm.
    “Reach me that box,” Lester said, snapping his fingers at her.
    “Why, I’d be happy to.” She stepped in front of him and leaned over, giving him a full view of her black thong.
    “I ain’t sticking around for this sideshow,” Red whispered in my ear. “Let’s me and you take a quick look around the building. The kid can’t have gotten far.”
    But Kendall had overheard us. She straightened up, then she plucked a vinyl poncho from the shelf and handed it to me. “I’d hate for you to get wet, Teeny.”
    “Don’t I get one, too?” Red asked.
    She ignored him and leaned over, giving Lester another X-rated view. Red marched out of the store. I pulled on the rain gear and ran after him.
    “Good luck,” Lester called in a snotty voice. “You’ll need it.”
    Red and I passed a shoe store. The rain blew sideways, flattening the azaleas and banana trees. Traffic had pulled off to the side of Pennsylvania Avenue. We rushed between the cars, our shoes filling with water. We crossed over to Rowan Street and gazed toward the bridge, where muddy water churned around the steel pilings.
    I grabbed Red’s arm and my fingers slid down his damp flesh. “You don’t think she fell into the river?”
    “Nah, she’s hiding somewhere.” He wiped his palm over the glass dial of his watch. “We got thirteen minutes to find her. Then the DNA guys will leave.”
    We slogged past the bridge and headed down Hyacinth Avenue, past Dickens’s Books, where the store’s cat, Pip, stared out the rain speckled window.
    “We need a freaking Amber Alert,” Red said.
    I thought of the river again, and I let out a pre-asthma hitch. I’d left my pocketbook on the counter, and my inhaler was tucked inside. But I’d lose precious time if I ran back to the pharmacy. I drew in a mouthful of watery air and forced it down my throat.
    Red tugged the edge of my poncho. “You need your inhaler. Let’s head back.”
    “No, let’s keep going.”
    “She don’t even like you.”
    “But I like her .”
    “No, you pity her.”
    “Her mother’s dead. Her legal father is an asshole. And, she might be Coop’s child.”
    Red scraped his hand over his face, flinging off water. “But she ain’t yours.”
    I reeled backward. If he’d slapped me, I couldn’t have been more hurt. “No, she isn’t. But I know how it feels to be alone.”
    “Oh, I get it,” he said. “You’re identifying with the kid. She’s motherless. Just like you.”
    I shook my head. He didn’t understand the first thing about me. I did want children, a child army, and I didn’t care if they were bios or adopted.
    “I’ve made peace with my mama,” I said. “I’m just trying to find Emerson before she drowns.”
    “You’re setting yourself up for heartache. What will you do if she’s Philpot’s kid? He won’t let