August peered into the screen on his cell phone and reread the text message for the third time.
"Hey, its Augie, can you please give me your friend Sonrisa's cell phone number? I need to let her know something. She stopped by the store earlier. Thanks."
August had revised the message a couple times. During the last revision he decided to add "it's Augie" fearing that Charlene wouldn't have his number and would ignore the text message completely. He also hated the fact that he had to use the name Augie - the nickname his family had bestowed up him - because it might not even to register to her if he simply put August.
"What are you doing? Who are you texting?" Merriam asked him between bites of her scrambled eggs. After closing up the comic store August, Elvis and Merriam had decided to go and get something to eat. They settled on First Stop Cafe. The was a favored local hang out for many of the college students who would often stay into the morning hours with cups of coffee pouring over their notes and text books. Since only the summer session was on going, the First Stop Cafe had less traffic that evening than usual.
August inverted his cell phone subconsciously as if he felt guilty of some crime. Or was it more from embarrassment. It wasn't a big deal, he said to himself, but then why was he afraid to tell his friends what he was up to.
"Oh leave him be," Elvis said before shoveling a triangular stack of pancakes into his mouth. "He's probably trying to get a hold of Sonrisa," a few bits of syrup laden pancake flew out of Elvis's mouth as he spoke with a full mouth. Merriam scruntched her face in disgust but Elvis apparently did not notice her and proceeded to spear a greasy sliver of burnt bacon.
"That's right, I was just sending a text to my cousin Charlene," August admitted, "She's a friend of Sonrisa's".
Merriam shrugged at August's admission and turned her attention back to her eggs. Maybe I'm the only one making this a bigger deal than it is, he pondered. He glanced over to Merriam, the hair from her black bangs had swung to partially cover her left eye which was heavily covered with dark blue eyeliner. She idley swept her hair away with her left hand and tucked it neatly behind her ear. August watched her carefully sweep her fork under a pile of light yellow scrambled eggs, with the fork in place Merriam picked up a ketchup bottle and gently squeezed out a few dallops of the bright red sauce.
"I can't believe you eat ketchup with everything," August said more to himself. Merriam looked up at him and gave a big smile as she heartily ate the ketchup soaked eggs. She let out a contented sigh, knowning that August harbored a distaste of ketchup. August could never pinpoint where his dislike of ketchup had evovled from, he just knew he did not like the normally very popular condiment.
"So did you text your cousin? I'm sure Sonrisa will want to come by and get that package." Elvis stated, though his attention was clearly more focused on his pancakes. With his two companions busy eating again August turned back to his cell phone. He looked at the message on last time then pressed the send button. He watched the small bar on the screen slide from left to right indicating the progress of his query.
August imagined his words turning into small peices of electronic signals that would quickly be beamed to Charlene's cell phone. Some odd questions rolled through August's mind after the message sent indicator flashed onto the cellphone's screen. Will Charlene think I'm stalking her friend? Will she even give me Risa's number? Why do I even care what Charlene thinks? Will she even reply back to my text?
August pushed a gaunt sausage link across his plate with his fork. He shook his head and sighed. He could not help thinking about the package and the sickening feeling he had after he dropped it and heard the sound of something breaking.
He had wanted to open up the package to see what had broken and to see if he could repair it. Elvis shouted his support of this plan, though his motives were solely based more on the morbid curiosity of the mysterious package addressed to a lost child rather than a desire to correct any damage done. August had begun to reach for a pair of scissors to open the box before he yeilded to Merriam's better reason. She insisted that charge of federal mail fraud probably wasn't worth any amount of yelling Risa may unleash. August wasn't too sure about that.
Nevertheless, he relented and stored the packages under the counter below the cash register and then locked up the store.
The remaineder of their late evening meal proceeded without further incident, mostly conversations about the findings of Merriams latest observational studies. Even efter they finished their food Elvis still had the ability to polish off an entire piece of First Stop Cafe's reknown peach cobbler pie.
It was not until August was well on his drive home that he got what he was waiting for. The cellphone in his pocket vibrated and he took a hand off of the car's steering wheel to take a look. Clicking on the "view message" button he had gotten a reply from his cousin. August shook his head and sighed as he read the message.
It read: "Don't be weird. I can't just give you her number. Call me tomorrow."
