The Little House of Paints

Chapter 10

I put a note next to the now finished grilled cheese telling my dad that I am going out and the sandwich is all his if he wants it. We basically have the same taste palettes so likely he won't turn it down.

I don't know how long Miller is in town for, but knowing my dad and their history it is best to keep the knowledge of me seeing him a secret. It is not like we are trying to elope together. We are just two friends trying to catch up.

After getting in the car, I start in the direction of The Cheesy Grin aka the new grilled cheese place. It is set up like Subway, if I remember the ad correctly. In a small town like this any kind of new restaurant opening is a big deal and being that this one isn't a huge conglomerate, my dad raved about it and sent me pictures of the ads for months. An ad that was kind of terrifying, with a huge cartoon mouth grinning with what I'm guessing was a bunch of different kinds of cheese as teeth. Without knowing what it was for, it looked more like a dentist ad, with all the discoloration and holes in the smile.

As I pull up in front of the store, it becomes apparent that they unfortunately have not changed the ad image. Maybe I should leave an anonymous comment on Yelp with the hope that someone at the company decides to see my reasoning and go back to the drawing board.

I text Miller to alert him of my arrival. The building is once more a brick exterior making it blend into all the others. That is another hold up I have with Winston, there is no difference between the looks of the stores. The insides and signs of them are different, but they all just blend together in one mass of red brick.

There was this one store a couple of years ago that tried to do black brick. Yes it was black, but it was still brick. They were forced to replace it by the city council, citing that it was an eyesore.

Looking at the time on my phone, I see that it has been five minutes and still no reply. I'm about to call him when he texts me an address with a winky face. Before I make a move to pull out of the parking lot, I text him back asking for proof that the sandwiches have been secured because I am not about to leave this parking lot empty handed.

He quickly sends back a picture of them along with a beautiful shot of his middle finger to signal to me that indeed the photo is real and not just one that he found on Google. I giggle to myself as I start to back up the car out of the parking spot. He remembered.

When Snapchat started to be a huge thing in high school, he was insistent on us both having a snap streak. The reasoning never made sense to me. It was something about him having a higher snap score or something. All I remember is that he used to send me a picture of his middle finger everyday, most likely the same photo that he would send everyone on his friend list. So, being the kind hearted person I am, I started sending him a new candid photo of my middle finger back to him everyday.

I'm about to go out of the parking lot, since unlike my dad's store The Cheesy Grin is actually in a shopping center with parking, when I realize that I actually have no idea which way to go. So parking back into a space closer to the exit, I pull up my Google Maps and put in the address.

The address doesn't immediately register in my phone, which has me double checking it. Seeing that I had indeed put it in right, I delete the numbers at the end and instead pick one of the addresses that actually comes up in that area. I will just have to look out for him when I get to the road.

Even as I leave the parking lot, I realize that this indeed does seem sketchy. But, if he wanted to do anything to me he surely has already had multiple opportunities at my house and the store.

With one freshly listened crime podcast on my brain, I park once more again and text Teagan the address. If she doesn't hear back from me in an hour then she is to call the police and tell them the last person I was with is Miller Cassidy. Since she knows everything about me, I know she remembers who he is. She even once asked me to loan her a picture of him that I had in my phone so that she could show it to some guy that wouldn't stop bothering her.