“Then I’ll bring you a salad,” I said.

“I don’t do lettuce or dressing.”

I gave her an are you fucking kidding me look, but she was too busy posing to notice.

“I’ll be back,” I called to Dad. He gave me a sigh when I tossed the reflector disc on the ground, but simply went back to clicking the shutter on Marisol.

Starvation wasn’t the only reason I was dead set on getting some food right away. The other reason was that the alleyway Dad had chosen for Marisol’s backdrop by happenstance was across the street from Morning Glory, a peace-and-love-style café. I had seen two people who I was pretty sure were Vee and Gibson, two members of Peyton’s band, haul all their crap inside. I hadn’t seen them for months, but I would recognize Vee anywhere. She kind of stood out.

I jogged across the street and into Morning Glory.

“Can I help you?” a woman behind the counter asked the second I stepped foot in the door.

“Uh, yeah,” I mumbled. “Three coffees and three turkeys on rye. To go.” Screw Marisol and her white food. My eyes landed on a display of cookies the size of cake plates. I grabbed three of them and placed them on the counter. “And these.” Hopefully—and likely—Marisol didn’t eat sugar, either, and I would be forced to eat hers and mine both.

The woman rang up my order, and then slipped on some gloves and turned to make the sandwiches.

I took the opportunity to mosey over to the back corner, where Vee and Gib were setting up. Gib was tuning his guitar, sitting on a stool with his ear bent so close it was practically touching the wood, and Vee was plugging in a microphone. Her hair had been cut—shaved on one side and left long on the other, coming to a point at her chin. Not for the first time, I wished I could pull off the looks that Vee rocked. That was the kind of person she was, though. Not me. I didn’t actually know what kind of person I was. Which was maybe why I had no look.

“No bass?” I asked. Her head whipped up. It seemed to take a second for her to place me, but then she smiled.

“Nikki, long time no see.” Ever since Peyton died, Vee had tried to forge some sort of bond with me. I was the only one who cared about Peyton as much as she did, which was weird since Peyton and I never actually spoke to each other out loud in her lifetime. And sometimes I wondered if Vee ever gave any thought to why I cared so much about Peyton. But somehow she just seemed to get it. I think she figured keeping me around was one way to keep Peyton alive.