#21 of 100 Stories

Even Atlas Cannot Handle the Weight of What One Should Not Know

More beans spilled

What the hell… again…, halos when my head follows Kiera’s.

I use my peripheral to observe Kiera’s jaw nosh and gnaw but wait three whims before directing my gaze where my words must fall -due north.

I tread forth with, “Maybe this is not the conversation to have with me.”

“Yeah…, you have that correct,” whines Kirra when she rubbernecks.

She bats her eyes, hooded with falsies suited for the evening, and adds, “Marcia,” then swallows but doesn’t utter another word.

“Listen, I do not want the weight of what is not my business,” I start but realization harder than moissanite slams my mouth shut like a bank vault at the end of the business day.

Kiera nods, slowly and profusely.

Her almond eyes convey what may have been apparent, if I too, lived under Marcia’s roof.

“I am not the problem,” snakes from her mouth with the stealth typically reserved for military artillery.

“And you should stop pretending,” she adds.

My throat releases a gale of oxygen, and I rock further into my seat, perhaps to amplify guilt or Kiera’s insistence; either way, I feel exposed.

“Kiera, I had no idea,” she mocks using a pitch so like my own, I almost offer her a round of applause.

“Jocelyn, tell me truly,” she teases after peeking around the thinning crowd.

“Kiera,” I embark above a whisper.

She leans forward with the speed of a cobra, then advises, “Joselyn, if my best friend’s brother helped me start a business, and my husband helps me lose it, I would not tell the truth either.”