War Girls (The Juniper Wars Book 5) by Aaron Ritchey (find a book to read TXT) 📗

me, it was the truth. We’d both been born in the Colorado Territory and were living in America, working there illegally.

Which made us cheap and disposable.

First the name-calling, then Mary Margaret started lying about us at every turn. She’d get the cooks to send back plates that they claimed were dirty but were clean. They’d throw trash in the parking lot and blame it on Dallas Pat, saying she couldn’t sweep worth a damn.

Management, some sour woman named Parvati, would cuss us out, half in English, half in Hindi.

That afternoon, Starla was out, taking a vape, while I scrubbed a big pot encrusted with the day’s tarka dhal, a spicy lentil dish that tasted oh so good. I’d put aside a bag of leftovers for me and Pilate that night. While bigger restaurants could afford automatic dishwashers and all the delights an Eterna battery could provide, the Hurry Curry was small time and used manual labor.

The dishwashing station was a series of stainless-steel sinks, drying racks, and stacks of sour-smelling towels. While I slept in the basement apartment, those sinks were my real home. The stoves were in front of us, the storeroom behind and the door that led outside. The door to the manager’s office was off to the left.

Mary Margaret came flouncing in through the kitchen to smirk at me. “Another plate is dirty, Junie. If you can’t do your job, you need to quit and go back to shoveling manure. You did do that when you lived in the Juniper, didn’t you?”

Exhaustion coated my brain in a fine layer of angry grime. I couldn’t help but cuss her. “That and shooting skanks like you, you goddamn besharam besiya.”

A voice called from the manager’s office. “That’s enough, Cavatica. You’re done. Go home and come back when you can be polite.”

It was Parvati, sending me home.

I wanted to protest, to beg that I needed the hours and the cash, but it wouldn’t do a blessed thing. I slammed the pot into the stainless-steel sink. “Good. I have more important crapperjack to do.”

Mary Margaret smiled. “I’m sure. Yeehaw, but you’re so important.”

If that skank only knew... but the World had forgotten about the real Cavatica Weller. They preferred the stories of the Weller outlaws in the Juniper, Hereford Gold (taste the adventure!), and Lonely Moon.

I didn’t say goodbye to anyone as I grabbed my leftovers, threw on my winter clothes, and stormed out. The sun was setting, which was okay, since I’d watched her come up, but she wasn’t going to warm me any.

The day though, had been warm enough to melt some of the snow on the fields, so I trudged through half-frozen mud. I had to stop every once in a while to scrape mud off my boots. As I walked, the businesses grew thinner and the Juniper ghetto grew in a ramble of cardboard, plywood, and leftover plastic.

A few Juniper hardcases eyed me, and I eyed them right back. I wasn’t armed—too dangerous to be caught carrying a weapon now that the U.S. had passed the gun control laws—but I made sure my eyes showed them if they wanted to dance, I’d stomp their faces.

A frictionless squad car floated down a narrow lane, blowing trash away in its rush. I knew both officers, Trujillo and Suda, and they knew all of us. One wrong move, and they’d take you in. If their scans didn’t bring you up in the U.S. Identify database, you’d find yourself on the wrong side of the SISBI fence. It was a long walk from Hays to Burlington if you didn’t have the right gear.

Nice thing though, the police officers scattered the tough girls and sent them running, so I wasn’t messed with. I got inside the door, carrying my plastic bag of Hurry Curry leftovers I could microwave back to life.

Pilate was out, either at an AA meeting, or at a church, or visiting some woman.

First things first, I found a bad circuit in the space heater and got her going. Then, I pulled out my stash of Bud Light and a shooter of Jack Daniels Freeze. I ate, drank beer, and scrolled through the news feeds on the VSD TV.

A commercial broke through the feed, an advertisement I couldn’t X out of. It showed a sunrise on the plains and cattle moving slowly through the sage. Above them towered three women on horseback. Wouldn’t you know it? They all could’ve been sisters. They all could’ve been us, on our way into Wendover, triumphant and not knowing our lives were about to be tossed into the dumpster again.

And then a crash cut to a high-end restaurant and women in New Morality dresses. An old man’s voice came on to bring us home. “Hereford Gold—Taste the Adventure.” And then a list of local restaurants appeared as well as organic markets, all serving our steak, our beef, our future.

I tipped a beer can to them. At some table, on some plate, T-bone steaks from Charles Goodnight would be served to rich women who’d paid top dollar for him. Or maybe they’d be eating Betty Butter’s tenderloin. Or prime rib from Bluto. It could be any one of the cows I’d grown up loving and walking with and keeping clean and feeding. Stolen. Lost. Gone.

Using the slate attached to the VSD, I clicked on a link about Tibbs Hoyt. Seemed fair, since he was the man who’d stole our Herefords from us in Wendover, made the deal with Howerter, and collected the paycheck from Sysco.

Hoyt was holding a news conference in Washington D.C. Behind him stood the current president, Amanda Swain, a fierce thick woman with a permanent scowl on her face. Next to her stood President Jack, the ex-president, who waited with an evil grin on his wizened face. President Jack had been president for twenty years, got voted in over and over. His popularity had busted the twenty-second amendment, but everyone had agreed it was the right thing to do. He was the