She Loves You, She Loves You Not... (7 page)

I lay in bed for hours, wishing I could be what he wanted me to be.

Now I only wish he’d accept me for what I am.

I turn off the TV, slide on my flip-flops, and snag the keys to the Mercedes. The only restaurant in town is the Egg Drop-In.

It’s packed. The aroma of coffee and pancakes and fried potatoes makes my mouth water. Arlo spots me through the
order window and motions me over. “You still interested in the job?”

“Yeah!”

Arlo says, “Help Finn with the rush.”

I see Finn taking an order at a table and, as I make my way over there, some guy whistles at me. Gag. Finn whirls and almost knocks me down. She snags my arm to catch me, and it tingles all the way down to my toes.

“What can I do to help?” I ask her.

“With what?” she says.

“I think I’ve been hired.” I smile.

Her eyes narrow over my shoulder, shooting daggers at Arlo. I think,
Get over it.
I need this job to save my sanity—or find it again. I can’t spend one more day alone in that empty house. The bell on the front door jingles, and a group of people dressed in scrubs enter. Finn pulls off the damp towel she has draped over her shoulder and dangles it at me. “Bus the eight top.” I take the rag, and she takes off.

“Wait!”

She hurries to the customers at the door and tells them it’ll just be a minute.

What’s an eight top? There are two empty tables. One is small, meant for two people, and the other is big and round. I’m guessing that’s the eight top. I have no idea where to begin. I stack the dirty dishes, along with the silverware, cups, napkins, and syrup, but I know I’ll never make it to the kitchen without dropping something. I set down the wobbly stack and disassemble, rearrange with only the plates and cups, but one of the cups tips, and coffee dribbles down my front.

The Scrubs circle the table, and I say, “I’ll have it ready for you in a sec.”

Finn shows up to help, thank God. She sets a gray plastic tub on one of the chairs and, with lightning speed, clears the table. Pulling the towel off my shoulder, she swabs the plastic tablecloth clean.

She might’ve told me about the tub for dirty dishes.

One of the women is staring at me; she has been since she arrived. What? I know I have coffee and syrup all over me. I’m clueless about waitressing, okay?

“You’re Carly’s girl.”

My jaw clenches. I don’t want to acknowledge it because I don’t need to be dissed in front of a whole restaurant full of people. “I heard about you, but I didn’t believe it. You must be a huge comfort to Carly.”

A comfort? More like an inconvenience.

The nurse, or whatever she is, says to her male friend, “This is Carly’s daughter.”

The guy’s eyes widen. Before he can say anything, Finn shoves the tub at me. “Bus table one, then the counter.”

I stumble backward, my flip-flops sticking to the floor where someone spilled syrup. I almost fall on my ass, but Finn catches me. She smirks, like it’s so funny. She pulls wrapped silverware out of thin air and sets the big table while I manage to clear the small one by the window in under a year.

At the counter, this guy wads his napkin and sets it atop his leftover fried potatoes. They look awesome. I’m starving. As he’s pulling out his wallet, Finn swings by the counter and
says under her breath, “We need a new pot of coffee. Can you make coffee?”

I click my tongue, like
If I knew where the coffee was, yeah, maybe
.

There’s nowhere to set the tub, and it’s heavy. I swing around, and Finn relieves me of the tub and then backs through the swinging doors into the kitchen.

“Thanks a bunch.” The customer lays a five-dollar bill on top of the dirty dishes and winks at me.

Finn snatches up the tip. Where’d she come from?

“Oh, hey, why don’t you take it?” I say.

She stacks his cup and silverware on the plate and sets them in a new tub.

“You could at least show me what to do,” I snap. Everything’s moving so fast and I don’t know how to make coffee and now I feel tears welling and I try to swallow them.

Finn blinks at me, and it’s like she ratchets down. “I’m sorry,” she says under her breath. “It’s just… I need the money.”

I wasn’t even thinking about the money, really. She waited on the guy; she earned the tip.

Finn gazes so deep into my eyes, I swear she sees the center of the earth. She says, “I’ll make the coffee and show you how later, okay? Just brush all the crumbs on the counter into the bus tub.” She pulls the towel off my shoulder and adds, “Swab the counter and chairs. We can sweep up the crap on the floor later, unless some little kid dumps his whole plate, which happens. The napkins are there.” She points to another tub under the counter, full of silverware bundled in paper napkins. She’s woven a leather thong with a feather on the end through her braid today. So cool.

A
clang
sounds in the kitchen, and Arlo curses loudly enough for everyone to hear. He shouts, “Orders up, goddammit!”

Finn rolls her eyes at me. “How desperate are you? Because working for Arlo…”

“On a scale of one to ten? Eleven.”

She stands there a minute, searching my face. I feel it getting warmer and warmer.

Arlo shouts, “I got two waitresses, and they’re both deaf as doornails!”

Finn says, “Pretend you don’t hear him.”

“Hear who?” I say.

She grins. I amused Finn. I quash the urge to feel happy about that.

On the way home, I can’t stop smiling because I did it. I got a job. I lasted through the rush, and not once did I think about…

Damn. Dammit.

Get out of my head, both of you. All of you.

I’d never been grounded. I was the good girl, Daddy’s little girl. Perfect in every way.

“When I’m grounded, I can have friends over, at least,” Ben said. “Your dad doesn’t expect Romeo and Juliet to actually be kept apart, does he? Make that Juliet and Juliet.”

We were in Ben’s VW before school, Sarah and me in the backseat grabbing a few minutes of togetherness before school. It was cold, and Ben had the heater running. Sarah was kissing my neck and nibbling my ear, and the windows were steaming up.

She said, “Ask, okay? I can’t stand not being with you.”

I did everything Sarah wanted me to do. Not once did I say no. Maybe she saw that as weakness. I asked Tanith about having friends over, and she said, “I’ll have to ask your dad.”

Because it was always what
he
wanted, what
he
said.

What
Sarah
wanted,
she
got.

Dad said yes. I was shocked. “I’d rather Ben comes here than have you sneaking out behind my back. So, yes, Ben can come over.” That was Dad’s rationale.

Little did he know how long I’d been deceiving him.

The climb up to Carly’s house is heart attack hill. It’s not paved, and my feet hurt, and I feel light-headed from dehydration. If I’m going to be walking to work, I need to pack bottled water and get better shoes.

I can tell by the stillness in the house that Carly’s not home, or she’s sleeping. I creep up the stairs to her room and find it empty, her bed made. A pile of clothes lies on the floor, as if she changed in a hurry.

All I want is a shower. But the whirlpool looks inviting, and I have all the time in the world.

As I’m running a cool bubble bath, I return to the main level and pour myself a Milk of Amnesia. On the rocks. I think,
This is how the bold and the beautiful live.

I take the drink upstairs, set it on the rim of the tub, strip, and slither in up to my chin. Heaven. The first gulp of my drink slides down my parched throat like silk.

The Baileys reminds me of eggnog. And Christmas.

I remember, they all burst on the scene—Ben and Sarah and M’Chelle. It was Saturday, and Tanith was baking cookies
for Paulie’s cookie exchange at school. “Oh my God,” Ben said. “It smells amazing in here.” He walked right past me and into the kitchen. M’Chelle and Sarah lagged behind. Then it was just Sarah. She took my hand and squeezed it.

Dad emerged from his home office, and I pulled away from Sarah fast.

“Hi,” she said to him. I freaked, but she smiled and introduced herself. She still had her braces, and her hair was longer, French braided. It made her look even younger than she was.

We all ended up in the kitchen, where I introduced Dad to M’Chelle and Ben. Which was stupid because he knew Ben. Dad snagged a couple of thumbprint cookies from the counter, and Tanith fake-slapped his hand. He winked at me and left.

Paulie and I had been assembling a gingerbread house, and Ben said, “Ooh, let me help with the landscape design.”

M’Chelle and I rolled our eyes. So gay. Ben sure knew how to turn it on and off.

Sarah said, “Wasn’t there something in your room you wanted to show me?”

Tanith was watching and I hesitated, but Sarah caught my sweater and yanked me back out of the kitchen. “Show me your room,” she said in a sexy voice, batting those baby blues at me.

It seemed safe enough. I led her upstairs, where she shut the door and pulled me into her. Kissed me so long and hard, my lips swelled. Then her hands were under my shirt and…

God.

I punch on the jets in the whirlpool and slide down.

… She unhooked my bra…

“Sarah…”

“I miss you so much.”

“Me too.”

“How much longer do we have to be apart?”

“I don’t know.”

She said, “I can’t stand it. I just want to be out. I hate hiding and lying about what I am. About us. I want to be together.” She tried to pull my shirt over my head, but I stopped her.

“We can’t. Not here.”

She ran her hand between my legs….

I drop my head back and feel the power of the jets. Her power over me.

She got her way. She always got her way, and I gave it to her. I gave myself willingly, Sarah. And you took and took until there was nothing left of me to take.

Christmas

You and Sarah bought each other initial necklaces, hers with an
A,
yours with an
S
. You exchanged presents in the shed by clasping the necklaces around each other’s necks before making slow, passionate love.

You weren’t looking forward to winter break, because Sarah was going to her aunt and uncle’s home in Philadelphia.

Now you wonder if she really went. If she was lying to you even then.

But she called you every night. She said how much she missed you. She must’ve gone.

There was no sign of any change in your relationship. Sarah ended
your conversations with a whispered, “I love you so much, Alyssa. I wish we could be together.”

“We are together,” you told her. “Distance can’t keep us apart.”

Distance wasn’t your undoing.

But then Sarah didn’t call the day she got back from Philadelphia. The day she told you she’d be home. You called her cell. No answer. She had a habit of letting the battery die or forgetting her phone. You called her home. No answer. You didn’t leave a message.

Paulie was bugging you. “One more game of Guitar Hero?”

You barked at him, “No! Leave me alone.”

He slumped on the floor and pouted. You felt bad about taking it out on him. You’d been grouchy the whole Christmas break. “You play,” you told him. “I’ll watch.”

“But you’re spazzier,” he said.

You struck a spaz pose, and he outdid you with his twisted limbs. It made you laugh and feel better. Paulie was—
is—
an awesome brother.

You lay on the sofa, calling Sarah again. No answer. Paulie set up Transformers on his Xbox instead. He talked to himself while he played video games. While he did homework too. Sometimes at night you’d hear him talking to himself in bed. What a weird kid.

Or a lonely kid.

You were crazy with pent-up energy and anxiety. You threw the cell down, jumped up, and attacked your brother, sitting on him and tickling him until he screamed.

You ended up spazzing out to Guitar Hero anyway.

The next day, New Year’s Eve, you called Sarah the minute you woke up. Her cell went to voice mail. Same with her home phone. You tried all day long.

Even though it was sleeting and bitter cold, you rode your bike to
her house. Cars were parked in the driveway, and the Christmas tree lights were on. You just sat out in the cold because you couldn’t work up the nerve to go ring the bell.

You rode back home.

Right before midnight, Sarah finally answered her cell. “I can’t talk to you,” she said in a hoarse voice. She sounded like she’d been crying.

“Sarah, what?” you asked. “What’s the matter?”

“I can’t! Okay?” She hung up.

It hit you. She’d done it. She’d come out to her parents.

I set my alarm for five, not really sure what time I should be at the Egg Drop-In to start work. Arlo’d just grumbled, “Be here tomorrow. And for God’s sake, speed the plow.” I guess he noticed I was a little slow. Today I was going to wow him.

Traces of cigarette smoke and perfume hang in the air, so I know Carly’s been home. I sneak down the hall and see a lump in her bed. I think to leave her a note that says,
How does it feel to get up and find
me
gone?
Instead, I write,
Got a job in town
.

The bell tinkles over the Egg Drop door when I walk in a little before six. The joint, as they say, is jumping.

“Look out,” Finn says. “He’s in a mood.”

Worse than usual?

Dishes and pans clang in the kitchen, and then something metal hits the wall.

I grimace. She hustles toward the counter, saying over her shoulder, “You’ll need to get here by five, at the latest.”

Five
AM
? Finn’s eyes are bloodshot, and her hair is kind of messy. As she hands me an order pad, I say, “Rough night?”

She sets a cup on a serving tray, along with a plated croissant, and balances the tray on her palm. Arlo yells out the order window, “Is Sleeping Beauty in yet?”