Peeking out from the galley, I check out my newest table, only to have my stomach drop to the floor in the worst way possible.
Myles.
Fucking Myles is sitting at table eleven, thumbing through his phone and trying to nonchalantly scan the room in search of me.
“You know him?” Rachael asks.
Exhaling, I shake my head. “Unfortunately.”
“Why do you say that? He looks cute … like in a nerdy, endearing kind of way.” Rachael takes him in from afar. “I like his glasses.”
“It’s a story for another time.” I load the waters on a tray and head out, and when I’m finished, I hold my head high and make my way to table eleven. “Myles. Good morning.”
He places his phone face down on the table and smiles wide when he sees me. “Maritza.”
“Can I get you something to drink?” I ask, trying to keep this formal and impersonal. The night after we slept together, which has been weeks ago now, he called me.
And then he called me the next day.
And the next day.
His calls tapered off over the course of a couple of weeks until they stopped completely and I found relief in the fact that he seemed to be getting the hint all over again.
“Been trying to get a hold of you for weeks,” he says, voice low as he smiles through his bruised ego.
Wincing, I release a slow breath. “I’m so sorry.”
Looking at him with his pitiful expression and his puppy dog eyes and falling smile, I feel like a giant piece of shit. I should’ve been an adult and told him right away that I wasn’t feeling … this … instead I ignored him because I didn’t want to hurt him—which only hurt him anyway. Faulty logic. Completely my fault.
“I shouldn’t have brushed you off,” I say, placing my hand over my heart. And I mean it. I feel awful. I knew he liked me, I slept with him which probably got his hopes up, and I ghosted him. “But I think we should just be friends.”
He removes his disheartened gaze from mine, staring across the booth at the empty spot. His fingers tap on the table and he shifts in his seat.
“Myles, I’m so sorry,” I say again. This isn’t one of my finer moments, but I’m willing to accept full responsibility that I screwed this up and hurt him. At the time, the drinks were flowing and we were laughing and all I kept thinking about was how badly I needed a quick release and how sex is just sex … but in my drunken stupor, I didn’t stop to think that Myles and I weren’t on the same page with that.
He folds his menu and shoves it across his table, exhaling hard. “Right. Heard you the first time.”
“Maybe we can talk about this another time?” I ask, glancing at the man at the next table who’s been trying to flag me down for the last minute. “When I’m not working?”
Myles’ mouth presses flat.
“Sounds pretty pointless.” Sliding out of his seat, he squares his body with mine, his expensive cologne invading my personal space. “Guess I’ll see you around.”
He leaves.
I feel like shit.
Brushing my proverbial shoulders off, I check on the table behind him, refilling a man’s coffee before returning to the galley.
“What was up with that?” Rachael asks, pouring an orange juice. “Why’d he leave?”
Drawing in a deep breath, I check the clock. “He’s had a thing for me for a while. We slept together a few weeks ago and then I ghosted.”
Her red lips form a crooked smirk. “You’re so bad.”
“I’m not bad. I’m cruel.”
“Nah. You’re not cruel, you’re just being too hard on yourself. Men do that crap all the time. We do it once and we beat ourselves up about it for days,” she says. “Let it go, sweets. He’ll move on. They always do. And let’s not dismiss the fact that you ignored him and he had the nerve to show up at your work to get your attention. Something’s not right about him so don’t go kicking yourself, all right? You didn’t handle the situation perfectly, but neither did he. See? You’re even.”
Sighing, I say, “I love you, Rach.”
“Love you too, Ritz.” Rach gives me a side hug before grabbing the OJ and heading out to table seven.
The rest of the morning is a blur, which turns out to be a good thing. We’re hit with our usual eight o’clock rush followed by a sightseeing tour bus full of retirees who traveled all the way from Reno to get their hands on our famous cinnamon pancakes.
By mid-afternoon, I’m back home with aching feet and a yawn that won’t stop. I’m halfway to becoming an actual vegetable on the sofa when Melrose texts me and asks me to walk Murphy.
Peeling my faux zebra-skin blanket off my legs, I climb up and call for the world’s most pampered pug before grabbing his leash by the door. The click-clack of his paws on the tile and the jingle of his collar follows and a second later he’s attempting to jump into my arms. I hook him up and head out, passing by the mailbox once I’m outside the driveway gate.
Stopping, I reach my hand inside and retrieve a small stack of junk, bills, and Melrose’s newest issue of Vogue.
Murphy relieves himself on a nearby palm tree.
Life goes on.
Twenty-Four
Isaiah
* * *
I almost died today. Granted, that risk is always a given when I’m out here in the land of air strikes, land mines, and suicide bombers, but this was different. Fourteen of my men were injured today. On my watch, no less.
But one of us, Private Nathaniel Jansson, paid the ultimate price.
War doesn’t care how old you are, how brave you are. War doesn’t care how hard you work or how much you love your country. War doesn’t care that you’ve got a woman back home waiting for you or that you’re months away from becoming a father for the first time.
It could have been any of us, but today it was Jansson.
While he was young and green, he was going to be one of the best. I knew it. I saw it in him. He may have been new but he had a fire in his eyes and a dedication like none I’ve ever seen before, and now he’s leaving behind a child that will only ever hear how brave and heroic their father was through secondhand stories.
My ears are still ringing and there’s no time to sit around and process what just happened. We hadn’t been back from our mission to the Syrian border but half a day when we found our base under siege. The flash of lights that preceded the deafening explosions and the sounds of men crying out in the dark will haunt my nightmares the rest of my life, but the strangest thing happened.
In the midst of all the chaos, when I wasn’t focused on sheer fucking survival, I found myself thinking about her.
Maritza.
Coming this close to death does something to a man, it forces him to reevaluate his priorities and the things in life that he truly wants, forces him to question if the kind of life he’s living has any sort of meaning at all or if he’s just drifting through life like a fool believing his own lies—that he’s happy alone, that he’s never going to want anyone else for longer than a drunken night in a hotel room.
But I’m done lying to myself.
I want meaning.