Especially because my hair dye was slowly fading away. My hair was past my shoulders again. I wanted to keep my identity a secret. But I also wanted to be me again.
I grabbed two plates full of pancakes and eggs and set them down on one of the tables I was waiting. “Anything else I can get for you?”
“Nope,” the man said, without making eye contact.
It was rude. And perfect. “Enjoy.” I hurried away and looked up at the clock. Only twenty more minutes until my shift ended. I worked the breakfast shift. At first I hated it. Because it meant that I had to run in the hot summer sun in the afternoon. But now that it was fall? My schedule was perfect. The cool breeze coming off the ocean was perfect for a midday run.
I had a great routine. Wake up. Get my free breakfast included with my work. Do my shift. Run. Jump around in the freezing cold water for a bit. Head to my second job. Come back and cook while dancing alone. Then read until I fell asleep. Rinse. Repeat.
I didn’t have a phone. Or a computer. I didn’t want to be tempted to look up anything about anyone I knew. One because it would possibly lead to my dad tracking me down. And two because I didn’t want to know what anyone was up to. They were all happier without me. I didn’t need the reminder. I was slowly learning how to be happy by myself.
The last couple whose check I had to close out kept me ten minutes late. When they finally left I hurried over to the table. $2? Fuck. It didn’t matter. It was money. And I didn’t have much of it. I’d set Miller up with unlimited funds. But I hadn’t set myself up with anything at all. I’d been heading to Matt. I didn’t think I’d need any money. But that quickly changed when I found myself out here.
I pocketed my tip and unwound my apron from my waist.
“A few of us are going out for drinks tonight,” Amelia, one of the other waitresses, said. “You should come this time.”
She always offered. And I always declined. I wasn’t out here to get close to anyone else. Besides, even though my fake ID said I was 21, I wasn’t. The last thing I needed was to wind up in jail. And yet…for the first time I wanted to say yes.
I’d started smiling more recently.
I’d started feeling more like myself.
This place was supposed to be my home. How bad would it be to put down some roots? “I can’t tonight,” I said. “I have another job. But maybe another night?” I’d have to look to see when my next day off was.
“When does your other shift end?”
“Usually 8 or 9.”
“Oh. Well, that works fine. We never go out until 10 anyway. Let’s do it! Come on, it’s going to be so much fun.”
10 seemed pretty late. Especially since we all showed up here at 6 am. But…maybe it would be fun. “Sure,” I said. Even though I wasn’t sure at all.
“Did you hear that, Heidi?” She turned to her friend. “Jane wants to go out with us tonight.”
It was weird when people called me that. I’d picked the most common name possible when I got my fake ID. Jane fit the bill.
Heidi beamed at me. “Finally! Oh, there’s that new club that just opened down the street. Barracuda. We can all go together. I’ll text you the details. What’s your number?”
“I actually don’t have a cell phone,” I said.
She stared at me like I was an alien. But she quickly recovered. “That’s fine. We can just meet there. How about at 10:30?”
It was 10:30 now? God, I was going to be so tired tomorrow. But I found myself nodding. “Yeah, I’ll see you guys there.” I wasn’t sure what the hell I was doing. I’d heard about Barracuda from some patrons. Everyone seemed to think it was the new hot spot. But I kind of liked curling up in bed with a book pretty early.
Who knew though. Maybe clubbing was my new thing. I was here to try new things. To figure out what I wanted.
I waved goodbye to them and hurried back to my place. I was renting an apartment a few blocks from the beach. If you could even call it an apartment. It was practically the size of a closet. But I didn’t care. What mattered was that there was a big window that let plenty of fresh air in. No, it wasn’t the same beach air as the east coast. But it was still fresh air.
I changed into my running clothes and headed back to the beach. I started running along the sand, dodging the water that came up on the shore. One wave crashed harder than I expected and splashed my thigh. I laughed and looked over at…nothing. For a second I thought Miller was beside me and would find humor in what had just happened.
I did that sometimes. Forgot where I was. Forgot that I was alone. I tried to shake away the feeling. But it didn’t elude me that when I was happy I thought of Miller. We’d run together on the beach so much that sometimes it felt like he was here with me.
The water on my thigh made me shiver. This water was getting colder by the day. I picked up my pace. Thanksgiving was a few weeks away.
Thinking about Matt’s words from last Thanksgiving hurt less every day. I felt bad about how we’d ended. But I’d untangled the last words he’d spoken to me. I used to believe them. I used to believe I was awful.
I didn’t believe that now. I believed I made mistakes. But I was always trying my best. And he couldn’t see that. Because he never saw the best in me.
I didn’t dream about Matt as frequently now.
Slowly the pain had eased in my chest. And even though this beach was different, I think being here had helped. All alone. I looked out at the water. Yeah, the beach here definitely wasn’t the same as the one on the east coast. There were more weed shops than ice cream shops. They had it all backward here. I was an east coast girl. And yet…I stayed. I felt like I couldn’t figure out who I was without some semblance of a home. This was my home now.
But it sure felt empty.
Tonight I was trying something new though. With people I could only really classify as acquaintances. I couldn’t exactly trust anyone here. For all I knew someone was a spy for my dad or Isabella. It was honestly a little weird that I hadn’t heard from my dad. Yes, I’d had a good escape plan. But he had a lot of resources. And yet…nothing. Maybe he was happier without me around too. Everyone else seemed to be.
I wondered if Miller was happier too. Probably.
I turned my head like I’d see him running alongside me. It was like images of Miller haunted me. More and more every day.
It was strange that I thought about Matt less. And Miller more. It was probably because I didn’t need to wonder if Matt was missing me. He most certainly was not. But was Miller missing me?
Did he think about me when he went for runs? Or when he cooked? Did he even do either of those things anymore? He hadn’t exactly loved those activities before he knew me.
He was probably sitting on his dock right now, staring at the lake. It’s why I’d picked the place for him. It just looked so serene. Kind of like how the beach house felt. I looked out at the Pacific Ocean. This wasn’t nearly as serene.
I started running faster, as if I could run away from the constant Miller loop in my head. But that was the thing. People weren’t forgettable to me. I wasn’t Matt.
***
I was down on my hands and knees scrubbing the bathroom floor. My second job was as a maid. I was just as invisible cleaning as I was serving food. But I liked this job more than my first. I liked using my hands and the muscles in my arms to scrub things. I liked taking a step back and seeing the visible difference. Like I was making an actual difference, even if I was invisible.