“I’d love the help, believe me. But I’m not really supposed to make decisions without checking with my dad first.”
Wow. That sounded familiar.
The girl behind the counter at the Little Tree Diner—Fiona, if her name tag was to be trusted—looked like she’d just been through finals. Twice. Her stringy blond hair fell out of what might once have been a neat bun but now looked more like something dug out of a bath drain. She had purple splotches under her eyes, her skin was dry, and her gaze darted around the busy room like she was waiting for it to explode.
“Well . . . is your dad coming in soon?” I asked.
“Not until tonight.”
“Miss?” someone shouted. “Miss! I need more butter!”
“Miss? This burger is undercooked.”
“I ordered chicken parm, not chicken piccata.”
“Fiona? A little help over here?” a busboy asked.
Fiona’s small shoulders slumped. “Can you start right now?”
“You’re serious?” I asked.
“I mean, I can’t guarantee you’ll get a full-time position, but we’re understaffed today . . . clearly,” she replied, wiping her hands on her black waist-apron. “Jason, can you please get the butter and fix those mixed-up orders while I talk to . . .”
She looked at me for a name.
“Lia,” I said. “Lia Washington.”
It sounded perfectly natural rolling off my tongue. I’m sure my proud smile confused her.
“Nice to meet you, Lia. I’m Fiona Taylor,” she replied.
Jason scurried off to do as she’d asked, and Fiona started bussing.
“I’ve got one girl who called in sick, one who helpfully texted an hour ago to tell me she landed a contract in Nashville and isn’t coming back, and my dumbass brother is forty-five minutes late,” she explained. “I’ll pay you out of my own wages if I have to.”
She looked up at me and her skin went blotchy. “Sorry. I don’t usually swear.”
Had she sworn? I hadn’t noticed. I was too busy hoping my butt off that this would turn into a real job somehow. “Oh, it’s okay. Don’t worry about it.”
“Can you wait tables?” she asked. “Do you have any experience?”
“Yes!” I said. “I waited tables at my school back . . . at school.”
Terrified that I’d almost blurted out a biographical detail, I looked away and reached up to tuck my hair behind my ear. Except my hair wasn’t there anymore. This Lia Washington person—her background, her look, her life—was going to take some getting used to. I caught my reflection in the foggy mirrored wall behind the counter. My hair was all but shaved in the back and around my ears. Daria had kept it slightly longer on top, so that a few stray curls fell over my forehead, but those curls were now blond. I looked nothing like myself. But damn. It turned out I had some serious cheekbones. At least that’s what Daria had told me.
I’d also stepped into Daria’s bathroom and popped out my contacts, replacing them with my rectangular tortoiseshell glasses. The more disguise, the better. I felt like I looked older—more sophisticated—this way. I wondered what that cowboy from the alley would think if he saw me now. Not that it mattered. Was that really how you wanted to meet someone? When he was busy crawling out some other girl’s window? I shouldn’t have been thinking about romance anyway. I had enough on my plate. Like securing a job and a home and making my new identity stick.
“You sure? ’Cause we get pretty busy around here,” Fiona said, walking along behind the counter with the bussing bin, tossing used plates and cups in at random. “You gotta be quick on your feet.”
“Pretty busy” was an understatement. We were standing smack-dab in the middle of the lunch rush, and every booth, table, and stool in the small L-shaped restaurant was taken. There were kids on their lunch break from school, a pack of guys probably from the nearby college taking up two eight-tops near the back, and some business lunches, too. Not that I was surprised. If the scent of the burgers and the thickness of the shakes were any indication, this place deserved its popularity.
“I can do it, I swear,” I said as I kept pace with her across the counter.
One of the more random and controversial policies at the Worthington School was that each semester every student had to hold down a different campus job. The kids of the very wealthy and very connected would take on blue-collar tasks like sweeping the gym and cutting the lawns and, yes, waiting tables at the school café. Parents were always up in arms about it, and a lot of students complained, but I secretly liked it. It was nice to get out of my single room and be around other people, to be active. And waiting tables had been my favorite. Aside from my few casual friends, I barely ever interacted with my fellow students unless they were paying me to do their work—about the only thing I’d ever done wrong until yesterday. At the café I’d had a couple of actual conversations about things unrelated to school. Music, movies, books, life. It was like Mardi Gras. As if I’d ever experienced Mardi Gras.
“All right, then. You can stash your stuff in the back, wash your hands, and grab an apron. I’ll give you a four-hour trial, and if you pass, you can meet my dad, Hal. He’s the owner.”
“Cool. Thank you for the opportunity.”
I barely kept a straight face. It was all I could do to stop myself from turning a cartwheel in the middle of the diner. Fiona’s bin was overflowing by now, and at the end of the counter were three half-full glasses of soda.
“Here. I’ll get those,” I offered, giddy. I was employed! I wasn’t going to go broke! I could buy clothes! Maybe I’d even get my ears pierced so I could wear dangling earrings and my neck wouldn’t feel so naked without my hair brushing against it. Pierced ears. My mom would die.
I pressed the three glasses between my fingers, holding them the way I’d done a million times at the café and, yes, showing off a bit. When I turned around to head for the kitchen, the front door opened, and a guy with dark hair wearing some kind of sports uniform caked in sweat came flying through.
“Sorry, I’m late, Fi!” he said with a grin, planting a kiss on the top of her head. “But we won!”
“I’m so happy,” Fiona said flatly. “Now go wash up before I murder you.”
He laughed, a carefree, booming sound that resounded inside my chest, and then he looked me up and down. This guy was undeniably handsome in a compact, muscular, boyish sort of way. He was maybe two inches shorter than me, but the sheer energy coming off of him made him feel a foot taller.
“How’s it going? Duncan Taylor. I’m Fiona’s cooler twin.”
He stretched a hand out to me, but mine were currently full. Still, I made some sort of move. I don’t know if it was a nod or a curtsy or somewhere in between, but my backpack slid heavily off my shoulder and yanked down on my elbow, sending me sideways. I let out a curse as all three glasses slid from my grasp. One hit the floor and smashed into a million pieces, showering the legs of the patrons at a nearby table. The other two fell into the lap of a girl who screeched so sharply I was shocked she didn’t shatter even more glass.
The diner went silent. The girl, who was Asian and about my age, with perfectly olive skin and long black hair that skimmed her tiny butt, looked up at me, her chest heaving. She plucked the two glasses out of her lap with her fingertips and deposited them on her table. The soda had puddled in the folds of her white sundress along with a few ice cubes. A constellation of brown spots decorated her chest. Her almost black eyes were homicidal.
Duncan spluttered a laugh.
“What the hell?” the girl spat.
Her three friends, who had gone unscathed, seemed frozen in terror.
“I’m so sorry!” I blurted. “My backpack fell . . . and I . . . I’m so—”
“Do you even work here?” she shouted, her arms out at her sides, palms up, as if waiting for someone to come towel her off. “Duncan!” she cried accusingly.
“Sorry. Sorry, Shelby.” He reached over the counter to grab a towel for her, struggling to keep from cracking up all over again.
I looked hesitantly over my shoulder at Fiona, expecting her to throw me out like a stray dog off the street. Four seconds into my four-hour trial and I was done.
But instead Fiona pressed her lips together and lifted her chin at Shelby. It took some obvious effort, like me talking back to my mother had, and I felt oddly proud of her, considering we’d just met.
“Yes. She does.” Her eyes fixed on me. “Lia, would you please run to the back and get a mop and dustpan? And you can change into a Little Tree souvenir T-shirt, too. They’re on the shelf in the staff room. We all wear ’em.”
Swallowing hard, I grabbed my backpack and ran, shooting Fiona a grateful glance.
“What about me?” I heard the girl wail as I rounded the counter toward the kitchen door.
“Well, Shelby,” Fiona said, sounding tired, “I suggest you go home and get yourself changed. But don’t forget to pay at the register on your way out.”
* * *
My four-hour trial turned into an eight-hour shift. At ten p.m., when Fiona and Duncan’s father finally arrived, bringing a new team of waitresses with him, the three of us were sitting at the end of the counter slumped over sweating glasses of sweet tea.
“So, Lia, where’re you from?” Duncan asked.
“Florida,” I replied automatically. It was, after all, where Lia Washington had been born. Sort of.
“So . . . this place is open till midnight every night?” I asked, changing the subject.
At the moment there were only three tables with patrons, and they all had their food. I knew that I should get up and make sure they had everything they needed, but I’d barely slept in the last day, and every muscle in my body ached. Plus it was slowly settling in that I’d taken a job when I had no clue how much it paid, that I had no place to sleep tonight, and that the only thing I’d eaten since that awful granola bar was a half a burger I’d scarfed during my fifteen-minute dinner break.
“Yep,” Fiona said. She brought her tea to her lips but couldn’t seem to catch the straw, chasing it around with her mouth popping like a guppy’s. She finally gave up, put the glass down again, and placed her cheek on her arm. “And as the new girl, you’re probably going to get the worst shifts, I’m sorry to tell you.”
“Isn’t my sister a big ol’ ray of sunshine?” Duncan joked, patting her on the back.
“’S okay,” I said with a yawn. “I can handle it.”
Keeping busy would also probably be a good thing. It would prevent me from constantly wondering what the hell I was doing and whether I was completely selfish and insane, which was what had happened every time I’d stopped to breathe this afternoon.
“So, you’re Lia Washington!” Hal Taylor burst out of the kitchen with so much energy my tired brain almost whimpered. He was thin and wiry, with defined arms and what looked like a naked-lady tattoo half peeking out from beneath his T-shirt sleeve. He was bald everywhere but around his ears, where a perfect ring of short white hair circled from one side of his head to the other. His blue eyes crinkled when he smiled, and he was tan. Very tan. “Tell me why I should hire you.”
I opened my mouth to speak, but Fiona beat me to it. “Because she saved me today, Dad. Honestly. Please, hire her now before she has a chance to think better of it and run.”
Hal laughed, his head jerking back, and crossed his arms over his chest. He had the same room-filling laugh as Duncan. “Think better of it? Who wouldn’t want to work here?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe the three people who didn’t bother to show up today?” Duncan joked.
“Nature of the business, son! People come and people go,” Hal replied, squeezing Duncan’s shoulder. “We pool tips here,” he said to me. “That cool with you?”
“Definitely.” My mouth went dry as I tried to figure out how to broach the subject of my lack of ID.
“And if you don’t mind, I’ll pay ya in cash. At least for now,” Hal continued. “I don’t usually put the new kids on the books unless I know for sure they’re staying on for at least six months. Can you guarantee that?”
I stared, dumbly, unable to believe my luck. He had just given me an out. “Um . . . no. Not exactly.”
“She’s a drifter,” Duncan joked, winking at me as he popped a sugar cube from the bowl into his mouth. “An outlaw.”
I smiled. He got up and sauntered around the end of the counter to join his dad on the other side.
“Good. It’s all settled, then.” Hal turned and slapped his hand down on the Formica as he looked at Fiona. “Get her on the schedule. She can have that good-for-nothing Jennifer’s shifts.”
Fiona slid off her stool. “Oh, please. You loved Jennifer.”
“I did, and when she becomes a big star, I’m gonna say ‘I knew her when,’” Hal said without missing a beat as he organized the glassware behind the counter.
“The one who’s down in Nashville,” Fiona replied. She gestured over her shoulder with her thumb, in what I guessed was a northwesterly direction.
“Jenny’s in Nashville?” Duncan asked, his eyebrows raised.
Fiona nodded. “She got a gig singing backup for Patty Parkman.”
“No way!” I said. “Good for her.”
The door behind me opened, and Fiona’s posture instantly straightened.
“Good for who, what?”
My heart twirled inside my chest. I knew that voice. Slowly I turned around, and there he was, my home-wrecker cowboy. He’d changed into a blue plaid button-down over distressed jeans, and this time the shirt was tucked behind a serious silver belt buckle. His blond hair was clean and pushed back from his face, accentuating the ridiculous cheekbones, square jaw, and blue, blue eyes. He gave me a quick glance but didn’t seem to recognize me at all. Meanwhile, I was sitting there practically gaping. I turned around again, mortified, my back to the door.
“Jennifer Kay. She’s backing up Patty Parkman now,” Fiona said, sweeping her stray hairs behind her ears.
“Wow. How’d she land that gig?” he asked.
For the first time all day Duncan’s expression darkened. “Why? Looking for a way to grab onto her coattails?”
The cowboy shot him an irritated look. Fiona and I glanced at each other, and instantly I knew—there was some kind of history between these guys.
“Well, Jasper Case! As I live and breathe,” Hal interjected, like he was greeting a major celebrity, but with a touch of sarcasm. “To what do we owe the honor of this visit?”
I almost fell off the stool. “You’re Jasper Case?”
Jasper smiled at me. That smile. Obviously. Obviously it was Jasper. How had I not realized it before? The eyes, the hair, the teasing personality. Of course, the last time I’d seen him he’d been pulling my pigtails and stuffing a wriggling worm down the front of my dress, but still. It was clearly the same boy.
“You heard of me?” he asked.
Duncan scoffed, wiping out a glass with serious vigor.
“What? No . . . I . . .” I paused and took a breath. “I got my hair cut at your grandmother’s place earlier,” I improvised. “I think she mentioned you.”
Jasper’s eyes narrowed, and he took a half-step back, staring at my head. “Red Sox?”
I reached up and self-consciously touched my neck, which was burning. “Yeah, it’s me. Home-wrecker,” I added for good measure.
He leaned away and looked me up and down. “I didn’t recognize you,” he said. “But I like it. It’s very you.”
“You don’t even know me,” I said, sliding off the stool to do one last check on my tables. I had this sense that it would be a good idea to put some distance between me and Jasper Case. Not because I thought he’d ever realize who I really was, but because my body was reacting to being near him in ways I didn’t know how to handle.
“Fair enough.” He chuckled. “But I still like it.”
I turned away before he could see the huge smile that lit my face.
“So Jasper, are you gonna order something, or did you just come in here to flirt with my waitresses?” Hal asked, rolling his shoulders back.
“Take a guess,” Duncan muttered under his breath as he dropped the clean glass onto the shelf with a clatter.
“Duncan! Shut up,” Fiona said through her teeth.
“I’ll take a fried chicken basket to go, and throw some of those delicious tomatoes of yours in there too,” Jasper said. “They got the best fried green tomatoes on the planet,” he told me, coming up behind me and leaning in like he was sharing state secrets. “And here. Flyers for tonight’s open mic.”
When I turned around, I found myself face-to-face with a bright green flyer. It advertised open-mic night at the Mixer Bar and Grill, starting at midnight. Jasper lowered it to reveal that damn smile.
“My new band’s playing our premier performance. You should come.”
I plucked the flyer from his hand and moved past him to the counter. He handed out more to the couples sitting at my booth. “Are you going?” I asked Fiona.
She looked from the flyer to me to Jasper. “I don’t know. I’m kinda tired.”
“Come on, Fi,” Jasper said, grabbing her around the waist and twirling her toward the window. “We even got a new song we’re gonna try out. You’ve gotta be there.”
By the time he released her, Fiona was breathless. She also had more of a spark in her eye than she’d had all day, which made her instantly prettier.
“I’ll go if you’ll go,” she said to me tentatively.
“I’ll go if you have some clothes I can borrow,” I replied, looking down at my once-crisp, now-ketchup-mottled Little Tree Diner T-shirt. “And possibly a shower.”
Jasper clapped his hands and rubbed them together. “Now we’re talking.”
I blushed, and Fiona shoved Jasper’s shoulder from behind.
“Duncan?” Jasper said genially.
“I wouldn’t go if you paid me,” Duncan replied. Then he shot me a look I couldn’t quite pin down, turned around, and disappeared into the kitchen.
“What flew up his butt tonight?” Jasper asked, making Fiona laugh.
“Of course you can come back to our place for a shower. I don’t know how well my clothes’ll fit you, but we’ll give it a try,” she said to me. “I may even have an idea of an apartment for you.”
“Awesome.”
Walking into the Little Tree Diner was the best decision I’d made all day. Maybe ever, considering I hadn’t been making decisions on my own for very long.
I picked up the water pitcher and reached over the booth to refill some glasses. Jasper stood back, and I could see his reflection in the window as he blatantly checked me out from behind. God. If he could think I was attractive after a whole day on the road, no sleep, and eight hours slinging burgers, then something was clearly wrong with him.
“So you’ll be there, Red Sox?” Jasper asked.
“I’ll be there,” I said.
“Good. ’Cause my new goal in life is to earn a standing ovation outta you,” he said.
I turned around and looked him in the eye. Very brazen of normally reserved little old me. But maybe I wasn’t the old me anymore. “Good luck with that,” I said.
As I walked away, he whistled like he was impressed, and I just about died. Suddenly I wasn’t that tired. In fact, I wasn’t tired at all.