Miss Crossley met me outside the door to her office. “Iced tea?” she offered as we walked inside, where she handed me a tall, icy glass, complete with lemon wedge.
Somehow that made me even more uneasy and suspicious, even though she was having a glass as well, because she was being so nice to me. Too nice. “Sure,” I said. “Thanks.”
“Elizabeth, here’s the situation,” she began abruptly.
I sipped my iced tea and tried to slow down my breathing. Riding that bike with Hayden had gotten my heart rate up to a slightly dangerous level. Then again, the fact my heart was pounding probably wasn’t the bike. It was the fact I had only been here two days and was already getting my second “talking to.” It was like being sent to the principal’s office, not that I would know much about that, except for a few dress-code violations.
Or maybe it was my encounter with Hayden that was making me feel out of breath. I couldn’t explain what it was about him, but we clicked, as if I knew him already, only I didn’t. Unless I was his cat, from a former life, reincarnated or something.
“Mr. Talbot Junior and I were talking at lunch,” Miss Crossley went on. “We were evaluating our staffing levels, and we seem to have overlooked a few things.”
Don’t say my qualifications, I thought, or lack thereof. “You know, I’m really good at sports,” I said. “Is there anything you need help with in that area? I could teach volleyball, or—”
But she wasn’t even listening to me, not really. “We realized we have enough housekeepers, if we juggle things a bit. And we don’t need you at the front desk, as we thought we did,” Miss Crossley said.
“Right,” I said slowly.
“And we’re covered in the restaurant, we have enough servers around the clock,” she said.
Last hired . . . first fired. I’d heard that phrase before. Was I about to find out what it meant?
They didn’t have room for me. They didn’t have a job. And all because I was lousy at cleaning my room at home for my entire life. Why hadn’t I paid attention when Mom yelled at me all those times?
“Is this just because I didn’t get all the sand out of the carpet?” I asked. “Or is it because I sucked that guest’s belt into the vacuum? Which completely and kind of ironically damaged the vacuum belt?”
“You did what?”
Oh. So she hadn’t even heard about that. I coughed. “We got it out. No problem.”
“As I was saying. Every once in a while we discover we’re short somewhere,” Miss Crossley went on. “So I’ve rethought your position here. You seem like the perfect person to give this new theory a try.”
What new theory? “I do?”
“You have a lot of energy, and you’re highly adaptable.”
“I am?” This was kind of news to me. Hadn’t my ex-boyfriend called me the most rigid, uncompromising, stubborn person he ever met?
But that was in a moment of anger, when I broke up with him because I wasn’t ready to move things to the next level, and he was, and he wouldn’t stop bugging me about it. Which is when my friends and I came up with our theory: You don’t really need guys. Until you sort of just, you know, want one around. But if he’s not good to you and won’t listen to you? Forget him. You can do better.
“That’s what your recommendations said, that you were a person who could handle anything. Therefore, as of right now, you’re the official Tides Inn gofer!” Miss Crossley raised her glass of iced tea in the air, as if to clink against mine in a toast.
“Gopher? Is that like some kind of animal terminology?” I asked. “’Cause I prefer fox, if that’s the situation.”
Miss Crossley didn’t look amused. She never did, around me. “No. It’s a—a term. Gofer. Means you will go for whatever we need you to,” she said.
“You say jump. I say off what?”
She laughed. Finally, I thought. I’d made her laugh. She didn’t completely hate me, then. “Not exactly, but close. We’ll assign you each day based on where we need help. We’ll do it on a trial basis. If it doesn’t work out . . .”
I thought of the beach, the Inn . . . all the friends and people at home I’d bragged to about this job. No way was I going home. “Oh, it’ll work out. I’ll be the best gofer ever. In fact, what can I do right now?”
“Well, we’re a little shorthanded in the laundry room—got a little bogged down by beach towels,” Miss Crossley said. “So if you could help out there, and then run them out to the beach cabana, and see what else needs picking up. And then—well, I’ll have to see.”
Did I mention I’m about as good at doing laundry as I am at cleaning mirrors? I almost said so, but stopped myself. “Laundry. No problem!” I said cheerfully.
But I couldn’t help wondering: Was this job going to be the best thing that could have happened to me, or the worst? Being at Miss Crossley’s beck and call could be a little stressful, but I’d rejoice at anything that got me out of vacuuming and cleaning bathrooms, so I wasn’t about to complain.
“I think this will work best if we set you up with an exclusive Inn pager,” she said. “Only the two of us will have the number. We should have it set up by tomorrow.”
“Sounds perfect,” I said. But all I could think was that moving from job to job was either going to be very cool, or very Cinderella-like—or some of both.
“What are you doing here, newbie?” Hayden asked when I walked onto the beach later that afternoon. He was standing at the ocean’s edge, binoculars around his neck.
“Hi, old person,” I said.
“Old person?” he repeated.
“Or is it oldie? If I’m going to be called new all the time, then you can be called old. Right? It only makes sense.” I picked up a pink-streaked shell that caught my eye.
“Yeah. Okay. Anyway, what are you doing? Shouldn’t you be keeping house, or whatever?”
“Didn’t your pal Miss Crossley tell you? I’m the new go-to girl,” I said.
He just stared at me. Actually he was looking me up and down a little, checking me out in my bikini, which I took as a positive thing. He didn’t feel the need to look away, anyway.
“Hey.” I snapped my fingers to get his attention back to my face. “Someone sends me to work on the beach, I dress for the beach. You know?”
I don’t mean to sound vain, but I’m not sure his attention was totally on the water, or the people swimming in it. Fortunately for them, another lifeguard was stationed nearby, so there was backup if needed.
I gazed at the water for a moment and spotted a lone figure taking slow, deliberate strokes through the ocean. “Who’s that swimming way out there?” I asked.
“Yeah, that’s Mr. Anderson. He lives a ways down the beach and he swims a couple of miles every day,” Hayden said. “Which would be impressive enough, but then he’s at least eighty.”
“Wow,” I said.
“You’re working here now?” Hayden asked. “On the beach?”
“I’m the Tides gofer,” I explained. “I go wherever I’m needed.” I saluted. “Sounds kind of militaristic, but that’s Miss Crossley for you. Does she have a background in the military?”
Hayden still looked a little dazed.
“Excuse me. That’s ‘Peach’ to you.” I went over to unlock the heavy wooden locker in the dunes and started pulling out beach toys. Chelsea was collecting the kids in the Inn lobby and bringing them down—we were the two “Beach Time Players” for the afternoon, while parents played tennis, went golfing, or just lounged in solitude for a while.
When I turned around to bring a collection of plastic shovels and buckets down to the hard sand, I noticed Hayden was checking out something with his binoculars. Me.
I smiled and waved at him, and he quickly pulled them away from his face and turned to face the ocean again. I wasn’t sure I wanted him to check me out while I was leaning into a footlocker, but oh well.
“So, uh, when did this new job start?” Hayden asked when I got back to him, pretending he hadn’t just been examining me from afar.
“About two hours ago,” I said. “Remember that meeting we hurried back for?”
He nodded. “My quads remember.” He rubbed his legs as if they were hurting.
“Shut up,” I said, pushing him.
“Uh oh. Here come the tykes. You’d better run. Ooh, look, there’s Will the Third. Lucky you.” He playfully popped me on the arm before heading back up the steps to his lifeguard post.
Okay, so maybe there were going to be challenges to this new position. But if it meant I could hang out by the water—with Hayden nearby? I was all for it.