Chapter 1 #2
“I don’t see it on the menu, but could we order some lattes with almond milk?” the lady’s eyes shoot up to the pretend veil on her head. Like I said, entitled seagull.
Which makes me more inclined to deny her request, but as I open my mouth to tell her Flo’s black-coffee only policy, Ponytail interrupts.
“You look familiar.”
My eyes dart to her before I can stop them. She leans forward, studying me too closely.
I’ve lived with the dread of being recognized for so long that it’s become a steady, dull ache. Always there, but so familiar it blends into the background. Her stare, though, brings it back sharp and clear.
I swallow and shake my head. “I get that sometimes. I’ll see what I can do about those lattes.”
I glue my eyes to the checkered floor and try not to run back to the counter. Back to the Oatmeal Mafia and Flo.
On my way, the front door flies open with a gust of wind and a proper Tassie devil whirls in wearing a bright orange sundress, red ladybug rainboots, a teddy bear on her back, and lopsided pigtails on either side of her head.
She zips past me, dragging some kind of leash thing behind her, headed for the counter, shrieking, “Pancakes peas!”
Pearl, an order in her arms, is directly in the little feral thing’s path.
Without hesitating, I grab the leash first, then the kid with a quick scoop around her waist. It’s all so fast, her legs are still in motion when I pick her up. Then reality hits, and her running legs turn to angry kicking.
“Hey! Wet go!” she yells over her shoulder. Angry blue eyes meet mine, their color vaguely familiar.
Keeping my arm around her waist, I crouch and set her on my bended knee. “Where’s your mum?” I ask. “Let me help you track her down.”
The kid’s not having it. She struggles against my hold, nearly toppling us both to the floor. “I want pancakes!”
I stay calm but hold her tighter. “We’ll fix you pancakes once we find your mum.”
She goes still. Her eyes narrow. “You talk like Booey! Are you from Stralia, too?”
“Who?” It takes a few seconds to work out what she’s said, but when I do, I notice how quiet the diner is and how many eyes are on us.
No idea what a Booey is, but I reckon her question about where I’m from has everything to do with me talking about tracking down her mum.
Three years, and this is the first time I’ve slipped into my Aussie accent with someone besides my regulars.
Of course, it’d be today when Flamingo’s full of outsiders.
Pearl walks by—hot coffee in one hand, a plate of runny eggs in the other—oblivious to the disaster I saved her from, and glances down. “What are you doing here, Juniper?”
The bite in Pearl’s raspy voice brings tears to the girl’s eyes, and she stops fighting me long enough to cry, “I want Daddy.”
“Juniper’s loose, Flo,” Pearl yells. “Better call, Cal.”
I take a closer look at her, and I see it. She’s Cal’s kid.
“Your daddy’s told me about you. Do you know where he is?” Keeping hold of the wild thing, I stand, looking around for Cal.
Junie snort-sniffs and shakes her head.
“Sit her at the counter,” Flo barks before coming out of the kitchen tapping on her mobile and mumbling, “He’s probably frantic.”
I glance down at Junie who’s blinking back tears. “You want to choose where to sit, love?” I ask softly.
“Can you talk like Booey, again?” Juniper lifts her arms to me, one tear running down her face.
“Oh.” I blink, not quite sure what to do. I'm still not sure who or what a booey is, and I know even less about kids.
This kid, though, needs someone to hold her. I know that feeling. That feeling is practically my best mate. Which means, I scoop her into my arms before my brain registers what I’m doing
“My name’s Frankie,” I whisper, in my own voice. I’ve already slipped with her once; it won’t hurt to use it again. Plus, it’s not right hiding things from a kid.
“I like Booey.” Junie sticks her thumb in her mouth, then curls into me, nestling her head on my shoulder.
My whole body swims with an unfamiliar emotion whose source, I suspect, is my ovaries. Brilliant.
The door crashes open followed by a panicked shout. “Did Junie come in here?”
With the Tassie devil-turned-cuddly-toddler in my arms, I turn to face the same striking blue pair of eyes in Callahan Holloway. The panic in them turns to surprise, then something soft.
Junie squirms out of my arms and runs to him. He swings a large backpack from one shoulder to the other and bundles her up in his free arm.
“Did you lose me ‘gin, Daddy?” Junie giggles. She puts both hands on his cheeks and turns his face to hers, breaking the gaze between Cal and me. “Can I have pancakes now, pease?”
“Junie, I told you to stay right next to me,” he scolds, gently.
Something tugs in my chest, nudging me out of the intimate scene I’ve got no part in. But as I hurry behind the counter, I can’t stop my eyes darting back to Cal and Junie.
“I sorry. I hungry.” Her lip goes out, which I suspect she’s already learned is her way out of trouble.
“You scared Daddy.” Cal tries to hold firm, but Junie’s already squirmed from his arms and runs to the counter.
She points to Gerry’s seat. “We sit here?”
“Mr. Geraldo is sitting there,” Cal ambles her way, the corner of his lip tugging, like he’s the one watching a scene he can’t get enough of.
“Time for me to be off anyway.” Gerry stands, then pats his seat. “It’s all yours, Miss Juniper.”
She pulls herself onto the seat, swatting away the hand Gerry offers while she scrambles to not sit, but stand on the swivel chair.
The seat shifts under her while Gerry sways nervously behind her.
Barry’s next to her. Both of them with hands up ready to catch her. Flo grabs a dish towel and rushes over.
Meanwhile, now that Junie’s been found, Cal’s as calm as the best of the pros facing a gnarly wave. When he reaches the counter, he shoots me a grin. “Thanks for catching her.”
I wonder if he knows what his lopsided smile tugging at one side of his mouth does to women. I can’t be the only one who gets a charge of adrenaline from it.
“No worries.” I talk softly so I don’t have to hide my accent. “I feel like a bit of hero preventing the disasters she nearly caused.”
He snorts. “I don’t doubt you earned your cape.” His eyes sweep over me, gentle and smooth, but powerful enough to loosen the hold LA’s had on me since I got back.
Next to me, Flo pries Gerry’s coffee cup from Junie’s hands half-a-sec before she almost gets it to her lips. “Last thing you need is coffee, June Bug. Gimme a sec, and I’ll get your pancakes started. Now sit yourself down.”
“No chocolate chips if you’re not on best behavior.” Cal takes Junie by the waist and helps her sit.
“Okay, Daddy. Best haviors.” She smiles sweetly, but with a hint of defiance I have to admire.
“That’s my girl. You want to sit on Daddy’s lap?” He kisses the top of her head, then takes the seat on her other side.
Junie shakes her head. “No Daddy. I a big girl. I can’t hold you right now.”
“Okay, but when your pancakes come, Daddy will help you.”
“No. I a big girl. I do it all by self.” She can hardly see over the counter she grips to swivel her chair back and forth, thumping the counter with each turn.
“Now, Juniper, you listen to your daddy,” Flo warns without any real threat in her voice.
Junie may be her great-niece, but only one of them is comfortable in that relationship. Flo looks like a surfer getting thumped on the inside of a wave.
I nudge Flo aside. “I’ve got this.”
With a relieved sigh, she hands me her dishtowel and wipes her hands on her apron. “Thank heavens. There’s a reason I never had kids. Or got married, for that matter.”
“You’ll marry me one of these days, Flamingo,” Larry says calmly from his spot at the counter just outside the Tassie devil habitat.
“We’d be a nightmare together, Larry. Now eat your oatmeal,” Flo answers on her way back to the kitchen without a second glance at Junie.
“I ordered eggs and fried ham.” Larry pokes at his oatmeal and watches it slide in a fat lump off his spoon.
“Pancakes, pease!” Junie calls.
“And your doctor ordered you to lose twenty pounds to keep from having another heart attack,” Flo growls at Larry, ignoring her great-niece.
“Don’t give up, mate. She’ll come round,” I whisper to Larry with a wink before reaching under the counter where we keep the booster seats.
“I hope not. Chasin’ her is what gets me out of bed in the morning,” he says loud enough for Flo to hear from her spot at the grill.
“A weak bladder’s what gets you up in the morning, old man,” Flo shoots back.
When I pop back up with a booster, Larry’s cheeks are pink, but the corner of his mouth pulls into a crooked grin. He lives for Flo’s daily burn.
I carry the booster around the counter to Junie. “I have something special for big girls.”
“No boosters,” Junie says as firmly as a No Entry sign.
“She got you there,” Larry says with a laugh before squeezing out of his chair and hitching up his overalls. “See ya, tomorrow, Flo! Hope you change your mind about marrying me. I may not ask again.”
“I won’t. And you will.” Flo blows him a kiss through the order window, and with a wave, Larry lumbers toward the door.
I return his wave, then set the booster chair on the counter in front of Junie and reach into my apron pocket for a Sharpie.
“This isn’t any booster. This is a Just for Big Girl Junie booster.
” I glance at Flo who looks suspicious but doesn’t say no, so I hand Junie the marker.
“You can decorate it any way you want so it’s your special big girl chair whenever you eat at Flamingo’s. ”
Junie swivels toward me, takes the marker, and turns back to the counter. “No thank you,” she says as she tugs the cap off the marker.
Cal grabs the marker and recaps it. She’s about to protest, but I pivot and let out a disappointed sigh.
“That’s too bad, because this chair is maaaagic.” I use my accent—quietly—and maybe a sprinkle of fairy dust, and Junie faces me again, suspicious, but interested.
“Magic?”
I nod and become the fairy godmother she never knew she needed. “When you sit in it…you’re as big as a grown-up.”
Junie’s eyebrows shoot up. “I can drink coffee?”
Cal raises a matching eyebrow, and a smirk follows.
“Suuuure,” I answer, absolutely not sure.
“Decaf, mostly chocolate, with lots of whipped cream.” Cal winks over Junie’s head.
“Got it. And for you?”
“That is for me. She’ll take hers black.”
I turn before Cal sees me laugh, but not before I catch his smile.
He does that heaps, Cal. He’s all serious and stone-faced, sorting out a hundred details in his head, making plans, then, boom, he makes a joke you could miss if you’re not paying attention.
Like, say, if you got distracted by his eyes or the little scar at the corner of his left eyebrow, you’d miss how funny he is.
Never at someone else’s expense though. Not like my ex-husband.
“Okay! Daddy help me with my name, pease.” Junie sits up on her knees while I go around the counter to make their drinks.
“Fwankie talks like Booey, Daddy. Are you from Stralia, too, Fwankie?” Junie yells while I’ve got my back to her at the hot cocoa machine.
I’ve made a huge mistake, telling a four-year old my real name. Cocoa spills over the top of the mug, burning my hand. I shake it off and keep my back to the counter and the conversation between Junie and Cal.
“Do you mean Fran?” Cal asks.
“No. Fwankie. Right there.”
I turn around to undo my mistake just as Junie stands in her seat.
“Your name is Frankie, right?” Junie yells even louder than before.
The first R she lands all day is in my name. Clear as the sky over Burleigh. At the exact same time Ponytail LA Lady, on her way to the restroom, passes behind Junie.
Of course she does.
Ponytail and I make eye contact. In slow motion, every part of her face registers what she’s known all along, she just needed a little push to get there. A little encounter with a Tassie devil is all it took.
“I knew I recognized you!” Her mobile goes up. “I knew it!” Click. Click, click, click, click. “You’re FRANKIE FORSYTHE!”