Chapter 2
ELIZABETH
The coffee mug felt like it weighed ten pounds as I set it down in front of Table Seven. My phone had buzzed in my apron pocket thirty seconds ago, and the notification was burning a hole through the fabric straight into my hip bone. Being unable to check it was torture.
“Finally,” the man said, wrapping his hands around the mug like he was preparing to strangle it. “I’ve been waiting ten minutes.”
It had been four minutes, but I’d learned months ago that correcting customers was a one-way ticket to a lousy tip. “I apologize for the wait, sir. Can I get you anything else?”
He took a sip, then immediately recoiled, his face contorting like I’d just served him battery acid. “This is hot!”
I blinked at him. “Yes, sir. That’s how we serve our coffee.”
“I could have burned my tongue!”
“Did you?” I asked, keeping all judgment out of my tone.
“No,” he said. “But still.”
“Would you like some ice water to cool it down?” The suggestion came out on autopilot. “Or perhaps you could try blowing on it.”
After eleven months of slinging slop at Rosie’s Diner, I had run into every customer complaint under the sun.
Coffee too hot. Salad too cold. Mac and cheese too cheesy.
Some people used complaining like a special sauce, unable to enjoy a meal without it.
I wished people like that would stay the hell home.
“I want coffee I can drink now,” he said, pushing the mug away.
“I’ll get you a fresh cup and blow on it personally,” I said, the words coming out a bit sharper than I’d intended. I grabbed the offending mug and turned on my heel before he could respond. Nothing he said would make my day better.
The diner was packed for a Tuesday lunch rush.
Every red vinyl booth was filled with construction workers, mothers sneaking in a cheap lunch while the kids were at school, and retirees who’d discovered our senior discount.
The air was thick with the smell of fryer grease and burnt coffee, a scent that had permanently embedded itself into my clothes, my hair, my pores.
I was pretty sure I’d still smell like French fries at my funeral.
There would be no keeping the raccoons away. Closed casket for sure.
I slid behind the counter and poured a fresh cup of coffee.
I walked it over to the industrial fan we kept running in the corner, then held the mug in front of the breeze for approximately ten seconds, long enough to technically say I’d cooled it but short enough that I wasn’t completely wasting my time on this nonsense.
Because honestly, I wasn’t going to blow on his damn cup of coffee like he was a child.
And ew. Gross.
“Lizzie, you got three orders up!” Danny called from the kitchen window, his face red and sweaty beneath his hairnet.
“On it!” I delivered the pre-cooled coffee to Table Seven with my brightest smile.
He took a suspicious sip, then nodded begrudgingly. I spun away before he could find something else to complain about.
The next fifteen minutes passed in a blur of ketchup bottles, club sandwiches, and coke refills. By the time I’d delivered all three orders, cleared two tables, and refilled half the coffee cups in the place, I was ready to scream.
I caught Rosie’s eye from across the diner. She was stationed at the register, her reading glasses perched on her nose as she tallied up someone’s check. “Taking five!” I called.
She frowned, glancing at the full dining room.
“Bathroom emergency!” I added, which was our code for I’m about to set fire to the place if I don’t get a break.
Rosie waved me off with one hand, already turning back to her customer.
I practically ran to the back hallway where we kept our lockers.
My hands shook as I dug my phone out of my apron pocket and quickly pulled up my email.
I had been applying at every fashion house in the city and I was hoping to hear back from one of them at least. I just needed to get my foot in the door.
One tiny little break to show people what I could do.
Dear Ms. Laramie,
Thank you for your interest in the Junior Designer position at Atelier Morgaine. We received an overwhelming number of applications for this role, and after careful consideration…
I didn’t need to read the rest. The words blurred together into a familiar pattern of corporate rejection. Overwhelming number of applications. After careful consideration. We wish you the best in your future endeavors.
Translation: You’re not good enough.
I slumped against the cold metal of my locker, the phone nearly slipping from my fingers. I’d lost count of the number of rejections I’d gotten. I was so sick of getting my hopes up only to have them crushed, over and over.
Maybe I just wasn’t cut out for the fashion world.
The thought slithered through my mind like a venomous snake.
I’d spent four years at the Fashion Institute, working my ass off, pulling all-nighters to perfect every seam and hem.
I’d graduated near the top of my class. My professors had praised my eye for color, my attention to detail, my innovative approach to classic silhouettes.
But apparently none of that mattered in the real world, where “entry-level” positions required three years of experience and a portfolio full of professional work I’d never had the opportunity to create.
I needed a job to build my portfolio, but I needed a portfolio to get a job. Trapped in that death spiral, all I could do was spin my wheels and go nowhere.
And in the meantime, I was waiting tables at a greasy diner and watching my dreams slip further away with each passing day.
“Lizzie!” Rosie’s voice carried from the front. “Break’s over, babe!”
I shoved my phone back in my apron pocket and took a shaky breath.
I needed this job, as soul-crushing as it was, because soul-crushing employment was better than no employment at all.
I liked to eat. And I liked sleeping in my shoebox apartment, both of which required me to deal with these assholes every day.
I forced myself back out into the dining room, smile back in place.
The rest of my shift dragged like I was wading through concrete.
I smiled at customers, took orders, delivered food, cleared plates, and thought about absolutely nothing.
It was easier that way. If I let myself think, I’d start spiraling, and if I started spiraling, I’d end up crying into someone’s meatloaf special.
Table Seven left me a two-dollar tip on a thirty-dollar check.
Of course he did.
By the time five o’clock rolled around and my replacement arrived for the dinner shift, I was exhausted.
I had been on my feet for eight hours. My back hurt.
My feet hurt. I felt like I was a hundred years old instead of twenty-five.
I didn’t understand how Stella, one of the other waitresses, did it.
She was over sixty and told me she’d been waiting tables since she was thirteen.
How? How was that physically possible? Waitresses should compete in some Olympic-style shit.
I was pretty sure they had more endurance than any famous athlete.
Add in the psychological factor of putting up with people’s bullshit and they were as tough as an NFL linebacker.
But waitresses weren’t making twenty-two-million dollars a year.
I sighed and shook my head. It was the same rant I went on every day.
It didn’t make it any less real. The subway ride back to my apartment in Queens was packed with evening commuters.
I stood wedged between a man in a suit who kept elbowing me and a teenage girl who was having an extremely loud FaceTime conversation with someone named Brittany.
I closed my eyes and tried to pretend I was somewhere else.
Anywhere else.
My phone buzzed with a text. I pulled it out, expecting another notification about a bill I couldn’t quite afford to pay. Instead, it was a photo from my brother, Chris.
It was a cat wearing a tiny pirate hat and eye patch, one paw raised in what might have been a wave or a threat. The caption read: How arrrr you?
Despite everything, I smiled. Leave it to my brother to send me the dumbest possible meme at exactly the right moment.
Me: Been better. Been worse. Been a cat pirate? No.
Chris: You should try it. I hear the catnip is primo.
The train lurched to a stop at my station.
I shoved my phone back in my pocket as I fought my way through the crowd.
My apartment building loomed ahead, a dingy five-story walk-up that had probably been “charming” sometime around the fifties.
Now it was just old, with flickering hallway lights and stairs that creaked ominously under your weight.
Stairs that were often covered in some unknown substance I didn’t want to think about.
I climbed to the third floor, my legs protesting after a full shift on my feet, and let myself into apartment 3C.
“Home sweet home,” I muttered to the empty studio.
And it was empty, with just a Murphy bed that I’d pulled down this morning and forgotten to put away and a thrift-store couch with springs that poked through the cushions.
The kitchen area was so small I could touch the stove and the refrigerator simultaneously if I stood in the right spot.
My sewing machine sat on a folding table by the window, surrounded by scraps of fabric and half-finished sketches.
All the raw materials for a dream that refused to come true.
I dropped my bag by the door and collapsed onto the couch, pulling out my phone. Chris had sent another text.
Chris: Seriously though, you okay?
My fingers hovered over the keyboard. I could tell him I was fine. I had been telling him everything was great. But it wasn’t great. Things were spiraling. I was spiraling.
Or I could be honest.
Me: Starting to wonder if I’m delusional.
The dots appeared immediately, indicating he was typing. Then they disappeared. Then appeared again. Chris: Call me?
I hit the call button before I could think too hard about it.
He answered on the first ring. “Lizzie.”
“Hey.”
“Talk to me. What happened?”
I told him about yet another rejection and the growing sense that I’d made a terrible mistake choosing fashion design as a career. “Maybe I should have gone into accounting,” I finished weakly. “At least accountants get jobs.”
“Accountants also have to deal with taxes all day. Taxes are no fun. You’re not an accountant. You’re a designer. And really talented at that.”
“Apparently the fashion industry disagrees with your assessment.”
I heard him moving around on the other end, the clatter of pots and pans that meant he was in his kitchen, probably prepping for tomorrow’s gig. Chris had always been like this, most focused when his hands were busy. He was a caterer. A damn good one. Successful. Everything I was not.
“You know what your problem is?” he said.
“I’m not good enough?”
“Your problem is you don’t know the right people.” There was a pause, then more clattering. “This industry is all about connections. Who you know, who knows you, who can vouch for you.”
“Great. So I’m doomed because I don’t know anyone.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Chris, what are you thinking?”
“I’m thinking…” More pause. I heard water running. “I’m thinking I might know someone who could help.”
My heart did a weird little flip. “Who?”
“Adrian Blackwell.”
I actually laughed. “Adrian Blackwell. I know you guys are friends but I could never ask him for a favor.”
I didn’t know Adrian and I hated the idea of using my brother’s connections to get a job. That was wrong, right?
“You’re not asking him for a favor,” Chris said. “I would be doing it. And I’m just going to ask him if he knows of any openings anywhere. That’s not even a favor. It’s just a regular question.”
The offer hung in the air between us, tempting and terrifying in equal measure.
“Chris, I don’t know if that’s a good idea.”
“Do you have a better one?” he asked.
“Well, no, but you’d be using your friendship to get me a favor. That’s not cool.”
“Lizzie.” His voice took on that big-brother tone that always made me listen. “You’re my sister. You’re crazy talented, and you’re getting screwed by a system that values connections over ability. So yeah, I’m going to use my connection to help you. That’s what connections are for.”
I pressed my palm against my eyes, feeling the hot prick of tears. “What if he says no?”
“Then he says no, and we’re exactly where we are right now. But what if he says yes?”
What if he says yes?
The possibility bloomed in my chest. What if Adrian Blackwell actually helped me find a way into the industry? What if this was the break I’d been desperately waiting for?
What if I finally got my chance?
“Okay,” I whispered. “Okay, if you really don’t mind asking.”
“I’ll call him tomorrow,” Chris said. “And Lizzie? This is going to work out. I know it will.”
I wanted to believe him. God, I wanted to believe him so badly.
“Thanks, Chris.”
“That’s what annoying older brothers are for. Well, that and sending you pictures of cats in costumes.”
I laughed. “You really nailed that part.”
After we hung up, I sat on my sad couch in my tiny apartment and let myself hope for the first time in months. Maybe this was it. Maybe this was the moment everything changed.
“Please,” I whispered to no one in particular. To the universe, maybe. To whatever force decided whether people got their shot or spent their whole lives waiting tables and smelling like French fries.
“Please just give me a chance.”