5. Sawyer
I followedMel back into The Hideout. If this opening was going to turn out how I’d imagine it to, I was going to need some lunch for fuel. Granted, it didn’t seem like much was left for me to do, but I had to at least pretend like I had some say in what went down.
She pushed one of the boxes filled with the smaller vases underneath the counter and exchanged it for an apron. Hopefully, customers didn’t mind the smell of daylilies wafting over their soup and salad combos.
“Do you ever stop to, uh, I don’t know… breathe?” I asked as she got straight to work on orders.
“Someone’s gotta do the work around here,” she pursed her lips and tapped ferociously away at the tablet system.
“Hey! What about me?!” My daytime server, Cherry, chimed in as she walked in for her shift.
“We’re kidding!” Mel and I said in unison.
I snuck behind the counter and started to pack up my takeout. My routine turkey club with a side of Old Bay macaroni salad. And of course, I couldn’t forget Billy’s puppy patty—though it’s nothing more than an unsalted burger patty with a clever name.
Cherry and Mel whipped back and forth behind me, their ponytails swaying as they sprinted through the back bar.
“There is no way this is humane. They’re trying to eat us alive!” Cherry exclaims as she waves her free hand over the crowd of people swarming in. “Everyone is coming out of the woodwork and it’s not even summer yet. And I just got here!” Her voice raised in pitch. She adjusted the teetering serving tray balancing in her hand and blew out an exasperated breath.
Cherry always had a flare for the dramatics and communicated in fluent sarcasm. She kept us on our toes around here. It was always that she was “burning in hell” on a day that was over eighty degrees, or in this case, our customers were “eating us alive” all because it was a busier day than we have had in a while.
“Girl,” Mel stopped in her tracks in the midst of writing out tonight’s specials on the chalkboard menu. “You say that every year. How long have you lived here?”
“My whole life…” Cherry deadpanned.
She clicked the cap back on the chalk pen and sauntered to Cherry, “Exactly, your whole life. You know that summer starts right after Memorial Day here.” Mel gave Cherry a pat on the butt, “Now get going! There are hungry people out there! We don’t want a bunch of hangry Sawyer-like zombies walking around here.”
Cherry perked up with a laugh before scurrying off to tend to her tables.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I cocked my head to the side as I swiped a fry off of one of the plates in the kitchen window.
“What, you can become unpleasant if you haven’t had your allotted meals and snacks…” Mel shrugged, smirked, then joined Cherry on the floor.
She acted as if I was a toddler who needed a constant flow of food. She likes to be the “bigger sister” despite being way shorter than I am, and ten years younger. But I had to give it to her—there have been countless times I’ve needed to be reminded to eat a solid meal in a day.
You’d think spending most of my time around food that could be made within minutes, I’d have no trouble. But the habit from my interning years of thinking “I’ll eat when my work is done or else I’ll never finish” still lives on.
I scanned the floor as I blindly threw napkins and utensils in my to-go bag.
That’s when I caught a glimpse of her fiery red hair that was now pulled on top of her head. Loose strands hung on either side, framing her face. Cherry guided Lucy over to an open booth, and immediately, she burrowed herself inside of it.
She pulled her leg up, bending it against her chest. She opened her laptop up and started typing away. Her attention bounced back and forth between a notebook, a slew of papers, and her laptop screen. I could hear the swipe of her pen scribbling away aggressively across the pages from over here.
Whenever the bell above the front door rang as someone new entered, her head shot up.
When a family of seven with young children flew by her table, getting a little too close for comfort, she followed them with her eyes until they were long gone.
In the midst of whatever was stealing her attention, she watched it all. And I watched her.
“I think you’re good there, bud,” Mel said from behind me.
Thirteen forks, seven napkins, and somehow a stray pen ended up inside my bag during my Lucy-induced haze. Cherry started to giggle as she walked over and took a peak in the bag. They both hovered their heads over the opening. I swear, they looked like little kids on Halloween above a candy bowl.
“What exactly did you have planned for this?” Cherry asked as she wagged the pen in my face.
I swiped it out of her hand and clicked it an obnoxious amount of times before chucking it at the register. I started to pull out the excess, avoiding all eye contact with either of them. I’ve never felt this pulled in to know someone before. Just when I thought that I was getting familiar and comfortable with everyone in town, she walked in.
“Pfft, d-don’t worry about what I’m doing.”
“Alright, I have never seen you so spacey before. What’s up?” Mel asked, speaking out the side of her mouth.
“I bet it has to do with the redhead that I just sat at table twenty,” Cherry said lightly as she got to work on cutting drink garnishes.
Mel and I both snapped our heads by looking in her direction. My eyes sunk into the back of my head, while Mel’s practically bulged out of hers. Cherry’s remained on the lime slices on the cutting board.
“Oh, my god. You’re totally right!” Mel slapped her hand down on the bar while half of the place turned their attention to us. “Sorry,” she winced with a whisper.
Cherry let out another giggle, and her chopping of fruit quickened. “It’s adorable really,” she says with a shrug. “You think I haven’t noticed you checking over there every other second, but I have. I have a sixth sense for these types of things. I think you should go talk to her. And when you guys fall madly, deeply in love, please let me be the flower girl at your wedding.”
“You two do know I can fire you, right?” I say, completely ignoring her nonsense.
Mel scowled at me, “Good luck with that.”
“If you won’t talk to her, I will,” Cherry teased.
I stole a glance in Lucy’s direction as Cherry paraded her insane need to play matchmaker over that way. Lucy had her fingers interlocked, her chin was perched in the dip of the palm of her hand as she focused on her computer screen.
Once Cherry reached her table, a larger-than-life smile appeared on her face as she sat up against the booth. Cherry pointed back towards the bar and I made myself busy by fanning through credit card receipts, attempting to look busy.
After a quick chat, Cherry was already heading back. I felt like a preteen girl in the middle of a gossiping hour, I inherited sweaty palms while waiting for some intel.
“What did you talk about?”
She slapped the order pad down on the bar beside her. “Uh… Food? I went to take her order.”
“But you pointed over here. At me.”
She points off to the side, keeping her attention on the tablet as she types away. “Nooo, I simply pointed to the chalkboard. I told her about the beer on tap. Ya know, pushing the alcohol sales like somebody keeps telling me to do. That was all,” she pursed her lips.
I clutched my chest from the instant feeling of relief.
I don’t get nervous, I don’t hide like a scared puppy with their tail between their legs. Especially not when it came to girls. But my nerves were just as strong as they were when I was in middle school. I talked to her before, so what the hell was my issue now?
Maybe it’s because she’s there, and she’s real. And even after our encounter earlier, she still came back here. I had hoped I’d see her around again, but I didn’t think it would be twice in one day. It’s my lucky day, right? I can’t let this opportunity pass.
She looked busy and probably couldn’t care less about a guy—especially this guy—coming up and bothering her. But if it was my lucky day, then she would be the type of girl who was fine with me saying a quick hello.
As a buffer, I cut up a slice of pie from the dessert case before I made my way over to her. “Key lime pie?”
Her eyes went wide when she locked them with mine and drew on a smile.“Always,” she said, wiggling in her seat.
I slid the plate of dessert topped with a lime garnish in front of her, only slightly crumpling the edges of her papers that were spread out. She picked them up and moved her laptop off to the side.
I watched as she ate a couple of forkfuls of the pie, the last bite left a speck of whipped cream on her upper lip. She bashfully wiped it away with her napkin.
“I wanted to apologize again for earlier,” she expressed with a rosy shade forming on her cheeks.
“I promise you’re okay,” I flashed her a quick smile and her face returned to its fair state. I extended my arm across the table. “I’m Sawyer Banks, by the way.”
“How formal of you. I’m Lucy Collins,” she enunciated her last name in a mocking way as she shook my hand.
“I know. I mean… I—” I started to stammer like a fool. “So,” I leaned back into my seat with my arms crossed over my chest, acting cool, calm, and collected as ever, “did you find what you were looking for this morning?”
She scraped the thinnest layer of pie off the side, but let it sit on the edge of her fork. “What makes you think I was looking for anything?”
“Just a hunch.”
She grazed her teeth over her fork, slowly eating the bite of pie. Her eyes went soft, and her face was unreadable. “Well, I was looking for someone,” she said, setting her fork back down. “Gus, actually. I was hoping to catch him. I am surprised he didn’t come running at the mini concert I had put on.” She nudged her head in the direction of the jukebox.
Moments before she walked in, I was exiting my office at the same time he had run off into the walk-in freezer with a heaving chest and flushed cheeks. I had never seen that man so avoidant before. Said he swore he saw a ghost. He looked like a guilt-ridden child. An emotional, scared, guilt-ridden child.
Cherry brought over a half sandwich and fries at the same time that her laptop dinged with a new notification. She snapped her neck so fast at the noise and pushed all else away from her. The clacking of the keys that started under her fingers was as loud as the conversations behind me. I fidgeted with the napkins and straightened out the unused utensils that were in front of me.
A moment had passed, “Everything okay over there?”
“Yeah, sorry, it’s—” she stammered, and crinkled her nose in the cutest way as she strained her eyes trying to read her screen. “I have spent my morning contacting realtors and contractors and yup,” she slams her laptop shut, “just as I figured. None of them are available.”
Lucy released a loud grunt and folded her arms against her chest. She had zoned out in a way that made me think she forgot I was sitting across from her.
“Are you looking to buy here?”
“Selling, actually. I had a feeling I was getting on top of this too late. It’s my fault.”
She blew a breath up her face in defeat, making the loose strands of hair fly all which ways. Her childlike frown crushed me.
“Let me see what I can do,” I said firmly.
“No, you really don’t have to –”
“I might know somebody.”
I had a Rolodex of realtors forever on standby waiting to work with the Banks family. For once, I could use my family name and not be filled with shame. The corners of Lucy’s mouth lift for a split second. Immediately, I found myself taking in each crease upon her face that formed, honored that I was the one who placed a smile on her face.
She reached for a fry and nibbled off the end. “Thank you,” she said endearingly.
I looked over at Mel who was giving me a smile of her own, one that was more mischievous than I would like. I mouthed an exaggerated fuck off her way. I could see her chest move with laughter as she moved to punch things into the register.
Before I could restart my conversation with Lucy, I was quickly drawn to the buzzing that started to stir at the bar. A little early for a brawl considering it’s one-thirty in the afternoon on a Wednesday… But what do I know?
“What? You can’t smile for me, townie?” A scrawny, good-for-nothing asshole taunted Mel, swiping his fingers underneath her chin.
She whipped her head away so fast, I thought her next step was going to be biting his head—or dick—off. “I don’t smile at people who disappoint their parents. How is your influencer presence going, anyway?” Mel snapped back without missing a beat.
Aaron Nelson was the kid who always said he would make it big but never did.
His family was just one of the ones who joined us at the lake house for our Fourth of July parties. People in town were rarely invited, it was more so an evasion of city folk coming up for the holidays, making a whole bunch of unwanted noise, and leaving the place worse than they found it. Assuming the town would clean up after them like their maids and servants do back home.
I remember Aaron’s dad being the type to one-up everyone in crowded conversations, though their reality back home in the city was far from what they projected. Massive debt, never promoting at work like he alluded. But they’d never tell a soul the truth. The apple doesn’t fall far from the douche—I mean tree.
Aaron is now in his thirties, living in his grandparent’s estate which he inherited, and talks about powdered drinks on social media. He’d never admit that he’s a “townie” along with the rest of us.
The way he sees it is that since he isn’t from here and doesn’t plan on staying, he is on an indefinite vacation. Somehow, our families believe if we don’t reside here, then it’s okay and we can keep our status. For whatever that’s worth.
For all my grandfather thinks, I have become a hermit who is so far off the grid.
I stood from the table and immediately stiffened my stance between the two of them once I reached the bar. “Alright,” I turned to Cherry behind the bar and whispered to her, “Maybe no day drinking for him anymore.”
“Oh, that’s right. I forgot that Sawyer Banks controls all of his bitches,” he slurred his words. Mel pounced hard against my back, trying to tackle the bag of bones standing in front of us. Those around us roared with distaste. But all I could hear was the clenching of a jaw from one worked-up Mel behind me.
“I will tear that L.L. Bean catalog shirt right off of your scrawny body, Nelson!” Mel shrieked, trying to claw her way around me.
I gritted my teeth together—and bit my tongue. Entertaining Aaron Nelson wasn’t worth it, it never was. He believed we were in some sort of competition with one another since primary school.
When he learned that I spent my sixteenth birthday in New York City, he had to book the penthouse at the Ritz a few months later on his birthday. Just to prove that he could.
“I don’t think you realize that I don’t control anyone here,” I said, pressing a firm finger against his chest, “Mel here could snap your twig ass in half. And after the stupid comment that you just made, I would let her. But I don’t feel like cleaning your blood off my bar stools. They’re new. I like them. So how about you turn around, leave my restaurant, and go kick some rocks before I kick the aforementioned twig ass of yours.”
He threw his hands up in surrender with a sly grin drawn across his face, then he looked around. Everyone was staring in his direction, unimpressed. He dropped his hands and his face went blank before leaving.
“Sorry about that, everyone,” I shouted out. “A round of bloody Mary’s, on the house.”
Everyone cheered.
On days that become harder than the rest, I found myself in a place of regret for leaving the life I once lived. Everything was laid out for me, even my freshly shined shoes and dry-cleaned socks that my assistant would pick up for me.
But then I saw people like Aaron Nelson, and how that life has literally torn him apart. As it has many people I grew up around. This very moment confirms that I am far from regret.
“Are you okay?” I said softly to Mel, who was cornered against the prep counter by Cherry.
“What? Me? Of course!” Her lips said one thing, and her eyes said another.
Mel can hold her own. That is something I am sure of. But once the clouds of dust settle and the adrenaline rush from puffing out her chest dies off, she becomes shaken up. Regardless of the confrontation’s magnitude, her pupils dilate and her focus wanders.
I know this, and that’s why I’ll never buy her of course bullshit.
“Go home.”
“But—”
“Mel.”
“Sawyer.”
We had a staring match so intense that Cherry walked backward away from us.
“Okay,” she sucked in a breath, then untied her apron and threw it back under the counter.
As I headed back to Lucy, who was wide-eyed off in her corner, I got distracted by the barking coming from outside.
I turned my head to see Billy chasing bunnies up the hill, then turned my head back at her. Her head was buried back into her keyboard. The dog, the girl. The dog, the girl. I could get whiplash from flipping my head back and forth so much right now.
I shot my arm up over the seated crowd and waved it around like an absolute maniac. “Lucy!” her head shot up. “I gotta go, but I’ll see you around!”
Her eyes widened before they went soft. She waved me off before throwing up a thumbs-up. I flashed her a wink, then rushed out the front and went after the mutt.