June, this year #2
I scan the room for who I might be meeting, trying to ignore the fact that it’s Ben’s dark-blond head I’m searching for. But he’s not here, and nor is anyone else I recognize. Greta, the owner, comes out of the kitchen to the area behind the counter.
“Millie! For God’s sake, there you are.” She reaches behind her, grabs a striped apron off a hook, and throws it at me.
Hard. I catch it, clutching it against me in surprise.
“You’re a half-hour late again, and we’ve been slammed since seven.
” She holds up a hand before I can say anything.
“Just get started. And I’m sorry, but I’m docking your pay this time. Table five needs clearing.”
I’m not meeting someone here. I work here.
Shit.
I mean, the diner is great. But why do I work here? And what happened to my marketing career?
No time to think about that now. Greta is mad as hell, and I don’t want to mess this up for Diner Millie, so I’d better work this shift and figure it out later.
Thankfully, I know the diner well, and I’ve worked casual café jobs in the past, during summer breaks, so I’m a confident server, and know how to work this kind of cash register.
“Sorry, Greta,” I tell her with a sheepish grimace.
I tie on the apron and get to clearing table five.
Greta and I work together in surprising harmony and, although I stumble a few times with not knowing how the kitchen staff like their order tickets or where the new ketchup is stored, it’s a busy shift and she doesn’t seem to notice my failings.
As she’s closing out the cash register, I apologize to her again for my lateness.
“It’s okay, Millie,” she replies, softer this time. “I know things have been hard for you since you lost your mom. But try not to let it happen again, okay?”
Lost my mom?
I nod, my tongue suddenly thick in my mouth.
I don’t even trust my voice to thank Greta as she hands me a week’s paycheck, with a tear-off attachment bearing my name and what must be my home address.
My fingers trembling, I remove my apron and put it in the laundry bin, and slip out without another word.
In the beat-up Ford, which now makes more sense given the pitiful paycheck I was just given, I pause and take a few deep breaths before I can think about driving.
Lost my mom.
This is a world where I work in a diner, and not only are the Masons still presumably dead, given the state of their house, but my own mother is gone, too. And I’ve no idea how.
I don’t think I’m going to like this new reality very much.
Then again, maybe there will never be a reality that I like very much. I know that life is never going to be perfect, and I’m not looking for perfection. I swear, I’m not. But finding one that I like as much as my original life is surely possible.
Exhausted, I drive to the address on my paycheck, which is a slightly shabby bungalow in Galewood, a half-hour west of downtown. I unlock the front door, expecting to find the place empty, but two young women around my age are in the living room, watching TV.
I have absolutely zero idea who they are.
“Hey, Mill. There’s still some gelato in the freezer, if you want some,” the platinum blonde one says.
“Uh, thanks, I’m good,” I reply.
Oh God.
Roommates.
Not only do I have a low-paying job and an apparently deceased mother, but also roommates in a crappy house.
What the hell happened to me? And what happened to Mom?
I turn a corner into a cramped corridor with four doors. One of these will presumably be my bedroom, but which? It’d be really weird if I walked into one of my roommates’ bedrooms — plus who knows who else might be here?
I open one door to find a shabby bathroom that doesn’t look like it’s been cleaned in months. Terrific.
Saving me from a potential bedroom faux-pas, the two girls in the living room turn off the TV, and walk past me into two separate rooms.
“Night, Mill,” says the redhead, pausing at her bedroom door. “Gimme a shout when you’re out of the bathroom.”
“Oh. You can have it now — go ahead,” I reply, stepping away from the bathroom door. At least I know now which my room is. I’ll crash here for a night, then head back up to Lake Bluff in the morning. I’m way too exhausted from my diner shift to make the long drive tonight.
Not to mention, way too tired from all the universe jumping.
I step inside the fourth door, closing it with some trepidation behind me.
It’s a messier room than I’d normally have, but I soon spot some recognizable stuff among the junk — clothes I’ve had for a long time, and some shoes, plus the crystal pendant Mom gave me when I turned eighteen is hanging over the mirror.
Yes, it’s definitely my room. There’s a laptop on the desk, which unlocks with my usual password, and reveals a manuscript for a novel that I appear to be writing.
What a cliché I am — working in a diner while I try to write a book.
The manuscript is unfinished, in chunks of disconnected pieces, with no coherent plot outline.
It seems semi-autobiographical, about a young woman in Chicago whose mother has just died of skin cancer.
The young woman, Mandy, is beating herself up about whether she could have helped her survive if she’d been around early enough to encourage her mom to seek treatment.
Maybe I can help Diner Millie with a few ideas for her story while I’m here. After all, I know a thing or two about what-if scenarios.
I spend the next hour writing out plot ideas for different life paths for Mandy, which Diner Millie will be surprised to find when she’s back in her body, and crawl into the unmade bed.
Tomorrow, I’ll wake up early and drive straight back to Lake Bluff to reset, so that Millie can be back in time for her afternoon shift at the diner.
Thank you, next.
* * *
This is a freaky one. Like, way too meta.
Only last night, I was helping Diner Millie out with ideas for alternate scenarios for her novel’s character to save her dying mother. And today, I’ve just stepped into a world where I appear to be saving my dying mother.
My phone’s home GPS is set to Indianapolis, where Mom lives in my usual life.
From what I can figure out, through researching a backlog of emails on this phone, I recently quit my job, which was my regular one at Magnolia, to go live with and care for Mom as she goes through treatment for skin cancer, which seemed to be what she died of in the previous life I found myself in.
Okay, good. At least in this world Mom found the cancer in time to treat it, and I’m helping her through it. Great. I’m sure it’s a bonding experience for us, and hopefully it all works out and she’ll be okay this time.
Doesn’t sound like a ton of fun, though, and I’m not sure there’s anything I can help out with in this world, that Cancer-Care Millie isn’t already doing. Probably best to get that version of Millie back to her sick mother, asap.
The Lake Bluff house is unoccupied again, so I can go right back in and reset without even interacting in this world.
Thank you, next.
* * *
This one appears more promising, at least to start with.
I’m apparently living in New York, having left Chicago after Northwestern for an advertising job.
I even remember applying for that New York job in my real life, right after graduating, while I was on vacation with the Masons in Oregon — but in my world I didn’t get the job.
I’ve always loved New York, so I take the opportunity to try on this seemingly glamorous version of my life, and hop on the first flight from O’Hare to JFK.
My social media reveals that I’m still in touch with Bonnie, but barely see her, now that we live in different cities.
Instead, I’m living with a slightly older guy, who seems around forty but is really cute — a video game designer called Peter.
As soon as I get to his — our — cool Brooklyn apartment, I feel like a ridiculous imposter and wonder what the hell I’m doing there.
Who am I trying to kid? This isn’t my life.
What’s more, over dinner, he keeps mentioning another woman, some ex-girlfriend of his called Josie. He’s clearly still totally hung up on her, and not really into me at all.
I sleep in his bed with him that night, but we don’t have sex, even though he’s really attractive and funny.
I write a note on Brooklyn Millie’s phone saying “Leave Peter — he’s still in love with his ex Josie” and slip out of the apartment when Peter is out getting Saturday morning coffee and pastries.
I get an expensive Uber to JFK and wait for the next flight to Chicago.
What the hell am I doing with all these lives?
Next, I guess.
* * *
This time, my research tells me I’m living in Dublin, having never even gone to Northwestern, and for some unfathomable reason having agreed to go live with my father in Ireland right after high school.
My job appears to be in a Dublin employee management firm doing office admin and a bit of PR, and I have a ruddy-faced boyfriend called Liam. I’ve never met Bonnie, or Ben.
I really do not have the energy to go to Dublin myself, and figure out if that is a worthwhile life. It’s too damn far, and it doesn’t look that exciting.
I’m exhausted.
There’s no car for me outside the Lake Bluff house gates, and I don’t even make it halfway down the street before turning around to go back and reset.
Next.
* * *
In this one, things seem really good at first. It could be the one.