Map The Stars Between Us

Chapter one-Lottie

Lottie tapped her pen on the notepad until the frantic tempo was all she heard. The restaurant around her blurred out of her sight and she could feel the tickling sensation of her breath hissing through her teeth. All she could see was the clock as the second hand slowly counted off to ten. She swore she heard the gears as they clicked into place at the hour mark and it was like a bell going off; she was free. Quickly before another customer could hail her down she tucked her black pen into the tightly wound bun atop her head and yanked at the apron ties behind her back. Once she had them undone she tore it off, balled up the apron with her orders notepad and tossed it with a thump under the cash register.

"I'm heading out Nora" She called out into the kitchen to the diner's owner, already rushing around the front counter to the short employee locker by the kitchen door. Snapping the warped metal doors open with a squeal before looping her long fingers around her knapsack straps and throwing it over her shoulder along with her long cotton jacket.

"Is it ten already sweetie?" The older woman asked from just inside the kitchen, her head popping around the corner, flour smearing a fine streak across her already age softened cheek. Lottie smiled genuinely. Nora Wilkins was the grandmotherliest woman she had the pleasure of knowing. If it weren't for her, Lottie would still be running from tired travelers with their wallets tucked neatly in her hand and her heart caught in her throat.

Nora owned the small greasy spoon diner near the only gas station off of the highway for miles. They'd met about a month after Lottie had hitchhiked into town with a trucker who had smiled too much and maintained a one-sided conversation, the entire 200-mile ride, about his at-home beer brewery he was thinking of starting up in his basement in Montana. When she'd finally gotten to his last stop she'd scrambled out of his truck like it had caught on fire, thanking him before disappearing into the trees that surrounded the small gas station and rest stop. He'd called out a few times but she'd ignored him.

Lottie had lived that way for weeks in the small roadside town, bunked down on old leaf piles in the green treescape that bordered it, sneaking food out of cars that had stopped and money from wallets of unsuspecting vacationers and truckers. Until one day when she'd been caught in from of Nora's diner. A man who'd been almost inside had remembered that his car wasn't locked and had turned only to find Lottie's fingers looting his cup holder for his extra change and the bag of Cheetos tossed on the passenger side. He'd pitched a fit, yelling, calling her horrible names before wrapping his fingers in her impossibly dirty hair and yanking her out of the front seat. She'd been crying leaving tracks on her dirt stained cheeks, curled up on the crumbled blacktop waiting for him to do his worst when Nora had run out of the restaurant her long grey curls whipping around her shoulders like a superheroes cape. It was because of her that the cops weren't called and she'd taken Lottie inside the diner and cooked her a meal on the house. She'd even let her sit at the back of the diner in a corner booth for the rest of the day. Lottie had sat there for hours reading that old romance novel the older woman had pulled out of her purse until midnight, when Nora left for the night. She still remembered the surprise when the older woman has kindly taken her hand and pulled her towards her beat-up old Impala.

She'd taken Lottie home and given her another meal before shoving her towards the bathroom with a towel and some sweats with a long black zip-up sweater—the latter of which had looked like it belonged to a tall and broad man rather than the small older woman whose hands rested on her shoulders—all the while, commenting on how "no self-respecting young lady should smell like a forest creature or look like one." Lottie had cried in the shower, so thankful for a full stomach, to be clean and overwhelmed by the compassion of this woman who knew nothing about her but still had treated her with more kindness than anyone ever had in her entire life.

Once she'd finally dragged herself out of the warm shower her fingers were pruned and her hair no longer looked brown but shone in long amber waves that dripped down her spine to rest in cooling, tickly strands beneath her ass. After pulling the warm pink towel over her too-skinny frame and draping it with the clothes she'd been given, Lottie had poked her head out of the bathroom door. Nora hadn't been standing by the door so she's walked into the small hallway towards the sound of clattering dishes and water. Nora stood at the sink with her hands in the dishwater, her back to Lottie, before she'd turned her head and smiled and that was how it had all begun for Lottie and Nora. The older woman had given her a home that day, practically adopting her. The small home had two rooms the older woman had said, and one of them was hers. Just like that; Nora hadn't give her space to argue and Lottie hadn't wanted to.

That had been years ago and now Lottie was eighteen and so very thankful for the older woman. She smiled at her before darting forward to kiss the flour smudge on Nora's cheek.

"Yes, and I'm heading home I'll see you in a couple hours." Nora smiled sweetly and patted Lottie on her own cheek.

"Yes dear enjoy your evening. I'll be home once we close up." She patted Lottie's cheek once more before turning back into the kitchen. Lottie's smile stayed on her lips as she walked out of the door shrugging on her coat and bag. Wrinkling her noise at the wet weather outside and the thunder off in the distance.

Even in the dreary weather it didn't take her long to spot the small cottage style house with the winter-drooped flowerbed in the front. She pulled her keys out and they jingles with small bells that she'd added weeks before, already feeling the holiday spirit in November. After locking the door and tossing her bag onto the couch in the front room she went to unbutton the front of her coat when she heard the noise outside. It sounded muffled at first, even through the storm, like the way the cars sounded from the highway but then it got louder until it sounded as if it were right outside. It no longer sounded like the buzzing of an engine but rather a whirring noise of something traveling fast through air. She stood still trying to listen closer when saw a bright light flash through the house before felt the house vibrate. The plates in the sink clattered together and she could see the windows in their frames shifting back and forth. She stood there for what felt like forever but was merely seconds before she heard the crash.

To anyone who wasn't nearby it would have probably disregarded the noise as a clash of thunder from the storm but Lottie knew differently, something had dropped into her backyard. Unfrozen by curiosity she darted through the house. She had never seen a shooting star before and if one had landed in her back yard she wanted to be the first to see it. She'd read about how once a woman had been in her house on the couch when a fist-sized comet had ripped through her roof and landed on her lap. The article made it seem like such an unusual phenomenon but if it could happen in the middle of boon-dock nowhere, maybe it wasn't or maybe Lottie's life had turned around completely 180 and she was finally a luck magnet. If she made a wish on a fallen star to always be as happy as she was now, would it work even better than on one still rushing through space?

She got to the back door and unbolted it with a snick, before throwing the door open and stepping back outside into the bone chilling rain and paused at what she saw before her. Her thoughts going blank for the first time since she's gotten home. Just passed her backyard, in the forested area that usually looked so green and vibrant, was flashing with flames that were being smothered by the rain. She ran passed her yard and towards the light until she stood a couple yards into the forest. Before her the ground dipped violently into a hollow that hadn't been there before. By now the flames had been limited to twigs and wet leaves making the air filmy and her eyes water. Kneeling near the dip in the earth she peered into the new hole in the earth.