Dear Diary,
I could not stop yawning.
It had been a while, like four weeks to be exact, since I had worked so late. It was passed nine by the time I headed home from the motel restaurant. The dinner rush was almost, if not more, hectic than the lunch rush had been.
Between taking orders and clearing tables, there was barely any time to man the front desk. But Calvin was right, there was hardly anyone stopping by to get a room. Every so often he would go and sit at the desk, open his farming magazine, and leave me to deal with the tables. He always came back when things got too crazy. He had this way of acting so calm in the chaos. Even between shouting orders at me, he was so... calm.
I liked the way he seemed to float through the craziness.
By the time 8:30 came around, there were just a couple tables with some men who had finished their meals a while ago but were still nursing their drinks. Calvin told me to count the register then head home, he would stay until they decided they were finally ready to go.
"You do this every night?" I asked.
"Do what?"
"Stay late. Wait for these people to head home."
"It's not much work. Sometimes I watch TV in one of the rooms until they stick their head in and say that they're leaving."
"What a weird town." His third smile appears again at my words.
"How do you even have time to help your grandma?" He said he was here to help her, almost implied the job supported him in that, yet he was at the restaurant more than he was ever at her home.
"Darla helps. And I always stop by throughout the day."
"That's where you keep disappearing off to."
"You keeping tabs on me?" He says with his cheeky smile.
I roll my eyes, but when they settle back on him, his smile has disappeared, as if he said something completely inappropriate. He doesn't say anything else to me as I finish counting the register and tidying a couple more things.
"Good night Janie." He calls out to me as I'm leaving. "Thanks for staying so late, you don't have to come in till 11 tomorrow."
"Okay. Thanks." I'm still a little off put by his weird behavior just a half hour before. "Good night." I mumble as I leave, so quiet he may not have even heard it.
...
Sitting in the kitchen this morning, as Darla bustled around and my grandpa kept to himself at the other end of the table as usual, I thought that I must have just imagined that awkwardness with Calvin. Maybe he was still thinking about the cheque book or something, and that made his smile fade as fast as it did.
I was just hoping it wasn't me.
"You worked late last night." Darla calls over her shoulder, I imagined her words were towards me as grandpa was already home when I got in, his door cracked ever so slightly when I went to my room.
I heard it click shut just before I shut my own.
"Yeah, people stay really late at the restaurant."
"They sure do. It's kind of the only place to be around here." She calls back.
"I feel bad Calvin has to stay so late ."
"Well he shouldn't be making you stay such long hours too. What was that, a 12 hour day?" My grandpa asks over his paper.
"Yeah, I guess. I don't mind. There's not much else to do anyway. Plus he said I don't have to come in until 11 today."
"Maybe I should have a talk with him about keeping you so late."
YOU ARE READING
That One Summer
Teen FictionJane was raised by her free spirited uncle, but when he moves to Paris she is forced to live with her grandpa for the summer in a small town where she finds romance and secrets to her past that she never knew were there.
