Olly, Olly

Chapter 3. World domination

I spent the morning in bed and caught a couple reality shows early afternoon. I started work at four. I'm scheduled a closing shift tonight. Walking through the restaurant, I kept an eye out for Amy. I had a couple things I wanted to talk over with her, like ask her why after so many years she blurted out my secret. Most importantly, I am interested in what exactly she spilled.

The restaurant was busy for this hour, a late lunch crowd spilled in from a nearby sporting event. I said my normal hello's as I walked through the dining room. The kitchen guys held devious grins in place as I walked in, and so it began— the jokes and the teasing. They noticed Oliver and my returned glances at each other yesterday and okay, full on stares. I tried to pretend they were all imaging what they thought they saw. Marco was working the grill tonight, he was the first to begin the heckling. Honestly, I never doubted for a second that he would be the ringleader. Marco loves to mess with me on a daily basis. I didn't expect him to let this one slide. He was enjoying the jokes at my expense. He said when he was talking to Oliver that there was no one else in the whole restaurant to him, but me. That he was returning conversation, but you could see that boy is in love. As much as I tried not to let his words affect me, I couldn't help it, his words made me blush and Marco caught it.

"Be good to him Mija!" Rosa cut in, as she left her prep station and came over and kissed me on the cheek. She was one of the eldest and longest employees at 'Cielo.' She had known the Cartagena family for many years. "Don't listen to these guys— they're all jealous because you didn't give any of them the time of day." I smirked at her words as she continued, "He's one of the good ones, Mija."

"I know, Rosita!" I replied to her kindness, as she held and rubbed my hand.

"May God bless you both! I prayed every day for that boy to come home safely."

"Thanks, Rosa!" She released with a gentle smile.

As I was about to walk away— Marco blew a low whistle to get my attention, "Aria," he called out. "He's a lucky man!" He stated as he gave me a dumb's up. Followed with— "he's a good guy," and smiled. I returned the smile back.

Walking to my locker, I questioned how they could tell. Was it that obvious? Were we that readable? A smile broke on my face because it was somewhat embarrassing that the guys paid attention. As I opened my locker, I was surprised but more confused at the sight of a little yellow envelope. I reached in and swapped my purse in its place. I pulled off my headset and rolled the cord, placed it in my bag and turned the envelope over to see if there was anything written on it, nothing. It was blank! I unsealed it and pulled out money, it was two one hundred dollar bills. I looked into the envelope to see if there was something in there expecting a note of explanation, but it was empty. My first thought was, this must be a mistake. Someone must have slipped this into the wrong locker. I slipped the money back into the envelope and placed it in a disposable coke cup in the back of my locker, where I usually stored my pens that I would need for my shift. I figured I couldn't walk around the whole restaurant asking people if they lost two hundred dollars. Amy, came into mind, something else I would bring to her attention whenever I'd get the chance to talk to her. I'd let her figure this out, so I closed my locker and was all set to start my shift. I had about another ten minutes before our pre-shift meeting, so I peeked into the office to see if I could find Amy in there. It was just Sam cashing out the A.M. servers.

At pre-shift, Gary the lead server, informed us what tonight's specials were, including what stations we were scheduled on. Just then, Lily walked into the room, she was still intimidating. I've spent many nights at her house as a kid, and we've never said any words to each other. Amy and I were very close, but Lily barely spent any time with Amy or Oliver. They were always at different maturity levels due to the age gap.