Coffee & Beaches

2

"Sorry. Sorry, sorry, sorry. Sorrysorrysorry. I'm so sorry." Anne rushes in behind the counter. Her eyes are red and her cheeks are tear stained.

"Anne," I say.

"Lia, I'm super sorry. I know I'm late, I just had a stressful morning and..." she continues on blabbering so fast I can't understand a word she's saying. Corrine, our co-worker who is the waitress, shoots us a glare as her current customers have seemed to notice the scene happening before me.

"Anne," she places her head in her hands and sobs, "Anne. Anne," I whisper, harshly. She looks up and wipes her tears. "Go in the back. I'll be right there." I look at the older couple who just sat down, "She'll be right with you."

"Is she alright?" the woman asks.

"Hon," the man hushes her, "excuse Marlene, she's a worrier," he leans forward, "and a gossip. Take your time. We aren't ready yet anyways." I smile kindly at them and rush to the back to find Anne. I find her on a stool with Monty, one of the cooks, rubbing her back while she cries into Monty's shoulder.

"Anne, what happened?" She whispers a thank you to Monty before she goes back to work.

"So, you know how the day I work I drop the kids off at Nick's? Well, today I got over there and I walk in, I always go first in case of an incident like this, and there's a woman on his couch. Now, it's only been a month and I... I thought we were just taking a break. Just last week he... he told me he still loves me. It sounded like he was in the shower which is unusual because he knows that I drop them off at 8:30 a.m. every other day. So, I go into the bathroom and... and there's a guy, clearly not Nick, in the shower. So, what do I do? I go to his room and there he is rushing to get his shirt on. You know what he says to me? Of course you d-don't. He says, "I can explain." I'm just like, "Really! Can you?" So, we get into this big argument about everything and the girl on the couch wakes up and she clears everything up but I didn't know if I could trust her, like, seriously? And then she hopped in the shower with the guy whom apparently is her boyfriend and the girl is his niece who needed a place to crash last night and apparently he didn't get home until later because he had to "work late." At this point I was a mess. And then I realized I was like 20 minutes late for work so I took off and dropped the kids at my moms house and then I rushed here." She takes a huge breath and wipes her tears. My phone buzzes in my pocket and I grimace. "Oh gosh, I'm sorry, you have plans don't you. Go. I'm good. I'll be, uh, fine."

"You sure?" I ask. Only out of pure generosity because not only do I not want to face the wrath of Amber but the sickening smell of pancakes is enough to make me ready to flee.

As soon as I check out of work, my phone rings Audrey's latest hit, Broken, and I know instantly it's my mother. I hit ignore and continue to my pearly white, volkswagen bug. Once I'm in the car, my phone buzzes and I groan. When I look at the ID I notice that it's a text from Amber.

"Hey, where r u?" It buzzes again."Why didn't u tell me u got a new neighbor? And that he's hot!" I smack my head. I forgot that the new neighbor was moving in and it was "recommended" I meet him or something. Well, if Amber thinks he's hot, he's definitely out of my league. Plus, she's probably already called dibbs. I start the engine and within 10 minutes I'm checking in with the gate guard. I pull into my parking space, next to a small moving truck. I slip out and immediately I see Amber and Madison joined at the hip, badgering a shirtless victim. Within minutes the scorching California sun burns my black clad body.

"Amber, I'm going to go change." I say, tapping her shoulder as I walk past. I avoid all eye contact and casually walk fast up to my door. As soon as I turn the key a manly someone calls out, "Hey," with footsteps to follow. On the inside I groan, assuming it's the new neighbor. "I'm Levi." I turn around and he's up close and personal. I try to ignore the sweet smell of coconut tanning lotion and the musky cologne coming off of him.