A Year Around the Sun

t w o - growing up is great

show me some place i'd like,
make me feel like i'm d r e a m i n g . . .

🌊🌊🌊

As I pushed open the glass doors of The Sand Dollar the following morning, I shut my eyes for a brief moment to savor the feeling of home.

The smell of freshly-baked breakfast pastries drifted through the cool air of the diner, bringing a small smile onto my face. My eyes fluttered open and I saw my mom standing behind the aqua counter top, wiping it down and humming to herself. If it weren't for the small chimes attached to the door, she probably wouldn't have even noticed me.

Glancing up from her rag, she looked at me with a tired smile. "Oh, hi sweetie," she said.

"Morning," I greeted her. My sneakers scuffed along the tiled floor, then I took a seat on one of the coordinating aqua stools lined up at the counter.

Behind my mom, I could see her other half running around in the kitchen, getting ready for the day ahead of us. My dad paused by the window to send me a short wave and a grin, and I smiled back.

I leisurely rotated back and forth on my stool, the feeble sound of the soft-rock radio station stealing my attention. With only half an hour until we open, all we had to do was wait for the rest of the employees to come and for the clock to strike six.

This place could easily be my sanctuary. Aside from my own home, I'd never found a place so comforting as inside the ivory walls of my parents legacy.

The booths that fit the aqua and white color scheme severed as the spot where I'd shared myriads of milkshakes with my dad, toying with the idea of which one of us could guess all 25 flavors on the menu. In the small kitchen was where I learned how to make my first pancake. For the last three minutes of business nearly every day when I was a kid, my parents would let me pick what song to play as the last one on the jukebox.

Interrupting my reflection on my younger years, the clanging of the bells on the door caused me to snap my gaze to whoever had entered.

"I can't stand those damn seagulls," my favorite waitress, Robyn, came barreling into the diner with an irritated look on her face. My mom and I both chuckled, and she plopped down on the stool beside me with a heavy sigh. "They're always lurking in the parking lot, and they don't even move when you get close to them! I need a parking spot, you don't."

Robyn is about my parents age and is practically my second mother. Knowing my parents before I came along because of the diner, that means she's known me my entire life. She's also my godmother, so I've always felt a special connection to her, knowing that she'd have my back if something were to ever happen to my parents.

"Anybody want anything to eat?" My dad's voice came from the kitchen, cutting into Robyn's rant on seagulls.

"An egg sandwich, please!" I called out to him. He grinned back with a nod, then fired up the stove since my mom and Robyn both denied the offer. Which is blasphemy to me, because who would turn down free food?

My mom threw her cleaning rag over her shoulder, adjusting the bandanna wrapped around her head. "What are you doing today?" She asked me, raising a thin eyebrow.

"Well, I'm here 'till twelve then I have work at the pier from one to six," I explained my work schedule. "My friend Heather is having a party tonight, so I think we're all going to that later on."