Clearing my throat and trying hard to deny the thrum and whoosh of my heartbeat in my ears, I deliver my chocolate milks with a smile before making my way to table ten.
Sliding my notepad from my apron and clicking the tip of my pen, I cock my head. “Good morning.”
Isaiah places his menu flat on his table, drawing in a deep breath before checking his watch. “Just a coffee and eggs today, please.”
My pen presses into my notepad with a slight tremble.
“Seriously?” I ask.
He glances up at me, his expression cold and distant. “I’m in a bit of a rush.”
Lingering and at a total loss for words at the fact that he’s treating me like a complete stranger, I clear my throat and let my notepad fall to my sides. My lips part as I try to say something, but the perfect words fail to find their way out of my jumbled brain.
A million thoughts spin around and there are a million things I probably should say to him right now, but I promised Rach I wouldn’t do anything stupid and at the end of the day, I’m not willing to sacrifice my job over this jackass.
God help him if I ever meet him outside these four walls though …
“No pancake today?” I ask, forcing a smile. If he wants to pretend we’re a couple of strangers, then two can play that game.
He shakes his head. “Coffee and two eggs over easy.”
“Really? Sure you don’t want two pancakes?” I offer an incredulous chuckle, wondering, for a split second, why I feel the insane need to try to jog his memory. He didn’t forget me. He couldn’t have.
Isaiah points to the sign above the register. “Heard you guys are sticklers on that one-pancake rule. Figured I’d stick to something simple today.”
The oceans and continents that once separated us have nothing on the distant gaze in his eyes when he looks at me.
Pressing my lips together and trying to stave off the stinging threat of tears, I take his menu. “I’ll put that in for you right away.”
Isaiah turns away from me, staring out the window to the sidewalk. His hair is a bit longer than it was before, which makes me think he’s been home from his deployment for a while. And he’s dressed in a navy suit with a white button down, a far departure from the fitted ripped jeans and v-neck t-shirts I only ever knew him to wear before.
“You okay?” Rachael asks when she bumps into me back at the kitchen window.
I hang his order on the line and turn to face her, squeezing my eyes tight until the burn subsides. “He looked right through me, Rach. Like he didn’t recognize me. Why would he come all the way here and pretend like we’re strangers? What’s he doing?”
Her nose wrinkles and her gaze skirts over my shoulder and lands on him. “That’s … really weird. Did you say anything to him?”
Shaking my head, I say, “What am I supposed to say? ‘Hey … do you remember me? We slept together earlier this year…’”
“You’ll think of the right thing to say. You’re just in shock right now.” She smooths her hand along my arm and offers a sympathetic head tilt before heading out to the floor.
Grabbing a full coffee carafe from a burner, I return to Isaiah’s table and flip over his empty coffee cup.
“Room for two creams, half sugar?” I ask, hating that I remember the way he takes his coffee.
His brows narrow as he gazes up at me. “Lucky guess.”
Lucky guess?
“Yeah, sometimes I think I’m psychic or something,” I say, not so much as attempting to hide the biting snark in my tone.
“Thanks.” He pulls his coffee closer and reaches for the sugar holder by the window.
“You look good,” I say. And I mean it. As much as I want to rip his hair out and smack him across his pretty boy face and tell him what an asshole he is, a part of me is glad he made it home safe and unscathed. “I like the suit. It’s a nice touch.”
And my mother always said, you can never go wrong when you take the high road.
His dark brows meet as he turns my direction, studying me. “Thank you.”
“Your eggs should be out soon.” I leave and check on my three other tables before his order comes up, and when I return with his breakfast, he’s on his phone. He doesn’t acknowledge me or thank me with a quick wave of his hand when I place his plate in front of him. He simply reaches for a fork.
My stomach hardens, unsettling.
So much for the closure.
If anything, I’m more confused than I was before.
I spend the next fifteen minutes fully immersed in work, even pre-bussing some of Rachael’s tables so I have every reason not to stand around fixating on why he’s here and why he’s pretending not to know me.
When he finally flags me down and asks for his check, a blanket of anxious heat warms my body and I will myself to find the right thing to say before he walks out of here.
“Thank you,” he says a minute later, when I hand him the leather check wallet. His total was thirteen dollars and fifty-eight cents and I watch as he slips a ten and a five-dollar bill inside and tells me to “keep the change.”
The dollar forty-two is a far cry from the hundred-dollar tip he once left.
“Why did you come here today?” I ask, hand on one hip and head cocked.
“I beg your pardon?”
“Why did you come here today?” I state my question clear as fucking day, enunciating every last syllable.
Isaiah frowns. “Is this some kind of trick question?”
“Why did you request me?” I ask.
“I … didn’t.”
Pulling in a hard breath, I massage my temples before splaying my hand across my beating heart. “This doesn’t make sense.”
“Are you mad about the tip?” he asks. “I usually try to tip more, but you made me wait fifteen minutes for my check and now I’m going to be late for a client meeting.”
“Oh, so now we’re going to pretend this is about the tip and not about the way you’re treating me?” I ask. My mouth falls and I can sense the burn of cherry heat in my ears.
“The way I’m treating you?” He scoffs, sliding out of his booth and standing. “Ma’am, I think you’re confused.”
Ma’am.
He’s back to calling me ma’am.
“Did you hit your head or something?” I ask. “Is that what happened? I’m not being facetious, it’s a legitimate question. Do you have amnesia?”
Isaiah chuckles, like I’m being cute, and then he shakes his head. “Are we done here? Because I’ve got someone waiting for me back at the office.”
At the office?
He’s been back long enough to get a job in an office that requires a suit …
He’s not fresh off the military boat. Not at all. And at this point, I’m starting to wonder if he was ever really in the army. It could’ve all been a ruse, maybe something he tells girls so he can get laid and have an excuse never to see them again. Or maybe he was some method actor studying for a role?
Then again, the letters came from an APO … so that couldn’t be it.
Gram always says, “It takes all kinds,” but I never knew what she meant until now, when I’m standing in front of one of the worst ‘kinds’ I’ve ever had the displeasure of knowing.
“If you’ll excuse me,” he says, squeezing past me, his meaty hands on my shoulders. Straightening his jacket, he gives me one last look—like I’m the crazy one here—and then he turns to leave.
Gathering his dirty dishes, I take them back to the kitchen, scolding myself for all those wasted days and sleepless nights I spent worrying about that selfish prick.
When I said I wanted closure, I didn’t know it was going to feel like this, and I didn’t know it was possible to mean less than nothing to someone who meant more than something to me.
Chapter Thirty-One
Maritza
The clock on my nightstand reads 2:41 AM.
I’ve been tossing and turning since ten o’clock, when I took a Benadryl and
a melatonin and thought I could force myself into a coma-like sleep.
All I wanted was to shut my mind off for two seconds, to stop the spinning and the madness and the questions that’ve been playing on a loop in my head since Isaiah walked into my café yesterday morning and pretended like he’d never seen me in his life.
Sitting up and finally accepting the fact that I’m not going to get a single minute of respite tonight, I click on my lamp and reach into the drawer of my bedside table, grabbing a pen and the notebook of letters I’d written Isaiah for a brief period of time when he was supposedly out on some mission—before the radio silence.
Flipping to an empty page in the middle, I write a letter that’ll never be sent, but at least if I get it all on paper and out of my head, I might be able to catch some sleep before the sun comes up.
Dear Isaiah,
Eight months ago, you were just a soldier about to be deployed and I was just a waitress, sneaking you a free pancake and hoping you wouldn’t notice that my gaze was lingering a little too long.
But you did notice.
We spent one life-changing week together before you left, and we said goodbye on day eight, exchanging addresses at the last minute.
I saved every letter you wrote me, your words quickly becoming my religion.
But you went radio silent on me months ago, and then you had the audacity to walk into my diner yesterday and act like you’d never seen me in your life.
To think … I almost loved you and your beautifully complicated soul.
Almost.
Whatever your reason is—I hope it’s a good one.
Maritza the Waitress
PS – I hate you, and this time … I mean it.
Pulling in a long, cool breath and letting it go, I close the notebook and tuck it away in the drawer before clicking my lamp off. Lying down and pulling the covers up, I stare at a dark ceiling before closing my eyes.
My mind is barely lighter than it was before, but my thoughts seem to have quieted a bit.
In the still, small minutes before I finally drift off, I remind myself that LA is full of people who use people, people who do unscrupulous things and who have no qualms about hurting others.
Isaiah Torres was never anything special—he was just another run-of-the-mill LA asshole.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Maritza
“Morning, Hollie.” I tie my apron around my waist and glance at the clock to confirm that I am, in fact, on time for work. Normally I can go a whole shift without seeing her because she’s usually hiding in the back, door closed and only emerging when there’s an issue.
But today it’s like she was waiting.
“I need to see you in my office.” My manager says a sentence I’ve never heard her say in all of my time here. She doesn’t smile.
“Everything okay?” I ask, following her to the back.
Hollie says nothing and I find myself holding my breath without even thinking about it. Every silent second is torture.
“Close the door, please, Maritza,” she says once we’re there. “Have a seat.”
Oh, god. I’m being fired.
Grabbing a sticky note off her computer monitor, she exhales. “I got a call from a customer last night.”
I glance down at my lap, realizing I’ve been digging my nails into my palms this entire time.
“He had a very unsatisfactory experience here yesterday,” she continues. “And he said you were his server.”
“Hollie, I’m so sorry and I can explain.” My gaze flicks into hers.
Her brows lift. “No need. He didn’t want to get into specifics.”
Leaning back against the chair, I peer to the side. None of this makes sense.
“Anyway, I wanted to tell you that each and every customer who walks through our door needs to have a five-star experience,” she says. “And as a server, you’re one of the many faces of this restaurant. It’s your job to represent Brentwood Pancake and Coffee in a way that’s going to keep them coming back.”
“I know. And normally I do that, but this—”
“Rachael does a fine job,” she says. “So does Harry. And Pam. And Chloe.”
I bite my tongue. The comparisons aren’t necessary and besides, I’m the one who trained all of them.
“If anything like this so much as happens again, Maritza, I’m going to have no choice but to let you go,” she says, thin lips forming a hard line. “Anyway, I don’t normally do this, but he was rather persistent and I wasn’t in a place to disappoint him since he’d just had a God-awful experience with us, but here.”
Hollie hands me the yellow sticky note where a phone number is scribbled in blue pen alongside the name “Torres.”
It’s an LA area code, but the last four digits of the number are unfamiliar—he must have changed his number.
“He’d like you to call him when you get a chance,” she says, head tilting as she exhales. “While you have him on the phone, I’d highly recommend a profuse apology.”
I nod, not sure what he’s hoping to accomplish from this phone call—or if I’ll even call him for that matter.
“Now, get back out there,” she says, rising from her desk and adjusting her blouse. “Let’s make today a better day than yesterday.”
Piece of cake.
Any day would be better than yesterday.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Maritza
“Just call him,” Melrose says, watching me pace my room. “For the love of God, just get it over with. See what he wants. Do it for yourself because you know and I know that if you don’t do this, you’re going to spend the rest of your life wondering what he wanted. Aren’t you curious?”
“Of course I’m curious. I just can’t decide if this is worth it—giving him another ounce of my time or energy.”
Melrose pulls her legs onto my bed before bringing her knees against her chest. “Do you want me to do it? I can pretend to be you. I can talk the way you talk … I took an impressions class last year.”
I stop pacing for a second and give her a crazy-eyed glance. “Pass.”
She shrugs. “Well, the offer still stands if you change your mind.”
“I’m not afraid to talk to him. It’s not that I’m physically incapable of calling him. I just don’t want him to know that what he did got to me, you know? I don’t want to give him that satisfaction.”
“So call him and be a mega bitch,” she says. “I know you’re usually the nicest, sweetest person who ever did live, but maybe show him your super-secret evil crazy lady side. The one that comes out a few days a month … only worse than that.”
Taking a seat on the foot of my bed, I drag my thumb along my screen and pull up the keypad. The sticky note in my left hand is crumpled from shoving it into my apron after leaving Hollie’s office earlier today, but the numbers are still legible.
“Screw it. I’m calling—but only because I just want to get this over with,” I say, tapping out the numbers and hitting the green button.
Sucking in a lungful of vanilla candle-scented bedroom air, I chew my bottom lip and count the rings.
One …
Two …
Three …
Four …
“He’s not answering,” I say, a flash of panic washing over me. I didn’t even consider the fact that he might not answer, and I hate playing phone tag.
“Hello,” Isaiah answers a half-ring later, proving me wrong.
“Hey, it’s Maritza,” I say. “You wanted me to call you?”
“Maritza the waitress from Brentwood?” he asks.
I exhale, gaze locked with my cousin. “Yep. That’s me.”
The line is quiet for a split second, though for some reason that second feels like forever.
“So … what do you have to say for yourself?” I ask because I haven’t got all night. “What was that about earlier?”
“Can you meet me somewhere?” he asks. “I need to speak to you. In person.”
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My jaw hangs. “I don’t know. I’ve got a lot going on these days.”
“It’s important,” he says. “And it won’t take long.”
“Is there a reason you can’t tell me right now? Over the phone?” I chuff.
“Yeah,” Isaiah says. “This is just something I’d rather tell you face to face.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
Maritza
“I would’ve ordered you a coffee, but I wasn’t sure what you drink.” Isaiah stands when I arrive at the Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf on San Vicente the following morning. He’s dressed in a gray suit sans jacket and his hand grazes against his skinny black tie when he sits.
“I don’t remember you being this … formal.” My discerning gaze scans the length of him before returning to his familiar amber eyes.
Everything about him is off … from the way he dresses to the way he carries himself and even the way he looks at me, but we established that two days ago.
Taking a seat and opting not to buy a drink because I don’t plan to stay long, I fold my arms across my chest and give him my full attention.
“So?” I ask. “What is this thing you just had to tell me in person, Isaiah? And I can call you that, right? Since we’re done playing this we’ve-never-met-before-in-our-lives bullshit game of yours?”
He offers a pained smile before licking his full lips and straightening his shoulders. “That’s the thing … I’m not Isaiah.”
“Ha.” I shake my head, rising and slinging my bag over my shoulder. “Right, right.”
He’s mental.
He’s completely mental.
And now he’s wasted my time.
“Maritza, please. Sit down. I’m not finished.” He reaches into his back pocket, retrieving a brown leather wallet and flipping it open to his driver’s license.
My eyes go to his photo. “Okay. What am I looking at?”
His thumb slides next to the name.
P.S. I Hate You Page 17