“And I’ll pay them,” I assure her, my tone changing. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll find another job. You should just be excited about retiring now.”
“Owning a restaurant isn’t that different from managing a restaurant,” she suggests.
Now I laugh. I simply can’t hold back. “There’s a world of difference. When I’ve been managing this restaurant, it’syourmoney on the line. Not mine.”
I look around me at this place I’ve come to love. It’s quiet now that the busy breakfast crowd has departed.
After next weekend when Memorial Day is upon us, there won’t be as many lulls in the day when I can take a moment to catch my breath. They’ll be lining up out the door waiting for homey favorites like stacks of pancakes in the mornings, burgers or grilled cheese at lunch, and apple piealways, regardless of the time of day.
“Maybe,” Harriet begins. “But it would be your profit if you owned it.”
I feel creases form at the sides of my mouth. Her words seem to whisper to this other side of me—the side who used to feel the allure of one day having my own name on the firm’s door where I once worked.
My eyes flit to the door of the diner with its name stenciled onto the glass.
The Breeze-In Diner.
Millie’sBreeze-In Diner, I let myself add in my head for one brief moment.
I was named after my grandma, just as she had been named after hers. I come from a long line of Millies. And wouldn’t they all be proud to see their name on that door, watching over me from that great Canasta game in the sky?
Giving myself an internal shake, I squash the idea like a mosquito. Because it’s just as likely to bite me on the ass.
I know what happens when you start envisioning your name on the door.
“And it would be my loss if it all went belly up,” I counter.
Her eyes roll upward. “Such a pessimist.”
Bells jingle as someone walks through the diner door.
I glance toward the sound and stand to greet the small family that just entered and look around to see if Penny is back from her break. The summer season doesn’t really kick off around here until after Memorial Day, so I haven’t hired any of the local college kids for extra staff yet.
As restaurant manager, I pinch-hit as needed.
I send them a welcoming grin. “Sit anyplace you’d like. I’ll bring you menus.”
“Just think about it,” Harriet whispers as I leave her behind the counter—a place she’s enjoyed standing for the past thirty years of her life. I can’t imagine her not being there anymore, just like I can’t imagine this place without Penny or Janet, our longtime waitresses, or Bo, a big brute of a guy with a menacing tattoo and a heart of gold who also happens to be the best short order cook and pastry chef I’ve ever had the pleasure of knowing.
My frown deepens. As bad as I feel for myself right now, I feel even worse for Penny, Janet, and Bo and the half-dozen local kids we hire for the summer season. What willtheydo?
I manage to smile as I take over the menus, and the expression holds fast to my face even when I take lunch orders from the family.
It’s usually easy to smile in a place like this, which always sparkles when the bright sun blazes through our clean windows.
But right now? That smile threatens to flicker out as I ponder the idea of being jobless at the end of the summer.
Dammit.
How am I going to get a job here on Tybee Island? There just aren’t enough to go around. Most people commute into Savannah—to jobs which are a lot more likely to use that Stanford MBA I worked so tirelessly to achieve.
The chimes above the door jingle again just as I see Penny emerge from the back. She picks up her pace, but I give her a slight wave. “I got it, Penny. Take another five,” I tell her, immediately wondering if she knows yet that all of our lives are about to change in just three short months.
Turning, I spot the man who just walked in, and I stagger backward, almost losing balance.
Mercy.
Sometimes you see a sight that just knocks the wind right out of you. Like a sunrise over the Atlantic, stretching out its glowing, auburn arms across the wide sea. Or fireworks—the kind that set the sky ablaze with glory. Or the Grand Canyon.