Today is the day I die. Either from Noah's long and hard stare, or mob beaten by hungry guests.
Despite my job now hanging on the line between me getting fired, which I don't really care about because I'm not getting a dime out of this, I'm more concerned on the monstrous assumptions Noah already has in his head.
Did he really hear everything? I can't tell. His bushy eyebrows are slightly furrowed, and his mouth is set into a line as thin as paper. A well known scowl.
He should know very well by now that my mouth works without a zipper and everything that comes out of it shouldn't be taken too seriously. Mom had always told me my mouth diarrhea would get me into trouble one day, and today is definitely looking like that day.
Sharp heels click themselves to our direction as I see Miss Renee stomping towards us, looking like she's about to shove a stick up someone's ass.
Point of correction, that ass would be mine.
Woe is me. Woe is definitely me.
"What did you do?!" She gapes at the mess on the floor, then flickers brown orbs in my direction. "Explain!"
"Allie kept having phone calls on duty and got distracted, resulting in what you have before you." I almost forgot about the ogre behind me.
"This is a catastrophe! A heinous debacle instigating into a horrible exigency!"
Skip the fancy English, Renee, World War 111 is going to happen right here if we don't find a solution.
"Did anyone else see this?" I shook my head a 'no'. "Just you three?"
My head voluntarily nods.
"Why do you keep moving your head?! Are you a Lizard or something?"
"I'm sorry this happened, and I'm going to take full responsibility for it," I say.
"Good thing you know. Clean this whole mess and serve them back in the dishes, I'm not about to lose my job," She wipes a stress sweat that drips from her forehead. "And as for you, kitchen duties no longer ends at 8:00 pm. You'll be working till midnight."
My mouth hangs open. "You're joking!"
"For a week."
"You can't be serious!"
"Two weeks!"
"Miss Renee..."
"One more word, and you'll be working 24 hours a day till you say bye bye to Hawaii."
What did I get myself into?
"I'll wash your son's bicycle every morning instead," I bargain and throw her my best pity look.
"She's a girl, and owns a Skateboard," Renee incredulously says and walks out on me, Alexa following behind her like a headless chicken.
That could've gone worse than expected. The guests are only going to be having floor food. I think I can arrange that.
My attention comes back to the boy who continues to look unpleasant, and the permanent scowl etched to his incredible face never leaves, either.
"Just so you know, I didn't mean..." I begin talking, but he cuts me off with a hand.
"I've heard worse."
The words hook in my throat, guilt crawling up my spine and making me internally shrivel.
I wasn't having the best of day so far, and it wouldn't be as much of a surprise if Ninjas flew in out of nowhere to gate crash the party. Today was meant to be doomed.
Sweat rolls down my back, making me itchy and irritable. I strip down to a tank top after I clean the mess up, luckily, without being busted.
I spend the rest of the ceremony watching how everything goes from afar. A waiter stops in front of me and offers me fish steak, but I turn it down, knowing fully well the history of the food everyone is happily munching on. I notice the Groom of the day, a tall burly man, sneaking inappropriate glances at the Chief Bride's Maid as she also in turn, sends him a wink.
No shame.
The Bride too doesn't look happy she's going to be having his last name from now on. I think marriages are meant to be a life-long commitment but with the way things are looking between both partners, this whole thing would crash and burn within a year. But oh well, who am I to judge?
I resume back to the kitchen with a throbbing head and a dry throat. Someone had forgotten the coffee they were heating as it boils over with a spiteful hiss.
I leap forward, burning my hand on the pot. A viscous swear leaves my mouth as the pot smashes, shattering glass, and spewing hot coffee in all directions. I rip open a drawer, grab for a stack of napkins and slice my thumb with the lethal edge of a nail file.
Damned to perdition.
I wrap the napkin over my busily bleeding thumb and survey the damage— broken glass, droplets of blood, pools of coffee— a sigh escapes my lips. Nothing seems to be going my way.
Lacey and Simone are conversing in hushed voices when I go back to the rooms to get disinfectant for the cut on my thumb. They don't seem to notice my presence, and I in turn ignore them, zipping open my bag. I notice how worn out and old the leather is getting, the zip looking like it would come off any minute as I make a mental note to get a new one before the end of the month.
A paper falls out from the corner of my bag when I take out the disinfectant. It appears to be a plane ticket when I pick it up and look closer, and my frown deepens as I recognize Noah's name on the passenger's credentials.
It's a plane ticket, so he must've dropped it at the airport. Then what is it doing in my bag?
My mind spirals back to two weeks ago when Simone and I literally Usain Bolted into the airport back in Florida. I remember knocking into someone which sent my things flying everywhere and out of proportion. So it was him I bumped into. That should definitely be where I lost my neck-chain, and maybe also where he misplaced his plane ticket. It all makes sense now, we only swapped stuffs.
How was he able to get on the plane without a ticket, though? No wonder he was grumpy and moody throughout the flight.
The evening wind shifts the curtain away from the window and as I peek out the glass, I spot him from a far distance, sitting on the beach sand and watching the high and low tide of the sea waves.
Speak of the devil.
I hastily clean up my cut and bolt out the door with the plane ticket in my hands, already smeared a little with my blood.
Trudging lazily to where he's seated, I observe a few seagulls flying above the waves and squawking all over the place. A few dolphins alight out of the water, wagging their fins before returning into the water with a splash.
"Hey." I say when I settle in beside him on the sand. He doesn't reply, not like I was expecting a response. "I think this belongs to you."
Only once does he spare me a glance when I stretch out the ticket to him. Noah observes the ticket in his hands as he immediately connects the dots.
"Now this explains why there's a bunch of G-string underwear's laying comfortably in my bag," He says.
Shoot! I knew there was something else missing.
"You didn't happen to sniff them- Did you?"
"No, I wore them. How do you girls cope with a tiny string of rope stuck in between your ass. It felt weird."
My jaw hangs open. "You're joking!"
He only rolls his eyes in return and focuses on the sunset ahead of us. I follow his gaze, and look as air molecules scatter away the shorter wavelengths of light with the colors violet and blue, and the only light penetrating through the atmosphere are the longer wavelengths of lights now showing the colors Yellow, Orange, and Red which produces a colorful sunset.
The brilliant colors reflecting in the clouds take on the red and orange hues of the setting sun, reflecting the colors back to the ground. It all seems like a movie projector screen and it's in fact, one the most beautiful sight I've ever seen.
"Uh... about what I said earlier this morning..."
"Don't do it," He runs both palms over his face. "I know what you're going to say. Don't apologize. They were only just pieces of your mind, what was only wrong is that you had to say them behind my back."
"Well, this is me saying what I think to your face. I think you're the snobbiest motherfucker I've ever come across, and that's the subtlest way I can put it."
Noah muses for a bit. "Subtle enough. Anything else?"
"You shut people out in the rudest way possible, and there's this everlasting scowl that never leaves your face. It goes like this," I try to imitate him by setting my mouth in a thin line and furrowing my eyebrows together in a deep frown as tight as I can. Note the word: try.
"There's no way I look like that. You look like you're being castrated right now."
"Here's a better representation," There's a short stick laying between us and I pick it up, drawing the shape of a human face on the beach sand. I start out by drawing out two 'o's as the eyes with curved brows at the top. A small triangle is drawn next to display his small but pointy nose, and then lastly, strike out a straight horizontal line as his mouth.
Noah stares at the silly drawing on the sand that now looks like a hairless mutant and raises a curved brow. "It's missing both ears."
I watch as he picks up the stick this time and makes on the sand, two medium sized 'c's on both sides of the drawing.
We both tilt our heads to the left at the same time and stare at the drawing on the sand. One of the eyes are way bigger than the other and the nose seems to be falling out of proportion, the shape of the head looks like that of an amoeba while the ears he just drew isn't fully connected to the face.
"I think it's phenomenal," He says.
"Totally. This is an outstanding piece of art." The wind picks up again, ruffling his hair in all directions and covering half of the scar by the top side of his face. "Pretty sure you don't hate me anymore."
"Why would you assume that?"
"You're talking to me."
Noah acknowledges that for a moment. "Whatever. Don't get comfortable."
A silly grin appears on my face as I close the space between us and shift closer to him. "Get comfortable, you say?"
He stares at me in amusement, then scoffs. It all happens in a brief moment that I think I must've imagined it, but my eyes never fails me in broad daylight.
For the first time in two weeks, Noah smiles.
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