Chapter 5

It wasn’t until a bit more than a week later that she noticed him watching her. The Monday started like every other day she was working; cleaning up a bit, getting her trays of desserts baking, and serving the old couple that was always awake the earliest, and usually her first customers of the day.

But then, as the clock ticked and the sun started moving from the center of the sky to back down again, Jones made his entrance into the diner, as almost every day. He nodded at her in greeting, Emmie smiling back, and then took a seat in his regular booth; one a bit away from the public eye, but still clearly seeable from her position behind the counter.

She served him, almost digging up the courage to ask for his name—the real one, not the family name—but then failing when his eyes moved to his regular cup of coffee, away from her. Emmie told him to call her if anything more was needed, and he nodded, as usual, letting her return to her job.

The diner wasn’t busy on Mondays though, especially at this hour when people had just eaten their lunch and only ordered coffee and pie, so Emmie didn’t have much to do. She wiped the counters, watched how Carl went home from his long shift, knowing he’d be returning in a few hours and was just about to go into the kitchen to make a fresh pie, only to realize not all of it had been eaten just yet.

She simply didn’t have anything to do (besides pushing down the urge to eat a slice of it, of course). So, her mind once again wandered to the beanie-wearing Viper in a lonely booth that seemed to love being alone and observing people.

He had a character to him that she hadn’t frequently met before… He was a bit moody sometimes, usually not saying much, and only smiled around the pink-haired girl that either had to be his girlfriend or best friend. Maybe both.

Emmie was intrigued by him. He didn’t act like a total jerk as her parents had tried to warn her for her whole childhood. She had seen him smoking outside of the diner, next to his motorcycle, but he never did inside like some of these douches from the Southside. She knew it wasn’t probably allowed, considering he had to be somewhere around her age, maybe one or two years older.

And then, sighing to herself, leaving the skin around her fingernail alone and dropping her hand to the counter, Emmie looked up in his direction. She shivered, meeting his greenish-gray eyes staring back at her from the booth, his feet kicked up on the table.

She frowned at the last fact, raising her head a bit more to look him straight into the face. And even though separated by the distance, she spoke, “You shouldn’t put your feet on the table.”

A smirk appeared on his face; the one that always made her think through the existence of the human race. How could he look so handsome with just a twitch of the left side of his lip? “What are you gonna do about it, princess?”

She huffed at the nickname, rolling her eyes at him. “First, don’t call me that. And second, take your feet off the table.”

Ramsay quirked his eyebrows in her direction, amused by the word exchange between them. “Or what?”

“Or…”

He nodded, arching his eyebrows all the way up now, eyes amused. “Or…?”

Emmie scoffed, shaking her head a bit. “You want something more to eat?”

Ramsay acknowledged his victory while his head was boiling with the fact that she hadn’t been rude to him. She didn’t seem to know how to be mean. He was intrigued by that. “Uh, a fresh cup of coffee would be nice.”

The blonde nodded immediately and jumped off of her stool, straightening the skirt and the apron before moving to the machine, abruptly stopping once she was there. She poked her head out from behind it, finding him still looking towards her direction, and shivered a bit. “Um, do you like hand-made coffee better?”

Ramsay raised his eyebrows, this time from a pleasant surprise, and nodded his head. “Sure.” Carl had offered him a few of those for the usual price when he came into the diner at 2 am, and besides the hungry truck drivers was the only one there. Now, there were still a handful of customers left, and he knew some more would come soon. Plus, Carl had known him ever since Ramsay could remember, and he had only met Emmie a bit more than a week ago.

She was a weird one, that girl.

Ramsay watched the way she even ground the coffee beans by herself, looking peaceful with a small smile on her face while doing so. She breathed steadily, pouring it into a pitcher, and leaving it to rest while cleaning the rest up. She followed every instruction in her head, and when it was done, walked over to his table.

The feet he had been holding on it slid off of it immediately, respecting her a lot more now than before, and Emmie seemed to be happy about that. “Thanks,” Ramsay murmured instead of just nodding like he usually did.

Emmie was surprised but didn’t chirp her usual you’re welcome, either, smiling at him instead. Ramsay almost groaned at the amazing taste of the coffee, letting his eyes follow the girl to other booths, asking other customers if she could serve them some homemade coffee, too. When asking what the price was, Emmie shook her head, already pouring it out. “Don’t worry about it,” she said.

Ramsay chocked on his coffee quietly, frowning in shock. Don’t worry about it? He was getting this for free? What was she going to do? Pay for it herself?

Emmie happily walked back to the counter, cleaned the last things up, and welcomed the new two customers with a smile on her face. It wasn’t a quite real one, Ramsay understood, and judging from the way they talked to each other, he was pretty certain they went to the same school.

“Tate, new order!” she called out, and Ramsay briefly saw the exchange of the small piece of paper between the two teenagers. Emmie was smiling to herself while making two strawberry milkshakes, humming some song quietly, and then after serving them, plating a piece of pie with some extensive sugar coating. She bit her lip while looking at it, tempting to eat it, but shook her head and stayed true to her plan, walking over to Ramsay.

The guy’s eyes looked lazy and were still lingering on her like she was sure they had for quite some days now. But, as Emmie placed the blueberry pie in front of him and sat down on the other side of the booth, he pushed himself to sit up straighter, surprised she wanted to have anything to do with him.

“I didn’t order a pie,” he stated after a brief moment of hesitation, and Emmie simply shrugged, knowing she had taken him by surprise.

“I gotta make a new load anyway, so might as well enjoy it before it dries up.”

“Do those things even dry up?” he murmured, but already started shoveling the dessert into his mouth.

“Unfortunately, yes.” Emmie bit her lower lip in thought, rummaging the bravery in herself. When she finally found it in some weird part of her brain that she didn’t even know existed, she looked down at her hands on the table before asking it. “What’s your name?”

She looked up at the boy a few seconds later when he still hadn’t answered her, and observed the way he ate, swallowing the bite he had been chewing on. “Ramsay,” he said.

A small smile appeared on the blonde’s lips, making the boy hoist his eyebrows a bit. “What? Too weird for you?”

Emmie wondered he was either a jerk for using a tone like that or just a guy protecting himself from getting hurt. “No,” she said. “I actually like that. Ramsay,” she tried it out, the word easily rolling over her lips.

When her eyes met his again, he was smiling. It was the first time she had seen it. It was real—no smirk, no grin… just a smile. And Emmie didn’t want to take her eyes off of it, adoring his face this way, smiling right back at him.

Just a moment later, the bell above the door rang, and the blonde sighed, standing up slowly. “If you want another slice of that, you gotta pay,” she murmured, the smile still present, and Ramsay chuckled, nodding in agreement.

Emmie walked away, smiling as she felt his eyes still lingering on her. “Hello,” she smiled at the new customer who was standing in front of the counter, probably waiting to be served takeout.

#

“Mother,” Emmie said, straightening up even more and looking the woman straight into the eye.

“Hey, honey. How’s it going?”

Emmie managed a tight-lipped smile that she was sure most of this diner understood was fake. Not her mother though. Or, maybe she did, just never said anything about it. “It’s going nice. Can I get you anything?”

“Just the usual.”

Emmie nodded, scribbling her parents’ names down on the paper, and walked off to stick it through the window. “Fifteen minutes,” Carl called back in a few moments, and the blonde nodded, announcing it to her mom as well.

Her mother’s usual just happened to be some salad Carl knew how to make just for Alice Davis, and her father’s was a burger with some minimalized sides, again, because of her mom. Emmie wished she could get what she used to order when she was eight: cheeseburger and a vanilla milkshake, no sides. It had been the alternative her mother had approved on about once a month when she was younger. Now, not so much.

When she focused back on the woman standing behind the counter, Emmie noticed with a sigh the way her mother seemed to be sharing smiles with some Northside families while glaring down a few other booths, including Ramsay’s, where the boy had been joined by Ani about half an hour ago. And to Emmie’s surprise, the two teenagers were glaring right back at her mother. She wished she had that kind of confidence.

“Order up! Table thirteen.”

Emmie breathed slowly, grabbing the plates, and serving them to the family in the booth. The bell rang on her way back to her earlier position, and as she reached it, she gave the redhead a brief smile, sighing inwardly. Both Olivia and her mother on the same night. They sucked the energy right out of her, always.

“Emmie,” the girl beamed.

“Olivia,” Emmie smiled, lips tightly pressed together. “What are you doing here?”

“I’d like three pieces of that cherry pie to go, please.” The blonde nodded and started working on packing the dessert while listening to her mother and Olivia making a small conversation about whatever it was they got out behind of those fake smiles of theirs. The two families couldn’t stand each other but were forced to get along.

“Here you go, Liv,” Emmie said, pushing the white box in front of her classmate, telling her the price. The redhead paid and left her some generous tip, at which Emmie smiled while pocketing it.

“So, Emmie…”

Oh god, she wanted to talk some more. “Yes?”

“I’ll sign you up for the cheerleading squad, right?”

Emmie arched her eyebrows. “Um…” Making a face she said, “It’s months away, Olivia.”

“I know,” the redhead beamed and shut up while Emmie served another table. Then, as she reached them again, she continued as none of it would have happened. “But I need to know now because the new sophomores are begging me for spots already.” She looked happy giving her that news.

“Look, Olivia—”

“She’ll do it,” Alice Davis stated, leaving Emmie gritting her teeth when the redhead clapped her hands. “Won’t you, honey?”

“Actually, I—”

“Awesome, baby Davis,” the girl smiled hugely. “See ya.” And just like that, she was out of the diner and Emmie’s angry eyes were directed at her mother.

“You need a lot of extracurriculars on your college applications.” And then, as Emmie finally got her mother’s food, she saw the older woman sliding her eyes over her body. “And some working out wouldn’t do bad to you either.”

Emmie’s eyes dropped at that sentence as she swallowed and let her mother pay, in silence. “I’ll see you at home.” The woman walked away with a smile on her lips.

“Carl,” Emmie called out, Jessy busy making coffee. “Can I take five?”

“Sure, sweetie!”

“Thank you,” she breathed, squeezing her nails into the palms, and rushing to the bathroom, trying to give nothing away.

She didn’t notice a certain beanie-wearing boy looking after her as she went. And he didn’t notice the blood in her fists.