Cherry on Top, page 2
That redhead, though? Yeah, she made it bearable, because day-um. And she did not say that lightly. The color of her hair was like a mixture of everything and anything with vibrant shades of red-orange. Sunsets and autumn leaves and fire. She wasn’t what her dad would’ve called a carrottop. Her hair was more auburn. Deeper than traditional red. It looked soft and rich, and Ellis had a moment standing there next to her table where she envisioned herself leaning forward to smell it, wondering if she’d get whiffs of strawberries or coconut or something else entirely. She had to clench her teeth to keep herself standing upright. The last time she’d been that physically affected by a woman was…yeah, never.
Not that she had the time to spend thinking about pretty girls. Waitressing was grueling. She knew that, she did, in her brain somewhere. But knowing it and experiencing it were two way different things. Her shift had begun at six, and her feet were already killing her. How people made a career out of being a server was beyond her, and she found herself with new respect.
“Order up.” Cal’s voice was like a shotgun blast from the kitchen as he slid a plate onto the little holding area under the heat lamps and smacked the small bell with his metal spatula. Sunny Side Up was nothing if not stuck in time, though Ellis would be hard pressed to name which time. The fifties? Seventies? Eighties, maybe? Whatever year it was, it was not this one. But Cal had been the short-order cook for longer than Ellis had been alive. He was a sweetheart of a man, no matter how hard he tried to be gruff beneath his dark mustache—sprinkled with gray and with the long sides down to his chin—and Sunny Side Up was always packed, so they were doing something right. Nobody made french toast like Cal did. Ellis could testify. She had it for breakfast at least three times a week.
“Got it,” said Kitty, one of those women who’d been waitressing her entire life. Watching her fascinated Ellis. Despite being, by Ellis’s estimate, well into her sixties, the woman could carry the meals of an entire table of four in one trip, plates up and down both arms, and never seem the slightest bit worried about spilling a thing. Ellis, on the other hand, preferred to make several trips if it meant not dropping a Western omelet in somebody’s lap. She’d dropped things twice that morning—a mug of coffee and a small plate of toast—but both times, she’d been behind the counter, thank God, and between her and Kitty, they’d cleaned it up quick, and even laughed about it.
By the time nine thirty rolled around, things started to clear out, tables emptied, and Cal got to take a breath. Only a few customers remained. A man in an oxford and tie scrolling on his phone. A woman with short strawberry-blond hair reading a book. Ellis took a rag and spray bottle of cleaner and hit the empty tables, one of which was next to the redhead, who had slipped on a pair of black-rimmed glasses that did nothing to diminish the sexiness factor. In fact, they added to it.
“You’re still here,” she said to her. Good one, Captain Obvious. She internally rolled her eyes.
The redhead looked up from her laptop, and Ellis noticed her eyes were large and brown. “I am. Do you need the table?” She blinked and looked around the diner.
“Oh no. No. Not at all. You can stay there as long as you like.” Smooth, Ellis was not. Exhibit A: what just happened. Her plan had been to engage in more conversation, but after that, she just felt stupid and couldn’t get away fast enough. Back behind the counter, she sighed. It was probably better this way anyhow. Who had time to date? Not her. And while it was super unusual for her to be so physically attracted to somebody so fast, the redhead was clearly out of her league. Dressed in a business casual outfit of dark jeans and a green top, she looked professional and competent.
And here’s me in my rust-orange uniform and dirty apron. Yeah, way, way out of her league.
Her phone was in the pocket of her uniform, and she felt it vibrate once, quickly, which meant a text. She slipped it out and took a quick look, just in case it was the residence with a question or issue.
It wasn’t. It was from The 11th Commandment.
Are you available for an interview? Today, our offices, 3pm.
She rolled her lips in and bit down on them as she read it again, then typed out her response, telling them she’d be there. When she looked up, the redhead was smiling widely as she took a selfie. Ellis watched. She couldn’t help it. Something about her was fascinating.
“She’s here a couple mornings a week, you know.” Kitty’s voice was quiet and very close to her ear. “You stay cooped up in your office in the back, and you miss things.”
Ellis flinched in surprise, turned to meet Kitty’s eyes, and blurted, “She is?” before she could stop herself.
“Mm-hmm,” Kitty said and turned away to make a fresh pot of coffee. “Always sits at that table. Goes between her laptop and her phone. Takes lots of pictures. Of herself. Of her food.”
As manager, Ellis did spend most of her time in the back office, dealing with orders and invoices and payroll. It was rare for her to be out here on the dining room floor. She watched the redhead pack up her laptop and move toward the door where she stopped with her hand on the handle and turned back. Her eyes met Ellis’s. Held. A smile. Then she pushed through and out into the day.
Yeah, maybe she needed to start coming out of the back office a bit more often…
* * *
“Well, it’ll bring in a little extra money.” Ellis used speech-to-text to communicate with Evan, one of her besties. It was too hard to type while walking, and she was already running late to see her sister, but he’d asked her to update him as soon as she got out of the interview. “I don’t love the premise of the place. Do you know what the eleventh commandment is?” She sent the text, zigzagged around a woman who’d stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, and made her way to the parking lot where her ten-year-old Honda Civic was parked. “Gotta drive,” she spoke into her phone when Evan hadn’t answered back.
Her tiny apartment was within walking distance to the diner, but the residence home where her sister lived was just outside the city limits. It took her about half an hour to get there if traffic wasn’t crazy, and she did her best to be there at least a couple hours a day. When Evan called her halfway there, she put the phone on speaker.
“Sorry, I was in a meeting,” he said. “The eleventh commandment is Don’t get caught.”
“Exactly. So this place is about catching people in lies. Celebrities. Politicians. Local businesses. Etcetera.”
“So, it’s an online tabloid?” Evan laughed, the sound deep and throaty.
“Kinda? But it’s just writing the articles. I guess the photographers are the real investigators. They give me info and photos, and I write it up and send it off to the editor.”
“Quick and dirty.”
“Sounds like it. Both things. Not really my jam, but at least I’ll be writing again. And the pay’s not awful. It’ll help with some of my sister’s incidentals.”
“I get that,” Evan said. “You do what you gotta do.”
“Will I see you later?”
“Depends on my client. He needs hand-holding like he’s five.” Evan’s irritation was clear. He was a financial advisor, and some of his clients made him feel more like an elementary school teacher, he’d told her.
“I’ll make sure Kendra eats something.”
“Appreciate it.”
They talked for another minute or two and then hung up, and a few minutes after that, Ellis turned her car into the long driveway for Hearts and Hands Residence Home.
It wasn’t a commercial building, but a large, one-story house that had been turned into a home for residents who needed twenty-four-hour care, but not a hospital. A nicely maintained place with immaculate landscaping, they only took on five patients at a time. Three spots were short-term, for people in rehab. Two were for permanent residents. Ellis’s little sister, Michaela, was one of the two.
The staff knew her by now. Michaela had been there for just over a year. Finding Hearts and Hands had been difficult, and once she had, getting her sister a bed there had been even harder, but Ellis had made a giant pain in the ass of herself until Michaela had the right home.
“Hey, Corrine,” she said to the silver-haired woman behind the front desk. “Here you go. Cal says hi.” She handed over a Ziploc baggie with two of Cal’s buttermilk biscuits in it, Corrine’s favorite.
“Oh, Ellis, you are too good to me. Thank you, sweetie.”
“She good today?”
“Her usual sunny self.”
With a rap of her knuckles on Corrine’s desk, Ellis headed down the hall, smiling to herself. That was their conversation every time. She’d ask if Michaela was having a good day, and Corrine would say something like Her usual sunny self or She’s been running laps around the house or She knit an entire blanket this morning. And they’d smile at each other wistfully. Because if only any of those things was actually the case.
Michaela’s room was at the end of the hall in the back corner of the house. Ellis knocked softly, which she did every time, even though it wasn’t like her sister was going to call out for her to come in.
“Hey, Mikey,” she said softly. “How are things in your world today?” She went in, pressed a kiss to her sister’s forehead, pulled a chair close to her bed, and sat. It was an honest question, one she asked often. Because Michaela was definitely in her own world, and Ellis wished she could visit there.
“So, I had to waitress today.” She snorted a laugh. “Yes, you heard that right. Me. Carrying plates of food. Can you believe it? I only dropped things twice. And not on anybody, thank freaking God.” She took a moment to just look at her sister, which she didn’t do every time because it could overwhelm her. She wasn’t as blond as Ellis, something she’d endlessly complained about when they were teenagers. Her hair was more of a light brown. Today, it was in a braid—she’d have to thank Shaq for that. He was the nurse who always did her hair or her nails, which were a new shade of pink. He’d bathe her, give her a pedicure, brush her hair, rub lotion on her arms. Her blue eyes, so much like Ellis’s, were open as usual, and for about the millionth time, Ellis wondered what she saw. The room? The view out the window? Something in her own head? Something only she could see? Anything at all?
“I like this pink,” Ellis said, stroking the back of Michaela’s hand. “It’s a good color for your skin tone.” She reached toward the nightstand and grabbed the book that sat there. It was a well-worn copy of The Girl on the Train. Michaela had never been one to read romances or heartfelt drama. She liked gritty psychological thrillers. Paula Hawkins. Ruth Ware. Riley Sager. Opening the book where the bookmark was, she asked, “Ready? Where were we?”
And she began to read.
Chapter Two
“Okay, so tomorrow afternoon, I’ll get some happy hour shots,” Cherry muttered to herself as she sat in Starbucks and studied the calendar on her phone. Pretty shots of pretty drinks always garnered interest, so she made plans to stop by that cute bar near the office after work and order something fruity and fun. Pink.
She’d surpassed twenty thousand followers, not bad for somebody who had a very small built-in base as it was, but her growth seemed to have slowed. Every day she got a comment or seven asking after Alyssa. Where’s the hot gf? Or Haven’t seen your sweetie lately. When she went back and did the math, she got way more engagement from shots that included or mentioned her girlfriend than solo stuff. Seemed her base liked seeing a stable sapphic couple over a single girl on her own in the city. But she wasn’t about to tell them that Alyssa had run off with her fitness trainer. Her male fitness trainer. Her male fitness trainer and his wife. This was embarrassing. Cherry wasn’t left for somebody else, she was left for two somebody elses, and they’d all moved to Colorado together to live in some yoga retreat commune thing, and Cherry hadn’t been able to tell anybody. Not a soul. She was too mortified.
Some emo dude was singing along to his acoustic guitar over the speakers in the ceiling. Cherry shook herself back to the present. She should’ve taken a shot of her latte before she drank any, but then she tilted her head. The print from her dark pink lip gloss on the cup made it look kinda cool, so she set it next to the bud vase in the center of the table, angled it so the light hit just right, and snapped a couple photos. Picked the best one, used her editing app to clean it up, then posted it to Snapchat, using a pink filter with hearts and tagging Starbucks. Not that she’d ever get any acknowledgment from them. They were too big. But you never knew, right? She tagged every place and every company she could, which was paying off in small ways because every now and then, she’d receive some product in the mail. Super cool. And totally the goal. She knew some of the big influencers got tons of free products and sponsorships. One of these days…
Speaking of products, she had to do a mascara post. It had been a while since she spotlighted makeup. And the last video was up to seven thousand likes and almost ten thousand views. Not too shabby.
She tossed her napkin and was headed out of Starbucks when her phone buzzed a text. Shea Gibbons—one of her roomies and her BFF and the self-proclaimed voice of reason in Cherry’s life.
Bach 2nite, came her text, followed by an emoji of a rose.
Yasssss, she texted back with a grin. She didn’t love the show The Bachelor nearly as much as Shea did, but she found it entertaining and used it as a way to spend time with her best friend. Plus, it gave her fodder for posting, and Shea was always a willing partner in crime when it came to creating videos. She had a great eye, and she was funny, two things that Cherry was always happy to use. They’d make a couple videos as they watched. Bachelor ones always got lots of views.
Shea was still at work, and Cherry walked from the Starbucks back to their apartment. Adam, her other roommate, was just pulling into the parking lot when she got there.
“Hey, bitch.” His standard greeting. He wore khaki pants and a black polo shirt, the uniform of the pet store he worked at during the day, and his dark hair was so perfect, it looked like it had been drawn. Animated. Complete with a fun swoop to the right side of his head, which would change direction the next time he ran his hand through it.
“Your hair is stupid perfect. I hate you.”
“Get in line.”
Their apartment wasn’t fancy at all, but it didn’t suck. Three bedrooms, two full bathrooms, a decent-sized living area, galley kitchen. It was on the top floor of a three-story building that housed five other apartments.
“You working tonight?” she asked him as she dropped her keys on the small table by the door and hung her laptop bag on the coatrack.
“Ugh. Yes. Dashing. Someday, I’ll have a job that pays me enough, and I won’t need to work three.” He headed toward his room, and Cherry knew he’d likely take a quick nap before he had to do his DoorDash shift.
She turned on the TV but kept the volume low. That was something cool about living with these two—they were all very cognizant of the others’ schedules. When Adam was Dashing, he might work until after midnight. When he did his bartending gig, he’d sometimes not be home until three or four in the morning. So he needed to grab sleep where he could, and the last thing she wanted to do was have the TV too loud and keep him from catching some z’s.
They’d met taking classes at Northwood University, more than ten years ago now. They’d bonded over how much school was not their thing. They’d dropped out together, met Shea at a Pride event one night when she was being an ally to her cousin, and the three of them became a bonded trio for several years. They’d only moved in together two years ago, and Cherry couldn’t be happier. Would she like her own place? Sure. There was plenty of time for that. Besides, she’d be lonely without her besties—she couldn’t imagine living all by herself.
She flumped onto the fairly new couch, velour or microfiber or something like that, dark blue and super soft. She really needed to do the mascara post, but she was exhausted today. Cruella had been relentless, she had five claims to look into before the end of the week, and all she wanted to do was sit and watch the latest episode of The L Word: Generation Q, which was sitting right there on the DVR, but she’d promised Shea she wouldn’t watch without her. Then after they watched the show, they’d order a pizza and settle in for The Bachelor later. Her favorite kind of night.
A commercial for Motrin came on, and the model was blond and pretty, and suddenly, without warning, Cherry’s thoughts went to the waitress from that morning.
What was her name? What was her deal? Where had she come from? And why couldn’t Cherry get her out of her head? Her kind eyes. Warm smile. Those legs. God…those legs…There was something about her…something magnetic. Pulling her attention.
Before she could analyze it any longer, the front door opened, and Shea burst in like somebody had shoved her. That’s how she entered any room. Quick, loud, a burst of energy.
“You better not have watched The L Word yet,” she said in greeting, pointing a prematurely accusatory finger at her.
Cherry held her own finger to her lips, then pointed in the direction of Adam’s room.
“He gotta drive tonight?” Shea asked, her voice considerably lower.
Cherry nodded. “And I haven’t watched. I waited for you, as promised.”
“Cool. Gimme five.” Shea headed to her bedroom.
Cherry pulled out her phone and scanned her socials, looking at likes and reading comments. She got a very mixed bag as far as comments. Lots of praise from others in the LGBTQIA+ community. Bible verses and scripture quoting from religious fanatics. Then there were the trolls. The ones who told her she was fat or ugly or untalented. Or worse, the gross sexual things they’d like to do to her. She liked to picture them as pasty, greasy-haired twentysomethings living in their parents’ basements and playing Call of Duty all day long, fingers stained orange with Dorito powder, completely unfamiliar with things like fresh air and sunshine. As Shea returned with two cans of Red Bull and a bag of salt and vinegar potato chips and dropped down onto the couch next to her, Cherry laughed. “This guy says I’m a no-talent useless flesh bag and I should stick to doing the things I was meant to do like cooking and cleaning.” She made air quotes around his words.
