Page 4 of Obsessions of the Heart

Like they could feel my gaze, they each looked up as they got to the car, staring at me in the rain. They were too far away from me to see their faces, so I lifted a hand and waved goodbye. They didn't even wave back. They just stood there, staring at me, until a mean looking man barked at them to get in the car.

I watched my first and only true friends leave my life in a BMW as tears rolled down my face. Once again, that old voice worked its way back into my head.

You're alone. You’ll always be alone. You were nothing to them. Just someone to pass the time with. Everything they told you was a lie. Come back to reality. Your place in this world is to be unwanted, unloved. You're worthless and will always be alone. Forever and ever.

Chapter 2

11 years later

Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.

I swung my hand at my infernal dollar store alarm clock, hoping that if I hit it hard enough, the cheap plastic thing would break.

Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.

That was just my luck. I threw off my thin covers, bent down, snagged the clock by the wire, and yanked it from its socket. The annoying beeping stopped, and I crashed down onto my mattress.

Working a double the day before had been grueling, and working a long shift tonight seemed unfair. My bones ached. All I wanted to do was cocoon myself in my bed and sleep for five days, but I needed the money.

Growling at my responsible self, I threw my feet up and over the mattress, twisting my body to get up. It wasn't a long drop since the mattress was on the floor. The getting up was the annoying part.

An unofficial part of my morning ritual, I reached up, fingering the gold triangle pendant on my neck, taking solace in the fact that it was still with me.

Shaking my head, I stood up and took five short steps to get into the bathroom, then shucked off my sleep clothes and turned on the shower. I turned it to cold, spraying myself with the frigid water for ten seconds to wake myself up before I turned it to a blazing hot spray, almost burning my skin off in order to keep me up. It was going to be a long day, so I needed my wits about me. Pulling on the already fraying, holey towel, I hurried to dry myself before getting dressed.

Not having a uniform for the diner was annoying since it meant having to repeatedly wash the few clothes I had to make sure everything was clean. It was only a couple of jeans, a couple of leggings, a black circle skirt for interviews, about a handful of v-neck t-shirts, and a few blouses. Oh, and one emerald green sequined dress that was far too short for my liking. Vivian had given it to me a while ago when she figured out I didn’t have any “clubbing” clothes.

I threw on a clean set of jeans and a t-shirt, grabbed my thrift store crossbody leather purse, and booked it out of my dump of a studio apartment.

Since I lived in the crappy part of town, I quickly made my way down the street and around the corner to Mel’s Diner where I worked. It was a decent place with decent people running it. Mel had taken a chance on me a few years ago when I was out on my own, with only a high school diploma and no prior work experience. He looked at me and said he knew a hard worker when he saw one. He was the first adult person who didn't look at me like I was a street urchin, a scourge on society, or a cursed child surrounded by bad luck.

I was used to my bad luck. It had followed me around all my life. First, for being an orphan, landing in Miss Vaughn's orphanage, then it got worse when unexplainable things started to happen around me in high school. The small town I grew up in ended up calling me the black cloud and the cursed kid, blaming me for the misfortunes that fell upon people who associated with me.

It started with Jake Grinder, my first kiss, who got his face bashed in by a strange man who also cut off his lips. The girl who bullied me in high school, Raina Herbs, got hit by a bus, breaking both legs and losing a toe. Kenneth Parish was the guy I gave my first blowjob to. He ended up falling down a mine shaft and ripped off his nails by trying to hold on to the sides. Trevor Monic, the guy I’d lost my virginity to, mysteriously disappeared. Later, I found out he’d had an accident involving his dick and ended up moving away with his parents. After that, everyone was wary of me and started whispering behind my back.

The bullying got worse after that, but I brushed it off, acting like it didn't bother me. Eventually, when it was no longer fun, everyone left me alone, kept me isolated, which was fine by me, but when I tried to pick up a few odd jobs for some cash, no one would hire me. That was the main reason I had to escape my shitty small town by moving two towns over, just so I could get a simple job. I was far enough away for the rumors not to follow me but close enough that I understood the people and where I stood in our community.

Shoving open the aluminum door, I walked past the hostess stand and yelled at the dancing man through the slit at the kitchen counter. “Hey, Mel! Clocking in.”

He swiveled his large body around, smiling at me with crooked teeth that were part of his charm. “Hey, sweets! Didn’t you just work a double? Who the hell is workin’ you so hard?”

I pretended to play his little game with a wry smile. “Oh, you know, I have this mean boss man that’s just a slave driver. He tells me to work or else he’ll put me on the streets.”

He cracked up, his whole body shaking, especially his Santa Claus belly. “Oh, man. He sounds like the worst. In fact, he sounds like my boss too! Having me here in this hot ass kitchen like it's where I sleep!”

I shifted my eyes around, leaning against the metal counter as I whispered, “But you know how I get him back?” His eyes went wide before he put his spatula down and leaned toward me. I cupped my mouth. “When he asks me to get him a coffee, sometimes I use salt instead of sugar.”

He straightened up, giving me a serious face as he rubbed his finger and thumb around his chin. “Oh! So that's why my coffee tastes so weird.” We looked at each other expectantly before we bent over, cracking up again. This was Mel, the kind-hearted, sixty-year-old jokester that owned this diner. The man had looked at my ratty clothes and scraggly hair and let me bus tables for some cash. Once I showed him that I was planning to stick around, he trained me to become a waitress, telling me I would make better money that way.

He sobered up then asked, “Any news yet?”

I shook my head and gave a small smile. “Nope.”

After one particularly hard night, Mel convinced me that I had the “stuff” to be able to get out of here and make something of myself. He told me about some site where I could apply for scholarships to get into college, insisting on it even though I tried to tell him it was too late for me. I was already twenty-one and working hard on being a responsible adult, and I didn't even have a computer. He’d balked and driven me to the library, where he showed me the site and walked me through one of the applications. From then on, whenever I felt extra shitty about my life, I would go there and apply for another scholarship so I could dream of a life beyond what I knew.

“Yet. You forgot to add the yet,” he chastised, and I rectified it to appease the sweet old man.

“Not yet.” I didn't tell him that after the dreams in my mind played out, reality came crashing in. I never expected anything to come back because if I did, I would just be crushed when it didn't. Keep those expectations low, Layrin.

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