Page 1 of Saltwater Memories
Chapter 1
It was the puddle that sealed it for her.
Amanda was able to grin and bear everything up until that point. She could handle being called into the Seattle office on short notice. It was for an important meeting, after all, and she was able to get in quickly by using her last seaplane ticket.
She’d bought a ten pack of flights on sale weeks ago, never thinking she’d need to fly between Friday Harbor and Seattle urgently so many times, but oh well. That was life with Erica as a boss, a woman who wasconvincedthat the smallest missteps at their mid-sized marketing firm were of life-or-death importance.
She didn’t complain when Erica subsequently called her out of that important meeting to throw a scrap of paper at her and mutter, “I need lunch on my desk by 12:30.” (There was no “please” or “thank you” involved. Just a bright pink Post-it note with a scrawled message: “Carpy’s Cafe – Caprese sandwich with chips. Don’t let them put soggy tomatoes on it this time.”)
The rain on her walk to the cafe didn’t bother her – not truly, since she’d remembered to bring her umbrella and her hair was already irredeemably frizzy. Though the first quarter mile of the trip in the downpour rendered her cute flats completely soggy, it was fine. At least she was getting some exercise.
Amanda managed to keep her cool through allof it. She held her head high and didn’t allow the absurd little frustrations to get her down. Until, that is, one of the frustrations jumped up and hit her in the face.
She didn’t even see it coming; her vision was obscured by the umbrella. She didn’t notice that a car swerved, jerking at precisely the right moment, to synchronize its passing with her hurried steps. She didn’t see the water, arching with spectacular grace and accuracy, before it hit her in the chest, splattered onto her face and soaked into her clothes.
It was that moment, when the malicious tsunami puddle made contact, that it all came crashing down.
Amanda stopped in the middle of the sidewalk and screamed.
The rain continued, unmoved by her rage. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes; she could feel the water dripping off of her clothes. She raised a hand to her face, picking cinders off of her skin.
Amanda looked around to see that the car was gone and that no one was paying her any attention. That was one of the benefits of being in a big city – no one cared to notice her losing her temper. Or her mind.
The downside, though, of being in a big city was that someone embraced that same anonymity to splash her in the first place.
She now felt slightly embarrassed by her scream. It was the wrong way to react – she knew that. But she’d just snapped.
Amanda readjusted, moving her umbrella to her other hand, and whispered to herself that she just needed to regain her composure and get through the day. There was still almost half a mile before she’d get to Erica’s favorite sandwich shop, and there was no point in storming around in a fury. She repeated it to herself three times before she calmed down.
After wiping her face with the sleeve of her jacket and taking another deep breath, she looked up and saw a deli across the street.
NYC Bistro Deli. It looked like aperfectlygood deli. It was like an omen, smiling down at her. Were the clouds parting? Was the rain slowing down?
Amanda shifted and her shoes let out a squeak. Would Erica know the difference?
Probably.
At this point, did Amanda care?
No.
No she did not.
She hurried across the street and ran inside the shop, grateful for the refuge from the rain. Using a handful of napkins, she dried off as well as she could. When she caught her reflection in the front window, she didn’t lookgreat,but it wasn’t as bad as she’d imagined.
Sure, her hair was a wild, humid mass hovering around her head, but the makeup she’d put on that morning was still holding strong. Her mascara had run a tad, but she was able to fix it with a napkin, too.
After throwing the glob of napkins into the trash, Amanda took a spot at the end of the line. There were only two people ahead of her – a guy who’d just stepped up to be helped, and an older lady with perfectly coiffed hair. She had a plastic sort of bib on her head – like a hair rain jacket. Maybe that was what Amanda needed – just to encase herself in plastic every time she was sent out on an errand.
She smiled – she wasn’t against the idea, but she wouldn’t even know where to buy such a thing. She stood there, studying the back of the woman’s head, when a man walked over, first looking at the display of potato chips nearby, before parking himself in front of the older lady.
The lady let out a loud sigh and turned around, as though looking for an ally. Amanda shook her head in disgust.
The guy took no notice of their quiet protests.
She could feel the anger building in her chest. It was always harder for her to control her temper after losing it once; it was like she had a loose grip of it for the rest of the day.
She stared knives into the back of the man’s head as the grasp on her temper slipped through her cold, grimy hands. Amanda took two steps forward and tapped the man on the shoulder.
