Page 1 of Sugar Coated Lies
Chapter1
Everleigh
Fifteen more minutes,then we’re closed for the night. I can last fifteen more minutes, right? My willpower is strong, but my sore feet are weak. They’re begging to be soaked in a warm bath, along with my aching body.
One day, I will live in a home with a tub. The place doesn’t have to be fancy or big. It only has to have a tub. And hot water. The placehasto have hot water.
“You’ve got a dreamy look on your face. Who’s the guy?” Annabeth, my co-worker, asks, as she stacks more empty sugar jars on the counter.
“Not a guy. A bath. A hot bubble bath with lavender soap and a pillow to rest my head on.”
She laughs and coughs, the sound of phlegm rattling in her throat. “That’s some fantasy.” She pulls a cigarette from her apron pocket and gestures to the sugar bottles. “Can you finish these without me? I need a smoke. I haven’t had a break since the lunch shift.”
“Of course.” I smile. It’s my night to refill the sugar jars, anyway.
Annabeth was helping me out. That’s how we do things around here. She’s worked at the diner the longest and should be a waitress manager or supervisor by now, but our boss is too cheap to give promotions or raises.
The diner’s been around since the seventies and hasn’t been changed or updated since. When something breaks, we’re told to tape or glue it until the table, chair, booth, or stool is unfixable. I hate it, but the customers are kind regulars—some from the seventies themselves—who live nearby and come in for company and a slice of our famous pecan pie.
“I won’t be long.” Annabeth moves toward the back door in the kitchen. “I’ll lock up when I’m done.”
I glance at the clock on the wall above the diner’s neon-lit name:My, Oh My, Pecan Pie.Ten minutes.
I shift from foot to foot, trying to alleviate the discomfort as I finish refilling the sugar and wiping down the jars. After I stack them on a tray, I take them to the tables and distribute each one, straightening the napkin bins and wiping down the ketchup bottles as I go.
Three more minutes. I glance toward the kitchen and the circular window in the door, searching for movement. How many cigarettes is Annabeth going to smoke?
My gaze swings back to the clock, and I shuffle toward the entrance door. Rain falls outside, heavier now than the light patter it had been. If I know Annabeth, she went to the derelict pavilion out back to smoke and is stuck there, waiting for the rain to lighten up. I reach for the bolt lock.
“What do you think you’re doing, Everleigh?” Gary’s voice bellows from the back of the dining area.
I flinch and glance at the camera in the corner of the diner before facing him. He can’t splurge for new vinyl booths, but he has no problem buying a camera so his lazy ass can spy on us without having to leave his office.
“I was locking up.”
“That’s Annabeth’s job.” He scratches the scruff on his triple chin, then runs his hand over his massive stomach, which hangs over the waist of his pants.
“I was helping.” I don’t want to get Annabeth in trouble. She needs this job as badly as I do.
“Don’t. Besides, you’ve got a customer.” He nods at car lights shining through the windows.
Dammit. Gary never turns away a customer.
“Take care of them,” he orders.
But we’re closed,perches on the tip of my tongue, but I don’t waste my breath.
Gary returns to his office, closing the door. I think sometimes he sleeps in there on the new couch he bought two years ago and paid to have delivered, even though we had to tape an “out of order” sign to one of the broken bar stools.
Soon, feet. Soon you’ll get to rest, I murmur to my aching soles and paste a smile on my face as I turn to greet the customer.
The outside light illuminates a tall, wet man in a sports blazer and jeans standing in the rain with his arms raised, yelling, “What the fuck?” to the car that is now driving away.
The car veers onto the road and disappears behind the woods and darkness.
Please don’t let this man get stranded here. It’s hard to get an Uber in this area because it’s mostly rural. Occasionally, we get random partygoers who dare to venture to Honeycomb for some honky-tonk fun, but I don’t think that is the case with this guy. His clothes say preppy rich dude who is far from home. I don’t know what kind of car his—friend/s?—were driving, but it looked fancy compared to the usual trucks and beaters the locals own.
Maybe the people in the car are headed to the gas station up the road and they’ll be back.
