I pull the crust from the oven and spoon in my strawberry mix before popping it back in the oven. While it bakes I wash all the dishes I had used and scrubbed the prep counter I had made my temporary workspace. It’s like Gram always said, “Clean as you go and the dirty work is over twice as fast.”
When the timer dings, I pull my pie out of the hot oven and place it on the counter to cool. Hidden deep in my pocket is a note written on ugly motel stationary. I place it next to the pie on the counter before making my way over to Russell, who up until now, has been doing a crap job of pretending that he is not watching me move around his kitchen.
Dear Russell,
I don’t know what it is that you saw in me that day, but thank you. Whatever it was that made you stop me in your diner that day and offer me a job, I’m glad for it. You will never know how much you changed my life. I wish I could pay you back for everything that you have done for me, the job, and the protections and freedoms that it gives me, but I can’t. At least not yet so this pie is a down payment. It’s my Gram’s secret recipe. I used to find safety and security in her kitchen with her and now I find those same things here with you. Such silly things I took for granted until I didn’t have them anymore. So thank you.
-Abby
“What was that for, doll?” he’d asked.
“Just thank you . . . for everything. Enjoy the pie,” I said as I kiss his cheek. Russell blushes bright red under his beard.
“It was nothing,” he said shyly.
“It was everything,” I said and then I walked out of the kitchen and went back to my motel home. The very next day, Russell asked me to make a pie for the diner. Now I make pies every morning. It’s part of my routine.My new life.
I hear a sweet laugh and look to the front of the cafe. Ellie and Gunner Mathews sit on one side of the booth, while Ari and Jeff Johnson sit across from them, laughing about something Gunner said. I didn’t hear what, but I stop wiping the table down and look over at them across the cafe.
I can’t help but wonder what it would be like to love and be loved like that—a timeless love that lasts the ages—one with the freedom to be yourself, exactly who you are meant to be, but also the comfort and knowledge that you are safe and protected,cherishedeven. I wonder what that feels like because one thing I’m sure of, I have never felt like that before.
I’m not sure that I ever loved Brandon. I know that I loved the idea of him. I loved that he promised me a way out of the trailer park and the ability to stop dancing in my underpants for shady men with quick hands. But the dreams of babies and country club dinners and white picket fences turned to dust years ago. Any love I had for Brandon died with those dreams.
Ellie laughs again and smiles a knowing smile at Ari. If only I knew then what I know now, but at nineteen, I thought I knew everything. I never knew what it felt like to have your dreams crushed or your ribs broken. Daddy might have gambled, but at least he never knocked us around.
That thought makes me incredibly sad. I wish I had grownup with the kind of childhood that teaches you to raise your standards not just except shit because it’s all you know. Well that ends here and now. It ends today.
I look back one more time just before the bell sounds over the front door. It’s nice to see couples that seem so happy and in love, so confident in each other and their marriages that they carry themselves as if they have no fears. And just as sure as they are in their marriages, I’m sure that that life is not for me. If there is one thing I have learned over the years, it’s that my taste in men is shit. I obviously can’t be trusted to find a good man. No, I will never get married again.
