Moving in with my best friend seemed to be the only way for me to stay in Florida and not be forced to move back to Colorado.
Due to my lack of money, my best friend suggested me to move in with her, her younger sister and her father who happens to...
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"She sold the diner?!" Valentina asks in shock at what I told her. She's standing in my small kitchen and makes us some pasta as I sit on the sofa, looking for a movie to watch. "She did. To a second hand shop owner."
"That's awful." Valentina also worked at the diner for a short time. When her mom left them three years ago, we were in our last year of high school and Val asked me to ask Elizabeth for a chance for her to work with me.
She needed a distraction. Valentina doesn't avoid this topic. She doesn't like to talk about it but she needs to to keep her cool is what she says. "Have you ever heard from her? Do you even know she's alive?" I ask her.
I know Valentina follows her mother's Facebook profile. She does to know she's alive and to know where she is right now. Amanda didn't leave with no track behind her. We always knew where she was.
She wrote a letter for all three of them. Valentina, Olivia and their father. Olivia was only about two months old when she left so Mr. Matthews immediately burned her letter.
She told Valentina that she doesn't want to be a mother. She became one too soon when she had Val and wants to have her old life back. No apology. No I love you. Just a goodbye. I have known this woman for two years and she always seemed to be a good person.
Mr. Matthews is a very sucessful and busy architect and works in New York. He has to fly to New York during the week. That's why I haven't seen him in the first two years of me being here. Only when Amanda left I saw him the first time.
I was seventeen at that time and that man took my breath away as soon as I saw him. He stayed at home for half a year and then hired nannies for Olivia. Now he's back to only being at home on weekends.
Val stills stirring the pasta water and looks at me. "She's currently in Austria. Vienna to be exact." Austria... ouch. She's never been in another continent. She's always stayed in south and Northern America.
"I think that this is the final sign that she won't come back. That's her final goodbye." "Did you... did you want her to come back?" Is it wrong to ask that? "This year is the first one where I really hoped she wouldn't come back in fact. We're better off without her anyway... fuck her, right?"
She hates being vulnerable and hates to show it. "Yeah. Fuck her." I finally found a movie I think seems fitting and then walk over into the kitchen as I help Valentina finish our dinner.
"So.. what are you going to do now? Are you going to look for another job?" "I have to. I can't afford my rent with one job. I have to find something as fast as possible."
My parents will probably tell me to come back to them but that is not an option. I will not go back to Colorado. Not after everything I have built for myself there. It may not seem like much but for me it's the most important thing. I am proud of myself. So, so very proud.
And I know that someone wants to lay some big stones in my way for whatever kind of reason, I will get over it. Maybe fate wants me to have another job. Maybe it will lead me to endless happiness.
Has to be a pretty damn amazing job because I'm not sure anything can stand above the diner. God I sound like I am eighty years old and will die any minute.
It's not like I am not even at the legal age of drinking alcohol here.
"You know?" Valentina asks me as she stuffs another fork full of pasta in her mouth. "I know what?" I watch her as she pokes around on her plate and chews before she talks again.
"I'm trying to find a new woman for my dad. That man is lonely. He doesn't spend time with anyone but my uncle, Olivia and me and his clients. I am not there most of the time and Olivia isn't really someone to have proper conversations with yet. I feel like he could use having someone again. Someone who makes him happy and won't leave."
I know basically nothing about this man. The only thing I know is that he seems to ge a good dad and his name is Ryke Matthews. "Well. You won't have big problems with finding a woman for him with those looks."
Valentina looks at me shocked and stills for a moment. "Ew. Don't say that, Louisa." "What? It's supposed to be a compliment. Should I say your dad is ugly? Apart from the hair color you look very much alike, so I am basically calling you pretty." Still, the man is some really attractive creature.
The most attractive one I have ever seen. And I have seen many men in my life. From working at the diner and the club most of my customers were a part of the male species.
Val throws her head back in laughter and then looks at me. "Bullshit. Dad and I look nothing alike. Please let's just change the subject, alright?" Fair enough. What can I ask her to annoy her?
"When's college starting again?" She releases a little huff and thinks. College is pretty stressful for her at the moment. "Two weeks, I think? I'm not sure. I just hoped I could avoid school and everything else while I am back at home. And I will have to fly alone for the first time."
Val always flew with her dad. They both had to be in New York at sunday evening and flew back together on friday. She said that Mr. Matthews doesn't have to work for a month so he will stay at home with Olivia because he doesn't have another nanny for her yet.
