When Bluebirds Fly | ✔

Part Four : Chapter Three

"I have nothing else to do!" I shouted in the phone, pacing on the sidewalk. "I'm going now to cancel the job at Bailey's Nuts . . . I'm sick of having nothing to do and she invited me."

I heard my dad's exhausted sigh. "She didn't visit you all these years---"

"That's because you didn't let her," I intervened, then realising my stupidity, I continued, "Yeah, I know she's a horrible excuse for a mother and that's precisely why I want to go. I don't want her to think we're weak and that's why we're avoiding her wedding."

He began pointedly, "Mariana---"

"I have reached Bailey's Nuts, I'll talk to you later, okay?" I cut off the call, slipping the phone in my pocket and marching ahead. There was this growing contempt in me fuelled by curiosity as I felt a need to prove to my mother at how beautiful I had grown. To show her that I wasn't that little scrawny kid who trailed after her like an ugly duckling and whom she had abandoned with no feelings.

I arrived at Bailey's Nuts and pushed through the glass doors, my eyes searching for Tony. I could have declined the offer on-call, but I found that act insolent after all the efforts he had put into trying to get me this offer. Besides, after the entire shameful scene with Allison, I wanted nothing to do with disappointing her.

Tony was behind the shelf containing the glazed doughnuts, rearranging some sugary treats with metal tongs. On hearing the bells of the glass doors ring, he scurried towards me and thrust an apron and a red cap. His eyes flickered from behind me to my face. "You're l-late. The manager isn't here thankfully. Oh-here he comes! Go, go, go! Get behind the counter!"

I was going to object, but Tony's fear somehow made me sprint behind the counter and hastily wear the cap and the apron.

"Tony!" The pot-bellied manager barked as he entered, approaching a petrified Tony. "How late is this new girl!"

Tony whose face was bathed in the manager's spit and he stepped, pointing at me. "She's here."

My face had a mollifying effect on him as he regarded me. "Teach her how to use the ice cream and drinks machines."

"Yes sir." Tony led me to the various machines, showing me the buttons and filling a small cup with cola.

"Actually, Tony . . . I came here to tell you that I don't want this job."

Unfortunately, all he must have understood was 'now you're going to get beaten up by the manager' because the full cup in his hand plummeted to the chess-tiled floor, spilling the liquid everywhere.

At the manager's booming voice, he paled. "What happened there?!"

"I'm sorry sir, I dropped the cup. It was an accident. I'll clean right away," I said, giving an apologetic smile and the manager only grunted in response before shifting his attention to his phone.

"T-Thank you." Tony's lips trembled as he retrieved a washcloth from the pocket of his apron and crouched down.

I joined him. "Hey listen, I'll pretend to work here today, but my papá won't allow me further." He nodded, his face still pale and I wondered if he had heard me at all. Feeling responsible for his predicament, I suggested, "Okay, I'll do one thing. I'll work for a week till then, you can find my replacement. Works?"

He again merely nodded and we felt someone tall tower over us.

"Hey man, what happened? Use this," a friendly voice calmed Tony who looked up and smiled.

For me, it was all a blur. My eyes were fixed on the clean, branded shoes of the person and rest of the surroundings morphed into one black, blanketed mass with tiny spots for lights as if a camera's shot was out of focus. Their conversation died down too and all I could hear was the throbbing of my own heart.

"Ana," I heard the boy with curly hair and pale-grey eyes say, my childhood best friend, Isaac Connor. I swiftly got up and my cap tipped over his chin, falling to the ground and exposing my face. He repeated, in a more cheerful, amazed tone, "Ana . . . It is you!"

"I don't know what you're talking about," I mumbled, never meeting his eyes and unfastening the strings of my apron.

His face hovered over me in concern, urging me to look at him and I felt myself doing exactly that. "Don't you remember me?" I stared, stared at how his curls were bigger than when he was little, stared at how his eyes still retained the same gentleness of a light drizzle, stared at how he now had a stubble. He laughed in a quieter tone. "That's what I thought. You do remember me, of course, you do."

I looked away. "I got to go."

"Ana, can we talk---"

"There's no talking to do," I cut him off. "I don't want to talk to you. I'm leaving."

I didn't have the heart to see his face break into a million pieces like it had been six years ago when I had peered out of the taxi which was carrying my father and me into a new life and saw his skinny face mirroring the same anguish that my twelve-year-old face had from our separation.

I dashed outside with a million thoughts running in circles in my mind when I heard footsteps behind me. I whirled around and was about to burst, but I quickly checked myself when I saw that it was Tony. A sudden sadness at this discovery crept in my stomach, but I concealed it.

He said in a confused tone, "Y-You told me that you would stay for a week.'

"I can't- I'm sorry, but I'll help you in finding someone," I said as earnestly as I could, but a look of pure betrayal passed his pliant expression and he again only nodded.