When You're Ready by Britni Danielle Page B

knew I didn’t want to let her go again.

 
    10 Nola
     
    As soon as I clocked in and stepped on the floor, I was slammed. Pink Taco was always crowded with corporate types during happy hour, but there was some big game on TV and we were overrun with loud, drunken sports fans demanding an endless stream of ice-cold beer, nachos, and way too much attention. I hated working game days because people—scratch that, guys —ordered a ton of food, hogged the tables, got wasted, and then left horrible tips. Maybe all the brews they drank short-circuited their brains, but it usually sucked. After three hours of running around like a chicken with my head cut off, I was ready to go home. Unfortunately, I was only halfway through my shift.
    When it was time for my break, I retreated to the back room and grabbed my phone out of my locker. Usually, I kept it in my apron, but I was so in a rush after Scout dropped me off that I just threw everything in my locker and ran to check my assignment for the night. I pulled my phone out to scroll through Facebook and see if I had any text messages, and thankfully there was one from Scout.
    “What are you smiling at?” Roxy asked when she walked into the small room. “New boyfriend?”
    “Huh? No…you know I don’t date. It’s just something dumb on Facebook.” I lied. Roxy was a cool girl but she had a mean streak and seemed to take pleasure in knocking people down to size whenever she had a chance. I didn’t dare tell her, or anyone besides Tara, anything.
    “Umm hmm,” she hummed, and then put two fingers to her lips. “Going out for a smoke.”
    I nodded then turned my attention back to Scout’s message, and my heart swelled. Even though I must have looked like a crazy woman in his car, he didn’t make me feel like an idiot or like I was losing my mind. He was so warm and encouraging, I felt like it was okay to tell him just about anything.
    That feeling, the warmth in my chest, felt familiar and scary. I’d been trying to figure out why I was both drawn to Scout and frightened of him ever since we met, but as I was sitting in the locker room grinning like a fool, it hit me: He reminded me of my father.
    Before he died, my dad made me feel like the most important little girl in the world. Sure he was messed up at times, but he never took it out on me. Instead we’d stay up late into the night catching blinkies and listening to The Wailers when we were in Jamaica, and when we weren’t, he’d spend hours telling me about his childhood in Kingston. On any given day we’d do about 10 different things together and I’d be so sleepy at the end of it all I’d usually drop to sleep right over my dinner plate.
    One night, when I was about eight, my dad snuck into my room and woke me up to watch the sunrise over the Caribbean Sea. When I complained and told him we could see it another time my dad shook his head and said, “Tomorrow’s not promised, princess. All we have is today, that’s why it’s called the present. It’s a gift.”
    That morning the sun looked like a gigantic scoop of rainbow sherbet—orange, pink, and yellow all rolled up into one glorious ball. I never looked at the sky the same way again after that, and spent the next month waking up early with my dad to watch the sun dance its way into the day.
    I didn’t understand it then, but it’s like my dad knew his time was limited and he wanted to squeeze as much into it as possible. I loved every minute of my ten years with my dad, but anything or anyone that made me feel that alive scared the shit out of me. I knew what happened when someone you loved wrung everything out of life and called it quits, and I didn’t want to feel that alone or lost ever again.
    I glanced down at my phone, realizing I never read Scout’s message.
    Scout: Hey beautiful, I hope work’s going well.
    Beautiful. I loved when he called me beautiful or baby or even said my name. It was like he actually meant it, and it wasn’t just