Have a Nice Day

The radio is on too loud and the air vent is blasting, making me too cold, and the lights in here are too bright, and the woman standing behind me has been on the phone for too long. I'm so tired, and my head is aching where I hit it this morning, before I turned the lights on. My hair is a mess because I didn't have time to brush it since my toaster was not plugged in the whole time I stood there waiting for a stinking pop tart. My meeting is in ten minutes and it takes me fifteen to get to my firm from where I am now, but the man currently ordering is simultaneously changing his mind about what he wants and telling his kid to calm down, and there are three people, besides him and his child, between me and the cash register. A pop song about summer and sandy beaches- really, sandy beaches? What else would they be?- comes on the overhead speakers. Just as the woman behind me hangs up her phone and starts tapping her long fingernails annoyingly on her Blackberry keypad, a teenager standing two people behind her starts singing along with the song, terribly, her voice loud and clear because she's singing to a friend, tugging on her arm, confident to inflict her awful voice on all us innocent bystanders because she has a friend to hide behind. I have to pee and I accidentally took my roommates shoes- we have the same pair, but her feet are a size smaller than mine- so my toes are squished and burning with the promise of blisters. A guy struggling with a huge box squeezes between me and the man in front of me, and the box proves to be heavy enough to justify the expression on his face as he promptly trips slightly sideways, catching himself before falling on me but slamming the box, which must be holding something metal, right into my funny bone. He hurries off, not realizing the pain he's caused, and I scrunch up my face and hold my injured arm with my other. I finally step up to the counter, sighing and ordering straight black coffee, hoping it's scalding and strong. When I pull out my wallet, I realize my roommate took the last of my cash, yet again. I sigh again and pull out my card, and the infant behind the counter rolls her eyes dramatically and says, in a tone that's been soaked in a vat of duh, "You can only pay in cash, ma'am," I close my eyes for a moment and am about to start screaming my head off when I feel a hand on my arm and my eyes shoot open as a tall man hands a five to the cash register girl and says to me in a soft voice, his eyes on mine, "Let me take care of that for you." The cash register girl looks baffled but rings me up and starts to hand the man his change, but he looks at her with a smile and says, "Keep it," before turning back to me and saying, "Have a nice day." He smiles at me and walks off, and I walk slowly over to pick-up counter, baffled as the cash register girl. Then, when a kid with a red afro and an oily face hands me my drink with a huge, brace-filled smile, I smile widely back at him and say, "Thank you." I start to walk off, but then turn, abruptly, and add, "Have a nice day."

© 2011

MUTE part 5

Chapter 3

I ran into Munday's late, again, and Mr. Hoffman shot me a look that told me this better be the last time. I gave him a sheepish grin and hurried to punch in. Sometimes it got really old having the owner of the restaurant I worked at constantly hanging around, working shifts as a waiter and as a cook. I suspected he didn't have much else to do with his life. He was a nice guy, though, and other than at moments like this, I usually didn't mind having him around, especially when the wait staff was low and the amount of customers was high. I pulled my wrinkled uniform out of my backpack and hurried into the bathroom. The stupid zipper was stuck on my little blue and white dress, so I pulled on my shoes and my hat and hurried out of the bathroom with the zipper only halfway up, so anybody who happened to look could see the back of the stupid hot pink bra my mom bought me. Janice was leaning over the counter blowing a gum bubble, and I motioned quickly for her to come over. She saw my zipper and pulled it up with a yank, and I mouthed thank you to her before stowing my stuff in the manager's office. I was looking down when I came out of the back, trying to flatten out the wrinkles in my dress, and when I glanced up, Ames was sitting on one of the stools, grinning widely at me. "Hey," he said, looking like he was in on a joke I hadn't caught. "Nice dress. Pesky zipper, though, right?" I gaped at him and he laughed loudly before I blushed, rolled my eyes, and grabbed a pad, walking over to a table newly occupied by a young, newlywed-looking couple. I smiled at them and motioned as if I was taking a drink of something, and then indicated my pad.
This was the worst part about my job. Regulars knew I was mute and just told me what they wanted, but new people always had to figure it out, and the expressions on their faces when they did...let's just say I wasn't too fond of them. There was the "surprised" look, where they told me what they wanted quickly, their eyebrows high on their foreheads and their eyes wide, and of course the "concerned" look, where their expression turned to one of pity and they told me their order as if they were telling me my grandma just died. My favorite of all was the "understanding" look, where they smiled at me and talked calmly, enunciating carefully, I guess in case I was deaf and trying to read their lips. Sometimes they even raised their voice unnecessarily loud, which never made sense to me, seeing as, if I was deaf, I wouldn't hear them, no matter what volume they spoke at, or what emphasis they put on salad. Mr. Hoffman hesitated before hiring me, which I couldn't blame him for, of course. I was going for a waitress job, and Mr. Hoffman didn't see how I would be able to do that with my "speaking malfunction", but I told him- or rather, I motioned, Val told him, that I knew how I would handle it, and I was a very good worker, so he gave me a chance. The hesitation that came from the customers, especially drunk ones who just wouldn't catch on, was always a pain for everyone involved, but when people eventually understood, or when I caved and wrote it out for them on my pad, I was a fast worker. I had cards with things like, "medium or well done" written on them that I showed to customers. And I never dropped anything, unlike butterfingers Janice. Also, I never skipped a shift, unlike Danny, who was always tired and slow on the rare occasion that he actually came to work. This couple gave me the "Oh, you poor girl" look and told me they'd like an iced tea and a coke.
Ames was still grinning when I came back around the counter, and I rolled my eyes and walked to the soda fountain in the back, getting the newlyweds' drinks.
It was pretty quiet, given the time, and Janice had the only other table that was currently occupied, so I was forced to wait on Ames. "Hello again," he said to me with a grin. I gave him dagger eyes and motioned drinking again, and he smiled and said, "I'll have some coffee, please." He said "coffee" with a New York accent and then smiled hugely at me like he'd just cracked the world's greatest joke, and I rose an eyebrow sarcastically and turned away from him. I poured the coffee and brought it back to him, and then I scrunched up my face. "What?" he asked, glancing down at his shirt. I ripped a sheet off my pad and wrote, You have paint in your hair. He laughed, "Oh, yea. So I do." And smiled at me. I bit my lip, placed his coffee down, and hurried away to get the newlyweds' food order.

© 2011

MUTE part 4

There were a lot of flowers after Ames died. It was to be expected, of course, that flowers would cover the Tyler's front porch, but what surprised me was how many flowers were presented to me. My own porch was spilling over with them, and there were flowers in the bed of my truck, and when I drove to my four o'clock shift at Munday's, there were flowers waiting for me there. I skipped school on that first day back. My mom said I could, and my whole body felt like the rock that had pinned Ames down was on top of me, gluing me to my bed, forcing my eyelids to shut, so I took her offer. I pulled my covers around me and listened to my unsteady breathing until it fell into a normal pattern, and then when I opened my eyes again, I found that hours had passed. It was time four PM, the time that my shift at Munday's began. My mom told me I could skip that, too, with a worried expression on her face, but I felt sticky and gross from sleeping so long during the day, and I wanted to get out of the house. My mom had taken all the flowers off our porch and out of my truck by the time I stepped outside again, I had no idea what she'd done with them, but I was grateful they were gone.

I pushed thoughts of Ames from my mind as I walked into Munday's, pretended I had stayed home sick, but when I saw those flowers, waiting by the register, everything flooded back, and I fell into the first booth, the one right by that annoying chiming door. Janice was already there, and she rushed to my side immediately, her hands fluttering nervously around me, not sure quite what to do with themselves, as she said, "Are you alright? Can I do anything to help?" I buried my face in my arms on the metal table and listened to my breathing again. I told myself how it should sound-in, out, in, out- but instead it was jagged and quick. I looked up at Janice and nodded slightly, and she hurried off to the front of the café and came back with a box of crayons. I pulled a napkin from the metal dispenser at the end of the table and wrote sloppily with the red crayon,

could you get rid of the flowers

Janice rose her eyebrows and then nodded quickly, and I buried my face back into my arms as she rushed off. I think I fell asleep there, because the next thing I remember is Mr. Hoffman, the man who owned the restaurant and spent most of his time there, patting me on the shoulder and leaning over to whisper to me, "I think you should go home, dear." And I really didn't want to. But I couldn't find the energy to argue without words right then, so I obeyed.

© 2011

Brilliant Last Lines

So I've read a lot of books. Like, a lot. And some of them have these last lines that just blew me away. I thought I'd share some with you.

*Mind you, I'm only sharing ones that I think are pretty much equally brilliant if you don't know what's going on, so this doesn't mean other books I've read don't have brilliant endings.

WARNING: MAJOR *SPOILERS*. LAST LINES, TO BE SPECIFIC. IN CASE YOU'RE A DUMB-DUMB AND YOU DIDN'T GET THAT FROM THE FIRST FIVE SENTENCES OF THIS POST.

The Tension of Opposites by Kristina McBride

"I laughed so hard that when Darcy snapped the shot, I wasn't even looking at the camera."

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

"I take his hand, holding on tightly, preparing for the cameras, and dreading the moment when I will finally have to let go."

Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins (Before the epilogue)

"So after, when he whispers, 'You love me. Real or not real?'

I tell him, 'Real.'"

Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë

"I lingered round them, under that benign sky: watched the moths fluttering among the heath and hare-bells; listened to the soft wind breathing through the grass; and wondered how any one could ever imagine unquiet slumbers for the sleepers in that quiet earth."

The Host by Stephenie Meyer

"'It's a strange world,' I murmured, more to myself than to the other native soul.

'The strangest,' he agreed."

An American Childhood by Annie Dillard

"And still I break up through the skin of awareness a thousand times a day, as dolphins burst through seas, and dive again, and rise, and dive."

Across the Universe by Beth Revis

"I wrap my pinkie around his. He squeezes my finger, and this world doesn't feel so cold anymore.

'Will you stay with me?' I whisper.

'Always.'"

Ballad by Maggie Stiefvater

"'The most dangerous and wonderful creature alive is a human.'"

Forever by Maggie Stiefvater
"'Grace?' Sam said, and I opened my eyes.
He reached out his hand to me."

Breaking Dawn by Stephenie Meyer

"And then we continued blissfully into this small but perfect piece of our forever."

New Moon by Stephenie Meyer

"I squared my shoulders and walked forward to meet my fate, with my destiny at my side."

© 2011

Sienna's Book Reviews #4: The Ghost and the Goth by Stacy Kade

****The Ghost and the Goth by Stacy Kade

(And The Queen of the Dead, also by Stacy Kade)

I read this book the other day with the most awful cover imaginable.

It's one of those books that I usually would scoff dramatically at and walk past in Barnes and Noble, but for some reason the terribly cheesy title and cover art caught my attention. It's called The Ghost and the Goth, and it's by Stacy Kade. Generally nothing about the title or the cover would catch my eye, but lately I've been wanting to read a cheeseball book in which a hot and poppin' female falls for a not-so-hot-and-poppin' guy, instead of the much more common reverse. So when I saw the title and the picture of this major goth with this hot and poppin' blonde cheerleader resting her legs over his at an arch, I was intrigued, though I didn't want to admit it to myself. Eventually, I caved, and I have to say, I was extremely surprised. I read the whole book and the first hundred-and-some pages of the sequel in one day, and although it wasn't exactly a book that made your brain work, I think it was really well written, and the teen voices of both leads were almost always very authentic. Not to mention it was very funny, and the couple made me super happy. Now the only problem is that I have to wait until summer 2012 for the next book. Just my luck.

I recommend this book, just don't read it in any public place, if you know what I mean.

My age recommendation for readers: 13+

© 2011

Nibble part 30

"You should have seen," Lindsay cooed, "the way he looked at her." I groaned and Gabby rolled her eyes, though she was grinning. "I can see that every day, Lindsay," she said, smirking at me. I groaned louder, "You guys are unbelievable."

"Why don't you just tell us," Gabby said, losing the smirk, "I mean, we're your best friends." Lindsay nodded, "To be honest, I'm a little offended, Rem, that you don't trust us with whatever information you're withholding. If you were embarrassed, that would be one thing, but I'm pretty sure that's not the case." I sighed, pushing the potato chips away from me, and paused for a moment before saying, "It's not...I mean, it's not like I don't trust you. I do trust you guys, you know that."

"So tell us," Gabby said. Then she narrowed her eyes a bit, but not suspiciously, and added, "Tell us as much as...you can." I looked straight at her and she smiled a little bit at me, almost pityingly. As if she knew there was more to what was going on than I could share, as if she knew something was...wrong. With me. With whatever was going on between Nick and I. I made a split second decision and said, "We kissed." Gabby was right. I didn't have to tell them everything. But they were my best friends. And I should at least tell them this much. Immediately, all the seriousness evaporated, and Lindsay was giggling uncontrollably, Gabby smiling hugely despite herself. "I knew it," Lindsay said, "I knew it, I knew it, I knew it." Gabby laughed and I couldn't help but grin, and then I quickly added, "But that's it. Only once. And it's not like...I mean, he didn't ask me out or anything. We're not a couple." Lindsay leans it toward me on the bed, "Who kissed who?" I laughed out loud at her enthusiasm. "I kissed him," I said, and Lindsay's lips began to purse unhappily, so I added, "But he kissed back." Gabby finally broke and fell into giggles with Lindsay, both of them clutching Lindsay's pillows, and I leaned against the bed frame and laughed at their girlish squealing. They really were ridiculous, but I did love them.

Nick was looking at the ground when I walked up. "Hey," I said, smiling, and he grinned a little back but immediately looked back down at the ground, stuffing his hands into his oversized pockets. We walked down the alley in silence, but he paused at the base of the step leading into the grocery store, so I stopped, too, and faced him, and eyebrow raised. He cleared his throat, "Did you wanna-" he paused, and cleared his throat again, "I mean, would you like to..." he trailed off and looked out into the alley. Finally he looked at me and said, "You wanna get something to eat?" Without thinking, I said the first thing that popped into my head, "I don't think there's any restaurants open at this time." And then I realized that he just asked me out. "I know a place," he replied immediately. I felt like I should have said something, but there was suddenly a major frog in my throat, so I just nodded. He said nothing else, simply turned back into the alley and started back the way we came, and I walked slightly behind him, as his tread was quick. He seemed nervous. And judging by my sudden stomachache and the pounding in my chest, I was nervous too. When we reached the end of the alley, he turned to the right, opposite the way I had come, and walked a short ways to a red camaro with whites stripes. I laughed when I saw the car, it wasn't something I'd imagine Nick driving. "What year is this?" I asked as we approached the vehicle. Nick smiled proudly upon the car and said, "1967. I love her."

"She looks just like the one in that movie. A Walk To Remember." Nick laughed, "I have been told so before." I laughed, too, and Nick opened the passenger-side door for me.
Nick took me to a little restaurant located about twenty minutes away, on the first exit off the freeway, in a town the size of a thumbtack. The door chimed when we walked in, and there were only two people working. The first was a man who was clearly the cook, but was sitting in a booth, sipping coffee out of one of those little white restaurant mugs and turning the page of a novel. The other was a waitress donning a dress-and-apron look with roller skates and everything, and it was so cliché I couldn't help but smile. "I figured," Nick said to me, grinning, "That I should make a good impression. Take you some place real fancy like for the first night of our courtship." I laughed and said, "Oh boy, you done and capped yourself. This here place sure is real fancy like." Nick laughed and hooked his arm through mine, "Only the best for my sweet pea, the purtiest lady in all these here counties." I giggled and slapped his arm, "Aw, shucks, teddy bear, don't make me blush." Nick laughed loudly and we sat down at a booth. The waitress skated over to us and popped a huge gum bubble before handing us our menus. "Thanks," Nick said to her, and she nodded and walked away, The Breeders' Cannonball blasting from her iPod headphones. Nick glanced over his menu and then grinned at me, "So what do you think you'll have?" I looked down at the menu and spotted one thing that never did me wrong. I smiled at Nick, "Mac and c." He grinned, "Ooh, good choice. I think I'll get that too." He glanced down at his menu again just in case, and I couldn't help but smile as I looked at him- his white hair sweeping over his face, his hazel eyes lit up by my presence, his unfailing grin playing on his lips like fingers on a clarinet, making me want to lean forward and kiss him again. He looked up at me right then and smiled, and I blushed and smiled back, quickly looking back down at my menu.

© 2011

MUTE part 3

I sat down with Val and her friends at our usual table and swirled the water in my canteen idly. When I looked up, I found Ames standing at the front of the cafeteria, searching the room for something. Someone, probably. When his eyes met mine, he grinned. Looking for me, apparently. He walked over to our table and slid in across from me, next to Val's friend Patricia. "Hi," he said to me, grinning widely. "Hello," Patricia responded, leaning on her hand and fluttering her eyelashes. I grinned at this and looked down at my sandwich. "Hey," Ames addressed Patricia with a grin, and then proceeded to once again stick out his hand. "I'm Ames. Who are you?" Patricia laughed at this and said, "Patricia. But you can call me Pat."
"Or Patty," Val added, "Cake. Baker's man."
Bake me a cake as fast as you can, I motioned, and Val and I laughed. Patricia rolled her eyes and shook Ames's hand, "Just Pat."
"Nice to meet you, Pat," Ames nodded, smiling. He cleared his throat, "So, do all of you speak sign language?" Val shook her head, "Nope. Just me. And Lissa, of course." Ames nodded, and smiled at me. I blushed and looked back down at my sandwich. I wished he would stop doing that. "So," he said, grinning at the now-silent table, everyone looking at him, "Do you guys mind if I sit with you?" Val grinned, "Depends. For today, or forever?" Ame smiled and glanced at me, "I think I'll stick around, if you don't mind."
"In that case, we'll have you," Pat said with a big smile. The whole table laughed and Ames smiled, said, "Well, thanks," and winked at me. I smiled a little bit and took a bit of my sandwich.

Chapter 2

The boat they pulled me onto was small, a jet boat, made simply for the purpose of flying on water. It was a freak thing, really, a miracle, that they happened to be out, that they happened to find us. The relief of them finding me, however, was crushed by the pain that they didn't see him. I was hysterical, of course, and I tried to jump back in the water, to jump back to him, but I guess they just thought I was scared and maybe temporarily out of my mind, because two people pinned me down while a third person climbed back into the driver's seat and started the boat back up, speeding us back to the dock. When I stopped struggling and just folded into myself and sobbed, they wrapped slightly damp towels around me, and one woman, someone middle-aged with long, dark brown hair that I might have found comforting if she hadn't just pulled me away from the dying body of the love of my life, wrapped her arms around me and whispered soothing sayings in my ear. I was freezing despite the towels and felt like I was the only person in the world despite the woman.
In the hospital, they assumed I was crying because of the trauma, figured my strange-sounding screams were because I was so scared. That was until a doctor came in and recognized my muffled noises, the strange way my screaming seemed to be chopped off, cut short. He immediately called someone in, and she took one look at me and motioned, What's wrong? This made me sob more, and I wished with everything in me that this woman had been on that boat. They pulled me up, I motioned, my hands shaking as sobs moved through my body, they saved me, but they pulled me away from him.
From who? she motioned, her eyebrows furrowed. I knew it wasn't likely she would recognize the sign for Ames's name, so I motioned, My boyfriend. She looked confused, and she turned and asked my doctor what had happened to me. He told her everything he knew, that some people had found me drowning, stuck under something, they think, and had pulled me up out of the water and rushed me over here. Her eyes widened in horror and she turned to me, He was stuck? she asked. I nodded, trying to make my hands steady so she could make out my words, Yes, under a rock, he was pinned down. I was trapped, too, but only my legs were pinned down, and they pushed the rock off me and pulled me up. The woman's eyes were full of water now, and her hands shook, too, though less than mine, as she motioned, Away from him. I nodded, biting my tongue so hard I tasted blood in my mouth as I pushed down the screams trying to erupt from my throat. The woman turned to my doctor and said to him, "She was with a boy, in the water. Her legs were pinned under a rock, and she was holding onto this boy, and the people who found her didn't see him, so they freed only her and pulled her up, away from him. She couldn't tell them, because she's mute." The doctor's eyes were filled with pain, "So he drowned."
He drowned.
And I took my teeth off of my tongue and let out my version of a bloodcurdling scream.

© 2011