We're All Running From Something

I lazily pushed through the two consecutive steel doors of the diner, each handle getting more sticky as the staff had probably given up on sanitizing after every nasty four year-old’s palm gripped the handle. Making my way in, I could see that the lively atmosphere shown from the outside was nothing more than a grim facade. It was getting close to four in the morning and most of, if not all of the regular traffic had shuffled out at this point. I wanted to just push through the whole night if I could help it, but the bags under my eyes had other plans. I was in desperate need of a pick me up, and some good food if this place could help it. 

Snaking my way into the farthest seat at the bar, I pulled over an ashtray and grabbed out my all but smushed pack of Camels from my coat pocket. Before I could even light one, a young woman approached me with a vigor that only a couple dozen shots of espresso could create at this hour. 

“Howdy Ho! Welcome to Happy’s Chow Town! Can I interest you in one of our freshly made homestyle milkshakes?” 

She was beaming with far too much enthusiasm for me to believe it one second. I glanced down at her nametag. ‘Holly’. I couldn’t tell if that southern twang in her voice was an affectation, or if I’m just bad at trusting first impressions. Given my past, I’d be inclined to think the second.

“Just some coffee and sugar, Holly. And a menu if you can spare it.”

  My brain was working on autopilot at this point. I’d been out on the road for nearly three days at this point. I knew a coast to coast road trip was bound to be a long drive, but nothing could’ve prepared me for just how grueling it would be too. Nearly a whole day in Texas, another one navigating Baton Rouge and Mississippi, finally in the homestretch of Alabama and my body decided to give up on me. She jotted down a few words and gave a glowing smile as she whipped back to the kitchen. She was a pretty girl to be sure. Deep hazel eyes that grabbed your attention no matter the lighting. Her chocolate hair was done up in a loose pony in the back, my guess is to hide the fact it hadn’t been washed in a while, and that smile… It reminded me of Lisa’s. She came back just as quickly as she’d gone, with a fresh pot, a mug, creamer in between her fingers, and a menu nestled between her ribs and arm. She laid it all out for me before pouring a hot cup of exactly what I needed. 

“Refills are free, so don’t feel like you gotta be stingy. Sugar’s in a cup right there, and if you have any questions, I’ll be happy to answer em’ for ya! Oh- Just one more thing. Smoke as much as you like, but I’d be quick to puttin’ em’ out if the Sheriff comes in. He’s not too big on the whole smoking indoors thing.”

I gave her a considerate nod before moving my eyes to the menu. However, this time, she didn’t dart away like before. I tried to make myself appear busy as I fumbled through the pages of options, but that didn’t stop her from hovering right beside. Instead of allowing this awkward proximity to continue, I figured I’d make use of her standing by.

“Have you got any recommendations, Holly?” I asked, figuring the sooner I ordered, the sooner she’d walk away and let me be with my thoughts. 

“Well I’d be more than happy to tell ya, but I gotta know one thing first..” She said, leaning in to emphasize the pressure. 

“Which is?” I said. 

“Your name. Can’t make a friend if you don’t know their name now, can you?” She giggled out.

If I was any more dense, I’d take this as flirting, but it felt different. Something told me this girl needed a friend, maybe just as much as I did. 

“Dennis.” I muttered. “My name’s Dennis.”

She let out a little smirk before turning her eyes to the pack of Camels on the counter and the half-smoked one in my hand. 

“Well Dennis, you should know that they’ve done studies about those things and apparently they can kill you.” She whispered, like a warning to me. I let out a small chuckle before pressing the filter to my lips and taking a long drag.

“You should’ve told me earlier, Holly. I’m past the point of no return now.” I joked. She laughed, a lot. I liked her laugh. Kinda like Lisa used to.

“Well if you can manage to take a break from puffing long enough to eat, Smitty’s working the grill tonight and he makes the best Reubens east of the Mississippi.”

I glanced over the menu a few more times before letting out a long sigh. 

“I’m not so sure Sauerkraut’s the best move at four in the morning. How about some breakfast?” I said, trying less to avert my gaze than I was before. The longer I looked at her, the more I could make out the smaller details. Things any passerby wouldn’t give a second thought, like her arms. Petite and bony, yes, but the bruises were what caught my eye. One on the right elbow, probably from bracing a fall, a few on the forearm, carefully covered up with makeup, and just under the collar of her uniform was a big nasty welt. One I could only assume comes from blunt force trauma. Suddenly that smile seemed a little less like an affectation and more like a shield.

“Smitty’s also got a specialty sandwich on the breakfast menu. Calls it the Dump Truck. You a carnivore Dennis?”

I nodded.

“Then that is, in my professional opinion, what I’d recommend.” I slammed the menu shut and slid it across the counter at her.

“Color me interested, I’ll take the Dump Truck.”

She snatched away the menu and scribbled down some diner jargon on a notepad before sticking it to the kitchen’s window. By the time I had ashed my cigarette once, she was back in my sight, elbows propped up on the counter, the left definitely compensating for the right. 

“So may I ask what brings you to Magnolia Springs?” She said, her words causing quite a bit of confusion for me.

“Magnolia what?” I questioned, unsure of what she even said to me.

“It’s the town you’re in. Magnolia Springs, Alabama.” a humble nod of understanding left my body. “What, you didn’t read the sign when you drove in?” She seemed to get a kick out of taking the piss out of me. I thought it was cute.

“At this hour, I’d be lucky to read a stop sign.” She laughed, despite the painfully dry humor I mustered up.

“I’m just passing through.” I brushed off, hoping I could keep the lighthearted tone going between us as it pleased me to see her smile. She didn’t budge though.

“Well where ya heading, Dennis?” I smushed the burnt filter of the cigarette into the ashtray before popping another one in my mouth, buying time in hopes she’d ask another question. With every question answered, she grew closer to really knowing me. Right now she didn’t know me at all, and she seemed to like me a lot. The last thing I wanted was for this girl to know about Lisa, the funeral, or the past six months of me slowly destroying my life. Her cheeks were bright red and she had all but forgotten about the bruise on her elbow, now fully resting it on the counter. I didn’t want to lose that. Even if it was for a night, or at least a few hours, this girl made me feel new, but as time trudged on, her smile faded into confusion. I hid my eyes from sight and mumbled through closed lips. 

“Georgia.”

“Got family there?” She asked. I shook my head as I took another drag, sipping my coffee in between breaths. 

“Work. Got a job as foreman at a lumberyard.” I said, giving more information than my tongue had intended. 

“Ooh! Dennis the Lumberjack! You look like you’d make out all right there.” She winked. “Pay good?” I let out a short chuckle.

“No. No, I’d probably make more shovelin’ horse shit, but they got beds and three meals a day so who am I to complain?”

I smirked. When I looked up though, her smile was gone, replaced with what I can only describe as disappointment.

“You must have a mighty hard time getting work if you had to move states just for a job.” She stated, as if to lure me in. Get me to tell her something. It was at this point I think she realized I wasn’t being the open book she’d hoped for. Not about the job, but about the reasons for the job. 

“Not really. I guess I just- needed a change of scenery.” The bell at the kitchen counter interrupted our staredown, followed by Smitty sliding across a monstrous sandwich I can only assume was the Dump Truck. She grabbed it up without a word and dropped it down in front of me. I figured if I can’t get her to stop asking questions, I could just start asking some of my own. 

“What about you?” I posed. “Did you grow up here?” She shook her head, looking at the ground, letting out a tired laugh.

“I’d assume you didn’t grow up in a small town, Dennis. Cause if you did, you’d know that every single one has got this impenetrable force field that surrounds every person in it. You can bend it for a time, stretch it pretty far, but it always pulls you right back to where you started. I was born here, I’ll probably die here. My parents did. That’s just the way it is.”

 Her words haunted me, like someone was dying and made peace with their fate, but this girl was young and vibrant. At least she was a few minutes ago. 

“You seem pretty young. When did you lose your parents?” I asked instinctively. Twenty minutes from the moment I walked in and all of a sudden I was a damned psychiatrist.

“About ten years ago. Drunk driver split our old station wagon in two coming back from the movies. I was in the back so I got out with a broken arm and some cracked ribs. Mom and Dad weren’t so lucky.”

The silence filled the room. I couldn’t compel myself to speak, as no words would ever serve as a proper response to something like that.

“I was twelve so Grammy took me in, till she got lung cancer. It took her about as quick as that wreck took my parents. I was seventeen when she died. Been on my own since.”

I felt like an idiot. The weight of this loss made me feel like I was the only one meant to feel this pain. Yet here’s this girl, no older than twenty and she’s lost far more than I could ever imagine. I mustered up all I could, squeaking out the best sentiments I could.

“I know what it’s like to lose someone.”

The closest I’d ever come to being actually open about Lisa since she passed. A solid rock of stoic idiocy, keeping my heart on lockdown for months and here I was, a thousand miles away from a single person who knew my name, bonding over the shared trauma of loss with a pretty-faced waitress at four in the morning. Kinda poetic how life works sometimes. She turned to me and gave a soft smile. She didn’t say anything and she didn’t need to. That smile told me all I needed. She looked up at the blinking fluorescent light above her.

“Dennis? Do you believe in God?” She said, rubbing her bruised arms, covering up a cold chill she’d had.

“I used to.” I couldn’t convince myself I still did. I hadn’t prayed once since Lisa was sick. 

“I’ve never had the heart for it, but I’d like to think there’s something after it all. You know that whole ‘energy can’t be created or destroyed, just passed on’ mess? I like to think when we die, the energy that made us who we were just passes on, goes into someone else, something else, and we keep going.”

I liked the way she thought. Her pain and losses hadn’t turned her completely cynical. There was still this little piece of hope shining out from her.

“If I’ve got a say in what I get to be next, I’m picking a sea turtle. Heard those things live forever.” I said, hoping to break the ice with a bad joke. It worked, breaking her trance with the lightbulb and giving her a good laugh.

“That’s real cute, Dennis. A sea turtle.” I smiled, before remembering I had a whole meal in front of me. I took to taking a few bites of it, washing down each one with my coffee. Holly sauntered over to the counter, leaning over me as I ate, her face pondering something.

“Can I ask you something?” She posed. I mindlessly nodded as I had some more of the sandwich. “What are you running from?” The question caught me by surprise, almost choking on the bite in my throat.

“What?” I said, almost with a laugh. I couldn’t believe the boldness of the statement, nor the ferocity in which she asked it. I did my best to brush it off, sipping my coffee and taking a hefty bite from the sandwich. 

“What makes you think I’m running from anything?” I said through a very full mouth. She leaned in, with an intensity I had not felt from her.

“We’re all running from something.” She whispered, before looking down at her bruised forearm before covering it up in a hurry. “Some of us just don’t run fast enough.”

The next few moments of silent eye contact were promptly interrupted by the flashing of headlights sweeping by the window. The fading of the light revealed the large print of the word “Sheriff” across the side of the car. I was going to put out my cigarette until I noticed Holly. She was frozen, stiff as a statue, her eyes wide with fear. Before I could ask if she was okay, she knelt down under the counter, grabbing a pair of keys and her coat. 

“I’ve gotta- take my break. You can let Smitty know when you’re done. He’ll take care of you.” She said, immediately followed by a mad dash for the back door, but just as she got there, she turned back to me once more. “Whatever it is you’re running from, just make sure you’re running to something else. Something better.” She gave me a wink, and next thing I knew, she was gone. The Sheriff stormed in only seconds after, frantically scanning the restaurant floor. Of course all he found was me, with a half eaten sandwich, two cigarette buds, and quite the look of confusion. 

“Good morning officer, can I help you with something?” He shuffled around his shirt pocket, unfolding a printed out picture of… Holly. 

“This girl, have you seen her?” It was a nice picture, her signature smile and hazel eyes perfectly lit by the sun above. It had to be a graduation picture or something with the quality it possessed. I had no reason to lie. Thirty minutes ago I had no idea this girl even existed, and odds are I’ll never see her again, so nothing can explain what escaped my lips. 

“No, I haven’t. I’m terribly sorry, sir.” The Sheriff groaned in frustration before removing his hat. 

“Her name’s Holly Whitley. Got a boyfriend, Alex. Nobody’s ever been charged, but we get a decent amount of calls regarding domestic violence at their apartment. Alex is a decent guy but- he’s a big drinker.” That explained the bruises. “Anyway, Holly usually works the night shift here. Was hoping I’d catch her during her shift. If you see her, do me a favor and call the police.” That last sentence set off alarms in me. I had to know what was going on. 

“Is she in trouble? What did she do?” I pulled back, realizing I was starting to sound a little too invested. The Sheriff sighed and tucked away the photo of Holly. 

“Alex was found dead a few hours ago. Officers on-sight found signs of a struggle, and no sign of Holly. I’m not one to jump to conclusions but- …She’s not dangerous. We just wanna have a word with her.” I knew from the way he said it, they did not just want to have a word with her. “Whatever the case is, I’m sure we’ll find her sooner or later. It’s a small town. No sense in running.” He said, before popping his hat back on to leave. “And put that damn thing out. There’s no smoking in here.” Without another word, he turned to the door and was back on the trail. I looked over to the rusty metallic door Holly had squeezed her way out of only minutes ago.

“We’re all running from something.”