Speak Low If You Speak Love

Zoë was walking into her apartment when her phone started ringing. She dropped her purse on the floor and lunged for the phone to answer it before it stopped ringing. Just as she put the phone to her ear the electricity went out. She sat the phone back in the cradle since the line had dropped as well. She sighed as she looked out the window of her little one bedroom apartment. It wasn't just her the whole place was out. As a matter of fact, it looked as if the whole street was out. She grabbed the flashlight out of the drawer by the door and went toward the bedroom where her candles were currently at in the top drawer of her dresser. She sighed as she put them out in each of their little holders and then took the lighter out of her kitchen drawer and lit each one. Once the little apartment was lit she opened the windows to let in the night air. She noticed that all of her neighbors were apparently doing the same. She shook her head and decided that she would leave only a few candles lit and go outside and see what the hell had happened to loose the electricity. She blew out all but the candles in the little bathroom and making sure that she had her key walked outside shutting the door behind her. She had no minutes on her cell phone so she couldn't call work and tell them that she wasn't going to make it in. Her closest neighbor looked her way and spoke.

"Girl shouldn't you be on your way to work?"

"I don't have to be there for two hours, but I need a shower and to change into my uniform."

"Oh, you need to call and let them know you'll be late?"

"Yeah I guess I kinda do." Her neighbor whose name she couldn't remember for the life of her handed her a cell phone and she called the diner that she worked at and let them know. It was a small town so it wasn't like someone there hadn't heard about the black out on her street anyway. As she sat on the stoop with her neighbor they waited for word on what happened. She sighed as an hour passed and finally they electricity not only came back on and Zoë wasn't going to be late for work, well that late, the landlord finally showed up and told them that it had been because of the accident on main street. Some teenager was going too fast and run someone off the road and they hit a transformer. Most of Main had been out as well. Zoë shook her head as she unlocked her apartment door and went straight to the bathroom. She blew out the candles that she had completely forgotten about and stripped stepping into the shower.

She quickly showered and shaved and then got out. She had to be somewhat on time. She pulled her shorts up over her legs and sighed. She preferred the winter and fall when they were permitted to wear jeans instead of black shorts. She tied her sneakers and then had to take them back off because she had forgotten to put on socks. She finally got that done and she pulled on the blue Ashbury Diner t-shirt over her bra and grabbed her car keys. She had no make up on and she looked like shit in her opinion and her blonde hair was soaking wet and pulled back in a messy knot on the top of her head. She jumped in her blue Ford F150 and was out of her parking space and the parking lot in less than a minute. She ran into the Diner and discovered she had managed to get there only five minutes late. She sighed and clocked in. Her boss was trying not to laugh at her.

She picked up her pad and pulled a pen from the cup next to the register and got to work. She was easily distracted from the fact that she had to go home and deal with whatever she needed to put away from the power outage. She had to put away the candles and the lighter and she needed to make sure that the flashlight was put away. She smiled at everyone that she spoke too, but she was currently hoping that her paycheck along with her tips were going to cover her rent and her electric bill. Since that was all that she had to pay. She didn't have cable and she preferred to not have internet. She preferred reading and listening to music to watching television, even though she didn't think that there was anything wrong with sitting down and watching a movie every now and then. She looked up from behind the register as she saw a group of people seat themselves in her section. She sighed, couldn't they sit in Ashton's section. She picked up her pad and grabbed four menu's and headed over. She slipped the pad in her front pocket since they were gonna need a minute to order.

"Welcome to Ashbury's, my name is Zoë and I'll be your waitress today." She said and handed them each a menu. "Do you want to order your drinks now or when you decide on what you want to eat?"

"Now" four voices said and they all ordered Pepsi. She walked off to retrieve it and when she brought it back they were still looking over the menu's so she kindly told them that she would be back and went to the next table. She was starting to tire out and it was because she was so stressed. She kept the smile in place as she took orders. Five minutes later she walked back over to the table the four men were at.

“Are ya’ll ready to order?” when they nodded and ordered, she took their menus and walked toward the counter where she clipped the order up with the rest. She placed the menus back where they belonged and went to refill drinks while she had a little time to do so. It wasn’t that busy at the moment now that Carmen had taken over the tables that she normal took over when she got there. It hadn’t helped that apparently the black out had hit her street too, and her electric was back on later than Zoë’s. She nodded to the woman that was late and walked back to the kitchen for a minute and took a drink of water. She rolled her eyes as she felt Ashton rip her back into the stock room.

“What the hell Ashton?”

“Do you know who is sitting in your section?”

“Please tell me not one of you numerous out of state exes.”

“Ha I wish” Zoë raised an eyebrow at her and waited patiently for an explanation. When she didn’t get one she shook her head.

“I have to get back to work, Ash hurry up or let go of my arm.” Ashton let go of her arm and Zoë walked back out just as the four guys that she hadn’t known Ashton was talking bout’s order was up. She took it to their table and asked if they needed refills. It was a little weird when almost an hour and a half later she was standing behind the counter handing the guy that paid his change, he didn’t hit on her. She was actually thankful for that. When strangers came into town they normally made comments to her, Ashton, Carmen, and Lilith, and most of them were extremely crude.

“You wouldn’t happen to know the best place here to crash for the night do you?” he asked her. She looked up from ripping his receipt off the machine and thought for a second. The man paying asked. It was only two in the afternoon, she briefly wondered why they weren’t moving on out of town to the next closet city with a hotel which was only about three hours away.

“Uhm considering the fact that this is summer your best bet would be Chase’s… well sorry, forgot your not local. It’s called Village Inn. It’s down off seventh.”

“Thanks, and how do I get there?” She looked up at him from where she had taken a second to double check and make sure that everything went through properly.

“Uhm yeah, just take a left out of the parking lot and follow the street signs. It’s at the corner of Main and seventh. Not that hard to miss the sign is huge and it’s right on the corner.”

“Thanks.”

“No problem. The only thing is they don’t have room service, but the dining hall next door to it has a really good cook and most guests eat dinner there.” She said and they nodded. She watched them walk out and shook her head. Around eight o’clock she clocked out when Lilith got there and collected her paycheck and Ashton walked out with her. She ignored her friend and began to open her check. Thankfully the bank didn’t close until nine on payday Friday so they headed in that direction. Zoë looked at her check and muttered a curse under her breath. Her check was enough to cover the electric and if she was lucky part of her rent. She just hoped that she got enough in tips from the past week to cover the rest of the rent. When they got to the bank she cashed her check and got money orders for both bills and headed back out to the car to wait on Ashton.

Jacoby Shaddix was looking at the building that the girl at the diner had told them about and shrugged. It was just one night and the place didn’t look half bad. They walked in and Jerry looked at him and shrugged as well. They walked up to the front desk and discovered that them each getting their own room here was actually about the same price that they would’ve paid for them to share two hotel rooms somewhere else, other than a really cheap motel. So they each got there own room and were actually shown up to them by the lady at the front desk. The place was friendly enough and no one seemed to be being rude to them or well fanlike towards them. It was a nice change of pace from other places.

They got to their rooms and crashed for a few hours and then when they woke up they all headed next door to get something for dinner. It was around eight thirty. Jacoby and the guys walked in and Jacoby saw that the girl that had been their waitress at the diner was working at the Dining Hall as it was apparently named. But hey that was a small town for you. They were seated and she wasn’t paying attention to something as the hostess motioned toward their table to let her know she had customers. She walked over to the table not looking at them but speaking to the other customers at her other tables as she walked.

“Hi, I’m…”

“Zoë? We know, second job?” Jacoby asked. She finally looked at them and laughed lightly. Jacoby didn’t like the way his heart reacted to that laugh.

“Yeah it is, let me guess the Inn?”

“You recommended it.” Jerry said.

“Yeah, well normally it’s full but with it being tourist season people are always coming and going from the place. I knew they had open rooms, they like to keep the diners and everyone informed where there’s a place available, even the other inn’s and the hotel and B&B’s do it.”

“Well thank you for the recommendation.”

“Not a problem, Pepsi tonight or something stronger?”

“Beer.” they all said and she nodded and handed them their menus and told them she’d be back.