A Place Where You Belong

A New Hope

Chapter 4: A New Hope

Princess Leia, where are you tonight?

 And who’s laying there by your side?

 Every night I fall asleep with you

 And I wake up alone. –Blink-182

 

The graveyard shift at KittyCat’s is a blessing and a curse. A blessing because Ms. Kitty Wright hardly ever works after 11 pm. A curse because on the weekend, all of the drunk twenty-somethings from Club Proof stumble in for coffee and breakfast food when the club closes at 4 am. Me and the other waittresess/waiters who are working start making pots of coffee around 3:30. We’ve found that everyone is usually so drunk and hyped that the freshness of the coffee is low on their list of concerns.

It’s around 3:45 when Officer Goodwin walks in all sleepy eyed and bushy haired. He’s young and handsome though, with a set of the straightest white teeth I have ever seen. He always reminds me that he never had braces—God just gifted him with two perfect rows of choppers. Ms. Kitty Wright hired him from the police department after the other waitresses and I kept reporting sexual harassment from the wasted club-goers, not to mention the countless drunken tiffs and the Halloween Night Brawl of 2013. Although Goodwin is a little too lazy and never misses a chance to flirt with the women in tight dresses and low cut blouses, he has saved me and the other girls from some unwanted groping many of times.

I know that Officer Goodwin has a small crush on me; he never tries to hide it. But he’s pompous and ditzy and is my older brother Adam’s best friend. Yes, he was my first kiss after a no-fair-dare from Auden a couple of summers ago, but that is where the romanticism between us ends.

“Hey, Charlie. Been a long time since you worked the graveyard shift,” Officer Goodwin says as I pour coffee beans into the coffeemaker.

“I work it once a week like I always do, Officer Goodwin. Every Saturday.”

“You can call me Joey, Charlie. I want a pretty girl such as yourself to only call me Officer Goodwin in the bedroom.” He winks and sips from the coffee he took the liberty of pouring into his Ocean City police department mug.

“I wonder what Adam would think if he knew that you were coming on to his baby sister,” I ask him, tartly, as I put the pot on top of the burner.

Goodwin grins and reaches over me to turn the coffeemaker on. His body isn’t touching mine, but his proximity is enough to make me feel irritated.

“His baby sister isn’t a baby anymore. And what he doesn’t know won’t hurt him.” Goodwin steps away and gives me an arrogant look that reads “I know I got you all hot and bothered” and I give him a look that I hope reads, “not a chance.”

By 4:05, the inebriated townies start spilling in. They are loud and wreak of sweat and booze and demand their coffee before they even sit down. The other two waitresses, Liz and Karyn, and I are throwing trays of coffee on tables like it’s going out of style. Mostly everyone wants our Hungry Kitty platter which includes two eggs (scrambled or fried), three pancakes of your choice, a choice of breakfast meats, and hashbrowns smothered in our special Kitty sauce (horseradish, sour cream, and dijon mustard) which either ends up being upchucked in the bathroom or not even touched because they realize if they eat it then they will probably end up upchucking it in the bathroom.