Inescapable Escapism

I woke up slowly, having fallen asleep at some point as light began to illuminate my room, and stretched under the covers. I didn’t want to get up. I was too comfortable. The bed, lumpy as it was, was cosy and warm.

Eventually, though, I managed to pry my eyes open. I groaned softly and rolled over again, pulling the duvet up even higher so that it bunched around my face. It was so soft against my skin.

Reaching out somewhat blindly, I grabbed my phone and stared at the time in horror. It was already eleven. I was meant to get up early to say goodbye to my grandparents before they left to go to the other house!

I threw myself out of bed, changing quickly and raced down the hall. The house was silent, apart from my loud footsteps, as I rushed down the stairs and glanced out the window at the front of the house.

Their car was gone. They’d already left.

My shoulders slumped and I started to walk along the hallway, ducking my head into the lounge to make sure they weren’t in there. They weren’t, of course, but I just felt the need to check.

I continued, emerging into the kitchen. My mom was sitting at the table, a book in her hands and an empty coffee cup in front of her. She looked up at me as I entered, her expression flat and melancholy.

“Good morning,” I said cautiously, unsure what kind of mood she would be in.

“Morning,” she said, her voice void of emotion.

Uncertainty filled me and I shuffled, not wanting to leave the doorway. It wasn’t that I was scared she’d get mad or hit me or anything, it was more just I wanted to be able to turn and run if I needed to which sounded dramatic. I didn’t need to run away from her, just sometimes it was nice to have some space.

“I’m sorry I didn’t wake up in time to say goodbye,” I continued.

“It’s fine. I wasn’t either.”

Sadness tinged with anger washed through me. They didn’t even wake my mom when they were leaving. That felt so rude, so callous. How could they be so uncaring? Did they not know how much their behaviour affected her?

They did, I knew that. I had seen the way my grandmother examined my mom after saying something particularly cutting, the slight smirk on her face. She enjoyed it.

“I’m sorry,” I said honestly.

“It’s fine,” she repeated, her eyes fixed on the book.

It clearly wasn’t but I didn’t want to push it. I stepped closer uncertainly, my eyes scanning the rest of the kitchen. It was spotless. There was no trace that my grandparents had even had breakfast this morning. I assumed they hadn’t. It wouldn’t surprise me if they waited until they thought my mom was asleep and then raced out of the house, just to hurt her.

“You don’t need to hover by the door. Come have some breakfast. The baker dropped off more scones this morning,” my mom said, still not looking up.

I hurried to grab a plate from the cupboard and joined her at the table, selecting one of the scones from the box in the middle and taking a bite before even adding anything to it.

It was delicious but I wasn’t surprised. They always were.

“There’s cream in the fridge and jam in the cupboard,” my mom told me, her nose wrinkling slightly.

I swallowed the dry mouthful, enjoying the faint sweetness even as it turned to paste in my mouth, before starting to stand up.

I hesitated halfway towards the fridge and turned back towards my mom.

“Would you like me to get you a plate?” I offered.

She never normally had breakfast, especially not at my grandparents, but I did see her picking at the scones sometimes.

She looked up at me, seemingly surprised by my offer.

“Yes, please,” she said after a pause.

A smile came over my face but I looked away quickly, retrieving the plate along with the cream and strawberry jam. I handed the plate to her a little awkwardly, placing everything else on the table and was about to sit down when she spoke again.

“Help yourself to coffee, if you want it,” she said before adding, “Because, apparently, that’s something you drink now.”

I hesitated, confused by her tone. It didn’t sound like she was annoyed or angry… it sounded like she was trying to tease me. I truly didn’t know how to react to that. She didn’t tease me in a lighthearted way ever, that wasn’t how we interacted.

“Umm… I’m okay today, thank you,” I answered haltingly.

She smiled faintly before looking away and we began eating in silence again. Mom picked up her book again, reading as she ate and after a moment, I pulled my phone out.

I caught up quickly, answering Phoebe’s texts before mindlessly scrolling through Instagram for a little. Nothing there was gripping me though and before long, my mind began to wander.

It lazily returned to the daydream I had been in the night before but I knew I couldn’t stay there for long. It was boring. I was lying in the surprisingly comfortable but small bed, the bus humming softly and the world dark outside the window. There was nothing for me to do there. I knew that I could get up and start learning but I just didn’t want to. The clock on the iPad screen glowed softly in the darkness, informing me that it was a little after four in the morning.

If I got up and did start reading stuff on the iPad, would Ms Brice find out somehow? Like, would she be alerted that I was up at an abnormal hour? Did that really matter?

“I thought we could go out to the cafe for lunch today,” I heard my mom say in reality.

“That sounds nice,” I answered without fully returning.

“We could go there for a late lunch, maybe?” she suggested.

“Sure, I’d like that.”

I would. It was really nice there. My mom and I usually brought a couple of books and ordered a sandwich. She’d get a coffee whilst I got a coke or something and we’d just sit there and read for a few hours. It wasn’t particularly different to being at home but sometimes it was just nice to not be in the house.

Maybe I’d get a coffee this time. I was pretty sure that they did weird flavoured syrups for the coffees there, I remembered my mom looking at them disdainfully, but maybe I’d try one. That would be good.

I rolled over in the small bed, facing the window. It felt a little strange sleeping against a window, like it would be dangerous or something but I think that they must have preempted that people would be worried about that because I had a faint memory of watching a video about my time on the bus. Apparently, if I remembered correctly, the window would be fine, even in an emergency. They’d shown clips of it being shot at and everything which I remembered made me slightly uneasy.

Was it likely that someone would shoot at the bus? Guns were illegal in this country, surely they wouldn’t be able to get any. No, that was silly. I assumed that people must be able to find a way to get them in but we’d be okay, right? There were only trainees on the bus, who would want to shoot at us?

I tapped the glass, causing it to brighten slightly and show the darkened world beyond the window. Well, it wasn’t really showing that. I wasn’t allowed to know where we were so it was just displaying a video of a random road at night.

I stared at it, my mind wandering back to the cafe and what I would order before a strange dizziness washed over me.

“Can I get a top up, please?” I heard someone ask but the voice was distant, foggy.

It felt like it was far away or on the other side of a window or something and I needed to wade towards it through my dizziness.

“Darling?” a woman asked, touching my arm gently.

Brightness assaulted my brain but I forced myself to just blink quickly, and smile at the unfamiliar brunette woman who sat at the table in front of me.

“Sorry,” I said in a voice that wasn’t quite my own. It was too polite, too clipped. “Another iced tea?”

The woman smiled, all traces of concern leaving her face.

“Yes, please. Unsweetened.”

“Coming right up,” I told her, not even bothering to scribble her order down on the notepad that was tucked into my white apron pocket.

I crossed through the busy diner, dodging other servers, and stopped at the red shiny counter. Leaning my forearms against it, I felt a chill go through me despite how warm it was in the busy room.

Eventually, the guy behind the counter looked up at me.

“Can I get an unsweetened iced tea for table six, please?” I asked.

“Got it,” he grunted, barely meeting my gaze.

It was normal for him though. I wasn't quite sure how I knew that but I’d been working at Amy’s diner for long enough to know that Aaron didn’t really like to engage with people, unlike the rest of us. He lived in one of the apartments above the diner, like me, but he still liked to keep himself at arm’s length. It was a shame though because he was kind of cute, in a dark and broody way.

I looked away, catching the eye of Sarah, one of the other girls who worked at Amy’s and sending her a smile as she passed, laden down with plates. She returned it before winking.

My grin widened and I felt happiness rush through me, tinged with confusion and excitement. I had only just joined this new world and yet, it felt like I already knew so much about it. I knew all about where I lived, the people here and what they were like, I even had friends. Somehow I could tell that I was popular.

After a moment, Aaron returned, placing several glasses on the counter in front of me.

“Do you mind taking some cokes to table eight?” he asked. “It’s Elsa’s table technically but she’s caught up with twelve.”

I glanced over at table twelve and winced. The men at that table came in once a week and they always had the most complicated orders, which they ran through multiple times.

“Oh, yeah, that’s fine,” I told him.

“Thanks. I’ll get you a tray,” he said, grabbing one from below the counter and beginning to load drinks onto it.

It wasn’t until he was done that he finally met my gaze. His eyes widened and his hands froze as pure fear crossed his face.

He leant forwards, his eyes flicking between mine as his mouth fell open slightly.

The look of horror on his face made me self-conscious. I wasn’t sure what he was looking at or why he was so scared but it made me race a hand to touch my cheeks. Nothing felt wrong.

I had no clue why he was staring at me like that. I knew Aaron, we’d been working together for a while. He was a year or so older than me so already working there when I started as soon as I turned sixteen and my parents kicked me out. He had looked at me before so I didn’t know why he now looked so horrified.

“Beth?” he breathed, the name sounding almost like a prayer.

Confusion and fear washed through me and I searched my memories frantically, trying to work out what my name was in this fantasy.

“Um… no, I’m Grace,” I replied, feeling genuinely thankful that I had the same name in my dream as I did in reality. “Are you okay?”

At once, the fear left his face and he laughed lightly as he ran a hand through his tousled brown hair.

“Oh, duh. Sorry about that. I didn’t really sleep well last night so I’m kind of out of it. You do look a little different today though, did you get a haircut or something?” he asked, his tone completely normal but the wild panic remained in his eyes.

“Oh… yeah. I did actually,” I said unsurely.

His lips lifted softly, making his chiselled face look a lot more gentle. He looked so different when he was actually smiling. He looked younger, more attractive too. It seemed forced though. He had seen something in me and immediately I worried that he could tell I wasn’t from this world.

No, that was stupid. It was a fantasy. I didn’t need to worry about that.

“It looks good. Do you want a hand with that tray?” he asked.

I slid it off the bar, trying to hide how much my hands were trembling.

“No, I’ve got it, thanks,” I replied, quickly turning away from him.

It was kind of terrifying to have someone actually see me like that. I was too used to people only seeing the facade, the person I was pretending to be, but it felt like Aaron had somehow seen that and could see me. I didn’t like it.

I pushed the fear aside, tightening my grip on the tray as I cross the diner towards the woman who had ordered the iced tea. I shot her a smile as I placed it on the table as started towards the group of boys who had been waiting for their cokes, passing Elsa who was recounting the order under her breath.

They didn’t look at me as I placed their drinks on the table and apologised for the delay but I could feel their eyes burning into my body as I walked away.

I ducked behind the counter, avoiding Aaron, and slipped into the kitchen.

“If Harry and his asshole friends come here one more time, I’m going to call the police,” Sarah told me immediately, not even bothering to lower her voice.

I grabbed a fry from the bowl in front of her.

“I know. I don’t think they’d actually do anything, they just like to stare. We can’t exactly kick them out just because they make us uncomfortable, right?” I said, my voice sounding more like my own but my accent was vaguely American.

I glanced up at the cook who dumped another serving of fries into the bowl and winked at me before turning back to her grill.

“Um, no. We absolutely can. If we tell Amy that they keep coming here and making all of the girls uncomfortable, she’d do something about it. You know she has a zero creep policy,” Sarah insisted, grabbing another fry even though they had only just come out of the fryer.

“Yeah, we can but I kind of feel bad. Is that weird?” I asked.

I did. They were harmless enough and they generally tipped pretty well, they just constantly stared at us and tried to look down our shirts. I was kind of used to that though.

“Yes! You live here. Do you really want them skulking around? Like, this is basically your front garden. I wouldn’t want him in mine!”

I snorted.

“It’s not quite that,” I said. “This is a diner, not my garden. If he were in my garden, I’d call the police but if we kick out every asshole who makes us uncomfortable, we’d have like no customers. Plus, they tip well.”

Sarah considered it for a minute.

“They do, I guess. Is it really worth it though?” she asked.

I laughed.

“I’ll cover their table next time they come in,” I offered.

“I love you,” Sarah said, sounding relieved. “Oh, wait. We should send Aaron out to deal with them! He’d definitely do it.”

I smiled but it felt forced.

I almost wanted to tell her about Aaron calling me Beth earlier but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I wanted to know who Beth was, if she was someone who worked here before I joined, but I was worried. It was probably just a mistake.

“By the way…” Sarah started, her expression mischievous. “I saw that you made him smile a minute ago. I don’t think anyone’s ever managed it before, what happened?”

I felt my face flush.

“Nothing, really.”

Sarah sent me a doubting look.

“Okay,” she said in a tone that told me she didn’t believe me.

“Truly!” I insisted.

“Alright, keep it to yourself for now. Are you coming to Ainsley’s tonight?” she asked.

I opened my mouth to ask what was happening at Ainsley’s before remembering. She was having another party. She always did. She was in our year but had been held back a couple of times. She threw the best parties though. I don’t know how she managed it because she was only like nineteen but there was always so much booze there.

“Of course,” I answered.

“Cool! Want me to swing by and pick you up? Jason’s driving us there.”

“That would be great, if he doesn’t mind?”

Sarah rolled her eyes.

“He won’t care, you know what he’s like. I swear that boy is almost too nice,” she said but her smile made it clear how much she loved him.

“Oi, the food’s going cold,” the cook, Hannah said, pointing at the plates under the warmer.

Sarah pushed away from the counter, sending Hannah a playful pout before looking back at me.

“Aaron will be there tonight, by the way,” she said blithely as she started towards the food.

Worry started to edge into my stomach.

“He will?” I asked.

I wasn’t sure if I wanted him to be there. There was something intriguing about him but I was a little scared. I didn’t want to be around him too much, just in case he did know the truth about me.

“Oh yeah. He always goes to Ainsley’s parties. She’s like one of his only friends.”

Sarah ducked out of the kitchen, her arms lined with plates, before I could ask her more about that.

I was tempted to skip the party tonight, even though I knew it would be great, but I ignored that urge and pushed it aside easily. It would be fun, even if Aaron was there. I didn’t even need to talk to him if I did see him there, I could just hang out with someone else and pretend that I hadn’t seen him. It would be fine.

Or, if he did come over and talk to me, I could just talk to him like a normal person. We’d spoken before and I was pretty sure I had seen him at one of Ainsley’s parties in the past but the memories were hazy and drunken. I could just pretend as if nothing had changed.

Nothing had changed. I was still the same person that I was before, pretty much. I’d be fine.

“What are you going to do this morning?” I heard my mom ask, her voice distant.

I pulled myself out of the fantasy, getting a flash of dark roads passing the bus as I returned, and blinked. I had to swallow a couple of times to get rid of my mouthful of scone.

“I’m not sure actually. I think I might just read. I downloaded a few books for the holiday,” I said.

My mom nodded and brushed the crumbs off herself before pushing her plate away.

“Are you going to go for another run or a swim?” she asked.

I considered it for a moment.

“No, not before lunch, I don’t think. I don’t want to have to shower and dry my hair, it’ll take too long.”

“Fine,” she said. “You can always go when we get back anyway. I’m going to empty out the fridge so that we can go to the supermarket on the way back.”

I smiled, relieved that we’d have more edible food in the house and wouldn’t have to rely on my grandparent’s food. I didn’t like their distrust of use by dates.

“Do you need a hand?”

She eyed me suspiciously.

“No, I can manage it,” she said.

I nodded and took another bite.

I felt a little bad leaving her to do everything but clearing out the fridge wasn’t exactly a two-person job. Plus, it meant I could just pretend to read and slip back into my fantasies. Or maybe I would actually read. I did have some that I wanted to read.

I finished my scone and stood, raining crumbs down onto the table, before scooping them onto my plate.

“Do you want me to put your plate in the dishwasher too?” I asked.

“Yes,” she said, her gaze on her book again but I could feel her looking at me as I walked across the kitchen.