Terrible Advice From a Career Temp- Chapter Five: Most Days are a Grind

It was painfully early when Piper arrived back from Oahu. She had taken a red-eye flight. She must have looked like airport-lost luggage, after she had ride-shared the rest of the journey. Dena picked her up outside the old town mall just as the sun was stretching over the parking lot. Piper was sitting on the curb, arms wrapped around her backpack like it held her last shred of dignity.

“Oh, honey. What happened?” Dena asked, crouching down to hug her.

Piper slumped into the passenger seat of the rickety Geo. “It was… a lot of things. Can we get coffee? Hawk said he’d call, and I’m running on fumes to be honest.” Dena drove to the nearest coffee shop — a local spot where the baristas looked clinically over-caffeinated.

The line was unusually long for sunrise, but Piper was too tired to question it.“So,” Dena said, trying to suss things out as they waited, “Was it Hawk?” Piper shook her head. “No. It was everything else.” The line didn’t move so much as exist in front of them. “Hawk kept getting called into work. Turns out in Hawaii, commuting to another island is apparently ‘not cheap,’ who knew? He rents a room with this awful guy from his job. The place was in the middle of nowhere — no car, no bus stop, no escape hatch. I spent the whole trip waiting for Hawk to come home. That was basically it.”

Dena frowned. “I’m sorry, baby. That sounds like… well, miserable.”

“Oh, that wasn’t the worst part,” Piper continued. “His roommate got drunk one night and threw up on me. And later, his girlfriend cornered me, crying that he wanted to cheat on her with me. I told the guy off, then she yelled at me for ratting her out. I booked my flight home before it got any worse.”

Dena blinked twice. “…You left out all of that on the phone.”

“I didn't want to deal with it any more than I already had. I didn't get to say goodbye to Hawk. I just texted him and took an Uber out. ” Piper said mildly.

They were finally next in line. The barista, a cheerful 19-year-old with an unusually high level of enthusiasm, leaned out the pickup window. Her nametag read “Annie” with a heart over the i. Dena had ordered an Earl Grey tea. Piper requested a double-shot Americano, plain.

Before Dena could hand over her debit card, Annie announced brightly, “GREAT NEWS! The person ahead of you already paid for your drinks! We’ve had a Pay-It-Forward chain going since 6 A.M. It’s our longest one ever! Would you like to pay for the person behind you to keep it going?” Annie blinked with giddy anticipation toward Dena while she thought to herself, and Piper finally realized why the line had been moving slower than grief.

“How much was our order total?” Dena asked.

“$8.26.”

“And theirs?”

Annie checked the screen. “$37.02. Not including tip.” She pointed to her aggressively full tip jar — it looked like it had its own savings account.

Piper leaned forward before Dena could speak.“Absolutely not. We just want our drinks.”

Annie glanced at the pristine G-Wagon behind them. “Really?”

“YES, ANNIE...actually, you can use your own tips if it's that important to you,” Piper hissed, eyes bloodshot like a raccoon who saw too much. Annie silently passed their drinks through the window with an air of betrayal. Dena attempted to tip what their total would have been, but Piper slapped her hand away like a knife fight. Dena drove off, mortified.

“You didn’t have to be so rude,” Dena said.

Piper sipped her cup and muttered, “That coffee shop pays more per hour than you make at the clinic, and we’re in a Geo held together by legit tape. I refuse to fund someone in a $90,000 luxury vehicle getting their ‘morning pick-me-up.’”

Dena decided to change the subject. “So… you and Hawk?”

Piper shrugged. “Maybe San Diego was a fluke. Maybe Hawk and I were two puzzle pieces cut from different puzzles. I don’t want a life where he’s gone all day, and I’m stranded somewhere with his awful roommates. It'd be too depressing.”

Dena nodded. “Well, you did get a job interview. They called yesterday. I took a message.”

Piper perked up. “For what?”

“A t-shirt printing company.”

Piper brightened. “Oh yeah! I applied to that forever ago! I guess it's my luck turning around.”

“Hopefully you’ll have a job when the fall semester starts,” Dena said.

“I took a full schedule. Meeting with my counselor on Monday.” Piper said, feeling a little lighter in mood.

They pulled into the driveway.“Be extra quiet,” Dena whispered. “Smol has been crying at every little sound lately.” They tiptoed inside. Dena set her purse on the counter — the buckle made a clink — and immediately Smol shrieked from the next room like an air raid siren. “See?” Dena sighed. Piper retreated to her room, phone in hand, waiting for Hawk to call. He didn’t. That night he sent: wish you were here.

Piper stared at the screen. No apology. No acknowledgment. Just wishful thinking.

That’s when it clicked: Hawk wasn’t a knight in shining armor. He was just… a tired guy in a shared rental with a terrible roommate. He wasn’t a dream — he was a maintenance plan.

He had once looked better simply because he wasn’t Lindo. That was Piper’s mistake. She didn’t need rescuing anymore — just a plan.

She tossed her phone beside her. Studies first. Job next. Hawk could wait.

She mentally filed him under: “Things that weren't meant to be.”

And for the first time that week, she slept.