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The soft swick of the broom over the linoleum was hypnotizing, drawing Fitz’ lids downward despite the ungodly amount of tar-like coffee he’d consumed. Forcing his chin up off his chest, Fitz stared hard through the giant plate glass windows and out into the nearly empty parking lot. The pearly gray of false dawn cast everything in an eerie light, turning the rigs that huddled in the corners of the lot into a hulking monsters that were ready to jump at the slightest provocation.
His overactive imagination got the better of him and Fitz shuddered before setting the broom aside. Grabbing the coffee pot, he topped off the mugs of the few truck drivers that were slumped along the counter before clearing the empty plates. Each of the men smiled at him, despite their own heavy eyes, and asked after his mother. Fitz did his best to return their greetings, but the fact of the matter was he was never as at ease with other people as his mum.
It never failed to amaze him when he thought about it, how she’d made a life for the two of them after his father had run off. Alone and far from home, she’d talked her way into a waitressing job at this diner and worked her way up from there. When the owners had wanted to retire, she’d bought the diner and the rest had been history.
Fitz just tried to stay out of the way and help where he could. Although in truth “help” might have been too strong a word. He had given Mary Fitz more than his fair share of gray hairs on her head, what with how often the school had called home about the things he and Hunter had been up to. Thankfully, she’d taken them in stride, willing to overlook a bit of delinquency so long as his grades were good.
A glance at the clock showed him that it was nearly time for him to head home so he could shower before school, and given the smells that clung to one after hanging around a 24-hour diner, a shower was most definitely in order. Tidying the last few things behind the counter, Fitz gave a quick nod to the head waitress before ducking back through the kitchen, stripping off the heavy canvas apron as he did so.
“Hey, Fitz!”
The greeting from Ray, the overnight line cook, caused Fitz to jump with a start, although he recovered quickly enough.
“Mornin’, Ray. ‘M jus’ heading out.”
“All righ’. You gonna be okay getting home? You look ready to keel over.”
Fitz did his best to grin. Pushing 50, Ray had taken a more paternal interest in him than the other cooks, despite Fitz’ best efforts to dissuade anything of the sort.
“Yeah, I’ll be all righ’,” Fitz reassured him as he shrugged into his hoodie. “I had some coffee, an’ I’ll grab some more a’ home.”
“That’s no good for a kid,” Ray admonished even as he turned back to his griddle. “It’s a school day. You need sleep on a school day.”
“I know, I know,” Fitz called, already out the door. “But y’ know wha’ they say! No res’ for th’ wicked!”
Fitz threw himself behind the wheel of his beat up old DeVille, turning the engine over and peeling out of the employee section of the lot without a second thought. He was running late for school, and if he started racking tardies up already, his mum would have his hide.
That was the biggest reason she gave for not allowing him to work morning shift during the school year, but with her feeling under the weather, she hadn’t been in a position to argue when Fitz had insisted on covering her morning shifts. Sure, she’d put up the token argument about him needing sleep with the school year starting, but he’d been able to talk her down easily enough.
What Fitz hadn’t told her was that he wasn’t sleeping much anyway.
It wasn’t even the fact that he’d shot his sleep schedule all to hell that summer by being up until all hours playing video games with Mack and Hunter. No, it was the fact that she had suddenly sprung back into his life.
Everyday for the past two weeks, he’d been required to work with Jemma bloody Simmons for 50 minutes a day. 50 minutes, five days a week of watching her bend over her lab notebook, skim their textbook, and generally look far better than anyone should in a uniform. And despite the fact that he very much wanted to hate her, he couldn’t. She was just too nice to manage that.
So instead he lingered at the fringes, trying not to say anything too stupid or too friendly or too anything that might offend her or her father and land him in trouble.
But what was most troubling was the way he couldn’t seem to shake the natural high that came from being around Jemma for any length of time. It made him feel as though he’d grabbed a livewire, and kept him thrumming through the day and late into the night.
Fitz sighed as he pulled into his driveway, killed the engine, and leaned his head against the steering wheel. He couldn’t keep going like this. Eventually running on three hours a night would get the better of him. He’d end up crashing his car or worse, and then where would that leave him?
Still in a better place than Jemma Simmons ever realizing you’re pining for her.
Fitz jerked the car door open and climbed out of the vehicle. He needed to get himself together, or he’d never make it through senior year.