saturday mornings are for pancakes // a dream x reader fanfiction

CHAPTER 71: MAGGIE THATCHER

APRIL 11

ONE WEEK LATER

RECOMMEND LISTENING TO: 'MEANS SOMETHING' BY LIZZY MCALPINE

I walk with a coffee in hand. It's from my favorite coffee shop, but it tastes more bitter than it usually does. If I didn't spend so much on it, I would throw it away.

There's more street vendors than usual too. I glance at all the signs, but I don't stop at any of them. They line the streets, inching into my personal space in order to make me buy something random.

I pass someone in a lime green sweatshirt. The bright color draws my attention before I see the smile stamped on it.

For the past week I've had an uneasy feeling in me. I don't know if it's because Magnolia is slowly moving out of the office, or if it's that Ben is leaving for Washington State in a week. Everything around me is changing in a way I should've been prepared for.

Something inside of me wishes for the world to stop spinning in order for me to gather my thoughts, but this is New York. It's not stopping for anyone.

If only someone could tell me what I should do. Maybe I should go to a fortune teller. Not the one on the end of my street, but a real one. I need to know if my life is even going in the right direction because right now I barely know if I'm headed towards my actual apartment.

Strangers bump me around in the street, and I struggle to keep walking forward.

"Do you want Clay?" a vendor asks me.

I stumble out of the crowd next to their small tent. "What?"

"Clay." They hold out modeling clay for me.

"Oh." I shake my head. "No thank you."

I keep going with the crowd.

My apartment feels like a safe haven. Nothing has changed since I've last been here, and I find sanctuary in that.

I slip off my shoes and put on some of Sapnap's merch. I lay on my bed; my eyes search the ceiling for answers to questions that haven't been properly asked.

I know I need to do something, to keep my hands busy. I stand from my bed and walk back over to the kitchen.

Maybe if I just clean off the counter, I'll feel better.

I start with some mail and papers. I sort them into different piles for recycling or to be filed. Some of them need to be dropped off at the office, too. I stop when I come across an all-too familiar brochure.

My fingers brush the indents of the handwriting. "What are you thinking, Maggie?" I whisper.

I flip through the pamphlet like I have so many times. I read her little notes, subconsciously looking for an answer that won't be in there.

Why is it only Maggie's scribbles? I wonder. Where is my handwriting? Where's my bucket list?

I put the pamphlet down, trying to remember all those years, all those times Maggie talked of her dreams and aspirations to travel. Then, I try to think of where I wanted to go most?

I struggle to find it.

What was something that I scribbled about my plans in? What city did I push to go to first? How did I plan to decorate our apartment when we got there?

I come up with nothing.

I squint at one of the buildings of the skyline, realizing for the first time that somethings written along the side in thin marker.