Where We Belong

Love Action

Harper groans as the radio blares from the hotel alarm clock. She reaches to turn it off and then rolls over putting a pillow over her face. She really does not want to get out of bed. She finally got back to the hotel at half past midnight and she is so exhausted that she goes straight to sleep. Less groggy now, she thinks back to last night and of Declan and the bar. She likes that she found a place to hang out.

When living in New York, whenever she wanted to relax and have a drink, she and Skylar had a place that they would frequent. They are friends with the owner, know all of the bartenders by name, and have even made friends with many of the familiar faces they saw regularly. It will be nice to have a place like that here in Seattle and Declan seemed genuinely nice enough. The owner though, Harper is still unsure about. If she were to guess based on last night's encounter, the woman is a real piece of work. But Harper did fall into the woman probably causing her to get hurt in the process, so maybe the cold reaction is warranted. Not one to really judge someone based on a first impression anyway, let alone the brief one that they had, she thinks that she will go back to Gillian's tonight to properly introduce herself.

She stretches and gets out of bed. Her body is sore and her muscles feel tight even though her feet are feeling much better. She wonders how long she will be able to stand on them today before they start to hurt again. She is dreading the day already but heads to the bathroom to shower and get ready for work.

She is able to find a parking spot on the second floor this time and even though it is a small win, she takes it as a good omen for the rest of the day. She makes it to the arena a bit early so she finds a place to sit and pulls out her phone. She sees a text message from Skylar telling her that she misses her and reminding Harper that she really needs to call her soon so they can catch up. She quickly sends a message back telling Skylar about the long day that she worked yesterday purposely omitting the part about Gillian's and Declan. The last thing that she needs is for Skylar to blow up her phone asking for details of her night out. She tells her friend that she will call her on Saturday because she will not have to work and they can talk for longer. Skylar replies with a good time to call her along with a kissing emoji. Harper sends one back and puts her phone back in her pocket.

Minutes later, she receives her work assignment and she finds that she is assigned to the same duties as yesterday but in a different part of the arena. She sees that they are handing out hand towels and walks over to see why. She grabs one and decides to ask an older woman that is at the bin next to her. "Hi, I was wondering if you might know, will we need these for something?"

It is evident that the woman is a veteran to this job when she answers. "Oh Sweetheart, grab more than one! And do it quickly while you still can because they go fast. We stack them up and stand on them. It makes these darn floors more bearable. It isn't an anti-fatigue mat by any means but it does okay."

"Oh, great. Thanks." Harper says to the woman and reaches in to grab four more towels. After the night she had last night, she is not going to take any chances.

She makes it to her post and soon realizes that the towels really do make a world of difference. It is still painful standing for so long but it is definitely much easier than it had been the day before. She is even able to enjoy the competition today. She enjoys it so much in fact, that by the end of the day, she has a specific team that she is rooting for to win. They are just beginning the last match of the night when Harper pulls out her phone to check the time. It is only 8pm which means that they could possibly get out of there earlier than she is expecting to. The two teams that are playing now will be competing for a spot in the semi-finals and Harper suspects that even if this match takes longer than the others had, they would be finished before 10pm and that guarantees that she will make it over to the bar before the kitchen is shut down for the night.