I growled.Stupid cats fighting in the alley again!As I glared at the window, fighting the urge to throw a pillow at it, I caught a glimpse of my bedside clock: 8:23.
“What?” I tore the sheets from my body and scrambled out of bed. “Dammit!”
I must have forgotten to set my alarm as I lay awake for hours the night before, going over and over Max’s news in my head—his girlfriend wanted to meet me.
I guess it made sense … kind of? Through this baby, Max and I were going to be in each other’s lives for good, like it or not. Assuming he and Madison stayed together, we were bound to meet eventually. Like Max said, maybe it was best to just get all the weirdness out of the way now.
Still, I’d just barely started to wrap my head around the idea of co-parenting with Max, a near-stranger—now he wanted to add another stranger to the mix? A stranger who probably had all sorts of feelings about me, the woman who’d slept with her boyfriend. It all sounded very messy.
But there was no more time to dwell on the situation. My morning meeting started promptly at nine—I was going to be late if I didn’t hustle. I rushed into the kitchen and turned the kettle on for decaf tea with one hand while attempting to brush my teeth with the other, then dashed back to the bedroom.
Apparently, I’d also failed to do a load of laundry the night before. I dug through a questionably clean pile of clothes on the floor, trying to find something decent to wear. As I stepped into a black, one-piece jumper I’d worn just a few days before, I smelled a whiff of something foul—but it wasn’t my clothes.
I ran back into the kitchen to find my kettle hissing and burning. How the hell had I forgotten to put water in it? “Dammit!” As I pulled it off the burner, pain seared through my pinky finger. I cried out and ran to the sink to run it under cold water.Well, isn’t this just a fucking great morning.
In the bathroom, I sprayed dry shampoo in my light brown hair, ran my fingers through it a few times, then smoothed it back out to where it sat just above my shoulders. No time for makeup; I grabbed my coat and work bag, shoved my feet into some black ballet flats, and ran out the door.
Walking as fast as I could, I pulled my phone out and sent a quick text to my coworker Sam, letting him know I was running a little late but would be there for the nineAMmeeting.
As I turned the corner onto Twentieth Street, a tall, thin boy wearing a backpack barreled toward me on a skateboard. He was staring down at his phone, instead of looking where he was going. Just as I was about to move out of the way, he slammed into me, jarring my right shoulder. I stumbled and managed to catch myself as my phone went flying out of my hands.
“Ow!” I rubbed my sore shoulder, glaring at the boy. His beanie was low on his forehead and he wore reflective sunglasses, so I couldn’t see his face well, but he looked no more than sixteen or seventeen.
“Oh, dude—sorry, lady. My bad.”
I bent over to pick my phone up, but he grabbed my arm to stop me.
“No, let me get it for you. It was my fault.” He picked up the phone and placed it in my hands. A fresh crack ran across the screen. “Sorry again,” he said as he hopped back on his board and sped off down the street.
Could this morning get any worse?
A few minutes later, I walked through the glass doors of the office building where the Blackwell Agency lived on the fourth floor. As I approached the security turnstile, I reached into my coat pocket for my keys with my employee badge so I could swipe through—and felt nothing but fabric.
I stepped off to the side so others could go ahead of me and smiled at Eddie, the regular weekday guard. I stuck my hand in my other pocket. Nothing there either.What the hell?I always put my keys in the pocket of my coat after locking my front door.Maybe I put them in my bag today?I opened my crossbody work bag and felt around. Nope.
“Dammit,” I said for the umpteenth time that morning. I racked my brain—I locked my door on the way out, right? Hopefully I didn’t do something stupid like leave my keys hanging from the doorknob. Or had I dropped them somewhere along the way? Maybe when that bratty skateboarder plowedinto me?Jesus Christ, I’m a mess!I looked up at Eddie again. “I must have dropped them outside somewhere. Hold my bag?” Without waiting for him to reply, I shoved my bag into his arms and took off.
I ran back the way I’d come, desperately combing the gutters and sidewalks for any sign of my keys, but with no luck. I checked the time—8:57.Crap!I was going to be late. I jogged back toward the office.
Eddie took pity on me and swiped me through, telling me to come back to the desk and file a missing badge report later if they didn’t turn up. I was in my seat in the conference room by 9:03, out of breath and coated in a layer of sweat, the new blister on my right pinky pulsing with pain.
As I was leaving the conference room after the meeting, the agency’s young receptionist stopped me in the hall.
“Savannah—one of the security guards from downstairs just dropped these off for you.” She held out her hand.
“My keys! My badge! Oh, thank God.” I sighed with relief, thankful for whatever Good Samaritan had gone to the trouble to turn them in.
On my way out at the end of the workday, I stopped by the reception desk. “Hey, Eddie. Thanks for sending my keys up earlier.”
“You got lucky. Someone dropped them off. Said they found them on the ground outside.” On the badge was my name and thumbnail photo, as well as the address of the building where they should be turned in if ever found—and someone had actually done it.
Huh. I must have walked right past them earlier when I was looking.It made sense—I was so flustered I probably wasn’t seeing straight. “Let me guess—teenage boy with a skateboard?”
“No, it was a woman.”
“Oh. Well, thanks again. I’m just glad someone turned them in!”
“Have a good evening, Savannah.”
