A/N: So, hi. I'm mostly writing this for me, since it has to do with lobstering and fish markets and all of that good stuff. You don't need to know a thing about the business, though, I'll explain where necessary. Like I said, this is really just for me because I've had the idea for a really long time. And if people end up liking it, that's a bonus!
Please review, message, whatever...I can also be found on Tumblr: boozy-von-drunkaton.
You should really feel bad, you know. Maybe not devastated or anything, but still. You should feel bad when your dad throws open the front door of the shop, sighing so loud you can hear him over the chiming of the welcome bells, and tells you that his stern man quit on him. "Little bastard just didn't show up," he spits and you glance at the clock, glad that it's only eight-thirty and you still have a half hour before any customers come in. Maybe you can calm him down by then.
"Did he call or anything?" you ask, even though you already know the answer.
"Texted me, little shit."
You laugh out loud because you weren't expecting that. You see your fathers face soften a little at the sound and that makes you feel good for a second, until his eyebrows knit and the clouds are back, making his brown eyes even darker.
"What'd the text say?" You're genuinely curious because, for one thing, your dad doesn't do much with technology so you're honestly surprised that he knew how to open the message. You backtrack at that thought. "Wait, you did open it right?"
A blush covers your father's face, his tan skin turning crimson, as he shakes his head. "You know I don't know how to do that, mija," he says, and you laugh again, reaching your arm out over the counter, where he's leaning. He hands you the phone and you quickly open the text. You let out a sharp ha when you see the words on the screen:
thx 4 the opportunity, cant do it n e more tho, real tired.
gna work at the tire place. sry.
"This kid's a neanderthal," you say.
"Hard worker, though," your dad says. "Or was, I guess. What'd the text say?"
You hand him the phone back and lean your head over the counter so that you can still see the screen and interpret the message for him. He says something under his breath about kids these days and then nudges your shoulder with his fist. He's proud that you don't talk like that and, even though he's never seen your texts, he knows you well enough to know you wouldn't be caught dead typing like that. You want to tell him that you told him from the beginning Dave Karofsky was an idiot and that you're not surprised he ditched his duty. You went to school with the kid for twelve years, after all. But that wouldn't do any good right now so you do what you always do and try to restore your father's confidence. "You're probably the best lobsterman in town to work for, dad, people know that. You'll find someone pretty quick, I'm sure."
He nods slowly.
"If you would just come out with me, I wouldn't have to mess around with these dumbasses."
You shrug, knowing that he doesn't really mean it. You're strong for a girl, but not strong enough to throw those four-foot traps around like they're pillows. And you're not squeamish—seeing as you handle the lobsters, crabs, and everything else you sell at the store—but still grossed out enough to gag when he demands you put the bait iron through the eyes of the red fish. Just, no. Besides, if you were out lobstering with your dad everyday there would be no one to control the misfits that he employs at the store. You tell him as much and he concedes, but lets you know, just like always, that if you were a son, he'd have had you out on the ocean with him at age fourteen.
"Yeah, dad, I know you would have," you say. "But, unlucky for you, I care about my nails." You waggle your fingers in his face even though you haven't had a manicure in ages. "Lucky for you, though, I'm one hell of an entrepreneur."
"That you are, mija," he replies and you smile at the easiness of your back and forth and at the fact that he seems to have calmed down. You and your dad aren't great at discussing the big things—the nitty, gritty emotional things—but you do know him better than anyone else and lowering his easy-to-boil blood pressure has always been a strength of yours. "I'm gonna go get some coffee, settle down."
"Not sure that's the point of caffeine, dad, but alright," you reply and push yourself up off the counter at the same time he does, his right knee giving out for a split second before he regains his balance. He lets out a grunt of pain and you wince at the familiar noise before reaching under the counter. He smiles when he looks back at you and you've procured a bottle of Advil from the drawer under the register. "Here," you hold it out and he takes it, pushing them down into his pocket to take once he gets his coffee.
"Guess I might as well head to Eric's dock and see what they got for haddock today," your father runs a hand through his thick dark hair, "they just got off a seven day haul, should have something for us."
"See what's up with Rand, too," you say as you turn and head for the back cooler. "We need some mussels."
He winks and nods, making his way towards the door. You're halfway to the cooler when you hear a clank and the clatter of the bell, followed by a cry of pain. You turn around to see Puck holding a hand to his forehead, the other extended towards your dad who's still in the doorway. "Shit, boss, didn't see you coming out."
"Yeah, sorry about your head, you okay?" You hear a smile in your father's voice and you can tell he's amused by Puckerman's pain.
"Good, yeah," Puck says, dropping his hand from his head to pat your dad on the shoulder. Your dad glances back at you and shakes his head as he continues out the door to the parking lot. "And sorry I'm late, boss," Puck says.
You see your father wave a hand over his shoulder out the window, "Didn't know you were, Puckerman."
"Aw, shit," Puck says under his breath.
"You're an idiot," you say and he startles when he sees you standing behind the counter. "You know I make the schedule, he doesn't know anything about it."
"Yeah, yeah," he retorts, making his way around the counter and taking his apron off the hook. You watch the ripple of his biceps as he pulls it over his head and reaches around back to tie it, and you have to admit, he has nice muscles but you don't think you're admiring them in the same way most other girls, like Quinn or Rachel would. In fact, you know you're not, and you shake your head to clear that fact from your mind, still not content to just accept that you prefer boobs to biceps. "Staring, Lopez?"
"Fuck you, Puckerman," you say, just waiting for the stupid response you know he'll have.
"You've done that, babe," he raises his eyebrows at you. And, yeah, you walked yourself into that once.
"Nothing to brag about, babe," you answer and shove him in the shoulder as you move past him and back towards the cooler.
You see him turn to say something else but you hold your hand up before he can speak, "Don't push it, or I'll sue you for sexual harassment." His face falls at that and you feel accomplished for shutting him up, even though you know you'd never do anything of the sort. If he's gonna hit on you, you'll let him because, gay or not, a girl likes to know people think she's pretty. "Now come help me count the lobsters, we've got orders."
"Whatever you say," you hear him mutter as he follows you out back.
"And, Puck?" You turn around to face him at the door of the cooler.
He cocks his head to the side, "Santana?"
"Don't tell my father when you're late or you fuck up, alright?" Puck nods. "He's still mad we went out in high school and I'm sure he'll be glad to take any excuse to put your ass on the street." Your tone is playful but you're kind of serious. You know your dad thinks Puckerman is a good kid when all is said and done, but still, it most definitely was not in the plan for your dad to catch him with his hand up your shirt on your couch when the two of you were sophomores, either.
Puck smiles, "Aw, I'm flattered, you're concerned about my well-being, aren't you?"
"Not really," you say, even though you know it's a lie and that, at the end of the day, he's probably your best friend—Quinn's too wrapped up in her own problems to actually give a damn about yours, and Rachel's just a pain in the ass most of the time. "I just don't wanna be left alone with Dumb and Dumber." And, while you feel bad insulting Sam and Finn, they're not that bad, you're not about to have a sappy moment with Puckerman.
"Whatever, Lopez," he shrugs. "Let's sort some lobsters."
Your dad comes back a little later, after the morning rush has come and gone. He's backed his truck up behind the store, it's tailgate almost touching the building's back door. You saw him at the intersection before he turned in and sent Puck to help him unload so that you could finish helping the elderly woman at the counter decide between sand clams and mud clams. "There's really not a huge difference," you press, eager for her to just fucking decide already. Your smile doesn't falter, though, and the cheerful tone of your voice seems to convince the woman that either variety of clam will do for her seafood chowder.
"Why don't I just take a pound of each, then, dear?" she trains her eyes on you over the brim of her glasses and you nod, moving towards the sliding glass door of the clam cooler.
"I think that's probably a good choice, ma'am," you say and bag her clams.
Once you ring the old lady out and wash your hands you decide to see if Puck and your dad need any help unloading the fish from the truck. They seem to have it under control and to be busy having a conversation about exactly why neither Puck, Sam or Finn are fit to be stern men. Honestly, you'd thought about suggesting one of them to your father earlier, when he first came in upset about Karofsky, but you decided against it. Puck's still got a bum shoulder from getting hit the wrong way in a high school football game; Sam's probably the most valuable of the three boys in the store—the female customers love him and he's the best at math—and you'd hate to lose him to the boat, even if he might like it more; and, as it is, Finn can only work for your dad part time because he runs his own stepdad's garage during the week while Burt is at the state capitol.
You return to the front of the store, satisfied that they don't need you to unload the fish. You busy yourself with scrubbing the counters, display coolers and stoves until you hear the welcome bells chime and look up to see a blonde woman, maybe in her late-thirties or early-forties, walk through the door. "Hola," she says and you're not sure if you're offended or amused. Maybe both. You straighten up from where you were scrubbing the burners on the stove and smile at her.
"Hi."
Her features fall into an expression that could be guilt when she sees you and you think that she probably didn't know your store was run by a Hispanic man and his half-Hispanic daughter. After all, what other Maine seafood shop is?
"Can I help you?"
"Is there a manager or someone I could speak to, please?" she asks and you point to yourself.
"That'd be me," you say.
She looks at you, seemingly unsurprised, and moves closer to the counter. She's wearing a gray wool skirt and a navy-blue blouse and you think it's a peculiar choice given the ninety-degree day, but don't say anything. That wouldn't be good customer service, after all.
"In that case," she says and her voice is cheerful, "I'm here to apply for the open position."
You're momentarily confused because she doesn't look like the type of person that would want to spend seventy hours a week on a lobster boat, but then you remember the sign in the window and realize that she means she wants to be The Lobster Company's new accountant. Since your very pregnant aunt was put on bed rest for the remaining eight weeks of her trimester, you've been sans accountant at the shop and the finances are being neglected.
"Okay, well," —you've recovered— "let me find you an application."
She slaps both palms against her thighs and smiles, widely, back at you.
"It's more of a formality, than anything," you say as you dig around the shelf underneath the countertop for the pad of applications. "In all seriousness, all we like to do is sit down for an interview type thing and ask you a couple questions and then just do a background check." You find the applications and tear one off to hand to her. "You can fill it out now if you want and, if you have time, I'll go grab my dad from out back and the three of us can talk for a minute."
The woman is beaming at you now, like really smiling hard, and you're starting to think she might be a crazy person. "Holly Holliday," she says suddenly, extending her hand over the register and out to you. "Pleasure to meet you."
You can't help it, you snort out a laugh because, really? Her name is Holly fucking Holliday? "I'm so sorry," you say quickly, taking her hand in your own and tucking your bottom lip underneath your top one to suppress anymore outbursts. "I'm Santana Lopez, my dad, John Lopez, owns the store."
She doesn't look offended by your outburst and that makes you feel a little bit worse because it probably means she gets it all the time. "No worries, sweet cheeks, I realize my name is a little out there," she says, dragging out the last two words and, hold up, did she just call you sweet cheeks? You cock your head at her, trying to figure out why you don't mind that she's already given you a stupid nickname. It probably has something to do with her over-the-top personality, it's silly and almost motherly, the way she's already given you a nickname, and the whole motherly thing still really gets you a lot more than you wish it did.
"Anyway," you shift your gaze back to Holly's face and tell yourself not to be such a fucking space cadet. "Do you have time to fill that out now and then talk to us? It shouldn't be more than ten, maybe fifteen minutes."
"Heck yeah, I have time," she says, flashing you a thumbs up and reaching for a pen from the mug next to the cash register.
"Cool," you say and you start to wonder if people still say 'heck.' "We're in desperate need of an accountant so, it'll be nice to meet with you now and get the ball rolling."
"Well, then, sugar," she smiles that borderline-crazy-woman-smile again, "it's a good thing I'm here, huh?"
"Yeah, I guess it is."
You head outside to get your dad, figuring he and Puck are probably done unloading. "Hey dad," you call when you're in earshot and he turns away from where he's talking with Puckerman to answer you.
"What's up?"
"There's a lady here, she's applying for the accountant position," you say and gesture behind you to the shop. "Says she has time to talk now, if you want."
Your dad shrugs and says okay, leading you back into the front of the store.
"Puck, you wanna man the register while we talk to this lady?"
"Sure," Puck replies and your father turns around to eye you in question.
You roll your eyes because you've always sat in on these interviews and you're the one that's gonna have to work with Holly Holliday anyway. You raise your eyebrows back at your dad and gesture for him to continue walking. As you both turn the corner back inside and walk around the counter, Holly looks up. There's something you gauge as surprise when she looks at your father and you watch closely to see what his reaction to the woman is. You're both within an arm's length of her now and he extends his hand pleasantly, making sure to wipe it on his cut off shorts first. "John," he says. "Nice to meet you."
"Holly Holliday. Really nice to meet you, as well," Holly returns her smile widens. You look to your dad and see a rosy tint to his cheeks, he's blushing.
"Santana tells me you're interested in taking over as our accountant," he says and you notice an awkwardness to his voice that isn't usually there. In fact, it's never there. Your dad is one of the most confident people you know, always sure of himself.
Holly nods even more frantically than she had been just moments before while talking to you. "Yes, Mr. Lopez," she says and you realize that they're still touching hands. You cough and it seems to startle Holly, who immediately drops her hand, but looks sorry for having to do so.
Your father leaves his hand out a beat longer before clearing his throat and assuring her that he wants her to call him John. "I know, I know," he elaborates, "John Lopez." Holly stares back blankly, not understanding, and you feel the need to clarify what your father meant, knowing that he won't be able to without floundering.
"He means," you interrupt, "John's not a common Hispanic name."
Holly nods and your dad shoots you a grateful look, not used to having to explain the obvious oddity of his name and his presence in the Maine lobster industry in general. "With a name like Holly Holliday, I really have no room to judge."
He laughs.
"I think it's a fitting name," he says. "Seems to suit your personality."
"And how do you know that?" Holly asks, crossing her arms. "You don't know anything about me."
Your father smiles, "We could fix that."
You actually make a scoffing noise, completely disgusted. He's outright flirting with this woman and right in front of his daughter, no less. Your noise seems to have brought him back, though, because his face flushes an even deeper red than before and he tries to recover. "I mean, if you worked here, you know," he sputters, "we'd probably get to know each other a little better."
Holly's crazy smile is back and she places a gentle hand on your father's arm, leaning in closer than necessary when she says, "I think I know what you meant." You're completely aware of what Holly was implying and you're beyond ready to have this little conversation over with.
"You know, I think I'll let you two chat," you say and walk away, neither your father or Holly seeming to notice that you've exited the conversation. In fact, you're not sure they realized you even entered it in the first place.
"Not interviewing the new employee?" Puck asks once you've made your way back to the register. "I think that's a first."
"Well, I'm not about to play babysitter for those two," you say.
"Yeah, they're smitten, huh?"
You laugh a little at the thought of your dad being smitten with anyone and shrug. "Maybe, I don't think he's used being in close proximity to attractive women," you say and your ears flame because you've implied that you think Holly is attractive. It's not really how you meant it—even if she is pretty, for an adult woman—but it's what you heard. You check Puck's face to see if he heard the same implication, but, if he did, he doesn't make it obvious. Instead, he does what he always does and makes a joke about how your dad is probably only used to the 'occasional dykes' that go as stern-women for some lobster catchers in the area. You don't flinch at the word, it doesn't really offend you and besides, Puck doesn't actually know about you. You're pretty sure he doesn't even have an inkling, and you briefly consider why you haven't told him yet. You've told Quinn and Rachel. Or, rather, they got it out of you after you flirted a little too obviously with the hot new barista at your favorite coffee shop. It had scared you at first, you genuinely didn't know how they'd react—Maine's a blue state but sometimes you're not sure how—but, in the end, they'd acted almost as fazed as if you'd declared you preferred yellow to green.
"Earth to Lopez," Puck says and you come crashing out of your thoughts. "Did I offend you or something?"
Your ears burn red and you shake your head.
"No, you're just an idiot."
"Your words hurt," he says and places his fist dramatically over his heart. "They hurt."
"I think you'll be okay," you say and he smiles. Puck has a nice smile, you realize, and you feel a pang, wishing briefly that you could just want him instead of a girl. Maybe you'd be more inclined to act on your desire to find somebody, like Quinn and Rachel always tell you to, if you didn't feel like you'd have to hide the relationship from the rest of the world.
"Lopez, you're spacey today. "You mad that your padre might get a little love?"
"Oh stop," you say and punch him square in the shoulder. Your face contorts at the thought of your dad and—ugh, gross.
Puck rubs his other hand over the spot where you hit him.
"You're a bitch," he mutters.
You roll your eyes and head over to the stove to start a cook order, "And you're an ass."
It's like an hour and a lot of false starts later when Holly Holliday finally leaves the shop. "Well, she was a nice lady," you dad states and comes over to lean on the counter. You turn away from the boiling pot of water on the stove and give him a look that lets him know you know exactly what's going on.
"You like her," you state, because it's obvious, and turn back around to the stove.
"She seems like a nice lady," he can't meet your eyes. "She'll be a good fit for us, I think."
"Wanky," you say under your breath so only Puck, who's next to you washing mussels at the sink, can hear. He just laughs at you and then asks your dad when Holly starts.
"Tomorrow," your father states matter-of-factly and you whip back around to face him.
"Tomorrow?"
"Yes, mija, that's what I told her." He blinks at you.
"Are you gonna run a background check, you saw the crazy way that lady was smiling. Looked like she was about to go all Sigourney Weaver—circa Alien—on us."
"Santana," your dad says, defensively. "She's a nice lady."
"It's the 'nice' ones you gotta look out for," you say, making quotations with your fingers. You're only teasing and your dad realizes it, you see the way his eyes crinkle around the sides and know he's trying to hold back a grin. You really don't mind Holly, she'd made a good first impression and you can't help but think she might be just the type of person you need around the shop. For a few reasons.
"Then I guess we don't need to look out for you, huh?" Puck says and the expression on his face tells you he's torn between being pleased with himself for the good joke and being afraid that your father might knuckle up and split his jaw. The former wins out, though, when your dad chuckles wholeheartedly before disappearing to the back office.
"God, you're a pain in the ass," you say and turn back to your task, picking up the lobsters on the counter next to the stove up one by one and dropping them into the steaming pot. Sometimes you feel bad when you stop and think about just how many lobsters have met their ends by your hands since you were little. Even as a kid, you used to love throwing them into the pots and watching them squirm. You think it's because it made you feel powerful when so many other things in your life made you feel utterly powerless. Still, though, there really aren't that many justifiable excuses to taking pleasure in the pain of another living creature, even if lobsters are considered insects. "Sorry," you mutter to the next few lobsters you drop in, as if repenting for the hundreds—probably thousands—that came before them. You feel Puck smirk at you, ready to say something snide about your apology, so you shush him before he can get the words out.
He holds his hands up in defense, "I said nothing."
"But you were going to."
"Maybe," he relents.
"Thought so."
You swing a dish towel over your shoulder and place the lid down over the squirming lobsters, deciding to go talk to your father about Holly Holliday. If he's gonna hire her, he should at least come up with a better reason than "she's a nice lady."
You love the end of the day. You find something peaceful about being the last one in the shop, the natural light of the sun cascading through the large glass windows at the front of the store and casting an orange light on the tile floors. Your favorite playlist plays a little too loudly through the speaker system but you don't mind, you like dragging the mop along the floor to the rhythm of Amy Winehouse's bluesy voice, the pine tree scent of the cleaner eliminating the odor of steamed seafood that you have to smell all day. You sent Puck home a half hour ago because all that was really left to do was mop and lock up and you were excited about having a little sliver of time to yourself after serving customers and ignoring his verbal jabs all day.
Puck's a good friend, and, if it took sleeping with him a few times to figure that out, you guess you don't regret it. He's been there for you since you dated, even though you dumped him rather publicly, though you didn't intend that. You'd been pretty distant for a while, not really wanting to hang out or do anything, especially fuck, and you'd finally lost it one afternoon while he was waiting for football practice to start and you were heading to a captains' meeting with your cheering coach. "Why don't we blow this popsicle stand," he had said, gesturing from his chest pads to your cheerleading skirt, "and you can blow my popsicle and not stand." And that was it. You lost it, exploding on him in what few Spanish curses you know, drawing the attention of all the other athletes in the locker room hallway. You had told him to go to hell, to stop being such a pathetic loser, to keep it in his pants once in a while. While some of those things may have been true, you still feel bad about the way that all went down, you know that a lot of the problems leading up to the outburst had been your fault. The two of you were young, he had raging hormones and you were figuring out that you might actually be into girls, which wasn't an idea that sat well with you at the time—it still really isn't. You still slept together occasionally after that. Either when your own desire to feel 'normal' was too strong to ignore or when he handed you PBR after PBR at a party and, soon, you weren't caring too much about what hardware was attached to the hands down your pants or the lips attached to your neck, only about how close you were to getting off.
Okay, so yeah, you were insecure and you thought with your lady parts a whole lot more than you did with your brain when you were in high school. Fuck it, you still do. The only difference is that you've come far enough by now to accept that no amount of groping or stroking is gonna get you turned on by a man.
Maybe you should tell Puck, he probably deserves to know. You're nervous, though, because, face it, Puckerman has a big mouth. He means well and you know that, but he shares a lot of information with Sam and Finn—the three of them are always yapping about girls and sex—and this is a rather large piece of information that you'd rather Sam and Finn not know just yet. And more than that, you'd really prefer it if your dad didn't find out anytime soon, either. Lord knows that if the boys knew, at least one of the three of them would slip in front of your dad and it wouldn't be pretty. You're genuinely not sure how your father would react and that's most of the reason that you haven't told him yet. The other part of the reason is that telling your dad—who, since your mom died, is the most important person in the world to you, hands down and bar none—would make it real, like one thousand percent real, and that thought scares you more than you care to admit.
Sometimes you try to imagine what your father would say after you came out to him and you come up short, which is strange for you since you know him so well. You weren't raised religious like a lot of Latina people are, both because your parents had agreed not to force you into it and because the Northeast isn't the most highly religious area in the country, so there has never been an emphasis on it for you like there has been for your cousins down South. So, clearly, it isn't religion that scares you off from telling your dad every time you think you've collected enough courage to try. You know your father loves you unconditionally, you know that. But that doesn't mean he wouldn't be disappointed or angry or confused or all of those things if you came out to him. You feel like maybe, since, at age twenty, you've already experienced so much tragedy, your dad would just be sad that you aren't going to have exactly the life he'd planned and wanted for you. If you want to get married—and you're almost positive you do, someday—it's gonna be a struggle. If you want to have kids—which, you have absolutely zero idea about that, but still—there are a lot of extra steps. Hell, even if you want to hold your girlfriend's hand in public, people are gonna look at you funny. So, as you empty out the mop bucket and wash your hands, you think that yes, that's it: your dad would feel sad for you if you told him you were gay, and you think that sad is definitely worse than angry would be.
If there's one thing John Lopez doesn't need anymore of, it's sad.