Kelly woke up with a start. Ripper and No-Pants Lance decided to burst into the shit hole of a Staff House, loudly at that. Looking at her phone, the time read nine thirty-four. Way too early to start her second day off in her opinion. The previous day, both of her room mates were on some sort of wild goose chase for something that she happened to have over heard, turned out to be a total bust. Turning over on her back and staring at the ceiling with a groan and a frown. Throwing her pillow on her face, low key hoping that she would be able to suffocate herself to death in order to get away from the two others. Failing that, she decided to roll out of her bed and get to usual morning routine.
"Hey Kelly!" No-Pants Lance said chipperly. Walking by her in the hallway with Ripper.
"Drop dead." Kelly snarled back.
"Good to see you too." Ripper muttered
She entered the kitchen after a run to the bathroom, and yanked open one of the cupboards. It almost immediately swung partially off of its hinges, catching her off guard. Staring at the door, then the inside of the cupboard, eyes widened and heart fairly quickly slowing down from the sudden jump. Then frowned at the situation. It seemed like minor things like this were setting her off more and more lately, not being helped by Ripper and Lance's dumb comments and snide remarks. Giving a frown, she yanked off the cupboard's door and put it outside of the kitchen. The last thing she wanted to do was waste her time attempting to put something together that she had no idea how to do.
"Don't those two have anything better to do then make noise?" Kelly thought bitterly as she heard Lance's obnoxious laughter from the hallway. Probably over something stupid, as usual.
From the looks of things, the two were going to go out again that day and actually enjoy a day of surfing while they still had a day off. Neither one of the three knew when Naomi was able to, or even going to give them two days off like this again, so it was understandable that they wanted to get out to do anything in the sun. At least, not until Naomi got things under some sort of control and sorts out the worker situation first, Kelly assumed. It wasn't too long after she had breakfast, and got herself washed up and dressed for her own day out on the town when she noticed Naomi and what looked like a construction worker outside of the Staff House. The man looking it up and down in disgust.
"You're right. This is a hell hole." He said "How did Ridgemount not notice? Or even think to look?"
"Andrew Bummer." Naomi replied "I suspect he had a hand in somehow keeping things in the dark."
"That sounds like him."
Naomi gave a humph in agreement. Just as surprised as he was in how well Bummer kept this hidden, especially with the fact that his daughter was in there as well for a summer and didn't get seriously hurt while there. A simple firing wouldn't even be the half of it that would be coming his way.
"Don't know why you're going right to Ridgemount for this and letting that trash man get what's coming to him."
"I ask myself that quite a lot too. Ridgemount's well within his right to ruin his life over this."
The two eventually glanced over and saw Kelly staring at them from the balcony with interest.
"Hey Kelly, good to see your face out of work." Naomi said, more then likely trying to be friendly.
"Suuure. What's going on?" Kelly asked, leaning over the balcony's railing.
"I'm having a guy look over the Staff House for remodelling." She replied
"I'll need to take the morning to take a look over the place before we rip the place apart." The construction worker said "So there's no need to rush your morning."
"Don't worry, I'll take my time." Kelly said, re entering the house.
Mostly to get a few things for her time out on the town. Anywhere was better then this place in her opinion, to be honest. Beating herself up for staying there for years was a common thing to do to herself on a fairly regular basis, sometimes several times a day. Yes, there was saving money by not having to pay rent in an apartment or splitting it into several parts like the new Groms did with their house. Yet the short walk to work rather then a bus or car ride to the hotel was a plus. Not by much but it was there. What was stopping her from going into town after all these years of her working at the hotels' restaurant was something that seemed to elude her at this point. Throwing her bag over her shoulder after packing, Kelly made her way at a quick pace out of the Staff House, ignoring her room mates (for lack of a better term) dumb comments and conversation to get on with her day. Making a call to Kahuna to make sure she hadn't missed the earlyish morning bus ride into town, Kelly gave a small smile as she found that he was still there and wasn't going to go anywhere to the next ten to fifteen minutes. In his words plenty of time to not only get there but get a quick coffee, on him, before they go anywhere. A couple of small things to try and make up for the bad start to her bad morning. With Kahuna taking her order for her so she could avoid some unwanted small talk with the local barista that was newly instated at the recently made small coffee shop, she took a much-needed slurp of coffee, giving a sigh of contentment after she did so. Kahuna merely looking her way and giving her a nod before turning to his own drink of choice. He was someone who definitely knew when to talk and when to give strange, unwanted and somewhat complicated advice. Especially if it made no sense in the situation. Or at least, that was her interpretation of him when the two interacted with each other on the rare occasion. This year it seemed that he wanted to make more of an effort to be more friendly towards her, or at least not have some sort of bad relationship, despite the two not having any real reason to interact with each other. Other then the occasional bus ride into town that was. Kelly still had no idea why he wanted to make a better relationship now out of all times, but she couldn't complain. Especially with what she was going through at the moment. With Ty.
"If things are bad for me… then I wonder how things are going with Lo and her family…" Kelly thought, in a rare moment of empathy for her long-time rival. "Still can't believe he just left like that."
Stretching out and finishing off her coffee, she decided that she had some time to get a power nap. From then to the trip to town, there was definitely time to get some sleep from being rudely woken up from a pair of idiots that seem like they had full run of the staff house. As shitty as it was, it was a place to rest her head, for the moment. Then again there was absolutely nothing wrong with wanting better for herself and her mental state. It did make the temptation of moving into town and bumming rides with Kahuna and the Groms every morning that much more appealing for her. It didn't seem like such a bad idea at the end of the day to be honest. When she woke up next, she was in town. Looking around rather confusedly, if not disappointed that she made it there without too much of a hassle or being bugged by the small group of people that happened to be on the bus at the time she decided to grab her stuff and finally get off of the tacky thing and get on with her day. For better or for worse.
First things first, there was just meandering around the town and just wasting an hour or two of her morning just walking. Thanks to the job at the restaurant being head waitress, there was little time to dedicate to just meander and do nothing or just waste time and do whatever. To be honest, it would be quite nice; just turning off her brain and not think about work at all or the monotonous-ness of it, doing whatever comes to mind, even if it was just for one day. And for the morning, that seemed to be the thing to do to keep her mind off of everything. Until a little bit after twelve o clock in the afternoon, when she felt like hunger was demanding her attention like no one's business, wandering into one of the small, quaint cafes that was near the shore, some red wood chairs outside of it with dark metal tables in front of said chairs. It was a simple layout when she strolled in, mid to dark wooden floor with the occasional darker wood tables around the area. A long looking red cushioned bench lined the wall to her left where the three small dark wood tables with matching chairs surrounding them. Large paintings on the wall with some hanging lights were over said tables. To her left was a smaller version of the red bench and a low wooden table another larger one not too far from it and a taller table with matching tall chairs. Looking over the taller table, it seemed to have coffee beans under some glass as a sort of decoration. In front of her was the cashier and a glass, curved shelf with various kinds of squares, pies and sandwiches with a large cabinet that had milk, cream, sugar, a water cooler and various spoons and stirring sticks. Giving the sandwiches, Kelly's eyes went down to the paninis.
"Hmm, the ones with peppers and chicken looks good." She thought "But there's also the pizza panini. That sounds fun."
Mulling over the two choices and a quick question from the cashier if she needed a little more time and could take orders from a few other customers that were there Kelly managed to make up her mind. The grilled chicken and vegetable panini and pink lemonade. After she paid for her food, she got her drink first as she had to wait a few minutes for the grilling of her panini. Taking a quick sip of her drink, she looked up from where she was standing and nearly spat out her drink in surprise at two people she did not expect to pop up at this specific café at this particular time.
"Speak of the devil! Kelly!" Luke said, making an overly friendly gesture her way.
He was standing beside Stefan, who she was really surprised to see having some time off. Being a head chef of head chefs, she figured that he had little to no free time to have on his hands. Or a lot of breathing room to spend on himself to do anything fun. Stefan looked like he did not want to be talking to her at the moment, or at least bugging her when she was clearly going to have some lunch very soon. Not that he could blame him with the wanting to not be bugged during lunch, as it was very annoying, making her wonder how many times it had happened to him in the past. Once she got herself more composed, making sure that she wasn't going to choke on her drink when speaking, she stood up straight and looked Luke right in the eyes.
"What are you doing here?" She demanded
"Getting some lunch, much like you." Luke answered "If that's okay with you."
"I really don't care what you do. As long as we don't speak to each other."
"Oh wow, excuse me."
"Look we don't have to cause a scene here. People are giving us looks." Stefan stepped in, giving the small café a glance.
Luke and Kelly raised their eyebrows and looked around. Not like there was a lot of ground to cover for them to really cover themselves. There were a few people there, a pair of couples and a small family were currently residing in the café as well and with worrying the new looking parents, Kelly and Luke decided to shut their mouths for once and leave each other alone. For now, at least.
"Now if you'll excuse me, I have some food to eat." Kelly said taking her finally finished grilled panini and walking off to sit at the farthest table at the window. Sipping her lemonade again and checking to see if her panini had cooled off enough to eat.
She figured that she didn't fully think things through as a couple of seconds later, Luke meandered his way up to her and trying his best to be smooth, he asked. "Mind if we sit here?"
Kelly gave him an un amused frown at his question. She wasn't too interested to have people around her at the moment, but in Luke's defence, she would rather have him and Stefan over some random nosey stranger any day of the week. Despite being co workers and all.
"There are literally several other tables for you to sit at and you choose here?" Kelly asked
"Why not? You look like you could use a bit of company." Luke replied
"Don't you have anything better to do then to annoy me?"
"Can we just eat already?" Stefan asked not even trying to disguise the annoyance in his voice.
He was holding a plate of wraps in each of his hands, looking Luke up and down as he spoke. More then likely mentally judging him for bugging Kelly like he was.
"Whatever, just sit down." Kelly said in a rush.
Luke practically throwing himself onto the bench across from her while Stefan casually gave him his wrap before sitting down beside him. The waitress coming up beside the table with a pair of coffees for the two of them. Luke smiling and thanking her for the drinks while Stefan dug into his wrap with much gusto.
"Hungry much?" Kelly asked bemused
"When you missed breakfast and had a bad dinner the previous night, I'd say so." Stefan replied in between breaths and bites, smiling back at her. Wiping his mouth with a napkin, he took a sip of his coffee to wash down his food. "Ah. Quite nice."
"Indeed." Luke added
The three happily ate their lunch in silence, enjoying the food. Kelly glancing up Luke and Stefan's way fairly curiously. Wondering why Luke seemed so insistent to have Stefan sit with him and Kelly, especially on a day off. It just seemed, well, pretty odd to her in all honesty. Frowning and finishing the last of the sandwich, Kelly washed it town with some more lemonade, having only finished about half of it during their stay together at lunch time. Much to her surprise as she assumed that she had finished it much earlier, before finishing her food or even during her conversation with Luke and Stefan before she ate. But to be fair, that was before the fact that the panini had any chance of properly cooling down enough for her not to burn her mouth, but not enough to be too cold and soggy from the olive oil that the café seemed to have grilled the vegetables in. Or fried, she couldn't fully tell at the end of the day.
Once the three finished lunch, they all gave each other a look and got up at the same time. Bringing their plates, mugs and glass to the counter, the trio meandered outside without really saying much to each other when they were doing their thing, glancing at each other. It seemed like they wanted to say something, but for whatever reason couldn't spit it out and just say something. So Kelly decided to be the first to speak once they were out of the way of the café door and break the silence.
"Look, do you wanna hang out or something?" She asked
"Um, yeah?" Luke stated
She figured that he wanted to do that since the three ran into each other inside the café. Especially with Luke's attitude and openness when they met. Stefan merely shook his head at the two in amusement at the twos' attitude.
"You two, I swear." He stated. "The more the merrier Kelly, I just wanna do a little more exploring in the quaint small town before heading home. Even having dinner if we take that long doing any sort of exploring."
Luke and Kelly nodded in agreement, still not knowing why in the world Luke had cold feet after having lunch. Stefan giving a smile in some sort of small victory. Guiding the two in a direction that he seemed to have planned out for some time, more then likely while they were eating. With that, the afternoon seemed to have been filled with a few activities that were planned out by the new, self appointed guide for the next couple of hours of their day. A look around by a free, open garden that seemed to have just been built the month before and ever expanding according to the workers there, looking at a couple of sculptures that were next door as well as scattered around the gardens. Running in and out of a couple of shops that were a few minutes away from the garden and sculpture area. A gift shop here and there as well as a specialized store, small hardware store, clothing store and a random teashop that was pointed out by Stefan. Just in case they wanted to pick up some tea, if they were interested. While none of them were interested at the time, it was something that seemed to be good to have in the back of their minds for future reference. Which seemed to be good enough for Stefan in the long run. He didn't seem to care either way, buying or otherwise, Kelly and Luke weren't interested doing that in any of the shops that they were in. All three were just fine with walking around the shops, browsing and window shopping at the places that they went to during their exploration. Even though Stefan seemed quite interested in the teashop, he sensed that the other two wanted to move on, suggesting that they go to one last place before getting dinner and going home. Stefan offering to drive Kelly home with him and Luke, who took up that offer fairly quickly. Giving Kahuna a quick call to update him about the driving situation, he seemed to be chill with the situation and thanked her for updating him on what was up. Telling her that he may have had to drop her off later then she wanted to due to him showing some back to back movies that people had paid him to see that day and would clearly run into the evening, if not the night.
And with that, the three marched off to the last place that Stefan had planned out for the day. Glancing over at the two of them over his shoulder to see them talking candidly to each other behind them, and though he had felt left out, things seemed to be going out the way he wanted it to. Focusing forwards, he stood up straight and marched onwards with the other two following suite to his pace once they picked up on what he wanted them to do. Walking wise at least, wondering where in the world he was taking them in such a fast pace. At least faster than how they were walking around the shops beforehand. Luke giving a small huff and Kelly playfully telling him off for being impatient and wanting to know where in the world they were going. Luke rolling his eyes, pointing out the same with her and her curiosity.
After another couple of minutes of walking, Stefan halted in front of a large gallery, making the other two freeze in their tracks suddenly a few steps away from him. Both of them looking over the gallery with some interest.
"So, this is where you were leading us in a rush." Luke said
"Interesting." Kelly added "Is this the final place you wanted to show us?"
"Yes, and yes." Stated Stefan "It seemed to be a good place to end our day before we eat. Shall we?"
"Sure."
"Why not."
Stefan nodded and they entered the building with some curiosity. Apparently, there was a fire the previous year and the place had a hell of a time rebuilding the months afterwards with funding and all of that fun stuff that happened. Glancing around the entrance, they had figured out that Sundays were free days and they could come and go at their leisure. It was something new that they were trying out fairly recently as well, and it seemed to be working out very well too with the local people. At least those who were interested in doing something like that, people who were interested in photography or art, families with older kids, and people who had nothing better to do then go somewhere to try and kill time for an hour or so. From the looks of things around them, there weren't too many people around, making them wonder if there was an off day for the gallery or when they arrived it was more of a 'quiet hour' with less traffic. More or less they basically had the place to themselves to enjoy the place to the fullest. Or until they were bored, whatever came first for the trio. It was all up in the air for them, for the most part. If the size of the gallery was any indication, they had a feeling that they were going to be there for quite a while, so they were going to enjoy the place as much as possible. Stefan out of all three knew that he was going to enjoy the place, no matter how long he was there for and there was a good chance that he would have another day off to go to the gallery. The one place he wanted to see while he was here, was the photography place. Mostly because there was some new stuff from someone that he loved following, and that wasn't going to be put on his social media for the next couple of months. More then likely to drive people to go to this particular gallery and potentially buy his stuff on top of that, if they were interested in doing so. If they had the money to do so too on top of that as well.
Stefan stepped into the room to their left and let himself soak it all in. It seemed to be the newer paintings from the local people. Kelly and Luke looked around, wondering where to start looking before moving on to the next section and room. They seemed to be a little shy, in Stefan's opinion, but then again that was understandable. He could only do so much, and forcing them to do anything other then bringing to the gallery in the first place would be a little too much pressure on them and may end up making them not want to come again. And that was the last thing he wanted to do at the end of the day, wanting them to come again in the future, if they so desired.
After a couple of minutes, they decided to move on. Some photography. Stefan gave a small grin as he searched around for the photographer, he was there for in the first place and made his move to split off searching for him. Not taking too long for his admittedly small section of the room. He suspected that it was so that other photographers could have some sections to themselves and get some time in the spotlight as well. Giving a smile, pouring himself over what was there what felt like hours. Yet after all that time he spilt over the details, Stefan suddenly felt a chill come over him. Looking around to try and find who was giving him the feeling, he left where he was in search of what was going on. Until he ran into Kelly. Who was not just staring at a photo, but the little plaque blurb beside the photo which read Ty Ridgemount.
"It had to be that person out of all people." Stefan muttered.
Kelly nodded. Stefan knew some inklings about what happened with Ty Ridgemount from Lo and how Kelly dated him before he left. He frowned at the photo.
"Do you wanna get out of here?" Stefan asked
"No… no. I'm good." Kelly answered, shaking her head.
"Then let's move on, okay?" Said Stefan, leading Kelly by the arm. Who merely nodded in his general direction.
A little while later, the three found themselves a couple of blocks away from the gallery and mulling over what they wanted to eat. At the moment the group seemed to be leaning towards Italian, or at least some sort of pasta dinner. Kelly had a hankering for some ravioli and the other two went along with it, just wanting to get something to eat fairly soon.
It was when they three got down at a table and made their orders was when they started some random people watching. None of them knew how in the world it started, but once it did, they didn't want to stop until their meal came. Kelly being the first to start it all when she pointed out what looked like a spindly guy from far away but athletic-lean when he got closer. Their almost hushed voices when talking to each other, making some comments on how in the world someone like that existed. All knowing that it was pretty judgemental of them to be doing what they were doing, but they were there doing it anyways. The conversation eventually going from judgement to how varied people looked as they passed by their table. Not that it was a hard thing since their table was near the front, and they didn't seem to mind their position in the restaurant, as it helped their conversation quite a bit.
Once their meal came, they almost immediately dug in. And like lunch, there seemed to be no more conversation between the three, though they more or less kept on looking around the crowd as subtly as they could with all of the decent action that was happening in front of them. Kelly looking like she was mulling something over in her mind, as potentially a question.
"See anyone you like?" She suddenly asked
"Huh?" Asked Luke and Stefan simultaneously in confusion.
"Anyone you like? I mean from the crowd." She said
"Me? Nah, none of these people are my type. If that was the question." Luke answered
"That's fair." Kelly answered "Same here. No one's catching my eye. And you Stefan? Ladies?"
"Nope. Gay." Stefan stated
Kelly froze for a moment. Then swallowed her ravioli and turned completely red. "Oh… This is so embarrassing! I'm so sorry!"
"Ah, don't be. I didn't really make it clear when we first met and you didn't ask." Stefan said, waving it off. "To be fair, it's not something that one discloses when they first meet."
"Right, right…"
Luke looked down and gave a small chuckle, more likely from second hand embarrassment. He had suspicions, but this was pretty blatant in his opinion.
"Guy searching, are we?" Luke asked
"No, not really. Just looking." Said Kelly. "I'm at least allowed to look right?"
Both nodded in agreement.
"And besides, it's been too long since Ty." She continued "With what he had done. Leaving everyone who cared about him like he did, it wasn't right…"
With that, they became quiet. Luke and Stefan not wanting to ask the details of what happened behind the scenes with what happened. Kelly shook her head.
"Anyways, I really don't think now's the time to get into that. Or a rant. Let's just enjoy our food."
"I'll drink to that!" Luke declared
"Right!" Stefan added
With that the three downed some of the wine that they ordered and continued on with their dinner, their conversation being immediately put behind them.