"Oh my god," Haseul whined. 

"Haseul, dude, Haseul, it's gonna be alright. It's gonna be alright! You've had jobs before, right?" Yeojin asked.

"Y-Yes..." 

"And you've done waitressing, right?" 

"Yeah..." 

"And Allison is the nicest old white lady you'd ever meet?" 

"She is..." 

"She is! Come on, I know everyone that works there and they are all so nice. I've been going there since I was a baby. And even if you make mistakes, it's okay! It's your first day!" 

"I know," Haseul answered. Well, yeah, she knew that, but she also didn't know that. Like, her brain refused to process the fact that it was okay to make mistakes, especially on the first day. 

It was 9:20 am and time for her to go to her first day at Allison's 24 Hour Diner. Was everything Yeojin saying true? Yes. Haseul has worked at very similar jobs before with much less nice people. But still, she was incredibly nervous. Anxiety sat like a weight in the pit of her stomach, her hands shook and she couldn't concentrate all that well. 

"Come on, Haseul. You've got this! It's gonna be great. You can have a job, I can get a discount when we get dinner from there....anyways. Yeah. You got this." 

Haseul managed a small smile as Yeojin patted her arm. "Y-yeah. You're right. Now...I think I'm gonna head out." 

"It's 9:25! Aren't you supposed to be in at 10?" 

"Yeah?" 

"Don't you wanna chill out for a few more minutes?" 

Haseul was absolutely not capable of chilling out for a few more minutes. "I don't want to be late though..." 

"Fine! But don't blame me when you're twenty minutes early." 

Haesul sighed and gave Yeojin a hug, darting out of the house. 

After coming back to her grandmother's yesterday and discussing everything with Yeojin, she realized that not only was Allison's 24 Hour Diner a local mainstay, just like Our Beach, it was also a ten minute walk from her grandmother's house. It would be a waste of gas money, parking space, and driving energy to take the car over. 

And of course, Yeojin had been right. She ended up getting there a full twenty minutes before her shift started. She sighed, pulling out her phone and sitting on someone's doorstep a few houses away. Even soft music through earbuds and scrolling through instagram couldn't calm her nerves. 

At 9:52 am Haseul decided that it was a good thing to be early, it showed initiative and responsibility, so she tied the red apron over her black t-shirt and mom jeans and walked inside. 

It altogether looked pretty similar to when she had come in yesterday, with a few groups of customers, the girls apparently named Heejin and Hyunjin walking around the floor, and nobody at the counter. She stood there, with no idea what to do. Well, all she could do was walk up to the counter and see if she could talk to Allison. 

After a few beats Heejin came back around the counter, just like yesterday, and leaned forward. "Welcome back," she spoke lowly. 

"H-Hi...um...I-I'm here for training, a-and..." 

"Ooh. Alright. Allison!" The high schooler yelled to the back. 

"Coming, coming," Haseul heard her voice say distantly, until she reached the front, wearing a similarly hippie-dippie outfit like yesterday's. "Oh Haseul! Hello. You're a bit early, but that's great. Come along now, dearie, let me show you a few things." 

Heejin slipped back into the main portion of the restaurant as Haseul followed Allison again into the back, stopping first at a strange little machine beside a plastic container full of long strips of paper. "Here's how you clock in. Just write your name on one of these papers, then slip it all the way in when you're ready. It'll put the time down, and do the same when you clock out." Haseul followed her instructions and with a little click, the paper said 9:57 am on it. It felt so old fashioned; Haseul had always clocked in through the computer before. 

"Now that you have that down, follow me." Haseul followed Allison to the main sinks, where Heejin was standing and doing some dishes. Allison led Haseul past her and to a bucket with a bunch of towels in it. Allison grabbed one and wrung it out, handing it off to Haseul. "Now, I'm a bit busy. So for the moment, could you just wipe everything down? Make sure all the tables and chairs are clean. I'll come get you when I can teach you the next task." 

Haseul breathed a sigh of relief. If she could do anything, she could do that. "Will do." 

"Thank you dearie." Allison patted her arm and made her way back to the kitchen as Haseul went back into the main part of the restaurant, passing by Hyunjin, who was taking orders at the counter. 

And so, Haseul began. She did the best cleaning job she had ever done in her entire life: wiping down all the tables to pure cleanness, all the chairs as well, the seats and the backs, and around and underneath the table condiments (salt, pepper, and ketchup). She stretched out the process as long as she could. 

But...soon enough, she was done. Every table and chair that wasn't occupied had been thoroughly cleaned. Heejin had returned from the back and her and Hyunjin were chatting by the food pick-up station. They were both giggling and smiling. And suddenly, Haseul felt both of their eyes on her, looking her over. But just as quickly the two girls shared a whisper and another giggle, Heejin's arm gently and a little too affectionately resting on Hyunjin's waist. 

. Haseul was one hundred percent sure the two girls were making fun of her, laughing at her behind her back. Haseul quickly looked down to the floor. They had worked together here forever, what else could Haseul have expected? This wasn't at all out of the ordinary, of course.

Allison hadn't given her another assignment yet and while Haseul had planned to ask one of the girls what to do, she absolutely did not want to do that now. So, she decided to do a deep cleaning, again: back to the back of the restaurant, wiping down chairs and tables and literally anything she could get at to clean. 

And...she was done. Again. Too quickly. Again. And Allison was nowhere in sight to give her more to do. 

So Haseul had to face the music: she had to go talk to the scary girls who probably already hated her. Hyunjin was talking to a customer but Heejin was behind the counter, in between taking orders, sipping on a drink. 

"H-Hi...." Haseul quickly spoke as she approached the counter. 

"Huh?" Heejin answered. 

"U-um...s-so Allison told me just to wipe down tables until she came out front, but I already did that twice and she's still gone, so...i-is there anything else I can do?" 

Heejin thought for a minute and sighed. "Look. Allison told us we were getting someone new today but she didn't tell us what to do about it. You know, sometimes she likes to take the training process slow. I dunno how she'd feel about us giving you more tasks. So...I dunno. Just wipe down the tables again, I guess." 

"O-okay..." 

Heejin chuckled. "She's just like that." 

"Alright." Haseul looked down and stepped away from the counter, going to do the deep cleaning process a third time. 

Now, she was terrified, her heart was beating in her chest. God, Heejin and Hyunjin were so intimidating. Were they cold? Or was it just Haseul? Knowing herself, it could have gone either way. 

She sighed, keeping on cleaning. Haseul should have known it would turn out like this with her coworkers. 

Haseul was about three quarters of the way through her third round of cleaning when a voice made her turn around. 

"Hey, sweetheart." It wasn't the gentle, soothing voice of Allison, no, it was the voice of an older man. A strike of fear ran down Haseul's spine, but ever the terrified food service worker, Haseul turned around with a smile on her face. 

"H-Hi," she stuttered at the middle aged man, leaning back against the wall in his booth, alone, with his legs spread. Haseul tried not to look horrified. 

"What's a girl as y as yourself doing working here?" 

Haseul immediately blushed a bright red. She felt sick to her stomach. 

"U-um-" 

"What's your name? How old are you?" 

Haseul noticed the gold wedding band on the man's ring finger. She was frozen. She didn't know what to do. 

"Haseul...I'm sixteen..." 

"Sixteen? The perfect age." The man let out a whistful sigh and Haseul's blood ran cold. "Anyways, don't mind me, Haseul. Go back to your cleaning. I like the view." 

Now she felt truly sick but , , she didn't know what to do. She really, really didn't want to turn around but she also wanted to still be a good employee, it was her first day after all. But before she could do anything, Hyunjin approached the table, a plate of food in hand. 

"Here you go sir- oh!" 

And before Haseul could do anything, Hyunjin kneed the man in the crotch. Hard. 

The man gasped and grabbed his pants, doubling over as Hyunjin wore the most falsely sympathetic look Haseul had ever seen in her life. 

"Oh, I am so, so sorry." Hyunjin's words sounded so fake Haseul almost wanted to laugh. And with a smile glance Hyunjin gave Haseul, she was sure Hyunjin did all of this on purpose.

"You just kneed me in the ing balls!" The man shouted. 

"But sir, it was an accident," she whined with a fake little pout. Haseul heard Heejin snort from across the store and Haseul had to work really hard to hide her grin. 

" this," the man growled, throwing his napkin on the plate, storming out of the restaurant with his food untouched. Luckily, none of the other customers seemed to notice, and Haseul just stood there with wide eyes. 

"I'll go get Allison," Hyunjin mumbled, running to the back. 

Haseul tried to focus on wiping down a specific part of a specific table, letting her mind process until Allison and Hyunjin came back a few minutes later. Immediately, Allison began to rub her back. 

"Haseul, I am so, so sorry that happened to you, on your first day too. Hyunjin and Heejin described this man to me and we will make sure he never enters our restaurant again." 

"I-it's alright..." 

"It's not alright, Haseul. This won't happen again though. Now, how about you take your first break, alright? Fifteen minutes. I'll go make you some food too. Now, go take a seat at any of the empty tables, and I'll be back." 

Allison rushed to the kitchen and hesitantly, Haseul sat down at an empty two seater towards the back of the restaurant. Haseul noticed that after checking to see nobody needed anything, Heejin and Hyunjin made their way towards her. 

Heejin sat on top of the table Haseul was at and Hyunjin leaned against the table across. Haseul froze, slowly locking her phone and putting it back in her back. 

"Dude, I'm sorry about that guy. That really , and on your first day and everything..." Heejin spoke. 

"Yeah. I promise we don't get guys like that too often. I mean, it happens occasionally, like at every workplace..." Hyunjin added. 

Haseul looked between both of them in surprise. She thought they didn't like her. Why were they over here? 

"Anyways," Heejin continued, flashing her beautiful grin. "We are, like, so excited to have you here! We never get new people, you know? The last summer waitress just graduated and started prepping for college..." 

"And you seem like a good employee. Which is good. Sometimes Allison just gets people, and then they're just on their phone the whole time and never do ing anything but Allison is too nice to fire them and we just have to suffer with them for the whole summer. So, yeah." 

"Welcome aboard the team," Heejin finished, holding out her. Slowly Haseul smiled and shook it. These girls weren't cold at all, in fact, they were totally sweet. 

"This place is actually pretty great. Our other friends have told us about their jobs and they sound so ty," Hyunjin added. 

"So you guys grew up here?" 

"Yup, born and raised in Egret Cove. How about you? It's really weird seeing a fresh face," Heejin said. 

"Oh, I'm staying with my grandma and cousin for the summer. I live in Morrisville." 

"Ooh," both girls said simoultaneously. 

"Makes sense. Everyone knows everyone here," Heejin answered. Hyunjin got up from her spot on the opposite table, making her way over to Heejin. She wrapped her arm around her waist and snuggled in to her shoulder, leaving a small kiss on her neck. Heejin giggled and Haseul just stared at them in surprise. 

"Oh, and I hope you don't mind lesbians. Because we are super lesbian. Together," Heejin said, a little awkwardly but there was still that veneer of cool on her, of both of them. 

"O-Oh, no way, no way. I don't mind. Because, well, um, I happen to be lesbian myself." 

"Ugh! I knew you were cool," Hyunjin cried. 

"Absolutely iconic," Heejin added, just as Allison came back and put a beautiful plate of pancakes and eggs in front of her. 

"Here's your food...let me know if you're ever hungry and I'll cook you something up, as long as it's slow, of course. I'm sure you know not to overuse the free meals, alright?" 

"This looks incredible...and will do, Allison," Haseul answered, smiling up at her boss. 

"Alright girls, have fun. And don't forget about the customers!" Allison affectionately spoke before heading to the book. 

Haseul smiled, from Allison to her amazing looking food to her new coworkers. This was going to be great.