Where the Stars Still Shine(28)

Chapter 10


Eight o’clock arrives much too quickly. I jolt upright when my alarm goes off and squint at the numbers, convinced they must be wrong. But it is official—the four hours of sleep I’ve had are all I’m going to get. My insides vibrate with tiredness as I drag myself out of bed, gather my bathroom supplies, and go into the house.

Greg, Phoebe, and the boys have gone to the early service at the Greek Orthodox church, so the house is empty. On the drive to Tarpon Springs from the airport, Greg told me I was welcome to attend church with them, but I have no interest in God. Especially when it seems he’s never really had any interest in me.

When I’m washed, dried, dressed, and caffeinated, I walk down to the shop. As I pass Alex’s boat, I wonder if he fell asleep thinking of me the way I thought of him. But mostly I wonder if he’s lucky enough to still be sleeping. The shop is already open when I get there and Theo is counting money into the cash register.

He looks up and smiles. “Hey, Callie, I’m Theo. Pick out a shirt.” He gestures at a tiered wooden display filled with T-shirts in a variety of colors and styles. All of them have Tarpon Sponge Supply Co. printed on them. “The first one is on me. If you want more, which you probably will, you’ll get the 50 percent employee discount. Same goes with jewelry. It’s always good if you wear stuff from here, because if the customers see how good it looks on you, they’ll want to buy it.”

“Okay.”

I choose a bright-turquoise T-shirt with a red scuba diver swimming across the front.

“Changing room’s behind that curtain.” He closes the cash drawer. “And when you’re done, I’ll show you around.”

It takes only about an hour to learn all the ins and outs of the shop. We sell T-shirts and sponges, along with hemp and leather jewelry, hippie-style dresses, sunglasses, and handmade goat-milk soaps. My job is to help customers find whatever they need and to ring them up after they’ve found it. I also sell tickets for the sponge-diving tour boat docked beside the building. Simple stuff. Theo tells me that if I do a good job, he’ll let me open and close the shop and make the bank deposits. Those sound like extra responsibilities rather than rewards, but I don’t point that out.

“Do you know anything about web design?” he asks.

“No.”

He drops a book about designing websites on the counter beside me. “I’ll pay you extra if you can figure out how to get our website up and running.”

I have no idea how I’m going to accomplish this, but extra money is extra money. “Okay.”

“When Kat gets here, I want the two of you to go out on the eleven o’clock boat,” he says. “I don’t expect you to be an expert on sponges and sponge diving, but it doesn’t hurt to have a working knowledge for when customers ask questions.”

A couple enter the store with their preteen daughter in tow.

“Hey, folks,” Theo greets, stepping out from behind the counter. “How are you today?” He’s so at ease with strangers. I hope he doesn’t expect me to be able to do that.

From my post at the cash register, I watch the mother wander slowly along the baskets of sponges, pausing occasionally to pick one up and squeeze it. The daughter makes a beeline to the T-shirts and unfolds six different styles before deciding she doesn’t want any of them. Leaving the shirts in a jumbled pile, she heads for the spinning rack of jewelry. Her hand freezes on the display and her mouth drops open, her eyes pointed at the open doorway.

I turn my head to see what she sees.

Alex stands in the opening looking as if he’s just stepped off the boat from Greece. He wears an ethnic-looking tunic-style shirt with an intricate flower design embroidered along the neck and a pair of loose-fitting white pants, and his curls are perfectly messy. On anyone else this look would be trying too hard, a silly costume, but on him—I have to check my own mouth to make sure it’s closed. He casts his beautiful smile at the girl, who goes as pink as her tank top.

“Here’s our diver now.” Theo drops an arm around Alex’s shoulders before he has a chance to smile at me. If he was going to smile at me at all. “Alexandros is second-generation Greek and has been sponging since he was twelve. He’ll be on the eleven o’clock tour boat. If you haven’t gotten your tickets yet, Callista”—Theo says my name with an accent that makes me seem more exotic than I am—“still has a few available.”

The couple debate quietly for a minute and then come up to the register to buy the tickets, while their daughter steals glances at Alex in the mirror as she pretends to try on necklaces. Judging by her expression, I think we’re both disappointed when he walks out.

After the tourists are gone, Theo says he needs to run an errand.

“I won’t be long,” he says. “Think you can handle it?”

“I’ll be fine.”

“If you get robbed—”

“Really? What are the odds?”

He laughs. “Good point. Be back soon.”

I’m folding the mess the girl left behind on the T-shirt display when Alex returns. He comes up beside me. “Hey,” he says. “When will your grounding be over?”

“Next weekend, I think.”

“I was thinking—”