Free What Happens to Goodbye by Sarah Dessen

to come out here and start asking a bunch of questions. He’s already out to get me as it is.”
    I waited a beat, for her to realize what she’d just said. One. Two. Then—
    “Oh, God.” Her face reddened. “I didn’t mean that how it sounded. I just—”
    “It’s okay,” I told her, walking over and picking up one of the smaller cartons. “Your boxes of secrets are safe with me.”
    “I wish they were boxes of secrets,” she said with a sigh. “That would be infinitely less humiliating.”
    “Then what are they?”
    She took a breath, then said, “Plastic buildings, trees, and infrastructure.”
    I looked down at the box. MODEL COMMUNITY VENTURES, read the return address.
    “It’s a long story,” Opal continued, hoisting a box onto her hip. I followed her into the side dining room. “But the condensed version is that I sold my soul to the head of the town council.”
    “Really.”
    “I’m not proud.” She went down a small hallway, past the bathrooms, then bumped open a doorway with her hip, revealing a narrow set of stairs. As we started up them, she said, “They were about to shut down the parking lot beside us, which would have been totally devastating, business-wise. I knew they were looking for someone to take on the project of assembling this model of the town for the centennial this summer, and that nobody wanted to do it. So I volunteered. On one condition.”
    “Parking?”
    “You got it.”
    We reached the top of the stairs, entering a long room lined with tall, smudged glass windows. There were a few tables stacked along one wall, some empty garbage cans, and, inexplicably, two lawn chairs right in the middle, an upended milk crate between them. On it was a pack of cigarettes, an empty beer bottle, and a fire extinguisher.
    “Wow,” I said, setting down my box. “What is this place?”
    “Mostly storage now,” she replied. “But as you can tell, the staff have been known to use it on occasion.”
    “To set fires?”
    “Ideally, no.” She walked over, picking up the fire extinguisher and examining it. “God! I have been looking everywhere for this. The kitchen guys are such kleptos, I swear.”
    I walked over to one of the big windows, peering out. There was a narrow balcony, made of wrought iron, over which I had a perfect view of the street below. “This is nice,” I said. “Too bad you can’t seat people up here.”
    “We used to,” she said, picking up the beer bottle and tossing it in a nearby trash can, followed by the cigarettes. “Way back in the day.”
    “Really,” I said. “How long have you been here?”
    “I started in high school. It was my first real job.” She picked up the milk crate, moving it to the opposite wall, then folded the chairs, one by one. “Eventually, I left for college, but even then I came back and waited tables in the summers. Once I graduated, I planned to get a full-time job with my double degree in dance and art history, but it didn’t exactly work out.” She looked at me, then rolled her eyes. “I know, I know. Who would have guessed it, right?”
    I smiled, looking back out the window again. “At least you did what you liked.”
    “That has always been my defense, even when I was flat broke,” she said, wiping off the milk crate with one hand. “Anyway, I was back here and unemployed when the Melmans decided they needed someone else to take over the day-today for them. So I agreed, but only on a temporary basis. And somehow, I’m still here.”
    “It’s a hard business to get out of. Sometimes impossible,” I replied. She looked at me. “That’s what my dad says, anyway.”
    For a moment, she was quiet, instead just taking the folded chairs and stacking them against the wall. “You know,” she said finally, “I understand he’s just here to do a job, and that we needed to make some changes. I’m sure he’s a good guy. But it just feels . . . like we’re being invaded. Occupied.”
    “You say it like this