Free The Good Girl's Guide to Getting Lost by Rachel Friedman

Carly revels in being the wise life guide. When the student is ready, the crazy Australian chick will appear, or however the expression goes.
    I had never considered not going home. Like dyeing my hair fire-engine red or getting a belly ring, this summer in Ireland was surely a small, contained act of rebellion, a momentary hiatus from what was expected of me. In musical terms, we might call these moments embellishments or ornamentations of the overall coherent, predictable melodic line that was my life before things began unraveling freshman year in music school. Could I really stay away? Even asking myself the question feels monumental.
    â€œI don’t have any money,” I tell her.
    She scoffs as if I have raised a concern totally unrelated to what she’s said, like lacking sunscreen in Seattle. “Get another student work visa. Where else can you go?”
    I think back to the informational pamphlet I received with my four-month visa. “Well, I can work in New Zealand for a year or Ireland, England, and Australia for four months—”
    â€œCome to Australia.” It’s a statement, not a question, as nonchalant a decision for her as deciding whether to wear her hair up or down that day. “It’s awesome. You can stay with me. Mum and Dad love visitors.”
    Australia. I roll the word around in my head, trying to conjure up an image of myself there.

    Less than halfway through the summer, Carly takes off to explore the rest of Europe and Asia, and I finally start getting enough shifts at the Hole in the Wall to quit degrading myself at the nightclub. Maybe it’s because I am the kind of person who is perpetually trapped inside the recesses of her own mind—always thinking too much—that I’ve always been drawn to working in restaurants and bars, where the tasks are routine and blissfully physical. Waiting tables has a clear beginning, middle, and end. Take the drink order, bring the drinks, take the meal order, bring the food, check in, get the extra pickles, another round of beers, dessert, then drop off the bill with a heartfelt thanks. Those customers depart and new ones shuffle in and you have to figure out how best to serve them. Do they want a funny waitress or one who is serious and knowledgeable or one who leaves them the hell alone? Most just want an unobtrusive, smiling one. I can smile or not. Knowing who they want you to be is straightforward. You just have to be observant.
    I’m more graceful as a waitress than I am in real life, deftly carrying three pitchers in one hand and two plates in the other or expertly twirling around a co-worker at just the right moment to avoid a collision. And I love the transient atmosphere, packed with creative types, everyone believing they are there temporarily, a fleeting stop on their way to something better. We banded together to weather unpredictable tipping, long hours, and customers who often treated us like complete morons, especially at the Harvard Square brewery, where I waited tables one summer. It’s a skill I feel guilty about because it is blue-collar, nonintellectual work. My grandfather did not flee the Nazis so that I could serve food. My mother didn’t climb out of poverty so that I could revel in my abilities to concoct the perfect apple martini.
    So although I know my parents wish I was doing something more productive with my Irish summer, I long to lose myself in the restaurant/bar world again. And the dimly lit Hole in the Wall seems like the perfect place to do it. The bar is directly infront of you when you walk in. Four or five stools, wood with worn fabric, are where the regulars park themselves. The old guy I saw when I applied for the job is a fixture. He comes in early and often stays until closing, growing more and more incoherent as the night wears on. He cackles, “I get up with the birds and I go home with the birds!” and workshops the same three stories on repeat, as if