Free Diary of a Resurrection (A Novella) by Amanda Day

Your Voice….
     
    The first time I heard your voice I
felt my skin flush. It made my cheeks rise and redden. It even made me start to
sweat. It was ridiculous; I didn’t even know you. I’d never seen you. My body reacted
of its own accord, without any sort of useful supporting information. It was
weird and confusing, and nice.
    I was at work, taking the calls to Pizza Planet. Writing
down the orders whilst daydreaming about something else was practically my
speciality. Until you called and something about your voice snapped me to the
here and now. It wasn’t deep or soft, or any of those other corny clichés. It
was just normal. You had an accent; a smile in your voice. I liked it
instantly. I liked you instantly.
    You talked to me about nothing in particular, the pizza,
what I recommended, my day, your night. You laughed and it made everything
inside my torso contract. That had never happened before. I was sorry to hang
up once you were gone. But life goes on.
    You called again the next night. Then again a few nights
later. Every time you called, you said more and I wanted to hear you more. I
joked you must really like pizza. You said it was ‘something like that’. I thought
you meant talking to me. I hoped you meant me.
    Soon you did call just for me. You waited until after one am
when the phones were quieter and you knew I would be sitting there, waiting for
something to do, an order to place, until my shift finished at three am. We
talked about films, music, hopes, dreams, our families and our lives.
Eventually you asked why I did it, why I worked at Pizza Planet of all the jobs.
I said I had to get through college somehow. That I was a night person; I
didn’t need much sleep. You said you were a day person and you liked to sleep
in. I should have known. I should have known then that although we had so much
in common that we could talk night after night for hours and still want more, we
were also very different. So different we could only be a disaster.
    You know that saying, always listen to your heart? Well I
did, and look where it got me.
     

Five Months Ago….

It was You….
     
    It was a Tuesday night, 1.30am. Or
Wednesday morning I suppose, depending on how you look at it. Nothing exciting
was happening. I was perched on my stool at work, doodling on my pad,
occasionally glancing at the phone, hoping it would ring and I would hear your
voice, when a rap knocked on the front window and I jumped, nearly right off my
stool. When I looked up I knew it was you. I just knew it. The way your blue
eyes looked at me like we were already connected. Your smile was exactly as I’d
imagined; sweet, cocky and beautiful. Like you. You grinned and I cringed; my
uniform is hardly a turn-on. No one looks good in a bright yellow and blue
striped shirt. You crooked your finger to beckon me outside, and like a puppet
already connected to your strings I danced at your whim.
    “Surprise, Mina.” You grinned and it did something to my
soul. It changed it. I was instantly yours.
    I looked at your face and I just knew you were a one off,
like lightning in a storm landing at my feet. I felt it in my bones.
    “I can’t believe you came here,” I said, not sure what else
to say but trying to seem unflustered. Just standing near you filled my brain
with cotton wool. The air around you was intoxicating. You ran a hand through
your short dark hair and laughed. I’d heard it many times on the phone, but it
was so much better in real life. You shrugged with a shy half grin on your face
and said nothing. I looked at you properly in the yellow Pizza Planet light
that shone sickly behind me, drinking you in. I’d imagined us meeting one
hundred times over the month we’d talked and there you were, so much better
than I hoped, not that I would ever have given you the satisfaction of knowing
it. You just stood there with your hands thrust into your jean pockets. When
you moved, your leather jacket creaked, breaking the silence. I