Love is in the air everywhere I look around.

Lacey sighed as the song blared over the speakers. Never had lyrics been so ill suited to their environment. She swayed and swooped, balancing a tray of margaritas as she navigated the narrow aisles of the crummy restaurant, Geno’s—which also doubled as a coffee shop in the morning—dodging the swipes and pinches of the old men at the tables. One of her best friends from the past, Sasha, had spent a summer interning at a rest home. Sasha was a bombshell and well versed in the attentions of men, but she had said that she’d never been groped the way she had by those 80 year olds.

Love is in the air, every sight and every sound.

Something was in the air, but she sure as hell didn't think it was love.

“You’re almost there, blondie!” someone shouted. “Keep believing!”

Finally, she made it to her table and set the drinks down without drenching everyone. The men at the table cheered. It was a performance that could have landed her a spot on some Cirque Du Soleil stage. That certainly would have paid better. The men were all regulars, and they were all regularly crappy tippers. They probably would have paid better if she had made an issue of it, but that was one of Lacey’s issues: she wasn’t used to making an issue of things, even when it would have worked in her favor.

Love is in the air, when the day is nearly done.

“Shut up Tom Jones,” she said through gritted teeth as she made her way through the kitchen. Her shift was nearly done, but that meant precious little these days. Her idea of a good time was a quick break at work, which she was about to take. The days and the shifts all blended together into a haze of order tickets and menus and dirty tables. She went into the employee’s lounge and flung herself down on the couch. She put one forearm over her eyes and gave a little moan. Was it too much to ask that she have one thing in her life to look forward to?

Her phone buzzed. Lacey figured it would be her babysitter helping Dana call her. Dana was her three-year-old daughter. None of Lacey’s old friends ever got in touch with her, and every man who was interested in her was currently two drinks and six decades deep out in the restaurant. And she sure wasn’t interested in them.

It wasn’t the babysitter. It was Sasha.

“I’ll be damned,” said Lacey, setting the phone down and staring at the wall. She had been getting messages from Sasha for months, but she’d been ignoring them out of a mixture of shame and spite. Not that Sasha seemed to notice. The muck and drudgery of normal life had never seemed to get to her. She ever asked if things were okay between them, but just kept checking in as if Lacey was engaging with her and they hadn’t missed a beat. It was surely the lengthiest one-sided conversation in history.

A part of Lacey—a small part—a part she didn’t like but couldn’t always ignore—had been jealous when Sasha had blown out of Palmera after high school to go to college in California. It’s not like she could blame her. Who wouldn’t have wanted to get out of Ellison, population not-many? At her high school graduation, Lacey had scoffed at the students clutching each other and crying at the heartbreak of having to leave school and go somewhere. Snap out of it! she had wanted to scream. Your lives aren’t ending, they’re about to start.

Unfortunately, getting pregnant straight out of high school had put a cramp in Lacey’s plans. And oh, what plans she’d had. Lacey had been accepted to the finest music conservatory in the country, smack in the heart of Manhattan, which was The Emerald City of Oz compared to this podunk town she’d grown up in. Whenever she had sat down at the piano—an old upright her mother had bought for the house but which only Lacey had ever touched—Lacey felt like she was doing something that no one else could do. She had taken to it like a prodigy and had also been willing to work longer hours practicing than anyone else. There had been a joy in it that transcended anything she had ever felt. Many of her most cherished memories were of simply sitting at the piano and wandering through whatever melodies her heart sent to her fingers.

She felt the familiar pang of guilt. This wasn’t supposed to be how a mother felt, and in truth, it wasn’t how she felt when she was with her daughter. Dana was her life, like it or not, more important to her than any conservatory or any opportunity. Most of the time she loved being a mother. That little girl had taught her more about herself than anything else. Unfortunately, when you started learning about yourself, it didn’t always mean you liked what you learned.

Done with memory lane for a moment, she read Sasha’s message.

Going to be home this weekend to start planning wedding! He’s a Hollywood Producer!! Need your help!!! See you SOON!!!!! XOXOXOXO

Sasha had never met an exclamation point she hadn’t fallen in love with.

“Oh good grief.” Lacey sighed again, the loudest one of the night. The last thing her self-esteem needed was for Sasha to roll back in from the distant lands of glamorous California and see the state that Lacey was in. Of course she was marrying a Hollywood producer. Of course. No doubt the day was coming when Lacey would have to turn on the TV and watch Sasha strolling down a red carpet, surrounded by celebrities in a Christian Dior gown while Lacey sat on the couch with her pants unbuttoned, reaching for another carton of ice cream. Why couldn’t she just have stayed away? Why hadn’t she blocked her number?

Other people were always the best and worst parts of life. They reminded you that you existed, but they also reminded you that your existence wasn’t what you had wanted.

But she couldn’t ignore Sasha anymore. It had taken tremendous effort and a giant swallowing of guilt just to do it for this long. She wasn’t a bad friend, she had just needed to protect herself for a while. And as so often happens, a while became a long, long time. Now the issue was forcing itself on her and she was going to be there within days. Lacey texted a brief reply and allowed herself two more exclamation points that she normally would have. CONGRATS!!! She considered adding OMG and then thought better of it.

“It wasn’t supposed to be like this,” she said to the empty room. She hated the self-pity in her voice and made a solemn oath to take the rest of the night off from moping. It would have been so much easier if anything she saw actually reminded her of something good. Her whole life was a series of signals that she had taken nothing but wrong turns.

Her shift ended a couple of hours after her break and she drove home in her ancient Honda Civic. It was about as big as a suitcase and rolled down the streets about as well. The babysitter, a sweet 14-year-old named Anita, met her at the door.

“Dana was perfect tonight,” she said. “As always. How was work?”

“Love was in the air,” said Lacey in a voice that would have sounded more natural coming from a robot. She put a twenty-dollar bill in Anita’s hand. “Thanks. Need a ride?”

“No, I’ve got my bike. Same time tomorrow night?”

“Yep. Have a safe ride. Thanks again.”

Lacey hung up her jacket and put her purse on the small table by the door. Dana met her in the kitchen and hugged her around the waist. They played the familiar game: Dana tried to squeeze her harder and harder, and Lacey begged to be let go, as if she were caught in the coils of an anaconda.

“Dana,” said Lacey, stroking the little girl’s blonde pigtails. “You’re the smartest person I’ve talked to tonight. You know that?”

“Yeah!” Dana always spoke with the complete conviction that only came naturally to children. “Anita says I’m smart, too.”

“She’s right. And she’s smart, that’s why she knows. But I’m telling you, if you came to work with me, I’d smile all night, instead of…” She trailed off. “Hey, forget about that, let’s go get some food.”

They talked while Lacey made dinner. A big Caesar salad for herself, SpaghettiOs for Dana. Dana had been drawing all night, writing stories about Lacey. There was never any text, just a series of illustrations Dana did with crayons. The night’s story had been about a mother named Lacey who killed a dragon that was about to breathe fire on the restaurant where she worked. The drawings were crude but the sentiment was exactly what Lacey needed. There was a lot to like about the idea of a dragon swooping down and putting the restaurant and its workers and its customers out of their misery.

Although, if people didn’t know their situation was miserable, they weren’t really miserable, were they? Geno’s in flames. It was a nice thought. But with her luck, the restaurant would rise from the ashes like a phoenix, summoning her back to another late shift.

While they ate, Dana looked at a picture book. The Scrawny Tawny Lion. “You read too, mommy! Put down your phone!”

Lacey had been wasting time surfing the web. Celebrity news was as inane as ever. “You got it.” She turned the phone off and pushed it away.

There was a weight in her chest that she couldn’t attribute to anything specific. Overcome by an unexpected wave of nostalgia, she took down a photo album that was wedged between her cookbooks. “Want to see how bad my hair used to be?” she said.

While Dana laughed at the pictures, Lacey turned on the TV.

Are you ready for some football? sang Hank WilAbels Jr.

Dana sang along. She loved the football players and had asked for a football helmet for Christmas that year. She also pointed out that when Lacey had been in high school, her hair had looked a lot like a football helmet. “Your hair was really, really big.”

“It sure was.”

And then, just like that, a ghost—a breathtakingly handsome ghost—from the past ran onto the field and waved to the crowd.

Dana waved back. “He’s waving at me!”

Lacey’s heart began to pound so loudly she wondered if Dana would hear it.

It was Abel, Sasha’s older brother, looking even better than Lacey remembered. Even that thought seemed like it was an insult to him. There was literally no way that Abel could look better, not even in her memory. He was twenty-six years old, an elite football player with money to burn and the kind of body that made people wish they could sculpt and the kind of shampoo-commercial hair that made women jealous. Abel had been a player even in high school. The quarterback, of course. The joke was that if he looked at a tree for too long he could start a forest fire.

Lacey found herself swept away in a tidal wave of memories. It had only been one night, graduation night, but she wouldn’t forget that night with Abel if she lived to be a thousand. Just thinking about it made her blush. It had been a while since she had felt even a flicker of arousal, and the sensation wasn’t entirely unwelcome.

“You’re red!” said Dana.

“It’s hot in here, baby,” said Lacey.

It had been hot with Abel as well. Volcanic. Feverish. Describing that night with every word it deserved would have required a thesaurus. Unfortunately, what she had done after her frantic liaison had been far less pleasant than her frenzied tangle with the soon-to-be NFL star.

Sasha was out in California with the sun-kissed beautiful people who were basically American royalty. Lacey was here in an eleven hundred square foot apartment with a stack of dishes in the sink that she hadn’t gotten around to. I could have been on the sidelines at every one of his games. Flying around in his jet. Giving him what he needed. Getting what I needed.

After high school, most of her dreams were gone within months. They had evaporated like ice in the desert. No music career. No Abel. No ticket out of town. Her parents, rigidly conservative, had disowned her after learning about the pregnancy. They hadn’t moved, they just wouldn’t respond to her anymore. The shunning had been total and devastating. She had closed her piano, which quickly accumulated a layer of dust that was practically impenetrable. Her future had sprawled out before her and it looked a whole lot like everyone else’s life who had never left town.

Long days, longer night, few opportunities, and aching feet.

Abel smiled at the camera. Lacey felt like she was being set ablaze.

“Why are you smiling?” said Dana.

“I used to know him,” she said.

“Was he your boyfriend?”

“I’m…well, I’m not sure what I would have called him, baby. What do you think of him?”

“He’s cute!”

“He certainly is.”

Love is in the air, when the day is nearly done.

Dana went to bed a few minutes later. After tucking her in, Lacey came back downstairs and watched the rest of the game.

Every time Abel came on the screen she vowed to find a way out of town.