Another one down. Lizbeth hadn't been working at the Golden Dragon for very long, but already she had learned not to grow attached to the waitstaff who were hired after her. She wasn't meant to come in today. It was supposed to be her day off, a much needed one considering that she had worked the past few days in a row. The only reason she had agreed was because Saturday morning shifts weren't usually very busy, and today had proven to be no different. She had spent the first hour or two sitting on her hands, watching TV until customers started to filter in. There was a hilarious movie on about a woolly mammoth and his talking animal friends, but she hadn't been able to finish it because people had finally decided to come out for lunch. Lizbeth only begrudged this fact slightly; she wasn't being paid to watch movies and she could always rent it later. It was something she would actually like to share with Melody.
Sometime around two, her replacement arrived. They talked for a moment -- only long enough for Lizbeth to explain why she was working someone else's shift and to explain that the morning had been terribly slow -- and then she left toward home. The day was perhaps not as pleasant and she would have liked, but she had never had a problem with a little rain. If anything, it made for the perfect weather to cuddle up at home in. Unless she got a call later, Lizbeth fully intended to change into her baggiest pair of pajamas and lounge on the couch with Melody -- or, at least she would until Milo came home in the evening. She could work six twenty-hour shifts in a row and if her brother saw her in sweatpants for five minutes he would accuse her of being lazy. It didn't seem to matter that she worked herself nearly to death or that Milo rarely did anything for himself.
But these negative emotions were none that plagued her mind as she walked down the sidewalk toward the bus stop. Her mind was blissfully blank. And then she caught sight of a face that she had memorized against her will. Before Lizbeth had the chance to change her course, Verina stood and greeted her. So she had claimed that she was her grandmother and had no intention of hurting her; Lizbeth might have been willing to take that at her word, but that didn't mean it eliminated the fear she felt by standing in the presence of an angel. "Hello." She couldn't help the shortness of her reply, anymore than she could her almost biological imperative to remain polite. "It's been okay." She had stopped awkwardly to reply, but now that she and responded in kind, she began to fidget and cast her eyes in the direction she had been headed. "Have you been out here all morning?" There was obvious concern in her voice, though it was not for the angel. Lizbeth didn't want to think about Verina following her, but she felt it would be wise to know the answer. Almost simultaneously the thought occurred to her to plead with Milo to move as well as the desire not to leave Liliya came to her mind.