"I said medium. Does this look medium to you?"
The waitress quickly apologised, "I'm sorry, sir. I'll take that back to the kitchen for you."
"You do that, sweetheart… what was your name again?"
"Ella," she replied. It was the fourth time she'd told him. She leaned over and picked the plate up, flashing him the usual fake smile.
With the warm plate in her hand, she weaved through the tables. She slid it back to the kitchen staff. "Gent at table eight wants it medium."
The cook rolled his eyes at her and peeked at the steak's interior.
"It is medium," he said but went about correcting the order anyway.
She returned the steak to the surly customer, who probably thought she'd spit in it and continued on.
While she didn't find her job particularly stressful - at least not compared to the last one - she didn't enjoy some of the more grating and difficult customers. It had been a typical bustling Saturday night but since the restaurant wasn't in a touristy section of the city and wasn't particularly popular, it wasn't overly crowded. The restaurant was starting to look empty and her section was clear. Her workday was coming to an end. After such a busy shift, she was looking forward to going home, eating some take away and parking on her couch for some mindless late night television. She'd just reached behind her to untie her apron when one of her coworkers tapped her on the arm. She turned.
"Ella, they just seated someone at one of your tables," he said, with an apology on his face.
"What?" she said, annoyed. The kitchen closed in ten minutes but with a fresh order she'd be stuck here another hour, if not longer. She craned her neck from the back hallway. It was a single man in a suit with salt pepper hair. She let out a small huff and said, "Oh, you gotta be shitting me. Some sad single jerk with nothing else to do on a Saturday night."
"I'm sorry," he said, untying his own apron. "They were going to seat him in my section but I have to get out of here."
"Thanks for throwing me under the bus," she said with mock annoyance.
"I forgot my anniversary. I'm in the dog house," he said. "Please? I'll owe you one."
"I'm just teasing. Go on," she replied with a warm smile.
"Thanks," he said, hastily. He threw his apron over his arm and headed for the back as quickly as he could. He called over his shoulder, "I mean it! I owe you one!"
She went to see to her new customer. She put on a smile and walked up to the table. She said, "Sir, I'm very sorry to rush you, but the kitchen is closing shortly. You'll have to order in the next few minutes."
The dark haired man had a slight scowl on his face, an expression of deep disapproval. His accent was straight out of south Boston.
"I'll have a bacon burger, rare. Everything on the side."
As she wrote the order down, she asked, "Something to drink?"
"Whatever lager you have on tap," he said. He handed her the menu with more force than necessary.
She nodded and smiled, politely. He was her worst customer of the day. The entire meal was a passive aggressive dance. The burger was undercooked even though he'd ordered it rare. When she put down the ketchup, he said she'd forgotten the side of mayonnaise he'd never asked for. He didn't like the lager and wanted a different one even though he'd drank most of it.
When she'd collected the bill, she saw he hadn't left her a tip. He'd also left behind his copy of the receipt. There was writing on the back of it.
Columbus Circle, one hour.
It was going to take her longer than an hour to get out of work and walk uptown. It would take her past her apartment in Hell's Kitchen but it didn't matter. As soon as was possible, she left work and made her way to Columbus Circle.
Her surly customer was standing in the middle of the circle. Columbus's statue was bathed in yellow light and he was pretending to admire it as he waited.
"Hi Miranda," he said, turning around.
"Ethan. How'd you find me?"
"Wasn't hard," he said, with contempt and anger. He didn't bother hiding either emotion from his voice. He put his hands into his coat pockets and walked towards her. "I'm surprised Torchwood didn't find you. Wasn't like they weren't trying. And stop fucking talking like that."
Miranda didn't bother dropping the American accent. She suspected the New York inflection she was using was offending his Boston roots. "We don't have jurisdiction here."
"We? Oh, it's 'we' now," he said, nastily. "Because last I looked you'd checked out of Cardiff."
"Ethan…" she warned.
"Don't." He shook his head in disappointment. "I just came here to make sure I wasn't imagining things. That the woman I knew - the woman who saved lives, who gave a shit, who tossed me against a car and told me to learn prudence - was slinging overpriced burgers in fucking Chelsea."
"Do not presume to lecture me," she replied, darkly. The accent and cadence of her voice taking on the archaic nature it always did when she was angry.
"Don't do the scary bitch routine on me, Miranda. It won't work anymore," he said, waving his hand at her. He wiped at his mouth and rubbed his chin. "You know, I once wondered what kind of mother you were, and now I know. You're the 'do as I say and not as I do' kind."
She opened her mouth to respond and he cut her off. "Don't. I don't want to fucking hear it. You know, I started talking to my kids again. I'm civil to what's-his-name. I go to holiday dinners and I take my grandson to the zoo. I eat cotton candy and…" He broke off, shaking his head. "What happened to you?"
His venom surprised her and caught her off guard. She never expected anyone to find her, let alone Ethan Donovan. She'd covered her tracks carefully.
"How did you find me?" she asked, again.
"Because the holes in your disappearing act are more fucking important to you? Fine, you wanna know?" he barked. He stepped towards her. "I didn't have to find you. All I had to do was find Kiernan. Ianto told me he'd traced him to the States. The Watcher's had done some pretty fancy footwork hiding him but I still got friends in the NSA, Homeland Security and the INS. I tracked him to New York. Finding you was a little harder. Since this was a personal project, I couldn't put any of my agents on it, but believe you me, I thought about it. You think a part time waitress can afford more than a cardboard box she shares with five other people in this city? Ella Yi stood out like a sore fucking thumb." He took a deep breath and then counted backwards from ten. "Why'd you do it, Miranda? There's taking a vacation and then there's disappearing off the face of the earth and leaving good people who care about you to wonder where the fuck you are and if you're alive or dead. Do you even want to know what's been going on in Cardiff? Do you even care?"
"Of course, I care, Ethan!" she snapped back. She took a deep breath, rolled her shoulders and slowly let it out. "Sometimes things just get too hard."
"Oh, don't give me that load of crap! I've had it up to here with your sanctimonious bullshit about how being immortal gives you some sort of monopoly on pain and loss," he said, rolling his eyes at her. "You don't get to pull that card 'oh poor me' card every time just because you've been around the block more than once."
In typical New York fashion, no one was paying the two of them any mind as they shouted back and forth at each other but he lowered his voice and stepped closer to her. "You got thousands of years on me. I shouldn't have to be the one to tell you that that's life. It ain't fair, and it ain't easy. Burying your head in the fucking sand, ain't the way to do it neither. You need to put on your big girl panties and deal with it."
"This is just a simple holiday-"
"Stop lying!" he shouted. He lowered his voice and spat, "A holiday is when you go work on your tan or take bad selfies in front of national monuments! It's not where you mothball your entire identity and make a new one! You renew your passport for a holiday not spend fifty grand so a cobbler can forge you a new one. Were you ever going to go back?"
"Our concept of time is different."
"Fucking excuses," he said, shaking his head. "Do you know Gwen lost the baby?"
"What?" she gasped.
"A week after you left. Ectopic pregnancy and a ruptured fallopian tube," he said and then took another step towards her. "Oh wait, that's right. You left your mobile on your kitchen counter so you don't know that."
Miranda felt the world slide away. Her stomach bottomed out and her hands felt cold as the implication of what Donovan had just told her began to race through her mind. Before she could fully realise what a heartless cunt she'd been, Donovan continued railing on her.
"You know how beautiful Joe and Henry's wedding was? Oh wait, that's right. You weren't there!"
She went to answer him but he cut her off again.
"Some time dilation device got Joe. He was standing in the middle of the Hub like a statue for a week. Some dynamic headhunting duo nearly chopped Ianto's head off. Do you want me to keep going?"
Miranda turned and started to walk away. He ran to catch her, grabbing her arm and yanking her around. "Hey! Hey! Don't you fucking walk away from me!"
She turned his grip on him, twisting his arm back and digging her thumb into the pressure point on his wrist. He let out a painful yelp. She said, coldly, "Do not touch me."
Her tone sent a shiver down his neck. She let him go. While their shouting hadn't drawn attention, the physical scuffle had. They'd earned a few stares.
"Walk with me, Ethan," she said, turning south down eighth avenue.
They'd walked a few blocks when Miranda said, "I am sorry my silence has distressed the team but at this moment, right now, this is what I need to maintain my own sanity. Do not think that my absence or my silence means I do not care about what has been going at home. Just because you don't understand my motives doesn't give you the right to judge me on them."
"Then explain it to me, Miranda," he said, trying to keep his anger in check.
She continued walking, not looking at him and said, coldly, "I do not believe I owe you an explanation for anything. Go home, Ethan."
He hadn't seen her in a long time but he knew her well enough to hear hurt in her voice. He jogged after her, lightly brushing her arm to get her attention. "Look, I'm sorry, okay? I spent the whole flight up here getting angry as hell at you. I'm sorry for before. I'm sorry for ambushing you at work. I'm sorry for just showing up like this. And, yeah, you're right. You don't own me jack shit - no reasons, no explanations, not even a fucking greeting card but you owe your family something. Ianto asked me to find you. What am I supposed to tell him?"
"Tell him whatever you like," she said, continuing down the avenue.
He shouted after her, "That accent doesn't suit you!"
She ignored him and continued walking away. Donovan watched and then turned, frustrated. He thought about going after her but he'd done what he'd come here to do. Now he just needed to decide what to tell Ianto. What would they do if they knew where she was? At the very least, Ianto would phone and tell Miranda everything that Donovan had just told her. He doubted the Welshman would show up here and confront his former teacher. This was more about Ianto wanting to know Miranda was safe and letting her know what had happened in Cardiff than dragging her back there. Donovan sighed and looked at his watch. He dug in his pocket for his mobile and dialed.
"Yeah, sorry about the hour, Ianto. I hope I didn't wake you or Jack," he apologised. He started to walk towards Penn Station. He was about to tell him that he'd found Miranda, safe and sound, but when he opened his mouth, something completely different came out. "No, man, I didn't find anything… No, that intel on Kiernan was a dead end… No… I'm sorry…" His gut twisted. The lies were bitter in the back of his throat but he'd made his bed and now he had to lie in it. "I can keep looking if you want me to… No? Are you sure?…"