by Mary Bowers
For the sake of Orphans, I didn’t care what her reason was. I had checked the necklace carefully the day before, and from the smell of the metal, I knew it wasn’t precious, or valuable. Just pretty. And – this was the worst part – something that Vesta had loved, and Florence had wanted to keep.
I pulled myself together and approached the check-out counter, the crowd parting before me like an obedient sea.
Vesta’s pendant was around Tina’s neck, clashing violently with her sweaty little tennis dress. She must have come straight from the courts. Several other women from her tennis team were standing around in matching outfits, sweating and beaming.
“A thousand dollars,” I said. “That’s very generous, Tina. Thank you. And,” I added, looking at her sweaty friends, “it looks like your team won.”
They broke into a chant of “We’re Number One,” while I stood there and made myself calculate how many bags of dog chow a thousand dollars would buy.
“Ladies?” somebody said behind me.
I turned and Bernie’s camera flashed, illuminating the shop.
Bernie had her headline and front-page picture.
Chapter 13
The energy seemed to drain away after that, along with all the people except for Michael, Tina, Florence and me. The silence was deafening and the air was electric, for everybody but Florence, who was still admiring the check.
Tina ignored me.
Instead, once her audience (and photographer) were gone, Tina turned to Michael and said, “Well! I came straight here after playing tennis, and I won’t say I’m sweating, but I’m positively glowing. I must get home and shower. Shall we have lunch, Michael? Dinner was so much fun last night, I say we keep the party going. You know, we ran into each other at Thirty-Nine last night,” she said to me. “We had such a wonderful time! What do you say, Michael? Meet me at the Diner in an hour?”
She had her drippy arm around Michael’s clean and dry one, and as she pressed closer, I saw a sprinkling of her perspiration appear on his polo shirt. He eased away from her.
“Some other time, Tina,” he said. “People will talk.”
He was only teasing, but she chose to put a spin on it, saying, “Let them! Maybe there’s something to talk about.” She started to count off on her fingers. “Coffee at Perks, dinner at Thirty-Nine – my, I hadn’t realized how we’d become joined at the hip.”
She mooned up at him while he turned red.
“Some other time, Tina,” he said, smiling gently.
Then, with a sharp glance at me, she jiggled the pendant and walked out of the shop.
The cats appeared immediately. I saw Basket on her high perch among the paintings, and I knew Wicked was preparing to launch himself, because of a sense that I’ve developed from being around cats for so long. His little game was always the same.
Don’t even think about it,” I said over my shoulder without even bothering to look. He was up on top of the entertainment center, as usual, getting ready to launch himself past my head and scare the living daylights out of me. He always did it from the same spot in the shop, and I was onto him.
Making a disappointed little growly noise, he pounced down anyway, then strolled on over to rub himself against Michael’s calf and get his ears scratched.
I turned to Florence. “I thought you wanted to keep that pendant.”
“I did, but I couldn’t very well say no to a check for a thousand dollars, could I? And when she saw me wearing it, she wouldn’t settle for anything else. I’ll find another piece of jewelry to remember Vesta by. There’s so much. And we don’t need to say anything to Myrtle about this. I don’t want her to get stinky over it.”
“Okay.” I wasn’t happy about it. Obviously the purchase was only a gesture; Tina could’ve chosen just about anything else. Florence will frequently wear donated jewelry as a way of modeling it and maybe generating a sale, but this was different.
“Cheer up Taylor. I’m thrilled!” Florence said. She had no clue about the confrontation I’d had with Tina the night before, and I wasn’t going to tell her. “A thousand dollars! We’re putting this in the bank today!”
“Good. That’ll be just fine.”
“What’s wrong, Tay?” Florence asked. “You act like you aren’t happy about the money.”
“I’m happy – about the money,” I said. Happening to glance at Michael, I saw a knowing look on his face.
Dinner at Thirty-Nine last night. After my confrontation with Tina in the shop just a couple of days before. I knew all too well what the topic of conversation had been. Fully aware of the spin that Tina had put on things, I felt my face grow warm.
“You may well blush, my dear,” Michael murmured in my ear.
“Well, since you’re not doing lunch today –“ I began.
“Who said I wasn’t doing lunch?” he said.
Caught with my mouth open and nothing to say, I looked down in surprise as he took my arm.
“Where’s your purse, little lady? Don’s Diner sounds like a good idea after all.”
I did not explode in triumph. But damn it, I smiled.
Take that, Tina!
Don’s Diner is across Locust Street and one shop over from Girlfriend’s, so we didn’t even take my car. (Michael lived in town and had walked over.)
Traffic was heavy today on Locust Street. We had to wait for two bicyclists and a skateboarder before we could cross. Even so we’d been out in the 93-degree heat long enough to enjoy the pleasant chill of Don’s Diner’s air conditioning. By the time we left the over-cold restaurant, the outside heat would feel good again, but only for about two minutes.
I enjoy sitting on one of the fixed stools at the counter in Don’s. J.B., the counter waitress, is a hoot. Pencil behind the ear, bouffant hair, harlequin glasses, the whole package, and she can crack back at you like a standup comic, all without breaking a smile.
Today, Michael had other ideas, however, and before I could head for the counter he gently steered me toward a booth.
“I saw that,” J.B. said, not even looking our way. “Jes’ be that way, I don’t mind. Counter’s empty, and I got mouths to feed, but you just give your tips to DeAnn over there. She’s young and purty.”
“Oh, hush, J.B.” DeAnn said, bustling our way with laminated menus and glasses of ice water. “That’s just rude. Don’ll hear you.”
“Stop being rude to the customers, J.B.,” Don yelled from somewhere back beyond the pass in the kitchen. He didn’t sound concerned.
“I don’t mind,” J.B. repeated absently. “I’ll just stand here and polish this fine crystal. Try not to break anything.”
We had slid into the booth, and I saw that Michael was grinning, enjoying the performance. “How many mouths have you got to feed now, J.B.?” he asked.
“Six raccoons, two cats and a worthless old dog. And my own.”
“And that last mouth is the biggest,” DeAnn said smoothly. “And now you two, what do you want to drink?”
“Unsweet,” I said, ordering iced tea without sugar.
“Same,” Michael said.
“Know what you gonna have to eat yet?”
“I knew before I walked over, but I’m not gonna tell you yet,” Michael teased.
DeAnn looked over her wire-rimmed glasses, gave him the eye, said, “Who you trying to kid? You always order the same thing,” and walked away.
He turned to me, in a good mood. “Alone at last,” he said.
We didn’t look at the menus. They were so old that if we opened them, we might damage them. We had it all memorized anyway (even the daily specials, which never changed). Don had no intention of going to the expense of new menus when hardly anybody ever looked at them anyway.
“Did you see them?” I murmured, lifting my eyebrows and elaborately misdirecting my gaze out the plate glass window by the front door.
He looked around like a periscope and I made a noise at him.
“Don’t do that! Just look over my shoulder;
they’re at a table behind me. I saw them when we came in.”
Graeme and Diana were at the very back of the diner, as if they were trying to hide, and when I’d seen them, they hadn’t looked happy.
“Hey, Graeme! Diana!” Michael yelled. “Come join us.”
“Oh, Michael,” I muttered in dismay.
“Don’t worry,” he muttered back. “They won’t.”
“Hey, Michael,” Graeme said loud enough to be heard. I turned, smiled and waved, then immediately turned back again. “Thanks,” Graeme called, “but we’re almost done over here. Good to see you.”
Michael raised his sweaty glass of water in a salute, dripped it all over the table, then set it back down.
“Clients,” he said quietly. “Can’t just ignore them.”
“Oh, yeah. I forgot. They, uh, don’t look very happy, do they?”
“They never do.”
“Really?” If I caught him quick, before he remembered to be lawyerly, he might give me more.
But at that moment, DeAnn returned with our iced teas.
She whipped out her book of Guest Checks, wrote our orders down in front of us without anybody saying a word, then looked up and said, “Thanks. I’ll get that right in for you,” and walked away.
“Order in!” she cried at the pass.
“I know,” Don said from the kitchen. “I already got ‘em on.”
“I know,” DeAnn said. “I just write up the tickets for fun.” She walked over to the soda fountain and pulled a root beer for a regular customer who had just walked in and taken a seat by the front window.
Suddenly the place was filling up, and DeAnn and J.B. had to hustle. Three men in dark blue shirts that said, “Sparks Electric Co.” with a phone number on the back, sat down at the counter and began to cross-talk with J.B.
“So, Michael. Just what did you and Tina have to talk about over dinner last night?”
He sat back and gave me a leisurely smile. “Let’s not talk about Tina. You know just about what she had to say. And I knew just about how much to believe. Don’t you know me by now?”
I suddenly realized that I did, and it hit me, kind of.
I suppose most people think that romantic feelings happen fast. Love at first sight. Infatuation. But there are other sorts of romance that nobody ever talks about, because drama makes a better story. I mean the kind of romance that happens slowly. Suddenly, that warmth is there, and the wonderful part of it is that you’ve known one another long enough to be – well – comfortable. Does that sound dull? It’s not. It just isn’t as violent as love at first sight, and doesn’t lead on to tragedy nearly as often.
I suddenly knew in the front of my mind what I’d known in the back of my mind for a while. I’d always felt like a Northerner in the South, but today, at 12:48 in the afternoon, E.S.T., in a freezing cold diner where the grilled cheese is greasy and the burgers even greasier, I belonged. I belonged here, and I belonged with the man on the other side of the booth. I was home.
It was a good moment.
And then Tina walked in the door.
Chapter 14
The good news was that she had showered. She was no longer sweating, and no longer wearing Vesta’s pendant.
The bad news was the simple fact that she was there.
She made her entrance as if everybody had been waiting for her and swept down upon us in a blaze of blindingly white teeth.
“Michael!” she cried, ignoring me. “So you decided to come after all.”
She slammed into the booth next to him like a hockey player throwing a hip check. Then she looked into my eyes.
“Taylor,” she enunciated.
Then, as far as Tina was concerned, I dried up and blew away.
This brought out the cat in me. Normally I wouldn’t be inclined to converse with Tina at any time, but if she wanted me to disappear, I decided I’d just get right up into her face.
“Cute top,” I said, admiring her spangly white tee shirt.
“Oh, this old thang?” she muttered, preparing to zoom in on Michael again.
“Why aren’t you wearing your new thousand-dollar pendant?” I said.
“Oh, that old hunk of junk? It looks like a vulture!”
“It is a vulture. It’s an Egyptian goddess.”
She popped her eyes at me. “Who walks around wearing a vulture? Not me, honey. Not my style! I just wanted to buy something for the sake of the animals. I already gave that old thing away to somebody or other.”
I stared, glared, withdrew my attention and shut my mouth, all in about three seconds, and then decided I’d go ahead and disappear after all. I didn’t want to be present. I’d just eat and go.
I glanced at Michael and saw him frowning too. Then Tina rounded on him, blazing the high-beams and got herself ready to charm the man.
DeAnn had apparently thrown Tina’s order in when she’d seen her coming across the street, because she never came to take her order and brought all the meals together, along with a brown Diet Something for Tina.
We ate. Tina nibbled and twinkled and twittered.
The odd thing is, I got the impression that from time to time Michael disappeared from Planet Tina too. She was cooing at him like the Southern Belle from Hell one minute, then surveying the room for other eyes to capture the next. Even the electricians weren’t safe. I began to think that Tina’s agenda was deep, powerful, and beyond my comprehension. I wondered if she wasn’t a very unhappy lady, with a hunger that would never give her a moment’s peace.
I crunched into my grilled cheese sandwich, with Don’s trademark butter-crisp finish, and let the cheese ooze lazily out the sides before setting it back down amid the fries and pickle spears. Suddenly, I was annoyed with Michael. I realized that since Tina had sat down, he hadn’t said a word to me, or even looked at me. He was letting the tramp make a fool of him. She was playing some kind of a game, and Michael was too much of a gentleman to do the right thing and push her out of the booth onto the linoleum. So she was able to keep his attention riveted on her (and away from me) with a tinkling stream of sparkly little nothings, rolled out with an ever-increasing Southern drawl.
I couldn’t see why Michael was tolerating her. Tolerating her, listening to her, eventually even laughing at her jokes. The more she worked him, the more he loosened up, and I could feel him slipping away.
And then, like a huntress, she focused. She didn’t look in any particular direction; it wasn’t something she did with her eyes. She did it with her whole body. She pointed, like a hunting dog, without making any obvious movements.
Then she looked up with brilliant eyes as Graeme appeared beside me and stopped to chat with Michael. He leaned over with his hands flat on the table and proceeded to carry on a conversation with Michael right over the top of Tina’s head. And, without looking up at him, she absorbed the nearness of him.
“She’s inhaling the smell of his skin,” I thought to myself. It was indecent. Especially since I knew that the moment Graeme was out the door, she’d be melting against Michael again like a hunk of warm taffy.
The men said the usual touch-and-go things people say to one another, just to be friendly. I don’t even know what was said, it was so cheerfully meaningless. Tina held herself poised between them, opening her pores to them, lips slightly parted in a way that was erotic and, frankly, embarrassing.
Diana had already reached the door and was waiting for Graeme, seething. She stared bullets at me, as if I were the cause, and I gave her a helpless smile.
When the men had finally finished with their patter, Graeme lifted his hands from the table and stood up, glancing at the door. Then he turned back to Michael as if he’d thought of one more thing.
“Graeme!” Diana shrieked, bringing the hum of conversation in the diner to a halt.
He straightened and looked at her, his face turning red.
“I’m waiting,” she said, lowering her voice, but not much.
“Well, we can’t have that
,” Graeme said quietly. He looked back to us, saying, “Nice seeing you all.”
As he turned to go, Diana suddenly glared at me and said, “I haven’t forgotten about that receipt. You’ve kept me waiting long enough. I want it today.”
I smiled. “I’m sorry if I misunderstood you, Diana. I thought you were coming back to pick it up the next day. You can go on over and get it from Florence. It’s been ready since Wednesday.”
She had something else to say to me, but Graeme took her arm and firmly pivoted her out the door.
“Oh, my,” I said, falling back in my seat as the door closed behind them.
I looked at Tina, but she was gazing at the backs of the men lined up at the counter. Natural conversation began to pick up again, and beneath the sound of it, I realized I was hearing a contented, tuneless melody. I strained to get hold of it, then realized that it was Tina, humming to herself.
I couldn’t help it. I turned around and looked, trying to see who she was humming about, and as I did I happened to notice that Andy Reilly was gazing at us with that thousand-yard stare that cops have. He was one of my Animal Control buddies, and when I looked, he lifted his chin at me and waved. I waved back. Tina must have thought he was flirting with her; I was happy to let her see that he’d only been waiting to say hi to me. Not every male in the place was lusting after her.
Suddenly, she called out, “Hey, Andy.”
I heard his reply: “Hey, Tina.”
She looked back at me with a radiant face, as if she’d won some pissing contest, and I decided I was done with these adolescent games. I got my purse out to pay for my share of the check and got ready to leave.
Lunch was over.
I walked back to the shop in a funky mood and pushed my way through the front door looking forward to some cheering up from my best girl, Florence. I had never seen her in a bad mood that I could remember, and when I’d left her an hour ago, she’d been happily waving Tina’s check around.
We had customers. Florence was behind the counter ringing something up, and the customer was nice enough to drop her change into the donation jar next to the cash register. The transaction completed and the customer out the door, I went up to the counter and was shocked when I saw Florence’s face. It was absolutely gray, and she looked like she was about to burst into tears.