Milkshakes and Heartbreaks at the Starlight Diner

by Helen Cox

  The motel I’d booked turned out to be a grey, concrete block emblazoned with maroon lettering that read: River View Motel and Rest Stop. An inaccurate name. The only view I got was of the McDonald’s Drive Thru across the road. The room itself was small but clean enough and it had a floral bedspread with matching curtains, the kind of linen my Grandma used to favour. For hours, I’d sprawled across the surprisingly soft double bed: marking strategic circles in black felt pen on maps of the local area and venturing outside my den of duvets and pillows only to pay the pizza delivery guy.

  Although I’d landed in New York and the anonymity of the place was appealing, originally I’d no intention of staying in the city. It was too expensive but also, it was just too intense. At that point I needed a slackening off; a parenthesis, possibly followed by a hiatus. If I could find outer peace, my reasoning went, then inner peace would duly follow and thus I ruled out a life caught up in the honking and screeching and hissing of the island.

  Atlantic City wound up being the place with the highest number of pros on the list. It was a coastal town, and I had some hazy vision of spending my days laid out on the sand, watching waves for hours with nowhere else to be. It was a relatively small place but it had the casinos so it would still have a Vegas-esque buzz and, most important to me, I figured due to the gambling culture it was the kind of place where the turnover of faces was above average. In other words, I was unlikely to be asked any awkward questions about what had brought me there or what plans I had for the future. I’d just be another hotel receptionist / waitress / poker dealer, depending on what work I could find. Nobody would look twice at me, and a spell of solitude would give me time to consider what kind of new life I wanted to construct after everything that’d happened. That was the theory. And for a good six months the theory held up. But then…well, I trusted somebody I shouldn’t have. Soon after, I packed my bags and moved back to New York and about a month after that I found work at The Starlight Diner.

  Mum’s flight flickered up on the arrivals board. The last time I’d seen her she’d stood crying on her doorstep in Finchley, mascara running down her face like black rain as I threw my battered, brown suitcase into the back of a cab. I could barely bring myself to look at her. So, instead, I’d put a stiff arm around her shoulders and said my goodbyes to the flower bed at the side of the garden path, in which she grew daffodils. She must’ve thought she was never going to see me again and, in truth, the way I was feeling, I couldn’t have made her any promises. Vanish. That’s all I could think to do. Run. As fast and as far as I could.

  ‘Hi, love.’ Mum shuffled over with one arm outstretched towards me and one hand on her trolley case, its wheels screeching across the polished floor.

  ‘Hi, Mum.’ I hugged her and was struck by the scent of lavender: a smell that meant safety. And love. I took a deep breath and held on to it for a moment. She put her hands on my shoulders and looked at me. Her brown hair was bobbed a touch shorter than it had been a year ago but that was about the only change. She wore a purple floral dress I recognised with her yellow beads – the ones that once belonged to her mum. She smiled though there were tears in her eyes.

  ‘You’re wearing your glasses,’ she said and made a half-nod. Here was me thinking this would be a big showdown and all she was concerned about was my switch from contacts.

  ‘Yeah. How was your flight?’ I asked, keen to avoid an argument about the fact contacts suited me better.

  ‘It was fine. I watched Billy Crystal doing stand-up. He’s a bit crude at times.’ She gave me a reproachful look as though I had control over Billy Crystal’s stand-up material.

  ‘Is he? I’ve never seen it, Mum. Shall we get a bus?’ I held out my hand for her baggage and adjusted to the weight of it. Typical. She never could pack light. She packed the weirdest stuff too, the Mary Poppins of North Finchley.

  ‘Oh no, let’s get a yellow taxi.’ Her eyes were huge, excited orbs and I at once remembered she hadn’t been on a foreign holiday since Dad died and the furthest he’d ever taken her was Guernsey.

  ‘Taxis are really expensive,’ I moaned.

  ‘Not a problem, I’ll pay.’ She took a twenty dollar bill out of her purse and held it in the air. Rustling it between her fingers.

  ‘As long as you’re not expecting any change from that,’ I warned her.

  During the cab ride, Mum caught me up on the long-running quarrel she’s had with the neighbours over their cat that, she believes, chews all the heads off her flowers even though she’s never seen it with her own eyes and has no concrete evidence. Though I’d been gone for just over a year I was convinced I’d heard the exact same story last time I was at her house for Sunday lunch and spent the majority of the journey with my head in my hands trying not to point out the pettiness of the situation. Even the cab driver, who was at first taken with our London accents, made his excuses about needing to concentrate on the road after ten minutes. I suspect he was as grateful as I was when the New York skyline swung into view, distracting her from finishing the story.

  ‘Astounding,’ she said, her mouth half open. Only astounding enough to delay the rest of the flower / cat yarn for about three minutes.

  Before long, the driver seemed to put his foot down for the second half of the journey, we pulled up outside The Royal Grande Hotel just off Park Avenue. Mum paid the fare while I lugged her case out of the boot and negotiated the steps up to the hotel entrance.

  ‘Will the room have a minibar, do you think?’ Mum asked as we trailed up to reception.

  ‘Bit early to be hitting the minibar, isn’t it?’ I replied, glancing at my fake Rolex.

  ‘I’m still on UK time.’

  ‘It’s still only 3pm there.’ I raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Oh. Well, I’m on holiday,’ she sniffed, adding, ‘you can have a bath when we get up to the room if you like.’

  ‘Well, I had a shower just three hours ago,’ I said. Mum pressed her lips together. ‘But, if it’ll make you happy then I’ll have a bath.’

  On seeing the accommodation she’d booked I resolved never to show Mum the dingy hole I’d been living for the past four months. Her room looked like it’d been newly painted especially for our arrival in a cosy, honey colour. All the furnishings were adorned in a rich, scarlet fabric that smacked of luxury. I noticed a chaise longue near the window and began lolling across it in provocative poses.

  ‘Esther, not in front of the bellboy,’ said Mum, shaking her head. I’d sort of forgotten there was anyone else in the room.

  ‘I’m sure he’s seen far more shocking things than that, Mother,’ I said, but cleared my throat, sat up straight and planted my feet back on the opulent, red carpet anyway. The bellboy nodded and flashed a smile polite enough to secure his tip. He bid us goodbye and closed the gold-trimmed door behind him.

  Once we were alone, Mother and I looked at each other. I took a deep breath and smiled. She mirrored my movements.

  ‘Well,’ she said, ‘first thing’s first.’ She disappeared into the bathroom. Then I heard the sound of a plug being positioned and the bath taps turned on full pelt. I shook my head at the bathroom door. If I could only get her to a doctor I’m convinced they’d tell me she had OCD.

  ‘What’s in the minibar?’ she called through whilst the bath was running. I rolled my eyes and went over to the fridge, that was masquerading as a cupboard, to examine the options.

  ‘Bacardi, you like that, don’t you?’ I called back.

  ‘Yes. Get something for yourself too.’ I thought about making a comment about it being too early for me but, who was I kidding? I wasn’t about to say no to anything that took the edge off Mother’s niggling. I pulled out an extra miniature bottle of Bacardi before heading into the bathroom, and stepping through a thin veil of rising steam to hand Mum the bottle. Irritated by the distraction from whatever magic she was working with the gold bath taps she gestured for me to set it down at her feet.

  ‘There we are,’ she said, checking t
he temperature with her index finger, ‘you’ll feel better after a bath.’

  ‘Thanks’ I said in a flat voice and began undressing. It must be an only-child thing. Or an empty nest thing or something, I thought. Other, normal thirty-somethings did not still have bath-time with their mothers.

  ‘Ryan says hello by the way,’ she said with the same over-wrought smile she used whenever the subject of Ryan came up. I turned my back so she couldn’t see me, rolling my eyes yet again. Ryan Fellowes was an old school friend from Finchley Grammar. Mum had always hoped something romantic might happen between us because we’d dated for about three weeks when we were fifteen. When I say ‘dated’ I mean he came round to our house for some fish fingers after school one night. Mum took a shine to him. I didn’t. At least not in the way she’d wanted me to. He was a mate. A good one but that was it. Well, one desperate, late-night kiss aside…

  ‘How is he?’ I asked, folding my clothes up on the ledge near the sink with as much precision as possible. The easiest way of warding off one of Mum’s nigh-on ritualistic lectures about tidiness.

  ‘He seems to be getting on alright, still no girlfriend though…’

  ‘Mother…’ She was such a meddler.

  ‘Alright. Sorry I spoke.’ She wasn’t sorry. Not when it came to interfering in the non-existent romantic destiny between me and Ryan. There was a brief silence. ‘How are things with you?’ Her tone was too casual.

  ‘Alright.’ I lowered myself into the water and felt instant relief against my will. ‘I got a job in a diner over on East Houston Street.’

  ‘Is that a safe street?’ she asked, perching on the corner of the bath and unscrewing the cap on her Bacardi.

  ‘I haven’t looked into the crime statistics to be honest but I’ve never had any trouble.’ Honest? My eyes widened at the shock of how easy I found it to lie. Too much practice, Esther. Far too much practice. It was then I made a mental note to tell everyone who might cross paths with my mother not to mention the fact I’d been mugged. If I couldn’t escape an unnecessary bath I probably couldn’t escape her if she decided to frogmarch me back to England.

  ‘And what are the people at work like?’ she asked with a hint of suspicion.

  ‘Oh, they’re lovely. You’ll meet Mona and Lucia tomorrow and there are some really sweet regulars we have in. Angela, Julie-Ann and Walt. They might be there too. The diner crowd, well they’ve sort of taken me under their wing. I didn’t expect to. Didn’t really dare to but in spite of myself I’ve met some good people.’ I paused. Was this the right time to bring up the existence of Jack? We’d agreed last night that I’d let Mum settle into her hotel before I told her about my new love interest and then, once she’d absorbed the news, we’d arrange dinner some place nice before she flew back to the UK. I shook my head thinking how insane it was to introduce someone to your mother after just a few days of becoming an item. But nothing else about me and Jack was logical, so I guess it followed.

  ‘The people you work with, do they know?’ Mum said out of nowhere. She looked into my eyes, then took a petite swig from the bottle.

  ‘They know I was a teacher. And that I had a husband. And that he died,’ I replied, looking down into the water.

  ‘Probably best to keep it that way. That’s all they need know.’ Mum’s face had become tight around the mouth.

  ‘I…I’m not sure if I can keep it that way, not forever.’

  ‘Why not?’ she asked, doing that thing where she clipped her words short.

  I took a breath.

  ‘I met someone.’ I let the sentence hang. She didn’t storm out of the room or try to strangle me with a nearby towel so I continued. ‘It’s very new. I met him a few weeks ago but…’

  ‘You’re thinking of telling him? A man you barely know?’ Her voice was quiet, the same kind of quiet as when she discovered me drawing in wax crayon across her new, fleur-de-lys wallpaper when I was seven. In her defence that was old enough for me to know better.

  ‘I want to tell him.’ I looked back at her, gathering courage. ‘I think I’m really falling for this guy.’ Mum’s chest inflated with a sharp breath.

  ‘Oh Esther, you can’t afford to be wrong about this. You need to be careful.’

  ‘I know. Mum. I know. But, I can’t really explain it. There’s something about Jack.’

  ‘So you’re just going to tell him? I mean, everything?’

  ‘I think, I’ve got to. It’s not the kind of thing you can keep from someone you’re in a relationship with. At least, not forever.’ She gave an almost non-existent nod. ‘Look,’ I continued, determined to convey that something must change about the way I’d been living, ‘what happened was pretty much the worst thing that can happen. To anyone. But I don’t want to feel ashamed for the rest of my life. I don’t think I physically can. I think… I think I’ll die if I do.’ I swallowed hard trying to keep my cool. Trying to ignore the sound of my own voice, fragmenting. ‘I’m not saying I’m going to tell him tomorrow. But Mum, honestly, I can’t live the rest of my life this way.’

  Mum sighed a deep sigh. Twirled one of her fingers around in the water. ‘You think you can trust him?’

  ‘I do,’ I said.

  She paused and looked up at me. ‘Is he handsome?’ she asked. Was that her version of acceptance?

  ‘He’s … he’s beautiful.’ I stretched a thin smile across my lips. ‘He wants to meet you.’

  Drawing a damp hand out of the water, I reached out to her. She took hold of it and squeezed.

  Chapter Nineteen

  A hard rain flung itself into the East River, churning the waters and misting up my glasses. Propping them up on my head, I looked out at the darkening silhouettes, eyes red raw from the salt of my own tears. Just two days ago I’d walked the length of this bridge with Jack and the world had been luminous and bright. Now dusk was approaching, a gloom was setting in and I was all alone. The rest of the city was tucked up inside. Out of the storm. Warm. Safe. Loved. But not me, never me.

  I heaved out a sigh and looked down again at the river.

  What was I going to do?

  I couldn’t stay in New York. Not now the whole city knew, or thought they knew, what I was. And what I’d done. I’d have to move somewhere truly remote. Somewhere old ghosts couldn’t follow. Like Peru. Or Siberia. Or, maybe I’d just stand where I was forever, letting the rain pound into me.

  I closed my eyes and saw again Mum’s contorted face as she handed me the newspaper. I was standing just behind the counter holding a coffee jug and it was the photographs that caught my eye first. Pictures of me and Jack. Lost in each other. Taken beneath the very bridge I stood on. But they were just a momentary distraction. It was that headline in towering, bold letters that’d sent the world into a spin.

  Jack’s Black Widow.

  I shook my head in remembrance. The crack of the coffee jug as it thudded against tough lino. The swarm of questions from Julie-Ann, Mona and Bernie. And then Walt’s words, slicing through everything: ‘I always knew you had a story, kid. And I think it’s about time we heard it.’ All those eyes looking. All those ears waiting for answers. And all I could think to do was run.

  I pushed my head into my hands. What a mess. All this time, while I was prancing about the place like an idiot in love, Boyle had been busy doing his homework. He’d looked at the police reports from the car crash I’d survived. He’d spoken to Ryan, the one person in the world I wouldn’t have wanted him to speak to, and he’d researched financial details like how quick I’d sold the flat and fled England. My late husband’s death had been ruled as accidental so Boyle couldn’t outright accuse me of anything. But his article, the facts he’d presented and the order he’d presented them required little reading between the lines. It was barely subtext. Boyle was insinuating that Michael’s death was far too convenient. And the worst part was, he was right.

  It wasn’t cold, despite the downpour, but I wrapped my arms around myself anyway and clung to the dampene
d fabric of my diner uniform. I thought about Jack’s face. His velvety, blue eyes. How they would look when he read Boyle’s article. How he’d feel when he found out I was rotten at my core. How could I do this to him? And of all the people in this city why did Boyle have to take an interest in me? I was just a waitress who’d fallen in love with an actor. In a place like New York, didn’t that happen every day? It made no sense for Boyle to be so fixated on us. Not that there’d be an “us” now. I would’ve liked to put all the blame on Boyle but my own insistence on keeping secrets had played a part.

  I closed my eyes again, and listened to the swishing of the traffic on the lower compartment of the bridge. Hoping to hear the voice of reason or my conscience or … I don’t know, God through the white noise of the city. Isn’t that the way it happens in the movies? If Jimmy Stewart could have someone to show him the way, couldn’t I? Where was my Clarence when I needed him? I guess Reverend Quinn must’ve passed along the message, that God meant nothing to me.

  Gazing into the thrashing river below, another question formed on my lips. ‘Why now?’ Just when I’d started to feel again, Boyle’s noxious words had, in an instant, banished me back to that desolate place I’d been living all these months. And now, all I could think about was making it stop. Finding peace. Any way I could. Maybe I should’ve made it stop a long time ago. Drank cyanide. The way tragic, nineteenth century artists did. That was their answer to marrying the wrong man. Which so many of them did. And although a brutal way to go out at least it was over quick.