Relatively Crazy

by Ellen Dye

  “You can’t wear Sunday on Monday,” she insisted.

  “It all balances out in the end.”

  “How?”

  “I made sure to wear my Tuesday panties,” I quipped as I quickly sidestepped and tugged the door open with my free hand. “So if you combine the Sunday top with the Tuesday bottoms it balances out to Monday.” I let the door swing shut on any likely reply and headed toward the dining room.

  After stowing my bag beneath the counter, refilling drinks, and delivering the King of Condiments—one to each table—I joined a still-simmering Jamie Sue at the coffee station. While my cousin spun about, alternately barking out a clipped list of closing instructions and brewing fresh coffee, I took my first real look around the diner which had once been the bane of my existence.

  The same shocking pink-and-white-striped booths, evenly split, lined the two far walls, each with a silver-flecked white Formica table between. Seven tables, each of which would comfortably seat four, were arranged throughout the center, along with their coordinating white wrought iron chairs, which sported pink vinyl seats. A wide array of felt-backed, plastic tablecloths covered each one in a jumble of pink print. The walls were dotted, high and low, with Nettie’s treasured collection of gilt-framed Norman Rockwell prints.

  The front counter was done in the same silver-flecked Formica, which had worn completely white in many spots from frequent wipings. Six swivel chairs with heart-shaped backs were mounted in front.

  All in all, it looked much the same. Only a little older and a bit more worn.

  I glanced behind. There was a difference.

  “Where are all the baked goods?” I asked.

  “Madge retired,” Jamie Sue huffed as she breezed past me and through the kitchen door.

  “And took the baked goods with her,” I muttered, looking at the darkened, refrigerated back counter display case. Empty, with its chrome dulled by fingerprints and speckles of rust, the case looked positively forlorn.

  I felt an odd twinge of nostalgia, remembering the abundance which used to line those glass shelves. Everything from chocolate layer cake to apple fritters and lemon meringue tarts—my mouth watered in fond remembrance.

  “Oh, the coconut cream pie.” I sighed.

  “Nope. I definitely miss the pecan most,” a deep male voice announced.

  I turned to see a familiar-looking man seated at the counter. One of the Osgoods, I thought. Rick? Roscoe? Randy? Reuben?

  “Ray,” he volunteered helpfully.

  “Ray,” I seconded. “Sorry, it’s been a long time. How are you?”

  “Not bad. Yourself?”

  I briefly considered giving the question an honest answer expressing every minute detail of my extreme dislike of being dressed to match the surrounding décor, but I decided against it.

  “Coffee?” I inquired instead.

  He nodded. “Jamie Sue leave already?” Ray anxiously peered about the place.

  “No, she’s in the back,” I commented, noting the definite level of male preoccupation in his voice.

  Interesting, I thought as I made my way toward the coffee station. A boyfriend would be just the thing to mellow out my sourpuss of a cousin. And sketchy as my memory was, I seemed to recall the Osgoods were rather a nice family.

  As I filled a small saucer with individual plastic creamers, I glanced toward Ray. Dark hair, brown eyes, nice features, and even though he was seated at the moment, he appeared to be fairly tall. Not bad, really. He seemed nice enough, and his outfit—a brown Dickies set with Timothy, the official spokesbird for Backhill’s, stitched above a pocket—screamed I’m employed.

  I shrugged. For Buckston County, Mr. Ray Osgood was a heck of a good catch. I wondered if Jamie Sue had noticed him or his obvious interest in her.

  “Here you go.” I placed both creamers and coffee in front of Ray. “You know, Jamie Sue should be finished up shortly,” I said, discreetly testing my theory.

  Ray’s eyes lit. “Yeah?”

  Bingo.

  I nodded, and then from the corner of my vision I saw a white coffee mug being waved. Seemingly of their own accord, my feet turned toward the coffee station. Amazing. A better than twenty-year hiatus and my body still responded, like one of Pavlov’s famed dogs, at the sight of a raised mug.

  Grabbing the pot of decaf and extra creamers, I headed toward the largest table in the center of the diner. The table, which usually seated four, was crowded around by the six older men who made up the group referred to as The Pie Club.

  They’d long since retired from various positions at Backhill’s and now (as they’d been doing for the better part of thirty years) spent their days puttering about and their late afternoons debating politics over a fresh Slice of the Day and a bottomless mug of coffee.

  Weird, I thought as I filled the last mug. It was as though time had stood still for these six men; not one had visibly aged a day. And the same could be said of their clothing. Each was dressed in a combination of Dickies, T-shirt, work boots, and the standard baseball cap, each of which differed from the others only in choice of embroidered logo gracing the front.

  I felt as though I’d fallen through a seam in the fabric of time yet again. Same men, same clothes, and—if you exchanged names of politicians currently residing in the Oval Office—the same conversation.

  “How was school today, Wanda Jo?” Mr. Delbert asked.

  Frightening.

  I squeaked an answer, gave a hasty smile, and then make a rapid retreat behind the counter as the theme from Twilight Zone played in my head.

  “How about a slice of,” I paused, looking toward the dry erase board mounted above the baked goods case to locate the Slice of the Day.

  “No, thanks,” Ray answered. “Takes a braver man than me to—”

  “Peach,” Jamie Sue barked as she erupted through the swinging door carrying a frozen pie box and a package of markers.

  “Sorry?”

  She thrust the markers toward me. “Peach,” she repeated with a nod toward the board. “Cross off lima beans and add—”

  “The Dinner Special,” I finished, grabbing a damp towel and turning toward the board. I sifted through long buried memories: Monday… Ah yes. Meatloaf, mashed potatoes with gravy, and green beans.

  “Are you sure you can handle this?” Jamie Sue asked.

  “Yes. I too enjoyed a free and appropriate elementary education.” I ignored Jamie Sue’s snort and smiled toward Ray, who’d spent the last few minutes not so discreetly admiring my cousin. “So, Ray, how about a slice of peach pie to go with that coffee?”

  He shook his head and continued to stare at Jamie Sue, who was absorbed in opening the pie box. A more lovestruck man I have never seen. And, unfortunately, Jamie Sue was more oblivious than usual.

  I made quick and exceptionally colorful work of the specials board and then stepped back a pace to admire my handiwork. Not bad at all.

  Jamie Sue set the now unwrapped pie on the counter. “What a waste,” she sighed.

  “Why?” I asked.

  “It’s awful,” Ray, finally finding his voice, supplied. “Even the Pie Club won’t touch it.”

  Jamie Sue glared, and Ray studied his half-empty coffee mug as though it held the secrets of the known universe in its depths.

  I privately wondered just how bad it could be. The palates of our collective clientele had never been what one might call first rate. In fact, I was willing to bet money that the lot of them would cheerfully eat a cat turd as long as it was deep fried, covered with gravy, or dripping with bacon fat.

  Jamie Sue must have noticed my raised brows. Within seconds she’d rounded up plate, knife, and fork, and had cut a thin wedge. “See for yourself.” She extended the plate.

  I took a small bite and nearly gagged. Cardboard smeared with cheap peach preserves came to mind. “Why are we serving this?” I asked once I’d finally managed to swallow.

  “Not much choice. Nobody bakes,” Jamie Sue replied.

 
“You’re a great cook, Jamie Sue,” Ray offered. “I bet you could whip up enough baked goods to fill the case.”

  My cousin’s mouth fell open. I discreetly jabbed her with a bent elbow.

  “Ah, thanks. But I don’t bake.”

  “Wanda Jo said you were getting off soon,” Ray paused and then sucked in a breath. “Want-to-catch-a-movie?” He asked, running the words together as one.

  “Can’t. I’ve got the late shift at Backhill’s,” Jamie Sue fairly squeaked before abruptly turning to me. “Any questions?”

  Yeah. Why are you blowing off such a nice guy?

  “No,” I replied aloud.

  Without pausing, Jamie Sue quickly dashed through the kitchen door, leaving a speechless Ray staring after her.

  Before I had time to speculate further on the perils of Ray, Jamie Sue, and their relationship (or lack thereof), the bell hanging above the front door rang. Mrs. and Miss Southland, the mother/daughter team of schoolteachers, I thought without bothering to look.

  “Why, Wanda Jo. How nice to see you,” Mrs. Southland said as I placed the menus on the table and pulled out my pad of ordering tickets.

  I smiled and gave a slight nod to each. This would be my only necessary—or even possible—response for the duration of their supper.

  The pair, dressed in identical navy blue sack dresses with starched white collars, hadn’t changed much. Thick hair clubbed back in tight buns rested at their napes, tortoiseshell bifocal glasses hung around both necks on long chains, and sensible tied-up shoes covered their feet. The only differences, so far as I could tell, was Miss seemed to be a bit more gray than she’d been during my third grade year spent in her classroom.

  “Oh, my,” bubbled Miss Southland before turning her attention to the topic at hand, a simultaneous discussion of the merits of the open-faced roast beef sandwich versus the ham-and-potato casserole.

  I smiled and dug deep for patience. I knew the routine. The pair would debate at least a half dozen regularly priced entrees before settling on the Special of the Day with two glasses of unsweet tea.

  I could afford to be big about this. Supper at the Dew Drop was the highlight of their day. Mrs. had been widowed young and then devoted her life to raising Miss and teaching. The same could be said of Miss, except she’d simply skipped the married/child/widow portion. And now, at sixty if she was a day, Miss had certainly earned the dreaded title of Old Maid.

  “We’ll have the Special of the Day. And two glasses of unsweet tea,” Mrs. announced at length.

  I smiled, nodded, and jotted their selections across a ticket. I reached out to collect the menus, and Miss grabbed my hand.

  “I just wanted to say how sorry we were to hear about your—” Miss began.

  “Circumstances,” Mrs. finished.

  “Oh, my,” Miss sighed.

  “Oh, dear,” Mrs. returned.

  “Why, we were simply speechless after the show. Isn’t that right, Mother?”

  “Oh, yes. Quite.” Mrs.’s hand joined her daughter’s, fingers clasped tightly around my wrist. “Speechless.”

  “And we haven’t been able to stop talking about it since,” Miss added for good measure.

  This last was followed by a chorus of oh-dears and oh-mys from mother to daughter and back again. My feet were rooted to the linoleum, and my arm was stuck in their firm grasp as I glanced back and forth between the two, much like a Wimbledon spectator.

  “Why, I’ve just never—”

  “Well, certainly not—”

  “Oh, Poor Wanda Jo.” Miss looked at me with genuine sympathy and released her grip.

  “Oh, yes. Poor, poor Wanda Jo.” Mrs. followed suit.

  I hastily made a grab for both menus and turned toward the kitchen.

  The pair sighed in unison, “Bless your heart, poor, poor Wanda Jo.”

  Tiny black dots danced before my eyes as I made a mad dash for the coffee station and promptly collapsed in the folding metal chair. Quickly, I tucked my head between my knees.

  Oh, God. Could it possibly get any worse than this?

  Chapter Eight

  Ten minutes passed, and I still hadn’t found the gumption to move. Chucking the self-pity was one thing, forcing my feet to acknowledge it seemed to be another matter entirely.

  Oh, Lord, this was bad.

  Bless Your Heart.

  This was worse than Poor. It even surpassed the much-dreaded double appellation of Poor, Poor. And in terms of the utmost pity describing only the most pathetic, it even surpassed Poor, Pitiful.

  Bless Your Heart was an appellation reserved for crazy old women who lived in tiny cabins and kept fifty cats. It was a term used to refer to old maids who spent long days crocheting doilies to fill their already overstuffed hope chests—which had long ago ceased to be the least bit hopeful.

  Bless your heart, Wanda Jo.

  That’s it, I decided. All pity, most especially my self-induced variety, was going out the window right this moment. I’d never been a Bless Your Heart. And so help me—even if it took my last breath—I wasn’t about to be one now.

  I’d be damned first.

  “Uh, Wanda Jo?” A timid voice called. “Is that you?”

  I raised my head and straightened in the chair.

  “Hi.” The slight woman dressed in a much-abused tank top and cutoffs gave a slight wave.

  “Hello,” I responded, my memory churning furiously to put a name to the shy woman in front of me.

  “I’m Dottie,” she responded to my knitted brows. “Dottie Blazak.”

  Recognition dawned. “Sure. You were in Jamie Sue’s class, right?”

  She gave a nod and then smiled, making her weathered face much more attractive. “Is she around?”

  “No. You just missed her.”

  “Oh.” Dottie heaved a dejected sigh. Her thin shoulders quivered a bit. “Did she go home?”

  “No. She’s doing the late shift at Backhill’s tonight.”

  My statement had a completely unexpected effect. Two large tears dropped from Dottie’s blue eyes and coursed down her thin cheeks.

  I stood, rapidly crossed the distance between us, and took Dottie’s arm. She needed the chair much worse than I did.

  “Honey, what’s wrong?” I asked, quickly filling a glass with sweet tea.

  Dottie shook her head and dropped her gaze. She accepted the tea and napkins I offered but continued to stare at the holes in the toes of her sneakers.

  “Has Jamie Sue done…” I groped. “Something?” I finally managed to finish.

  “Oh, no.” Dottie sniffed and blotted away her tears. “Nothing like that. I’m just having a lot of troubles.”

  “Is there anything I can do?”

  She brightened immediately. “Maybe. See, I married Donnie Simpson.”

  Ah, I’d consider that trouble myself. Donnie had been a whiny sort—like from birth. Throughout school he’d been neither smart nor talented in sports and had dressed in most unflattering combinations of plaids and checks, with the occasional polka-dotted garment. In fact, if memory served, Donnie’s main claim to local fame had been his ability to pack unusual items up his nose. I recalled an incident with dinner fries from my senior year—three of them wedged within each nostril. Amazing nasal capacity, that.

  “Accident,” Dottie blurted.

  “Sorry?”

  Dottie continued in a flurry of words. “Car accident” and “surgery” preceded “Donnie” and “laid off.”

  “Daughter?” I asked, thinking that had been touched on somewhere in the onslaught.

  Dottie nodded. “Susie. She’s only three. It could ruin her life. Kids can be so cruel. This isn’t silly plastic surgery just to be pretty or look younger.”

  My brows rose.

  “The scar. She was cut by some flying glass.” Dottie swallowed hard. “It’s the whole length of her little face,” Dottie finished, her voice barely above a whisper.

  I knew better than to inquire about insurance. Out
here, people who were out of work didn’t have such luxuries. Truth be told, most people working in these parts didn’t have the luxury of health insurance, either.

  “I really need work. Please, can you help me?”

  My maternal instincts jumped to the fore. And then they crashed headlong with the undisputed fact that my tight-fisted cousin firmly controlled all the diner’s money—salaries, and therefore hiring, included.

  An idea occurred. “Can you cook?” I gestured through the order window to the commercial kitchen beyond.

  “Sure. I worked at The Clock Diner in Worthington for five years, before Susie was born.”

  “Can you bake?”

  Dottie shook her head. “But I can do everything else from prep to short order.”

  Drat. But still, there were some possibilities.

  “Hang on.” I patted Dottie’s painfully thin shoulder. “Let me see what I can do.”

  Fifteen minutes later, Uncle Jimmy was happily showing Dottie around the kitchen and explaining the menu. Jamie Sue would blow a gasket when she found out I’d gone over her head and straight to her father. But that was for later. Now I was determined to concentrate on basking in the afterglow of a good deed well done.

  And naturally the gears of my brain were turning on the next step. I knew the minimum-wage job I’d helped Dottie get would provide them with a little extra income. But it certainly wouldn’t pay for an operation to the extent of what little Susie would need.

  Fortunately, I knew what would. One just might say it had been my profession.

  ****

  “I’m taking these old bones home,” Uncle Jimmy called through the order window a few hours later. “Be a good girl and lock up, will ya?”

  “Sure,” I returned as I stowed the last of the freshly filled catsup dispensers in the walk-in refrigerator.

  “Wanda Jo?” Uncle Jimmy called from the back door.

  “Yes?” I opened the swinging door.

  “You done good tonight. Real good.”

  I smiled. “Thanks.” I returned his wave as he disappeared through the door.

  Wow, I thought as I glanced at my watch. The past four hours had flown by. It had been a flurry of taking orders, delivering food, refilling beverages, and clearing tables. I’d seen faces, most of them friendly and pity-free, I hadn’t thought about in years. And I’d acquired tidbits of gossip—mostly positive—to go with each.