Cold Plate Special

by Rob Widdicombe

  “Yep. Just got here.”

  “Awesome. Well, congratulations.” She shook my hand with an exaggerated enthusiasm. She didn’t seem to hate me. “You wanna come in?”

  “Sure.”

  The smell of sandalwood incense filled my brain. Everything looked the crazy same except the hamster cage was gone. Hamsterdammit was off the map.

  “I’m getting ready to take the dogs to the river—wanna join me?”

  “Yeah, um—I’m kinda waiting for Shred to show up so I can move my stuff in. I don’t know if I should leave it.”

  “Did you bring a truck?”

  “No. It all fit in my Hyundai. I left a lotta crap behind.”

  “I’m sure it’ll be fine. We won’t be gone long.”

  Before I knew it, we were out on the sidewalk with the dogs. It was like old times. It was like new times. I saw a couple members of the white tee-shirt crew down on the corner. I wasn’t scared and I even thought about waving to them, but that might’ve been pushing it.

  “Something I’ve got to tell you, Summer.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I don’t know about this whole roommate thing with Shred.”

  “Really? What’s up?”

  “Well, I got here and I looked through the window and there’s all these beer cans sitting around his living room. He promised me he quit drinking. I don’t mean to be all uptightie whitey or whatever. If people want to drink that’s totally cool. I just can’t—I’m not supposed to be around all that, y’know?”

  “A few of us were over there last night after the show. I didn’t see him drinking at all. No—he didn’t drink all night. Pretty sure of that.”

  “For sure?”

  “Yeah—he’s really trying. He’s so excited to have you move down here. You mean a lot to him.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “Mmm…then where is he now?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “He was supposed to be here to meet me.”

  “If it doesn’t work out I always know someone who’s looking for a roommate.”

  “For real?”

  “Yep.”

  “You always make me feel better about stuff.”

  I stopped walking. I wanted to kiss her, but she yelled at one of her dogs who had started chasing a kid on a bike. I started walking again and she put her hand on my shoulder. I felt a wild voltage expand through my shoulder and back. She really knew how to get my personal electricity humming. Then another one of her dogs was right in between us, panting at me, so I gave up on the kiss. Too awkward. I like dogs, but this was getting stupid.

  We went down behind the giant concrete columns of the Lee bridge and made our way down a steep rocky drop. It was dark and cool underneath the bridge. I saw evidence that the area served as a hobo hotel. Upside down milk crates, empty bottles of rot gut, that sort of thing. We crossed over a little dried up, defunct canal and then around to a pedestrian walk bridge that hung from underneath the big bridge. The sun was getting low and dark orange. Looking west, the James River spread out like something out of a vacation brochure, the giant rocks, the rapids, the thick green trees on its sleepy banks.

  “Wow,” I said.

  “Yeah. It’s beautiful, right?”

  “This doesn’t suck.”

  The pedestrian bridge ended on a river island called Belle Isle. Summer said it had been a Civil War prison camp for the bluecoats. I said that was wicked. We headed down a wide path that ran close to the edge of the river. The island was covered with trees and I said it was like a forest in the city. She didn’t say anything. Maybe she didn’t hear me. The rushing water of the rapids was louder than highway traffic at rush hour. Twice as loud. Moosie, Vertigo and Soup were in their canine glory. They had a million smells to sniff and a thousand directions to run. I couldn’t believe I lived here. I felt like I was on freaking vacation. In spite of whatever was going on with my cousin, I knew I’d made the right move.

  We headed back when it started getting dark. I felt so relaxed, I didn’t give a shit about anything. We got back to Summer’s and her dogs shuffled inside like good soldiers. She kinda held back on the porch, though, like she wasn’t going to invite me in.

  “I’m glad you live here now, Jarvis. Let’s hang out soon.”

  “Yeah. Definitely.”

  That’s when it punched me.

  With a thousand fists.

  The swamp stomach.

  The deep center of my guts was instantly visited by sickest, most twisted nuclear winter of squirming hell nerves, a roaring car wreck at the bottom of the death lagoon otherwise known as my intestines. It was back. Full force. Worse than ever. Summer leaned in for a kiss and I jerked back. All I could think about was my bubbling, wormy death stomach. She looked way disappointed. Way.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I don’t feel good all of a sudden.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I’ve got this...bad stomach condition. I thought it was cured but I guess not.”

  Her eyes tightened. She looked like she didn’t believe me.

  A hundred billion desperate thoughts started streaming through my head. She hates me. I botched this. We should just be friends for a while first anyway. I am such a stalker. I LOVE her! She hates me. Fucking stomach! I’m not a stalker, okay?

  It was too much.

  “I gotta go,” I said. “See you soon, okay?”

  I gave her an awkward peck on the cheek. She still seemed disappointed. Then I stood there feeling like a tub of toxic glue, out of place in the world, every world. She gave me a tiny perfunctory smile and went back inside. I turned and headed down the sidewalk. I decided I would make it up to her somehow. I’ll buy her a circa 1872 leather-bound felt-lined Austrian corkscrew case decorated with little skulls. I wanted the Hillites to bash my head in with rocks, but no such luck. So I just got in my car and stared into empty space.

  I sat there for about five minutes and it gradually became clear what had to be done. It was the only choice.

  I headed for 7-11.

  I parked and went in and poured up a big-ass 24-ounce cup of steaming hot brown joe. I carried it like a sacred chalice to my car and sat there in the parking lot, ceremoniously tearing the sip-hole from the plastic lid, the exalted steam rising up in glorious ribbons of yes, the rich hallowed aroma of the roasted bean concoction floating its way into my nostrils and whispering to me: Welcome home, my dear sweet child. It had been two whole weeks since I’d had any coffee or caffeine, and as the hot deliciousness reached my lips, I learned that coffee was a forgiving mistress. Even though it was shitty convenience store coffee that had been baking into a black sludge for hours—that was the motherfucking best damn cup of coffee I have ever had. I felt human again. I guess the stomach thing was nerves after all. Oh well, I thought—at least I didn’t have to go without coffee now! I took another sip of roasted heaven.

  “Ahhh…”

  Damn, it was good.

  I sat there and savored it. In spite of Shred possibly drinking again and my botching the kiss with Summer, life wasn’t too damn bad overall. At least I was on an adventure. Then, at one point, I heard a familiar sound. A throaty, rumbling sound. I looked around and saw Farns’s van roaring down Idlewood Avenue. I got out of the car and waved. I waved like an idiot.

  “Farns!” I yelled. But he didn’t see or hear me. There goes my buddy Farns. Going to get himself into some Grade-A world class trouble. God Bless America.

  The van turned out onto Jeff Davis Highway and from that angle I could see that it wasn’t Farns at all. There were no punk rock stickers on the back. It was some dude with a skinny neck. I got back in the car and laughed.

  I was insane but I had this feeling that I was finally home. I felt enormously relieved for some reason. Some strange pressure that I didn’t even know was there seemed to have lifted. Maybe it would happen for me and Summer but if not, we could kick it friend-style and let things ha
ppen. If they were even going to happen. I felt good about this, free to just let things flow, free in a way I had never felt before. Everything seemed so new-ish. I was finally, finally far away from the eggshell off-white light tan of beige. Maybe I could pick up a gig as a roadie for a band or start that meteorite hunting business. Become a genetic eyeball farmer and serve the blind. Or something completely outrageous that I hadn’t even thought of yet. Life was indeed a giant tuna salad sandwich and if I wasn’t ready to chow the fuck down then I didn’t know who was.

  Maybe after another coffee, I thought I might go back over to Summer’s and give her a proper kiss. I liked that idea. I liked it a lot. What the hell, right? You only live twice.

  After an extended stretch of coffee-enhanced pondering there in my parked car in the 7-11 parking lot, I got a text from Shred: where hell r u?

  I wrote back: right hell here. b right hell there.

  I slurped in the rest of the joe like a vacuum cleaner and realized it was time for a follow-up. It felt like someone was driving a riding mower across the bottom of my stomach but I didn’t care. I was stoked for the deep caffeine super buzz, the rivulets of power and the roasted flavors gliding down the hatch one more time, turning my personal electricity flavor lamp up to screaming turbo level.

  For old time’s sake.

  For new time’s sake.

  Coffee in the morning, coffee in the evening.

  Coffee all the day night long.

  Speaking of which, it was now indeed time for that cup number two, so I went into the store and procured she. And I came back and sat there in the car and took my time and drank her down to the fantastic brown end. Down to where the orphan chunks of nasty coffee grounds sat languishing at the bottom of the cup. It was even better than the cup before. And I held it high and I swirled the magnificent dregs around a couple of times and I threw the cup back and downed those too.

  And they were good.

  •

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Many thanks to my editor and publisher J. Boyett, whose tireless efforts turn vague possibilities into tangible realities.

  I have been beyond lucky to have studied under some uniquely talented and generous authors such as Sally Doud, Marita Golden, Mary LaChapelle, Joshua Henkin, Victoria Redel, Lucy Rosenthal and Myra Goldberg, and it is with several tractor-trailer loads of gratitude that I say many sincere thanks to you all.

  Sometimes when a teacher is also a game changing mentor, a special shout out is in order. Having had two such beacons in William Tester and David Hollander has been crucial to the existence of this novel and has indeed made me feel downright charmed. Thank you much, gents.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Rob Widdicombe was born on the Virginia banks of the Potomac River in a military hospital on a typical Wednesday. A former singer, guitar player and songwriter for Richmond-based bands The Wiggins and Flying Shovels, Widdicombe has held a variety of both day and night jobs over the years, including gas station attendant, landscaper, encyclopedia salesman, cab driver, truck driver, maintenance man, cook, dispatcher, catering captain and paralegal. He received an MFA in writing from Sarah Lawrence College and his interests include staring out the kitchen window and falling asleep on the train. COLD PLATE SPECIAL is his first novel.

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