An Order of Coffee and Tears

9





Now that I’d come to believe Jarod Patreu was interested in me, Thursdays had changed entirely. First, I found that I was going to the restroom and looking in the mirror a lot. Second, I caught myself sneaking peaks at my reflection in one of the toasters. The bent metal of the toaster played back a funny, warped face, smiling with huge eyes, a pinched nose, and monster lips. I blinked, and the face winked at me. I giggled at the image; it was comical, and I needed the laugh. And third, I was nervous. For the last year, I worked in the diner with Jarod, but didn’t see him: not like a girl would look at a boy. Apparently, he did see me, and my heart swelled at the thought as my palms went clammy.

Could I be with a boy? Should I? I couldn’t help but wonder if my new fondness for Jarod was genuine, or if it was because Ms. Potts put the idea in my head. Ideas can sit and fester, and turn into something entirely new and different. I could be annoyed or mad at her, but I wasn’t. I found that I liked to think my affection for Jarod was more about me than anything else.

I was just a teenager when I last looked at a boy in that way. Just a teenager when I last held a boy’s hand, or kissed a boy, or did anything with a boy, for that matter. After all this time, could I be with a boy? Or better yet, should I? The questions tugged at me like the April chill that was in the air. Bumping the thermostat’s cool setting over to warm, I cursed our loss of the recent stretch of toasty days. Yes, everything is temporary, but I still cursed the spring season setback. The questions bothering me, tugged and nagged some more, and left me wondering if there was a place in this world for me to love again. And whether I deserved to love again. I shook the chill off, and then pushed the questions out of my mind. For now, I decided, the questions weren’t for me to answer.

As for Jarod, Ms. Potts didn’t think anything of it. She saw a young girl and boy, and let the game of matchmaking begin. But she doesn’t know me. She doesn’t know about the Gabby that ran from Texas in the middle of the night, the one who ran when it was dark, when the only other things on the road were midnight truckers, and armadillos, and other runaways like me. And she dug. She knew there was more to me than just someone who’d ended up homeless and on the streets.

Part of that is true, though, I did run from Texas. I did travel west, and then north, and then due east. And, during my travels, I met every kind of person under the sun. I walked during the days, and worked odd jobs, and ate whenever I could. And I slept on busses, and under bridges, and sometimes in public restrooms. I slept wherever I found I could lay my head without being beaten, robbed, or raped.

Grabbing a cup and pouring myself some coffee, the cold touch of the ceramic turned warm while I stared into the blackness steaming between my hands. A memory bubble surfaced, like watching someone through a window. I was living in California, and staying in a mobile home that was not so mobile at all. An old shell, a large trailer had been abandoned and left to rust away in a field. A small band of us called it home, and resurrected it, or, at best, we kept it from getting any worse.

I lived with a group of other kids, most of them had run from something, too. There was a code amongst us: don’t ask, don’t tell. And we never did. The trailer we lived in was under the name of someone who’d died a year earlier. As long as we handed over some dollars to the property manager, nobody seemed to care. Nobody ever cared. Nobody asked questions, and nobody came knocking on the screen door.

For a trailer, it wasn’t bad – we made a home. Nothing fancy. The screen door was rusted in spots, and hung from one hinge. It made a terrible metal-on-metal clacking sound when you let it go too soon, but it worked, and kept the outside from the inside. The trailer had old wood paneling for the walls that the kids posted pictures up on, or taped up drawings (some cheerful, some not) and, on occasion, I’d even read a poem from a loose page tacked up. Where we stayed and slept was just the one main room – most of the trailer’s walls and kitchen stuff had been taken or stolen. We attached a laundry cord near the ceiling and ran it from wall to wall, hanging sheets in a simple attempt to create some privacy for ourselves.

I liked it. I maybe even loved it. At night, I’d go in my own little sheeted cocoon, ball myself up in my sleeping bag, and listen to the life going on outside the thin walls of the trailer. And, sometimes, I’d listen to the life on the inside of the trailer. I’d hear a few of the other kids whispering to one another, or hooking up, the way kids do. But sometimes I’d hear crying. The kind that you try to hold back, but can’t; the kind that stops, as if taking a rest, and then gets going again. The next morning, when pulling our sheeted walls down, we never asked who was crying. We never wanted to. We just went on with our day. Don’t ask, don’t tell. It didn’t bother me, especially on mornings when my eyes were still red and sore, and my pillow damp.

Most of us worked as part of a picking crew for the handful of vineyards in the area. To look at a bottle of wine back then, I would never have guessed just how important it was to properly cut the grapes from the vine. A boy named Steve showed me how to do it. I don’t recall his last name, but that’s not important now. We worked and lived together for a month, and I’d gotten to know him, maybe even liked him a little. He was a cute guy with sandy hair and a dimpled chin. His eyes were sea-green, and I remember him liking to smile a lot. Or maybe he was just smiling when I was around; sometimes it’s nice to think that way.

The vines holding the cluster of grapes had a rough feel, and getting used to the shears felt awkward. One slip, and I was sure to cut more than just the grapes. Slow was good. I’d already cut a few grape clusters, and was working on another, when a man came running from between the vines. He was stout, and was wearing an orange vest. He had these tiny bean-shaped eyes that were set all the way back in his head. He was yelling something at me, and I dropped my arms. When he reached me, his round puffy face jiggled while he hollered some more. He took the grape clusters I’d cut out of my hand, and threw them to the ground.

He started darting his tiny bean eyes between the clusters on the ground, me, and the shears in my hand. And when his puffy face began to jiggle again while he shouted, I remember thinking that I was going to laugh. Just burst out laughing. And I think I sort of did laugh a little, but I stuffed it in a mock cough. He scolded another minute, or more, and I tried to apologize, but I think he just liked yelling. Finally, I grabbed another cluster of grapes and began to cut.

Steve approached me from behind, and wrapped his arms around me. I was startled at first, but then felt comfortable. I could feel his heart on my back, and his breath on my neck. He was close. He cupped my hands in his, and with the shears in one hand, we held a cluster of grapes in the other.

“Gentle,” he said, and then he showed me how to cut the stem. I liked that his hands were big, and covered mine. They felt strong. Safe. I leaned my body into his, and pulled his arms closer around me as we picked up another cluster of grapes.

“Like this?” I asked, and he breathed a soft reply in my ear,

“Yes, like that.” By the third cluster of grapes, puffy face had moved on to yell at someone else, leaving me and Steve to work the row of vines alone. I didn’t mind.

That night when we’d all gone to bed, Steve climbed into my sleeping bag. Was I surprised? Maybe a little. But I think I wanted to be with him, and certainly my body was telling me to. I remember how good everything felt. He held me and moved his hands, touching me, as he kissed my neck and my mouth. We helped each other pull our clothes off, and kicked them to the bottom of my sleeping bag. My body was wrapped in his, sweating and heaving, and then it happened. Memories of Texas, and why I had to leave stole the moment from us. I had to push him away. I told him I was sorry. I told him that I couldn’t be with him. Steve was a good guy, a gentleman. He didn’t call me a prude or a tease. Instead, he kissed my cheek and said that he liked me – that he cared for me, and that he could wait. I kissed him then: a good, hard kiss with regret on my lips. That was the last time I ever saw him.

The next morning, before the day stirred everyone awake, I was back on the road. I’d bundled and packed my things after Steve left my sleeping bag, and waited until I could see the first light reaching up from behind the mountains. I didn’t wait until I could see the sun; I only waited for the darkest of the night to start lifting. Leaving the trailer, I remember the cold hitting my face. With a cloudy breath whispered from my mouth, and only a thin jacket to cover me, the first miles were going to be cold. By then, I’d learned to cope with the weather; warm or cold, you wore what you had on you, because that was all you carried. There was no going back inside to change, or to pick up a sweater, or thicker socks and a heavier coat.

Walking that first mile, I was on a road that was just two lanes. I could see the outline of mountains to the left of me: ominous figures that stayed fixed in the horizon, and would scare me if I let them. Sometimes it was the moon that did it, too. On my right, I could hear the wind rushing over the long grassy fields of the farms and the vineyards. An owl startled me when it screeched a call over my shoulder, and picked something off the road in front of me. When the moon was highest in the sky, the smaller animals liked the warm blacktop of the road. The sun baked the asphalt during the day, and it stayed warm through the night, feeling tepid to the touch by morning.

When the first rays of the sun were a sliver in the horizon, I’d already walked a few miles. It wasn’t my first sunrise walk. Might have been my fourth or fifth. It’s easy to leave early in the morning. Leaving at night only invites the people you are staying with to try and stop you. Everyone is awake, half of them baked on something, or drunk on something else. But, in the morning, nobody wants to know, or cares to know. Even when they hear you rummaging around, or hear a door open, they might ask what you’re doing – you only have to tell them to go back to bed, and they always do.

I liked leaving before the sun came up. It was somewhat symbolic, I thought – a kind of rebirth. In my travels, I learned that the sun doesn’t come up like it does on cartoons. There is no funny pop sound as a glowing yellow orb vaults into the sky with a little bounce. Instead, a deep red light bends around the horizon, and reaches into the fields and mountains. As the sun rises, enough of the deep red turns orange and yellow, as the light begins to replace the dark sky. I love the watching the colors change, and sometimes sit on the warm blacktop and stare into the sky. The stars begin to fade, along with the blackest of black. Eventually, there is enough light that you can see your hands and feet, and make out the details of the mountains. When my timing was good for a symbolic rebirth, I could walk a full hour before finally seeing the light turn golden and sharp, and, best of all, my favorite thing: warm.



Texas. There was no wishing that away. There never could be. What’s done was done, and I’d moved on. Shaking my head, I pushed memories of home out of my mind. I forced myself to think about Jarod, and felt my cheeks warm. My eyes wandered to the old clock on the wall, where the hour hand approached the number four; only, it was spelled out in the letters. He’d be showing up soon to do his run around the diner, fixing what was broken. He never had to stay for more than an hour or two. And when he did have to stay, he would sometimes come back and finish the next day. A thought crossed my mind… maybe I’d break something that would bring him back tomorrow. I wanted to be closer to him, and see if there was more to this than just Ms. Potts’ imagination.

Walking around the counter toward the back, I glanced around the diner, and considered my idea. It was farfetched, and I laughed at the silliness of it, but it wasn’t a bad one.

“Help you, G-Gabby?” Clark asked. I flinched, and spun in the direction of his voice. He was quick to raise an apologetic hand, and chuckled, “D-didn’t mean to startle you.”

“That’s okay, should’ve been paying attention. What do you have, there?”

Clark was resting on his cot, his back against the wall, a blue book in his hands. I’d seen him with the book before. Many times. In fact, it was the only book I think I’d ever seen him reading. The corners of the pages were turned up and out – worn down to mere feathered remains of the paper. The book’s binder was creased, and the blue color emptied from it, exposing some of the amber-colored glue, and yellowing threads that held his book together. I tried to read the title, but that, too, had been aged, or rubbed away. I wondered how many times he’d read the book, or leafed through the pages? A quick look around the table, and his cot, and the shallow wall shelf above him: there was just the one book with blue covers, and worn pages.

“J-just reading. Did the b-bell ring? My hearing might be off. Happens sometimes,” he asked, and motioned a hand to his ear.

“No, I was just wandering and waiting,” I began, and peered out to the front to take a count of tables. “Ms. Potts has just the one table, but they look to be finishing. It’s okay; probably won’t see anything for another half hour. So, what’s your book about?”

“You was j-just waiting,” he looked at me with a smile, “I know it’s Th-Thursday. J-Jarod been crushin' on you.” A sudden rush of warmness filled under my collar as I waved off his teasing. Was I the only one who didn’t notice this about Jarod? To help push away the embarrassment, I asked again about his book.

“Tell me what you’re reading. I’ve seen it before.” A moment passed, and the smile on Clark’s face changed. He leaned the back of his head against the wall, and put his hand atop the book, and closed his eyes. At first, I thought he’d fallen asleep. Crazy as that may sound, you come to expect crazy sometimes, when working in a diner. I pushed the thought out when I saw his lips moving. He was saying a small prayer. I couldn’t hear it, but that is what I think he was doing.

When he opened his eyes, he glanced at me, and then back to the book. Then he began to speak, and it was different. I couldn’t put my finger on it at first, but it was different. His stutter was gone, or almost gone.

“First half of this book is about someone I knew a long, long time ago. A sad story – a painful story. So much hurt and despair. It’s a wonder they were able to survive it. The second half of the book shows how they recovered, a g-guidance to living, you might call it. Gabby , this book saved my life. Spent a lot of my early years in and out of trouble. Ended up doing some time, locked up with more of my kind. I was a mad and hateful person.”

“Is this what the detective was talking about?” I asked, then wished I hadn’t. I didn’t want to push, especially when he was sharing. Clark raised a hand, and I understood.

“When I was holed up in prison, full of hate, and spite, and wanting everyone t-to feel the same, I done some bad things a man shouldn’t do. But I liked feeling that way. It was like wearing a favorite coat. The hate gets on you like a skin, and you carry it with you, with very breath. I thought it was n-normal. But it wasn’t. I was a broken man. You understand?” he asked, narrowing his eyes. I nodded. I didn’t understand all of it, but I understood enough. “Gabby, I was the kind of guy you wanted to stay away from. The kind you crossed to the other side of the street when you saw me coming. Shit, I’d trip your grandmother if I thought she’d spill a dime bag. And, if nothing spill, then maybe I’d beat on her, and take what I wanted.” He stopped, and I suppose maybe my expression gave him reason to pause. The person in front of me wasn’t the man he was describing. Not our Clark. And I couldn’t understand how he ever could have been that person. Or maybe I didn’t want to understand.

“I’m sorry,” I apologized, and nodded for him to continue.

“You sure?” he questioned, and raised his brow. I nodded again.

“Please.”

“Six months I spent turning my cell block inside and out, running schemes to help get a fix. I did things I ain’t never gonna be able to take back. And then a man come up to me in the yard one day, and asked if I was ready. Just like that, asked if I was ready. I braced for a fight, a shiv to my belly, something. When nothing happened, he asked if I was tired of being me. And if I was ready to change. Till that day, I didn’t know you could change. Thought n-never crossed my mind. So, I told him sure. Be honest, thought he was holding something – thought he’d be offering it up; a quick fix I could take to pass another couple of hours. He told me to write a list. He said to write down everything I’d done, everything I hated, and everything bad that’d been done to me. And when I was done writing, to bring the list to him.

You ever try and write a history like that? I didn’t get it done that night, or the night after. A few weeks it took before I had what he was asking for. But I did it, and I gave it to him. That was the last I’d seen him in near a month.”

“Did he work for the warden?” I felt suspicious for Clark, and wondered if there was something more to the list. Clark’s eyes widened as he nodded.

“Th-that is what I thought. After a month, I was fixing to hurt him. Hurt him for holding what I’d written down. And when another week went by, I’d decided I was going to go after him. Was going to hurt him bad first, and then stick him. Man come to me a day later, grinning ear to ear. He gave me back my list, folded, same way I gave it to him. He told me he never looked at it – said he didn’t need to, he’d seen his own once, and didn’t expect much different. He gave it back, and said I needed to take it, to keep it. And he said that, when I was ready, I was to read it. I thought he was practicing some kind of voodoo shit, you see all kinds of weirdness inside them walls.

That night, I pulled my list from my pocket, and opened it slow-like. Had me just enough light to see my scribbles. I was expecting something to drop out, maybe some reefer rolled up in ass paper, or a stamp with the goofy glue on the back. There wasn’t anything in my paper – nothing but my pencil scratches. Had just a thin reach of light peeking into my cell, not enough to read by, though.

This is the part I’ll never forget. A moonlight finger come in from somewhere up the cell block. It crept across that cold floor of my cell, and then up the cell’s wall, and onto my paper. The light landed on the very first thing I’d written down. Later, I come to know that it was God’s finger pointing the way for me to see. And, by moonlight, I read my list, but had to stop halfway. It was too much for me to see all at one time. I cried that night. Was the first time in my miserable life I cried.”

“Is that the list?” I asked, pointing to the folded paper sticking out of the book. He lifted the book, and rested his hand back on the cover. Touching the paper, he answered,

“Yes. That’s it. I ain’t never read it again. Not since that night.”

“But, why?”

“I keep the list to remind me who I used to be. Time ain’t on my side – not up here in Clarksville,” he said, tapping his fingers against his head. “Time for me erases everything. Without something to remind me, I’ll forget. Can’t afford to forget. And I don’t ever want to be that person again. After that night, I went to that man, and asked him what he’d done. Man just looked at me with his silly grin again, and asked if I’d read my list. I told him I had, but that I had to stop. He put his hand on my arm, all gentle-like, and told me to meet him later. That afternoon, he gave me this book. He said you ain’t never have to feel the way you’re feeling. Not ever again. I read this book at l-least once a year.”

Questions about the detective and what happened with Ms. Potts were popping up in my head, and I wanted to ask. Even though this was Clark, I still felt nervous. Anxious.

“Did going to prison have anything to do with Ms. Potts? Or Detective Ramiz?” When I asked, Clark didn’t say a word. He stood in silence, and put his book back on the shelf. The sound of the book sliding into place seemed to last forever.

Finally, he said, “W-was sharing something with you, Gabby, was all I wanted to do. B-but, I can’t share nothing about that,” he answered with a look of disappointment. I’d hurt his feelings. Clark opened up to share something so very personal, and instead of listening to him, I went digging, like Ms. Potts had done with me. The nervous rattle inside kicked, and grew into guilt. I know what it is like being on the other side of questions. Questions that you don’t want to answer. There is a time to ask, and a time to listen, I heard in my head.

“Clark – I’m sorry. I am,” I breathed with guilt pressing on my words. He moved, and took a step forward, and I put my hand on his arm. I expected he might push past me, but he didn’t.

“Gabby, I wanted t-to share with you with a hope th-that one day, you might share with us. Your family.”

“I just wanted to know about Detective Ramiz, and what his interest is in you and Ms. Potts.” He sighed, and gestured a brief no.

“C-Can’t share that with you,” he repeated, and then went to the front.