“What else have we got to do around here?” he asked, and grinned so big his dentures slipped around. “Thank God there’s a new face now and then.”
A couple of Boulder City cops rode their mountain bikes up to the front of the diner, parked them where they could keep them in sight and sauntered into the diner. The sight of them made her instantly nervous and afraid of being recognized, but they seemed more intent on breakfast than anything. Ryan, the pudgier of the two, said, “Well now—what biker gang are you from?”
“Schwinn,” she answered, pouring his coffee.
His partner and a couple of other diners laughed, but Ryan just shook his head and said, “Schwinn? I haven’t heard of that gang. Schwinn?”
She met Sam the Vet, Judge Mahoney, and the girls from the beauty shop. The joggers were Merrilee and Jeanette, and by their third morning they were calling out “Hey Doris” as they came in the door.
A nice-looking young man came in late one morning and Buzz told her to go introduce herself to Louise’s other next door neighbor, Alex.
She took the coffeepot over and said, “Hi, I’m Doris. I see your neighbor Louise in here every morning.”
“Hmm,” he replied, turning the page on his paper and snapping it open with a sharp shake. She poured him coffee.
“And Alice. We keep dog treats on hand for her.” He said nothing. He peered at her from behind the paper, frowning as he took her in. “Bald,” she said. “Completely bald. Cream? Sugar?” He merely shook his head and went back to his paper. “Not friendly at all,” she reported to Buzz.
“He’s the tall, handsome, quiet type,” Buzz said.
“Definitely tall. And quiet,” she said. “Handsome is as handsome does.”
Jennifer was often seen wandering around town in her baggy green-and-tan fatigue pants, an oversize work shirt, a windbreaker tied around her hips, hiking boots and the backpack that was always with her. She went from the diner to the Sunset to the library to the park and back to the diner. And as she went, she was very observant, always on the lookout for that long black limo. But it did not reappear.
The weather was cool and mostly cloudy with occasional showers, so she spent most of her time indoors, passing the time with reading. Four-thirty came very early, which put her to bed by eight or nine, and for this she was very grateful—she had no desire to flop around all night, worrying about a lot of things over which she had little or no control—like being whacked by her ex-beau.
One evening she left the Sunset at bedtime to venture back to the diner. She had a cup of coffee and piece of pie on her mind. There were no customers present. She found Gloria seated on a stool at the counter and Buzz standing opposite her. Adolfo was in his booth at the far rear, newspaper spread out in front of him.
“Well, a person would think you’d had enough of this place for one day,” Gloria trumpeted.
“I was remembering that apple pie,” Jennifer said. “And the Sunset doesn’t have TVs in the rooms.”
“I been meaning to get a TV for this place,” Buzz said. “But then Gloria would never do a lick of work.”
“Probably true. Sit up here, girl. Buzz, get the girl a cuppa.”
“You don’t ever go home, do you, Buzz?” Jennifer asked as she climbed on the stool.
“There ain’t anyone at home,” he answered, giving her a cup. He poured coffee into both hers and Gloria’s, then he pulled a silver flask out of his pocket and held it over Jennifer’s cup. She shook her head no, but Gloria tapped her cup with her spoon.
“Ah,” Jennifer said, catching on. “Happy hour.”
“Something like that,” Gloria said.
“I go to my family at supper,” Adolfo informed her from the back of the diner. “My Carmel, she is a better cook than even me. We eat an early meal, then I come back most nights. But Señor Buzz, he can manage if I have need to be home. He doesn’t like anyone to know, but he can cook.”
“We trade off pretty good,” Buzz said. “I like it here. Always liked it here. This old diner is a whole lot friendlier than my house. You want ice cream on that pie?”
“Please,” she said. It was kind of nice not to think about the calories for once. This was a big change for her, and she genuinely hoped she wouldn’t grow into her baggy pants. Her mouth was watering before she could dig her spoon into the delicious dessert.
She was so busy eating that she never heard the soft knocking at the back door. Adolfo got up to see who was there, and with the door partially open revealing a man in an old and worn coat, he called, “Señor Buzz. Someone here for you.”
“Let him in, Adolfo. I got just the thing.”
Buzz went back to the kitchen and came out with a steaming bowl and basket of rolls while Adolfo let an old ratty-looking man into the diner. The old guy was in need of a shave, and he shuffled as if his ankles were tied together with a foot-long rope. Without saying a word, the man took the seat at the end of the counter and Buzz put the soup and bread in front of him. He then served the man a cup of coffee and poured plenty of cream in it.
The only person who didn’t understand what was going on seemed to be Jennifer, who watched the man out of the corner of her eye while she ate her pie.
Adolfo came out of the pantry in his coat, cap on his head. “I’m away,” he said to Buzz. “Señora, Señorita—hasta mañana.”
While Buzz was busy with something in the kitchen, Gloria talked about her husband, Harmon, who had had a stroke four years before. She found him on the garage floor, near death. Somehow he pulled through, but with fewer than half his former capabilities. He couldn’t communicate very well, but she claimed to do all the communicating for him. He went from bed to wheelchair to bed and could only be left alone for periods of a couple of hours at a time, so when she worked or ran errands, her neighbor looked in on him and called Gloria’s cell phone if she was needed. “To tell the truth, I work for a break. You have no idea how hard it is to take care of an invalid. Hard on the heart, too.”
The man at the end of the counter stood up and shuffled out the back door without a word, without a thank you or a goodbye.
“Is he homeless?” Jennifer asked.
“Oh my, no. He lives a couple of blocks away. Widower. We don’t see too much of him, but Buzz always reminds him that by the end of the day there’s usually food that’s going to get thrown away, if he’s interested. Once in a while, he comes down here and relieves us of the waste.” Gloria got up and cleared away the old man’s plates. “Not much of a tipper,” she laughed. And then, “You’re welcome,” she yelled toward the door.
The next couple of weeks Jennifer learned that there was much more to the diner than met the eye. More specifically, there was so much more to Buzz. His waitresses needed their jobs—jobs that seemed to be specifically designed for them. And he seemed to have a regular clientele of hungry people who needed a charitable bite to eat. Jennifer even saw Buzz tip his flask over a cup of coffee a transient was having.
“Did I see you just give that man a drink?”
“Appeared he needed one,” Buzz said, clearly not interested in discussing it.
And then she realized that Buzz had his own little meals-on-wheels service. He frequently excused himself from the diner for just a few minutes with a take-out carton in a grocery-store sack. Or he’d ask Adolfo or Hedda if they’d drop something by Miss Simms’s or Mr. Haddock’s place as they were leaving. It didn’t appear to be a scheduled service, unless he had a schedule in his head. Buzz seemed to know when and where to fill a need.
Saturday