Stop Here (2 page)

Mila sighs loudly.

It's her fault, souring her friends' mood. “Is there something else we can talk about?” she asks softly.

“How about a Bobby or Darla story we haven't heard before?” Mila offers with little enthusiasm.

“No offense, but that's duller than looking through a stranger's photo album.” Rosalyn flicks open her cell phone to search her messages.

“Then you come up with an idea. Or we'll sit here listening to our breathing,” Mila scolds.

“Fine.” Rosalyn shuts the phone, drums her fingers on the dashboard. “Let's tell a story. One of us starts, another continues, and on it goes.”

“Like a once-upon-a-time thing?” Mila asks.

“No, no. Not a fairy tale. It has to be real, important, dramatic, revealing, something that'll hold our attention,” Rosalyn tells her.

What in her story would be revealing, important? A shameful event from her teen years? Everyone has one, but which is hers? Something dramatic? Stealing a lipstick? Lying to her mother? Who cares? What would hold their attention? Maybe something about her dead husband; or that she hasn't had sex in years; or that she can't feel much. Or how her . . . Searching the night sky wishing her story were scripted there because whatever's ahead can only be imagined, yet wishing, too, she could scroll down dates and events and discover what led to here.

 

2

Reunion

Between five and six a.m. the weirdos arrive for coffee or handouts or just a booth for a nap. It's too early for real people, but somewhere out there, beyond the still-dark parking lot, Ava can hear the first few cars in what will become the morning rush. Nick is in the kitchen checking inventory. Bruce will show up late; Mila won't get there till ten; Rosalyn is probably still asleep. And Murray . . . well, he'll arrive at eight sharp to check on everyone.

The first pale light skips over the missing floor tiles illuminating the ashy black linoleum beneath. Soon the sun will burnish the white Cape Cod houses that dot the nearby shallow hills. Even on cloudy days, a narrow strip of pink appears in the sky for a few seconds. It's the play of light that tells her the hour, not the bold round clock on the wall.

For the only time all day, the marbled Formica counter is free of dirty dishes. On the back ledge there is an array of pies and cakes that arrive when she does. Taped on the wall over a tray of water pitchers and glasses is the list of blue-plate specials. Murray insists on varying them daily and it drives Nick crazy. How many different ways can you serve a piece of meat? The gold-edged mirror reflects empty red vinyl booths and small black tables. The last sugar container is filled and, bored, she's propped on a stool leafing idly through an old
Newsday
when the door chimes its ridiculous tune, and he walks in.

“Morning.” Clean blue eyes seem to seek her out.

“Coffee?”

“I'm starving.” He straddles the stool next to hers.

“What can I get you?” she asks as she stands up and moves behind the counter. She's already pouring coffee and laying out silverware as she hands him a menu, which she normally does without thinking. This time she feels different, questioning herself.

He points to number three,
Lumberjack Special
. Ham, eggs, hash browns, rye toast, and pancakes.

She gives herself a second cup of coffee.

“My name is Mark.”

She waits for a second. Clearly he isn't from around here. “Ava. You passing through?” She registers the blue denim shirt tight across square shoulders, and guesses he's entering his fifties. A thin man carrying weight. Her husband was barrel-chested.

“I'm the new owner of Cross Country Trucks, Long Island and Denver. You must've seen the green and white billboard on Sunrise Highway. I'll be working both places now. I'm renting an apartment in Wantagh.”

It's where she lives. Her small house is one of many look-alikes, the highway close enough to hear the traffic, but she hasn't seen the billboard. She piles two orders of toast and serves his eggs, then waits at the open ledge between the kitchen and the restaurant for Nick to deliver the pancakes. For a moment Nick's dark eyes fasten on her. It seems he has something to say, but he doesn't, so she makes busywork at the other end of the counter till she hears the plate slide toward her.

“Is this the end of your night shift?” Mark asks.

“I work four hours dawn and four noon. It gets me time to sleep.”

“That your son?” He points at Bobby's photo, stuck into the side of the mirror. She never wants to be far from him. She nods, unsurprised since Bobby looks just like her.

“How old is he?”

“Soon to be eleven.” For a moment she too gazes at Bobby's thin, sharp-featured face, his blond hair a bit long and shaggy, a sociable child who is curious about foreign places.

“His father must be proud of him?”

“He was killed in an army helicopter crash. He never met Bobby.” The words leave her mouth before she can check them.

He puts down the fork. “How awful for you.”

She looks at him, a customer, not even a regular. There's no way he can understand the unceasing pain that was her husband's death, which finally faded to an indifference she's vowed never to disturb.

“I was lucky,” Mark says. “Too young for Vietnam, too old for Iraq.”

Luck is for people with money, she doesn't say.

“I imagine you never get over that kind of loss,” he offers softly.

“You go on,” she says, more to herself. When Bobby was a baby and threw his toys on the floor, she'd retrieve them—again and again—to teach him that what leaves comes back. Except she doesn't believe it herself. Or in the power of love to last either.

“Breakfast is fuel,” he declares as if suddenly embarrassed, and mops up what's left of the eggs.

She was never good at small talk. She begins filling napkin holders and hears the swiveling stool, senses him watching her.

“You're good at that.”

“I can eat fast too, but what does that get me?”

She stuffs the last container with too many napkins, thinks about wiping the counter even though it doesn't have a speck on it.

“No insult meant, truly.” He catches her eye with his surefire blue gems.

“None taken. Is this your first time in New York?” she's surprised to hear herself ask.

“Lord, no. I lived in Manhattan for seven years a decade ago. Still miss it.”

“Why?”

He takes a sip of his coffee. “People, I'd say. I like people, all kinds. It's what you have there. Turn a corner, hear one language, next corner, another. It's exciting.”

“It's refreshing to hear the city described lovingly for a change.”

“You ever been to Colorado?” He leans toward her with his elbows planted on the counter. She notes the grime-free nails, odd for someone working trucks. Then again, he's the owner.

“No.” When was the last time she left Long Island?

“Imagine a hammock in a field of wildflowers, spectacular cloud formations. Think you'd like that?” He smiles, two dimples.

“Sounds like a resort.”

“I suppose . . . You ever travel?” His expression is inquisitive as if he's discovered something in her that sets her apart.

“I don't see travel in my near future.”

“It's close by plane, my house in the cup of the mountains. You'd fit right in.” He smiles once more. Men flirt with her all the time, though she can't imagine why. Her narrow face with its too-thin nose is intense, unsmiling. Some try to coax a smile, which makes her self-conscious, tighter, as if giving in would be a loss. Dina tells her to rouge her pale cheeks. Maybe she will, someday. Once in a rare while she has a drink with a regular, usually Mila or Rosalyn with her. A mother can't allow strange men into her bedroom.

She gathers up his dishes, sweeps the counter clean, and notices Nick watching her before he glances at the clock. Because of Mark she's missed the sunrise and quickens her pace for the early rush. Mostly it's men with faces weathered from outdoor work in the new construction sites near Jones Beach. They arrive famished in SUVs and vans, dropping half-lit cigarettes on the diner steps, which Murray picks up each morning. Women come on later after leaving their kids at school or day care. She lifts a two-pound bag of coffee off a nearby shelf; fills three urns with water. Then she twists her hair into a ponytail, fastens it with a barrette, and sticks two pencils in her pocket. Mark's eyes are on her all the while.

“I'll be using the diner's hospitality for my meals, unless you know a better place.” Only it isn't a question.

• • •

Two weeks of diner breakfasts, two weeks of conversations, and she lets him visit Bobby and her at home for the first time on a Sunday morning. Most people talk about how a boy needs a father, but who discusses how a man needs a son? She's seen men play nice with kids to get to their mothers, but his interest isn't feigned. Bobby is the missing ingredient in his life, and Bobby knows it immediately.

On a few of her days off he drives them to places they've never been: a strip of beach at the end of Long Island with edge-of-the-world rock formations; a park where the scent of cherry blossoms is thick enough to bottle; a seafood restaurant where he teaches Bobby how to crack open a lobster's shell with a knife blow to the belly. After two months he asks to stay over. To her surprise, she doesn't demur, except to say she hasn't slept with a man in years, which probably makes her a virgin again. He chuckles, even though she hadn't meant it as a joke.

That first time he makes love hesitantly. As he does, the memory of her husband enters the bed along with the long-forgotten certainty of her husband's arms, his repeated promise to please her like no one else could, which he had. It was eons since she'd heard his voice and it felt like a warning.

Mornings she has to be up by four and she makes Mark leave with her. Although Dina comes by each day to wake Bobby and help him prepare for school, she isn't ready to have her meet Mark.

By May, they're at her place most of the time, where he spends hours teaching Bobby the mysteries of the outdoors: the difference between a boat and a ship, how to read trail markers, what flies lure trout. He describes the privilege of meeting ravens, hearing birdsong, discerning wind direction, a life invisible to city boys.

In bed together it's easier, although she blames herself and her dead husband for never fully relaxing. Time, she needs more, she tells herself, except he's preparing to leave in a few weeks. The Denver piece of his business needs tending to, and he won't return until September.

• • •

On a June night as sticky as August, the three of them are in her living room playing Scrabble.

“That's it. My game,” she declares.

“Mom always wins.”

“We'll have to work harder to change that.” Mark winks at her.

“Very hard, indeed,” she says.

“Bobby, would you like a summer in Colorado?” Mark asks.

For a moment her son is as stunned as she is, then he grabs her hand. “Mom, please, can I, please? I'd really love it. Mom?”

“We'll camp in the mountains. There are some old caves to explore. I have a canoe, a sailboat, too. We'll hike; we'll trout fish . . .” Whatever Mark sees in her face checks his eagerness. He folds her hand in his. “I should have asked you first. It kind of came on me. If you don't agree . . .”

“Mom? Listen. It's hot in the city. I'll hardly have anyone to hang out with. It's such a good idea. And you have to work.”

True, and Murray's about to change her schedule yet again, straight shift, ten to dawn, beginning in July. She's already taken over a chunk of the ordering. Now he's showing her the books, bills, lists of salespeople. He isn't a good teacher; she has to concentrate. She'll have to sleep some during the day. What will Bobby do? Languish in this old living room watching TV, the couch too shabby for words, the walls in need of painting? Is that the kind of summer she wants for him?

“Will he have his own room?” That's not what she needs to know, but it's a start.

“Yes. And don't worry about expenses. Believe me, the fare's no big deal.”

Bobby's pulling on one hand, Mark pressing the other, and King Solomon comes to mind.

“He's not used to country life.” Okay, that's closer, but to what?

“He'll go to the warehouse with me now and then, but we'll have plenty of time for everything else.” He releases her hand but his eyes remain steady on her.

“Let me think,” she says, but thinking is impossible. Bobby's fingers are cuffing her wrist like she's his prisoner. It's clear what he wants. And yet . . .

“Mom? Listen. If I don't like it I'll come home. But Mom . . . listen? I'm going to love it. Sailing? Where can we go sailing here?”

Her son's excitement is infectious. She glances at Mark. He's been reliable, consistent, even devoted, she'd say. He has a good effect on Bobby. On her, too. The last months have been positive for the three of them. Isn't that enough to hold on to for seven weeks?

• • •

Bobby's face is still glowing in her head when she arrives at the diner. He was so eager to get on the plane, his hug and kiss so quick. It was all she could do not to grab him before he disappeared past security.

Dina is having an early lunch at the counter, as usual. “You let him take Bobby for the summer. A stranger? I don't care if you slept with him. I don't care how much they like each other.” Mila, who never keeps a thought to herself, promptly starts talking about those priests: You know, the kindest men on the planet. Who would have guessed! Her friends' words fire her imagination. Rosalyn slips an arm around her. “Listen, trust yourself. You know the guy, don't you?”

“Of course,” she shoots back. “Mark isn't a stranger. I know where he lives, where he was born, his upbringing, where he went to school, his past jobs, what he wants for this new business.”

“So?” Rosalyn says, “What more do you want? Unless . . . something in you isn't sitting right.”

“That's not the point. The man hasn't passed the test of time,” Dina says.

“It'd be different if you went with him, but that's expensive,” Mila offers.

“Hey,” Murray calls from the kitchen. “What is this?”

• • •

The lunchtime crowd is heavy, demanding. She won't miss it when she starts her new hours. She moves fast from table to counter to kitchen, all the time listening for the ring of her cell phone in her pocket. He's only been gone a few hours, but her nerves are shot and her friends' warnings are corrosive. She tries to put their words aside, but it's no use. She apologizes twice for giving the wrong check to a customer. She hurries the hours. Bobby will call as soon as they land. When the phone rings she runs out to the parking lot even though Murray is watching. Bobby's voice sounds so near. He's at the Denver airport; elated, he says they're leaving early the next morning for a few days of camping. The two of them alone in the mountains. That spooks her too.

• • •

Two days later, she finds herself at the Port Authority bus terminal, ticket in hand, a small travel bag over her shoulder, her adrenaline pumping. Dina, Mila, and finally Rosalyn, too, agreed that she had to do this or never sleep again. She weaves her way past food kiosks, panhandlers, and vendors to the Cruiser Line gate. Murray's displeasure follows her. She told him she'd only be gone several days; it was family business. “Who would you know west of Long Island?” Yeah, she said, that far.