By Sunnybunny
Heather watched the way Angie had left, apprehensively holding her breath, as if she anticipated the girl might come rushing back through the door for a sneak attack embrace. Later, she would wonder if she was imagining those things in hope or fear. She shook her head again, scattering the images and returning to the matter at hand. After all, it was looking as though she could be stranded for the foreseeable future.
The tower of baggage teetered in the corner, threatening to topple again and scatter the contents all over the carpeted floor. Best to put things away and keep herself distracted enough to focus on what needed to be done. She retrieved the first bag from the pile and tossed it open onto the bed, finding a mess of shirts within, most of them left unfolded.
In her haste to leave an old, unsatisfying life behind, she had neglected proper organization. Her mind flashed back to that night, a flurry of images of her old bedroom, tearing out the drawers from the dresser and upending them over open suitcases. In stark contrast, she scooped up the clothes and refolded them into a neat stack and stowed them away in the bottom drawer of the wide dresser against the wall. The mundane activity calmed her. Next came the jeans, organized from darkest colors to lightest, putting them away as well. She made a mental note to ask Walter for more hangers. The complementary three wire ones that had likely been there since the President Kennedy assassination were already occupied by her jacket and a few of her more extravagant outfits that she did not want wrinkled — any more than they already were.
“Knock-knock!”
Speak of the devil…
“Sorry, that took so long!” Walter announced in his booming, jovial thunderclap of a voice. “I was in the kitchen and got so wound up-hey, where did Angie get to?” He stole a glance around the room, blinking in surprise before turning his perplexed eye to Heather who shrugged.
“Sorry, but you just missed her.”
He chuckled at that, surprising Heather a little with his reaction after having been ditched by Angie after he had worked so hard to prepare an entirely separate meal. “Don’t that beat all!” he said, chuckling so hard the tray was rattling in his hands. “Told ya, you got to watch out for that one!”
“You… aren’t mad?”
“Naw,” he said, shaking his head slowly. “She’s just a young’un. Always running here or there after something! You know how kids are, can’t hold it against them.” He eased the tray onto the dresser, opening the two silver lids to reveal the meals. As in the movies, wisps of steam billowed out, and the room was alive with the fresh aroma. Suddenly, Heather remembered her appetite and was ravenous. How long had it been since she had enjoyed a home cooked meal? How long since she enjoyed a meal that hadn’t come prepackaged from a gas station, period? “Hope you’re hungry!”
Heather nodded her head, scooping up the plate of eggs and the offered fork and took a seat on the bed. Her belly cried out for nourishment and she happily obliged. After all, she thought, the only thing I’ve had to eat in the last day or so is an ice cream bar!
Walter was clearly in no hurry, folding his wide, hairy arms beneath the swell of his man-breasts and leaning heavily against the wall. “How long you in town for?” he asked, but there was nothing suspicious in his voice. More of that small town hospitality that Heather would have to get used to if she would be staying. Still, the idea nearly made the morsel of egg catch in her throat. She swallowed a gulp of orange juice to help it along before replying.
“I’m not really sure yet,” She replied honestly. Suddenly my financial stability has been brought into question was what she thought …but she didn’t say that. Instead, she went on, “Know anywhere here that could hook me up with a job?”
Walter lifted his eyes to the ceiling for a moment, giving the question some mulling over. “Well, might be,” he thought aloud. “I would offer you a place here but, as you can see….” He gestured a hand behind him, through the open door at the empty parking lot. “We’re not exactly bustin’ with business here.”
She smiled politely to hide her annoyance. “Anywhere else?”
“Always needing help at the local ranches,” he offered. “But that’s pretty hard labor out there, herdin’ livestock and you spend most of your day on the back of a horse. I could make a few phone calls if you want.”
Heather shook her head, hiding her frown in another few bites of eggs and drinks of juice. The theft had left her in a precarious position and though she had some other cash in the wallet in her purse, it wouldn’t last long, even here with the dirt cheap rent on the room. No, she would need to get a job, make nice with the locals until she found the money or figured out her next move. Her blood was boiling now, having settled back over the missing money (HER money), and Walter was not helping matters.
“Sorry, I ain’t being much help,” he murmured, perhaps sensing her growing displeasure. He looked down at the tips of his boots, grimacing with the effort of trying to think and be more helpful.
“Anything that doesn’t require me to get off work stinking of horses and cow pies?” She asked, trying to pass off her barbed comment as a playful jest.
“Angie’s daddy owns that garage out on main street,” he nodded his head to the far wall and stupidly Heather turned around to look at it. “He might could use a hand around or…” His face lit up and he slapped himself on the forehead. He bent forward at the waist and swept off his hat, revealing male pattern baldness. She wondered for a terrifying moment if this bow would end with a kiss to the back of her hand, making Heather’s skin crawl. “Kick me!” he laughed. “Kick me hard!”
“…Excuse me?”
“The diner!” he announced proudly, standing up straight and slapping his hat back into place. “You should ask old Mama Maven at the diner, just across the street there! Might could use a good waitress around. Shoot, she’s been runnin’ that whole joint for a dog’s age all by her lonesome! Bet she could use an extra pair of hands around.”
Internally, Heather grumbled. Was this what life was throwing her? A roadside diner waitress as a consolation prize? Her entire life, the daring escape, all funneling down to …this?
“Thanks, I’ll …look into that.”
Walter grinned all the wider, showing off every one of his yellowed teeth. “My pleasure! You just tell old Maven that I sent ya. If she can’t find something for you, I don’t know who can!”
Heather finished her plate in silence, dabbing the grease with a bit of toast before stacking it all back onto the breakfast tray. “Thank you,” she said, sincerely. “That was very nice of you to do.”
The big man blushed hard at that, shuffling around in his boots before busily taking up the tray, Heather’s empty plate, and Angie’s ignored one. “Don’t mention it,” he replied quietly, obviously flustered from the compliment and proximity. Heather wondered if the poor old guy was a virgin. It seemed likely. From what she had seen of Oasis, it wasn’t exactly a bustling community.
The air outside was considerably warmer now that the sun had risen but not so much to make it unbearable. Heather was careful to latch both locks adorning the front of her hotel room’s door and gave the knob a test pull for good measure. The last thing she needed was for more of her meager belongings to go missing. She had finished unpacking in Walter’s absence, thankful to be out from beneath his overeager gaze. Not that she did not trust the man, he was harmless, but he reminded her of an overly excited mongrel pup: amusing but quickly exhausting. Besides, how could she possible consider her predicament while prying eyes lingered?
The idea of finding a job had been a spur of the moment thought, something that would have normally come to mind and vanished just as quickly, dismissed. Yet now, staring down the barrel of nowhere near enough money to get to her destination, let alone funds to set herself up once she got there, her options were uncomfortably narrow. She felt caged, like a tigress that lived its whole life in the wild but was now in captivity, and her zookeeper was a middle-aged Mister Rogers with a beer belly.
The diner, much like the motel, was call simply that. No fancy or puny marquee to promote the establishment. When people spoke about it, it was simply ‘the diner,’ and everyone knew what they meant. It was more than a local eatery. More than just the local watering hole, the diner was a hub to fill up on coffee and gossip and in little towns, the latter was never in short supply. Likely, it was the only thing they had a surplus of, Heather mused as she crossed the road.
The diner was a T-shaped one story, looking like one of the sets from some old John Wayne flick had been renovated and converted into a place to get burgers. For all she knew, it was.
Further down the road, Heather spied the garage, the one owned by Angie’s father, and it looked just as deserted as it had when she arrived. The shutter doors were still wide open and the car was still raised up to the ceiling. A tumbleweed had caught itself between the stripped gas pumps, rustling in the breeze. She half expected Angie to be there, as if the girl was just waiting for Heather to appear so she could offer her hand in a friendly wave, but no…the child was nowhere to be seen. Heather breathed a sigh of relief to quell the feelings of disappointment as she climbed the narrow steps and pushed open the diner door.
Inside was refreshingly cool. A wall unit air conditioner hummed from a nearby window, accompanied by the lazy swirl of an overhead ceiling fan. It was more spacious than she anticipated. Outside, the building looked pretty modest but the interior was fashioned after an old 50’s sock hop, complete with stand-up jukebox in the corner. Upon closer inspection the jukebox was in a state of disrepair, and a thin layer of white dust told her it had been that way for some time. The front cabinet was unlocked and swung open with a slight prod from her fingers, revealing the silver guts of a mechanical interior. To her delight, the cluster of records available were era appropriate: Elvis Presley, The Drifters, The Coasters, Buddy Holly and the Crickets were on all on deck and ready to bat.
She moved away, passing a row of booths up to the bar where a soda jerk should have been poised to mix her up a chocolate soda. Instead, she found a bent back old crone of a black woman, hunkered down below the counter. Their eyes met, startling one another to cry out.
“Oh!”
“Whoa!”
The woman pressed a withered, brown hand to the small of her back and stood up to her full five feet of height. “Yes? Hello? What can I get you?” Her tone was polite but delayed in shaking off the surprise.
“Sorry,” Heather replied with a nod. “I didn’t mean to startle you. I was hoping you could help me. Are you Mama– I mean, Mrs. Maven?”
The woman frowned and cupped a hand over her cauliflower ear. “What’s that, Missy? Beggin’ your pardon, but the hearing went ‘round the same time as the eyes and this hearin’ aid don’t aid me much these days!” Heather spied a wad of worn, discolored plastic crammed into the hollow of one side of her head. Maven twisted it around a bit, scrunching her face up before asking again. “Now then, what did you order?”
“I didn’t order anything,” Heather said. “I came to ask about you a question, if you have time.”
“If I have them?” Maven echoed loudly. “If I have what, dearie?” Maven adjusted her lenses, thick as coke bottles and just as green.
“A question!” Heather raised her voice, her own strict upbringing making yelling at her nearly impossible. “I wanted to know if you need a hand!”
“No, no,” Maven replied firmly, shaking her iron-grey head, making Heather’s heart sink. “Everything here is made fresh, nothin’ canned!”
Heather sighed heavily, trying to quell her growing frustration and laid her hands flat on the counter top. “No,” she enunciated loudly, clearly. “I. Want. A. JOOOOOOB. I. Am. Looking. For. A. JOB.”
Realization dawned on Maven and she raised her chin, mouth forming a little ‘o’. “Well, why didn’t you say so!” she hollered. “You should check with old Walter Gates, just across the way there! Poor old man has to manage that whole place all by his-self! I’m sure a sturdy pair of hands will be just what the doctor ordered! Just tell him Mama Maven sent you!”
Heather had to work hard to keep from balling her hands up into fists. “I. Came. From. There. Walter. Told. Me. To. Ask. YOU! For. A. JOB!” Heather pointed a finger at Maven’s ample chest.
Maven blinked. “He did? Why, bless his heart! Yeah, I suppose I could use someone to help here but I warn you, it don’t pay all that much. I really only need part-time help with the breakfast and lunch rushes but it’ll put some money in your pocket.”
Heather nodded. “That sounds okay. Um, do you have an application? Oh, Do. You. Have. An. Application?”
Maven blinked at her again in confusion and she nearly repeated herself. “Shoot, no! I don’t need to see no resumé neither!” She laughed at that, a great throaty bark of a lifelong smoker that Heather couldn’t help but smile about. “I’ll pay you under the table at the end of every week. A good fair wage. Sound good to you, missy? Oh dear, I just hired you and don’t even know your name! Bless me, where are my manners? My name is Virginia Maven. Mama Maven to my friends and we are friends now, Miss…?”
Heather balked, nearly forgetting her assumed name. “Heather. Freemantle. Heather Freemantle.” They shook hands, apparently completing the hire process. “Always ready to meet new friends.”
Maven nodded and smiled a dentured grin. “Come on back tomorrow morning, six sharp. We open about half hour after that but that’s when we start prep for the breakfast crowd. Think you can manage?”
Heather grinned and flashed a thumbs-up.
She departed a few moments later after more raised voice pleasantries and breathed a sigh of relief. She had a job now, a steady source of income. At least that was a step in the right direction. It would buy her the time she needed to figure out her next move. A job at the local gossip mecca had its benefits. If someone DID suddenly come into a large sum of money or decide to skip town without a parting word, it would likely dominate conversation for months to come. She could get a name, maybe. Track them down, take what was rightfully hers by any means necessary and put Oasis in her rearview mirror where it belonged. Where the rest of the world had left it decades ago.
She could almost see it now, the wind whipping her hair into a frenzy as Heather sped out of the hamlet, sunglasses reflecting a distant setting sun. She imagined the recovered bag of cash stashed in the backseat, open wide to reveal the stacks of rubber-banded bills. She did not dare look to the passenger seat to see who the presence there would be, fearing she would spy Angie with her tanned legs raised and crossed over the dash. Would she be wearing that flimsy dress again…or nothing at all save for a pair of matching sunglasses?
Heather teetered down the front of the diner, steadying her hand against the short banister until she reached the bottom. She looked across at the service station and gasped aloud.
As if materialized from her imagination, Angie was seated out front, legs splayed open while she watched Heather. Her head was tilted slightly to one side, the dry wind teasing her hair in gentle waves. Her shorts and tank top seemed to blaze in the heat, and she raised her hand up in a greeting gesture. She couldn’t tell from this distance, but somehow Heather knew the girl was smiling.
The realization unnerved her, giving her a distinct sensation that Angie really had been waiting for Heather to emerge, had perhaps been watching her all along. Heather raised her hand and returned the wave, hesitated then headed back across the road toward her room.
Top drawer.
Beneath the stack of underwear, a neon purple vibrator.
After a time, she lost count.
I’m picking my daughter Holly up from school and looking for a parking space when she comes hurtling out from the school gate and streaks across the road without looking. Horns honk and tires screech.
“I hadn’t noticed that large painting above your fireplace,” I offered. “It’s very sensual! It almost looks like… ummmm, if the colors were a little different…”
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