“They’re simple, Helen, like salad, but rolled up.”
“Huh.” She looked back toward the kitchen, then examined the ceiling. “Goddamn place needs painting.”
“Yeah,” he drew the word out.
She went behind the counter and took the carafe, splashing coffee into her mug. He looked at her hands. The cuticles were stained with red-eye gravy, a variety of food smudges over her fingers. He glanced at her waist. She had been trying to diet lately, eating a lot of tuna and lettuce, though she liked to sop up the salad dressing with heels of Italian bread. She hit the No Sale button and extracted a coin envelope and slid it across the counter.
“What’s this?”
“It’s Friday,” she said. “Pay.”
“Oh yeah, forgot.” The envelope was tight with stuffed bills, thicker than usual. She didn’t like to write checks. She believed that a business should pay as it goes, avoid building up debt.
“It feels thick,” he said.
She always smiled when she paid him. He thought she might have read in some management book that you’re supposed to smile when you pay the help. She flipped her guest pad and recited: “Nineteen grilled-cheese steaks, eleven shrimp baskets, five Roman omelets, and seven bowls of Firebird Chili, Kenneth, just seven. Your chili did not achieve celebrity status.”
“It’s real chili with hand-picked Mexican habanaros,” he defended.
“It’s too damn hot,” she pronounced.
He felt a little hurt. “I’ll fix it, make a foot-long sauce that’ll make love in your mouth.”
They locked eyes. Helen swallowed the last of her doughnut, then licked the sugar from between her thumb and forefinger.
“Well…you know what I mean,” he trailed off.
She moved down the counter, poured some water and drank it, then turned to look at him. “No, I don’t know what you mean. Exactly what do you mean, Kenneth Tucker?” He knew it was trouble when she called him by his full name.
“I don’t mean nothin’,” be blurted quickly, struggling to say what was on his mind.
“What I know is you been acting weird for days, sneaking around here like a guilty rabbit.”
“That’s not true,” he snapped, nervously shaking a cigarette out of the pack.
Helen slammed the chalk down on the counter, smashing it into shards and dust. “Goddamn it, if you’ve got something to say, say it, because I know what it is anyway, Kenneth Tucker.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“It’s your name, isn’t it?”
They looked toward the door, where Moses, the lumpy boxer, was whining and scratching to get in. He licked the glass, cocking his head to one side. Helen went and unlocked it. Moses made his way toward the back, checking under each booth for scraps. Helen had done a good job this time and he whined some more. Looking sorrowful, he dropped down in a heap in front of the jukebox. He knew if he bided his time and wasn’t too much of a bother, dinner would be forthcoming. Kenneth eyed Moses resentfully. She has more regard for him than me, he thought.
Helen retreated to the kitchen and was banging things around. “I know what’s going on,” she yelled out the service window.
He splashed coffee into his mug and drew on the cigarette. What the hell’s goin’ on? he asked himself. Then he thought, This is taking a bad turn.
“I heard ’bout it,” Helen yelled.
“What? What’d you hear?”
“That you’d been down to King Street looking at the storefront where the barbecue place closed. I know what’s up.” He had looked at the storefront. He did have ideas about someday opening his own place, a place the two of them could have, use some of that expensive training, but under a different name. Maybe do a higher-level menu, but nothing too fancy. Something people would like. They could make a decent living, together, maybe. But he wasn’t going to mention that until he’d worked things out with her.
“You’re gonna open a little gourmet paradise, aren’t you? Poison some more good folks. Isn’t that your plan?”
He stood up, angry. “I told you that in private, Helen. For you to bring that up is just…ugly.”
“There’s an extra week’s pay in your envelope,” she shouted. “Take it and get out.” He felt the lump in his pocket. That explained the stuffed envelope. He was completely flustered. He looked at Moses threateningly. This was not part of his plan. Should he just walk out? Slowly, he took a guest check, touched the pencil to his tongue, and wrote on it, then slid it cautiously through the service window. She snatched it up. A moment later it sounded like she hammered the stove with a cast-iron frying pan. Moses jumped up and whimpered. The banging seemed to strike his chest. The coffee suddenly turned Kenneth’s stomach sour and he retreated to the head.
