However, there were customers present who still needed their re-fills, and some of the lot hadn't even been waited on yet. "You know, you could at least try." Chris' voice rang mockingly through his head. True, Jack hadn't been the best of waiters, yet it almost seemed as though he had gained some respect because of this; it was his first day on the job.
-----
The rain continues.
Jack pans once more over his customers, the audience waiting for the slip, for the chance they might get to hurl their tomato. Of course, he was a bit worried on his first day; and although he knew that these patrons weren't exacting his every move, the rain didn't help. The rain changed Jack. It did. It was a claustrophobic sensation, the walls closing in. He knew this was the calm (and he should have taken it likewise), that there would be nothing new coming his way, a significant depletion in the customer walk-in rate, until it cleared, yet he felt stuck--tied down to his customers and showing them his errors.
Still in the diner was Marcy, who had been there since 11:00; Earl, who entered just before the trickle; a couple unknown to Jack; a group of friends, men; lastly, an older lady--brunette. Ryan stood erect, tall, next to the group of guys, pen in hand, seemingly annoyed by their lackadaisical effort on choosing what to eat. Jack could almost hear him thinking, "Are they even paying for their coffee?". The kitchen was noisy, but with social balderdash, not the sizzling griddle or clamber of pans.
Mr. Frank had gone away in quite the discreet manner. It was right as Tina began her quiet chatter to Jack that Frank stepped out. As the matter of fact, it was nearly right as he exited the Easy that the rain started. He left without a trace, and Jack had been curious in the kitchen--"Where's Mr. Frank?" he asked as the cooks looked up, their faces exclaiming the question of why are you so curious?
Jack realized it was none of his business but thought he would make it his business before long.
Between the time of Tina's testimonial and the rainstorm, Jack had been toying with the idea of Bomb Squad Frank, trying to decide who to share the gossip with. It had just been shown that the cooks were uninterested, even frowning at Jack's interest. It figured to be the same with all other employees excluding Tina. Therefore, tickled with curiosity, Jack began his step toward Tina. She was idle behind the cash register.
"Tina," he initiated, with novice nervousness.
"Yea, sweetie?""
"Mr. Frank--it's about Mr. Frank: how come no one who works here's ever talked to him. Well, you know what I mean. How is it no one's really said much of anything to him?--well, of course except for his order and the little things."
Through all of this Tina was silent, devotedly attented to the Jack in front of her; she had taken the glasses from the bridge of her nose and let them fall to her bust, hanging on the cords that held them to her neck.
"Ya know, I really can't say--Have you ever tried it? I mean, really try to say something to him. You always get this feeling inside, like all the things you knew how to say had dried up in a desert."
Jack took this insight; a type of note-to-self. He glanced back to the corner booth, empty, and felt parched already. Before he could think any longer, the budding waiter inside of him raised this question: "Why Jack, if you're so thirsty, what can you say of your customers?" He looked to Marcy, the one he was to be attending. Yea, it looked like she could use another cup of joe, but there was more. Marcy looked lonely; she looked as if she emanated loneliness in a radius around her. So much so that Jack was a bit worried to walk over and be caught in her net of gloom.
She was still his to look after, so he grabbed the coffee pot. "Who knows," he thought delightedly to himself, "maybe a cup of coffee is just what she needs." Jack liked to think of himself as an uplifting waiter.
Marcy looked up now, cold eyes, and Jack poured down the warmth. He snatched a vacant chair and sat with her, across from her.
"Marcy. Don't mind if I sit?" Jack started.
"That's fine, Jack. Looks pretty easy now. The rain is coming down and it don't bother you--no more customers for a bit."
Just as she said this, the door swung open and the little bell sounded. It was Gabe, wiping himself down and discarding a wet newspaper into the trash bin. Jack heard the calling, and with a little dread, began to pick himself up from the comfort of conversation.
Ryan reassures "I got it," as he passes away from the group of guys, still indecisive on their order. Ryan may not seem enthusiastic about his job, but performance-wise he's considered the top, even beating out oldie Tina. It's why he's head waiter.
Relieved, Jack continued:
"Saved." A pause, while Jack observes Marcy, who drinks her fresh coffee down. Soothing. "So what's eating you? You look on the sad side."
"Oh, it's nothing. It's the rain." She answered back immediately, but with discomfort. Now she only stared down at her mug and swished it around.
"Maybe some food. You think maybe that'll cheer you up?"
"No, I'm not hungry."
Conversation had halted, had been halting. Jack realized that it wasn't easy to talk to unhappy customers. He began searching his head for topics of interest, unable to pin anything that seemed to be a conversation stimulator. How he had forgotten! Mr. Frank! Jack could easily tell her about Bomb Squad Frank. And so it started, it spilled out:
"You know Mr. Frank, right? Corner booth, weird fella. I heard some pretty crazy stuff about him."
Marcy was delighted, interested. Jack had won.
"Yea, Frank." said Marcy with a smile.
"Yea, I heard he's ex-bomb squad; you know, like counter-terrorist, defusal type." Marcy's smile faded at this. Jack was making an effort to keep her interest: "Story goes, his team is killed in an explosion and he's the only one left...Yea, no kidding. Like, the guilt has to be overwhelming. It's why he's so quiet and kept to himself."
Marcy had been in a type of frown for a minute or so. Was she tearing? Her face and eyes were red and warm. After a pause she says:
"That's not true."
This shooed Jack; uncomfortable, unwanted. "Well that's what Tina told me." Awkward silence. Jack looked around, unable to retain eye contact with Marcy who was looking laxly downward.
The rain continues.
Jack had an idea. A smirk grew on his mouth, and he looked to Marcy; half-inspired, half-curious--he tries once more.
"Ok, ok; Tina is known to gossip, I guess. Right? I mean, she's old. Wives-tales and whatnot." Now more serious--"I'm sorry. He's not who I think. But apparently you've got some kind of opinion on him...who is Frank?"
She sips her coffee and lets it drink down. She says to Jack confidently, "Frank is a friend."
"So you know him? Personally?" Jack asked almost instantaneously.
"No," Mary corrected, "no, not personally; look, it's a long story--"
"That's fine, I'm not going anywhere."
"It's complicated.."
Marcy felt downtrodden, wanting to explain her view of Mr. Frank while at the same time knowing she didn't want Jack to be mixed up in this all. She stirred, emotionally. Jack saw that she wasn't going to take this any further and stepped in thusly--
"Marcy, just tell me. I know it sounds crazy, but--if I could only make sense of this feeling you would--it's an itch; one that I can't scratch because I can't reach it. And even if I could, I wouldn't know where to start scratching because I don't know who Mr. Frank is."
"Why is he so important to you!?" Marcy calls back surprised at a seemingly overt dramatized plea.
"Curiosity, I guess." Jack began, "It's just bugging me. So far, no one who works here can give me an answer that isn't contradicted thereafter." By now, he had already filled a mug with coffee for himself. It was starting, Frank was unraveling. "Yeah, and why do I care so much? I don't know," a sip of coffee, "maybe it's because no one here does. How can someone so regular go unnoticed?"
Marcy retorted, "Maybe that's what he wants: to be unnoticed. And maybe the people just respect that."
It was here that Ryan butted in. In the midst of orders and re-fills, he had just enough opening to ask, "What's going on over here?"
Jack returned, "I'll get back to work in a sec, Ryan. Just hold on--"
"Gabe says the rain'll stop soon," Ryan cut in, "I can hold until then." He could hold until then. Eyeing down an empty mug, his calling, he leaves them to their conversation.
Continuing: Jack inquires casually, "Who is he? Marcy, tell me who he is."
"Ok," she agreed, "I'll tell you how I first noticed him. Rather, how he first noticed me."
"It was about 3 months ago, when Tim and I broke up. He dumped me, of course. We had been dating for a year. You know how it was, Jack, don't you? I was a wreck. I'd come here everyday and drink my coffee alone. I was definitely not who I am now...Well, I guess I still do that today," she chuckled, "but you know what I mean. I was a loner."
"It was late and some hipster-freak decided to play that Miles Davis album ya'll have on the juke. Bye Bye Blackbird. I couldn't stand it. Don't get me wrong, I love Miles, especially his cool blues. But when that song started I couldn't bear it. I darted outside there on the bench and cried. Right out there. You see? Right on that bench out there I cried."
"So it just happened to go that this was about the time Frank would normally go out for his smoke. He did come out and he saw me sobbing over there and he sat by me. Jack, I would be lying if I told you I hadn't been afraid. I was scared. Frank is a powerful man; I don't know if you've noticed, but he's got this aura about him. I can't explain..It was dark, remember? And Frank lit up sure enough, giving off just enough light to show his face; that face of his..it's his mouth, the length of it." Marcy shudders, "Yea, he was creepy in the dim light of a cigarette just started."
"He looked at me and says to me just like this: 'Boy troubles? He quit you? You don't know how to handle yourself, don't have anything to do because he isn't there to tell you to do it?' I was just stone quiet; I had stopped crying, just gazing there at him. He says to me, 'You're your own person now, thanks to him; really, thanks to him.'"
"And after that all he stood up and stomped his cigarette out and left me."
Marcy felt like she had just relieved a massive barbell from her shoulders; she felt better from letting it be told. Jack was too caught up with her story that it took him a second to realize that she was done speaking. Thirsty for more, he started up the conversation again:
"And what happened next? Did you talk to him. He talk to you? I mean, you're the only person I know of that Mr. Frank's ever said anything to. At least more than 'sunny-side up.'"
"There's more to tell," Marcy told him with some uninterest, "but it's really nothing much." She could see that Jack needed something more, some closure to the story, so she decided to tell him the rest--all of it.
"Ok. Well, after that I went home, and all I can remember is that it was really late. I fell straight asleep and I dreamt. I dreamt an epiphany. It was like--it's hard to explain. I felt wonderful, and i could feel the wind on my face, as if I were flying. But, you see, the catch is: I couldn't see anything. There weren't any pictures in this dream, just pleasure. That's all I remembered, anyhow, when I woke up."
"The next morning I come here, to the Easy, to talk to Frank. I thanked him, and told him that I appreciated what he said the night before. I offered to buy him coffee, but all he said was, 'No thanks.' At least he listened. Frank's a good listener; that's what I always thought about him. Anyways, I invited him to dinner at my house as a gift of appreciation. I was going to make spaghetti. Frank just wiped his mouth and shook his head and I knew it was rejection. It hurt. He looked at me with a face I have never seen on him before. It was like disapproval beaming straight at me."
"That went on for a bit until he lifted his mug and said, 'When people contend for their liberty, they seldom get anything for their victory but new masters.' He drank and put his mug down with some force; I remember a sip of coffee spilled out when the mug met the table. After that he didn't look at me. He just payed out 10 bucks on the table and got straight up and left."
The rain stops falling.
Jack is squelched. He has only nothing to say and everything to think about. And Marcy is tired and relieved in the same instance.
She concludes: "But, Jack, I still don't get it. That quote--i never really figured out who said it, but I knew it wasn't his--it didn't matter. I'm not that kind of person; I didn't 'contend' for Tim to leave me. I want someone. I need to be a pet. That's just..me."
Jack learned. Marcy dug through her purse and retrieved an envelope, pink. It was sealed and, in fine cursive writing, had Frank's name written on it. She wanted Jack to deliver it.
