Chapter 7 #5
“Oh, and Wanda, I don’t want to speak out of turn, because I don’t know if Levi works here regularly, but he really was a lifesaver tonight. My ribs are still super sore and my cast gets in the way,
and had it not been for him carrying those heavy glass racks out from the dish room and busing most of the tables, I don’t know that I would’ve made it through.”
She considered me for a brief moment before her gaze traveled to the hallway leading to the dish room.
“I’ve been on the fence about hiring Levi,” she confessed.
I wanted to ask her why, but I felt like that might be prying, and if she ran through all of her reasons out loud, she might decide not to hire him permanently. So, I waited quietly while she made up her mind.
“I’ll tell him to keep coming back,” she said at last. “The town’s probably gonna give me flak for it, but it ain’t like any of the high school kids have worked out.”
“Super,” I said, feeling relieved that I’d secured Levi both a means for regular meals and ready cash, even if I didn’t know why the town would give Wanda flak over hiring a kid who was clearly desperate.
Offering her a final smile and a wave, I headed to the same hallway she’d been eyeing, which led to the stairs that would take me back to the loft.
After making my way up to the loft, I flipped on the overhead light, which Wanda had turned off after she’d given me a tour of the place. The area glowed with that same harsh, white light, and it made the place look stark and even more uninviting.
After getting two of the space heaters going, I went over to the bathroom door, opened it, and surveyed the interior.
It housed a small wall-mounted sink, a pink toilet with a turquoise-colored seat and lid, and a curtain hiding a shower head and drain.
There was a bar of soap on the sink but not a separate one for the shower, which was just as well.
I’d buy another tomorrow at the grocery store.
I peeled off my clothes, which smelled like grease, and wrapped my cast with the plastic bag, taking care to cinch it tightly to prevent any water from getting in. Then I took a long, hot shower, which felt amazing—like I hadn’t had one in ages.
I realized once I’d turned off the water that I didn’t even have a comb to get the tangles out of my hair, so I used my fingers the best I could, and patted the long damp strands with another towel.
I avoided looking in the mirror too long.
Seeing a stranger staring back at me wasn’t a soothing feeling, but one thing I did realize while I was finger-combing out my hair was that, at some point, I’d had highlights.
There was at least a half year of growth between my crown and the top of the highlights, which made me wonder why I’d stopped getting them.
Had I been down on my luck? Was it that I couldn’t afford them anymore?
I then examined the ends of my hair, noting a lot of split ends. Not only had I not gotten highlights in a long time, but I hadn’t had my hair cut either.
Why? What’d prevented me from getting just the ends cut—or even doing it on my own?
I looked back at the stranger in the mirror, wanting to ask her so many questions, but I knew she couldn’t answer them.
I turned away before the melancholy overcame me and headed out of the bathroom to change into one of the T-shirts and fresh underwear, then I padded across the still-chilly room and quickly began to make the bed, shivering until I paused to put on the clean sweatshirt.
As I bent down for it, I heard some muttered voices outside. I leaned toward the window and looked down, seeing Levi as he left through the back exit while Wanda shut the door and turned off the light.
Even with the light off, I could still make out the alleyway behind the diner, which wasn’t much.
Just a dumpster and some broken bottles littered the alley.
While I looked on from the window, watching Levi pull up the hood on his sweatshirt and shove his hands into his coat pockets, I wondered where he lived.
Things became even more curious when I saw him look first right, then left, as if trying to decide which way to go.
He hesitated long enough for me to question if the young man actually had a place to call home. Even from up here, I could tell that the poor guy simply looked lost.
I was about to open the window and call out to him when he shuffled off. He headed to the right, away from the street on the side of the building, moving farther down the alley.
I leaned all the way against the window, watching him go. He wore only those two layers of clothing, had no extra meat on his bones, and he walked stiffly with hunched shoulders.
It was maybe forty degrees out. And it was likely to get eight to ten degrees colder as the night wore on.
I continued to watch Levi, when he paused near the far end of the building where the dumpster was kept, and then I was shocked to see him rummage around the area next to the dumpster where all the discarded boxes were kept until he came up with three boxes that still held their shape.
Then he moved off with them. I stared at the space where he’d fished out the boxes long after he’d gone, simply knowing in my gut that Levi was as lost and alone as I was.