Chapter 2 #2
“I was just muttering to myself about what I have to do tomorrow.” The words are a lie, but I think they’re plausible enough.
I’ve had practice coming up with things on the spot ever since this started happening years ago.
“I really don’t want to forget anything.
I’m, uh, hoping to prove to Cecil that I can take care of the mortuary more often, so he feels like he can go out of town or just have a night off. ”
“Would be nice,” she agrees. “Your food will be out soon, hun.” She walks away as I push a few loose pieces of black hair behind my ear and look down at the side of the coffee creamer pot that shines reflectively on the table.
God, I’m pale. Even distorted like this, it’s obvious just how pasty I am, and just how little my light grey eyes do to soften that fact.
Sometimes, I feel like I look as if I’ve climbed straight out of a cooler drawer myself, and by now I’ve heard all the jokes about my career in correlation to just how pasty I am.
Stubbornly, I shove the creamer away, not wanting to look at my reflection in it any longer. I don’t need that kind of guest coming to visit me tonight, after seeing my own distorted features in a way that could make things go bad in my head.
“Not tonight,” I sigh, though I open my eyes to gaze at Mary. “I suppose you could be worse. Hell, I don’t even know what you did while you were alive. Maybe you were a terrible person.”
“Or maybe I wasn’t,” Mary counters. “Maybe I was a great person who just made a bad decision. Maybe I had a family. Kids.” She continues as Betty does a quick drive-by to make sure her tables are all set.
“A career. Hell, a dog.” Though her voice rises, Betty doesn’t hear her.
Of course she doesn’t hear her. This pleasure is reserved, unfortunately, just for me.
The two women in the nearby booth get louder as their conversations jump from friends to relatives to school to the woman’s older daughter’s pregnancy.
“She’s having twins,” the mom insists to the daughter confidently. “I’ve seen how she’s carrying, and how much weight she’s picked up. Gosh, I hope it’s twin girls. Can’t you imagine how adorable they’d be? Black hair like their mother, freckles, and—”
I’m up before I can even think about what I’m doing. The table, securely bolted down as it is, only shakes a little when my knee slams into the underside, while I’m unsuccessful at biting back a yelp of pain.
Both women whip around to look at me, eyes wide in surprise like they didn’t realize I was sitting there. And, well, maybe they hadn’t. Maybe in their little world, I hadn’t registered to them before they sat close enough to be in my late-night-diner specific personal bubble.
“Sorry,” I whisper. “I didn’t…” But my heart is racing as Mary twirls on one of the barstools, looking completely at ease and a little amused.
“Gosh, you’ve freaked them out now,” she observes. “They probably think you’re on drugs. You look like a goddamn terrified deer.”
I ignore her, drop my eyes to the floor, and head to the register where Betty is standing, counting tips. She looks up at my approach, visibly confused, and glances back to the table where I’d been.
“You all right, hun?” she asks in her dry voice. “You, uh, want to find somewhere else to sit? I don’t mind.” She looks pointedly at the two women who she clearly agrees don’t know the proper decorum for being at a diner at this time of night.
Well, I think dryly, at least I’m not the only one who disapproves of their cheerfulness.
“N-no, I—” I tuck my black hair behind my ear, though it comes right back down to swing in my face in vengeance. “I’m not feeling so great.”
“You really aren’t,” Mary agrees as she peers into the cash register like it’s her responsibility.
“Could I go ahead and pay for everything? I-I know I already ordered, and I don’t want to inconvenience you—”
Betty cuts me off with a quick raise of her hand, palm out toward me.
“Cook hasn’t started work on it yet. He’s on a smoke break,” she informs me kindly, and walks back to pluck the ticket off the hanger.
“And don’t worry about the coffee, it’s on the house tonight.
I know you’ll be back in a few days, and when it comes to tipping, you’ll be kind to ol’ Betty.
” She gives me a wink that has me snorting, and my heart lifts, just slightly.
At least I have her humor to count on tonight, if only for a few moments of my time.
Even though I open my mouth to protest, feeling like it’s the polite thing to do, Betty just shakes her head again.
“Go home, Nell,” she advises, looking me over with a worried look on her face I’ve usually only seen used for the senior folks of Still Pines.
Do I really look that bad?
“Thank you.” With one last smile, I split, heading to my car and sinking into the driver’s seat with a sigh.
I’m ridiculous.
Literally, ridiculous.
“You are ridiculous,” Mary agrees. “How are you going to get around in the world if just the mention of twins bothers you? Or was it the point being driven home when she mentioned the black hair and freckles?” Mary turns, and I can feel her staring at my face like she’s cataloging all the small, faded marks there. “You don’t have as many freckles as—”
“Stop it.” My words come out sharper than I intend, and I immediately jam my finger onto the media button on the car screen. “You didn’t know her.”
“You didn’t know me, but here I am anyway. Do you even know if my birthmark is facing the right way, Eleanor?” The way she says my name reminds me uncomfortably of my mother, because of course I’d be doing this to myself tonight.
“No.” Once my music is playing, I crank it up until I can barely even hear my own thoughts, no matter where they’re coming from. “It’s like you said. I don’t know anything about you at all, Mary.”
The drive back out of downtown Still Pines takes maybe ten minutes, and that’s really just because I prefer cutting around the suburbs rather than going straight through the roundabout.
This late, I’d be lucky not to run into some stupid kids either out messing around with their dad’s cars, or daring each other to walk into the road.
Which, really, should be a marker of just how badly small towns need revitalization, in my opinion, but no one ever asks me.
The suburbs are quiet and clear of anything except the stray squirrel or prowling cat that I easily avoid. Then I come back up toward the buildings that are a mix of small businesses and residential, before it becomes mostly commercial near the center of town.
Coffee Crest is lit up, even at this hour. Its owner, Hestia, impressed upon me when I took the apartment above her place that part of the reason rent was much less than other places was because she kept her doors open until late, then opened again around eight am.
Well, that and the mysterious knocking that could be heard through the walls…and the mysterious stain in the bedroom closet.
But when you’re just looking for a small place that doesn’t judge, who can be picky?
The parking lot behind the building is empty enough that I don’t have to squint in the poor lighting to find a spot, and I recognize Hestia’s car there, which isn’t a surprise.
Sometimes I wonder if the reason she’s open so late is that she prefers working the graveyard shift.
Not that I can judge when I’m basically doing the same thing these days.
With the funeral home being staffed by a receptionist to field clients and open to the public during the day, I usually find myself starting work when the rest of Still Pines is getting home and comfortable for the night.
Because for some reason, embalming bodies is a job for the night, instead of one that’s acceptable to take place during the day.
After locking my car, I stride up the sidewalk, only belatedly noticing a car beside Hestia’s that I’m sure I’ve never seen before.
While I don’t know all the cars of all the people in Still Pines, I know that I’ve never seen such a nice SUV around before.
The words RANGE ROVER are embossed across the white hood, the shiny silver picking up light from the dim streetlamp overhead.
I’m so engrossed in eyeballing the SUV and seeing if I can peek at the details through the windows—God knows I’ll never see them from the inside—that I don’t notice anything in front of me as I round the corner to the front of the building, where I can get upstairs to my apartment.
A dog barking makes me gasp and stumble into the blue mailbox perched near the road hard enough to lose my balance completely. My hands hit the sidewalk, and it’s a good thing I’m not holding my phone, I think ruefully. Otherwise, it would be cracked to shit on the ground.
The dog barks again and I glance up into the face of a panting black Shepherd, its plumed tail wagging back and forth behind it like it’s trying to power the whole town with wind propulsion.
It doesn’t look particularly vicious, and I barely notice the dog sniffing at my ear as the one in front of me whines happily.
“Hi,” I greet, finally glancing around to see another, very similar looking black Shepherd at my side.
Both are leashed to a hook near the door of Coffee Crest, though it usually holds flowers, rather than dog leashes.
“You guys scared me.” It’s clear I’m not in any danger, so I reach my hands up to let both dogs sniff my fingers, belatedly hearing the coffee shop door open.