Chapter 15
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Rick Turner drove a sensible gray sedan and wore sensible gray slacks and had never, in Tyler’s memory, done a single spontaneous thing in his life.
So when the sensible gray sedan pulled into the Shack parking lot, Tyler knew something was wrong.
“Uncle Rick’s here,” he said to Joey.
“I see him.” Joey didn’t look up. “He’s been here three times this month. That’s twice more than usual.”
“You track that?”
“I track everything. It’s called situational awareness.”
“It’s called concerning.”
“Those are the same thing.”
Tyler wiped his hands on a dish towel and headed for the door. Rick was already out of the car, walking toward the entrance with the determined stride of a man about to deliver bad news.
“Uncle Rick.”
“Tyler.” Rick nodded, all business. “Is your grandmother here?”
“She’s painting.”
“Right.” Rick’s jaw tightened. “She’s always painting now.”
“That’s kind of the point. She’s earned it.”
“She’s earned a lot of things. I just want to make sure the Shack is still standing when she’s done.”
“The Shack is fine.”
“Is it?”
They stood in the parking lot, the afternoon sun beating down, neither willing to move first.
“Can we at least go inside?” Tyler finally said. “I’m sweating through my shirt.”
“Fine.”
The Shack was quiet. Three tables occupied — a couple sharing a grilled cheese, an older woman reading a paperback, and Bernie in his usual corner with his tablet and his coffee and his all-seeing eyes.
Joey appeared instantly. “Mr. Turner! Welcome back. Coffee? Water?
“Existential dread?”
“Joey,” Tyler warned.
“What? I’m being hospitable.”
Rick looked at Joey like he’d never quite figured out how to categorize him. “Coffee. Black.”
“Coming right up.”
They settled into a booth near the window. Rick folded his hands on the table — no briefcase this time, Tyler noticed, which somehow felt worse.
“Something’s off,” Rick said. “I don’t have all the numbers yet, but I can feel it. Traffic’s down. The energy’s different.”
“Three months ago, Margo was here every day.”
“Exactly.”
Tyler looked at his uncle—really looked.
Rick was in his early sixties now, gray at the temples, lines around his eyes that hadn’t been there a few years ago.
He’d spent his whole life worrying about this family’s finances, trying to impose order on the cheerful chaos of the Shack.
It was exhausting work. Tyler could see it.
“You think it’s because Margo stepped back,” Tyler said.
“I think something changed when she did. I’m trying to figure out what.”
Bernie rose from his booth with the slow deliberation of a man whose joints had opinions about movement, and made his way toward them, sliding into their booth.
“Richard,” he said, nodding at Rick.
“Bernard.”
“Couldn’t help overhearing.” He held up a hand before Rick could protest. “Mrs. Patterson was in last week. Asked her about her sandwich. She said it was fine.”
“Fine is good,” Rick said.
“Fine is not good. Fine is what you say when you don’t want to hurt someone’s feelings.” Bernie’s weathered face was serious. “In thirty-seven years, she’s never called Margo’s food ‘fine.’ She’s called it perfect, comforting, like a hug. Now it’s fine.”
He let that sit.
“The recipe’s the same,” Tyler said. “The ingredients, the grill—”
“I know.” Bernie shrugged. “Maybe that’s not what people were tasting.”
He slid out of the booth. Halfway back to his corner, he paused.
“Margo always knew who was supposed to get which shell,” he said. “Didn’t matter how long it’d been.”
Then he kept walking.
Tyler and Rick sat in silence. The ceiling fans turned. The shells gleamed softly overhead.
Rick watched Bernie settle back into his booth.
“You know,” he said slowly, “in fifty years, there’s never been a stretch where a Turner or a Walsh wasn’t here. On the floor. In the kitchen. Not for more than a day or two.”
Tyler frowned. “So?”
“So people didn’t just come for the food.” Rick’s voice was quieter now, almost wondering. “They came to be seen. To be remembered. Someone knowing their order. Someone asking about their grandkids.” He glanced up at the ceiling. “Bringing shells for Margo.”
Tyler stared at his uncle. In forty years, he’d never heard Rick talk about the Shack like this. Never. It was a side of his uncle he’d never seen.
“He’s not wrong,” Rick said finally. “Bernie, I mean. I’ve been trying to figure out what’s different, looking for something I can fix. But maybe it’s not something I can put in a ledger.”
“We can’t replicate Margo.”
“No.” Rick stared at the table. “I don’t know what to do with that.”
“Neither do I.”
Joey came over with a basket and held it out to Rick. “Can I offer you a muffin, Mr. Turner? To go with your coffee? I made them.”
Rick took one and nodded at Joey. “Thank you, son.” He took a bite and looked at it, then looked at Joey. “This is really good.”
“Thank you, Mr. Turner,” Joey said with a wide smile.
Joey headed to the other customers, offering them a muffin also.
Rick looked around the room. “Sparse as it is, they seem to really like these.”
“They do,” Tyler said as he watched Bernie take two.
Tyler thought for a moment. “Meg’s been experimenting. Menu additions. And Anna’s been taking more shifts. Maybe we don’t need to replicate Margo. Maybe we just need to figure out what we bring to it. Our version.”
Rick looked at him for a long moment. Then, slowly, he nodded and smiled.
“That’s either very wise or very naive.”
“Probably both.”
“Probably.” Rick stood, straightened his sensible slacks. “Keep me updated. On whatever you figure out. And thanks for wanting to try. You have my full support.”
“I will.”
Rick headed for the door. He paused with his hand on the handle.
“Tyler.”
“Yeah?”
“I’m glad you’re here. Doing this.” Rick’s voice was gruff, almost embarrassed. “The family needs people who understand the parts that don’t fit in spreadsheets.”
Then he was gone, the sensible gray sedan pulling out of the parking lot and disappearing down the coast road—but Tyler thought he caught something like a spring in his step on his way out.
Joey materialized beside Tyler. “So. That sounded intense.”
“You were eavesdropping.”
“I was monitoring. For safety purposes.” Joey handed him a fresh coffee. “Bernie’s right, you know. About Mrs. Patterson.”
“I know.”
“So what do we do?”
Tyler looked around the Shack — the faded booths, the ancient grill, the ceiling covered in fifty years of shells and stories. His grandmother had built this. His family had kept it going. Now it was their turn to figure out what came next.
“We find our version,” he said. “Whatever that means.”
“That’s very vague.”
“I know.”
“I prefer specific action items.”
“I know that too.”
Joey sighed. “Fine. Vague it is. But if we’re doing vague, I’m making more coffee. Vague requires caffeine.”
He disappeared behind the counter. Tyler stood in the middle of the Shack, Bernie’s words echoing in his head.
Maybe that’s not what people were tasting.
Somewhere, they had to find a way to serve something people could feel.
He just had no idea what.