Nick drove the old van to her motel early that morning. It had seen its glory long ago delivering flowers and plants to his customers. The rear hubcaps were gone. Spread out on the back floor were oily radiator hoses, clamps, assorted wrenches, a road hard spare tire wedged in and a half case of crankcase oil. It all goes to hell after 200,000 miles.
The passenger side had the classic garden store owners look; piled high with foam coffee cups, Wendy’s wrappers and diet coke plastic bottle tops. In the days when he went through the Marlboros, the empty little red boxes were scattered all over. There was always two or three coffee cups half filled with water and jammed with smoked butts.
God, he used to love to smoke and think and create. The best drag he would every take was when he watched customers just suck the products off the shelf from some display he made in the early morning hours. He would light up and inhale, exhale and say to himself,
“God damned, I knew it would work”.
He extended his long right arm and graded all the debris from the passenger seat onto the floor, shoving the stuff back under the frame for her shoes to find solid ground for the ride. He grabbed the latch and pushed the door open. “Good morning Nick” she said as she slipped her legs into the designated spot on the floorboard, balancing her Starbucks 13 shot soy hazelnut vanilla cinnamon with extra white mocha and caramel as she groped for the cushion.
They parked. Nick opened the door for her to The Village Pantry.
He liked these greasy old cafes where the waitresses were big and fat and friendly with the gravely voices and a pencil stuck behind their ears. There was no bullshit, no cute phrases, no fucking uttering of "enjoy". It was just good food and good service. W
here ever he landed, the first order of businesses was to find one in that town. He ordered the same thing, never changed; two eggs over hard, two pieces of crisp bacon, one piece of sourdough if he could get it and black coffee. It got so that when the girls saw him pull up each morning, the eggs went on the griddle. There were no words exchanged.
The food was delivered, the paper was read and the day began.
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