𝐅𝐋𝐎𝐖𝐄𝐑𝐒 • Steve Harrington

Chapter 5

ONE WEEK LATER
( Saturday, November 17th 1984 )

"JULIE, how are we feeling this mornin'?"

She stepped up to the counter at Benny's diner, smiling at the usual warm welcome from Earl. The place was quite small with five four-seated tables, but what Julie loved most was its jukebox and hospitality.

It was a little on the empty side most days due to the original owner Benny committing suicide last year, and today was no different. It was a Saturday, but there was only one customer at a table eating a hamburger by the curtained window. It was a shame to see. Her mother used to take her here for chocolate shakes when she was kid. It was always alive with chatter and smiles then.

In her eyes, Benny's was the heart of the town, so, just like her mother, she never gave up on it.

"Drained. How are you?"

"No better than you I take it." Yet, Earl still smiled. "Your momma's regular?"

"As always," she smiled, too.

He tended to her mother's coffee at the machine, making conversation all the while. "How'd that date of hers go in the end?"

"Well I think. She didn't say much." Her eyebrows pushed together, "She told you?"

"They spent it here for a while. Her and some lanky fellow, thin as a twig, a little on the tall side with a moustache."

Julie let the information reel in her head, trying to muster up an image. This was the most she knew about the man.

"Did she seem like she had a good time?"

"Seem it? She couldn't stop laughing."

Julie's worry depleted as she laughed through her nose with relief.

"For a square, he's got to be some comedian."

Earl headed back to the counter, holding over the disposable cup in exchange for the change she extended towards him.

"I'd say you ain't got a thing to worry about, but," he leaned forward like he was letting her in on a secret, "never speak too soon."

She laughed, but she knew he meant it just as much as she agreed.

"And I hate to ask, darlin', but I've been doing it all day," his demeanour immediately shifted. He seemed dismayed and a little guilty. "Anything for the tip jar's appreciated to help save the diner."

He picked up a glass jar he'd kept under the counter with some loose change and a few notes buried at the bottom.

"Course." She took her wallet out of her back pocket. "Are you closing down?"

"Not yet, but it's not looking so good. Finances were already scarce, living off the scraps Benny left. And it's been a year so I knew well and good what I was in for taking the reins on this place, but..." he shook his head, "that mayor Kline—he leased some land to build a mall and it's nearly on the rise."

Julie's eyebrows almost flew off her forehead. She couldn't believe this was the first she was hearing of it. "What? Where?"

"Just off Old Highway Seventy-Seven. Acres of land down that side. It's due to open in the summer and I'm not sure we can take it."

Julie's eyes had downturned, overtaken with sympathy and her own anxieties over her mother's business. She could hardly imagine the toll this would take on small businesses and families in Hawkins. She took out a ten dollar note, holding it up to make a show of it first before slipping it into the jar.