The Farmer's Son

Chapter 27 Why Bear Barks

The tiny bell over the diner door tinkled with the arrival of a new customer and a wash of heat from outside. Through the big glass windows, above the row of squat buildings across the street, a line of bright orange gave way to dark blue, heralding the end of the workday. Inside, weary farmers and townsfolk gathered, some sitting down to supper, some grabbing a coffee before they made the drive home. A warm cloud of voices and clattering utensils amid the smell of coffee and roasted meat filled the air.

At the far end of the counter, in the L towards the bathrooms, sat Geary and Noah. Bustling behind the counter in the dinnertime rush, Maeve broke away to serve them.

"Don't normally see you here at this time, Noah," she said, pulling a pencil from behind her ear to take their order. "The boys not home?" Finding the pencil to be a French fry instead, she flung it away impatiently across the room with a flick of her wrist.

"Oh, they're home," Noah sighed.

"Trouble?" Maeve asked, now searching in her hair piled on top of her head. "Of what kind?"

"Hell if I know," Noah grunted. "They were screaming at each other last week, now they ain't saying two words. Just coffee for me, Mae."

"Sounds like you and Alan," she said with a cackling laugh, picking up the carafe of decaf and pouring him a cup of steaming black.

"Cause that's what he needs," Noah said, picking up the cup, " 'nother one of my bad habits."

"Boys will be boys," Geary said, sitting beside him at the counter. "They fall in and out like chains on a bicycle. One minute they gettin' on like a house on fire, the next they fighting like junk yard dogs. Me and my brother was just the same. Give me a burger, would you, Mae?"

"I ain't giving you nothing but the boot, Geary," Maeve said, pouring him a cup of coffee, too. "Your misses expecting you, so stop dawdling and get yourself home."

"I will, I will," Geary said. But when she walked away, he pulled a small flask from inside his overalls. He uncapped it and held it out, but Noah shook his head.

"I'm driving," Noah said.

"Don't think on it too much, No," Geary said, pouring a couple fingers into his coffee. "They young and carefree, what they got to fight over but women and money? I tell you, it's probably over that girl," he added, picking up the sugar and pouring a steady stream into his coffee. "What was her name, Anaheim? One used to date Alan?"

"Annabelle," Noah said, folding his arms on the counter and frowning down at his mug of black coffee.

"Yeah, that," Geary said, still pouring. "Girl like that would make any young buck paw the ground."

Noah said nothing, but his frown deepened. He seemed like he was not a noticing man, and as long as no one was mad at him he tended to like to keep it that way. But he noticed more than he let on, especially when it came to his son. Things had been squirrelly between Alan and Ray since the Fourth of July, for sure. But from what he could make out when they were yelling at each other, he doubted it had anything to do with Annabelle.

Still frowning, he glanced over at his friend. Seeing sugar going like a waterfall into Geary's cup, he reached out and took the bottle from him. Setting it at the far end of the counter out of reach, he glanced down and checked his watch. It was almost seven.

"I got to go, Gear," he said, sliding off the stool. "Get yourself a straight cup of coffee before you hit the road, you hear me?"

Cup to his mouth and guzzling the spiked drink, Geary waved his friend off. Noah raised a hand in goodbye to Maeve, then passed through the diner door with another tinkle of the tiny bell into the street.