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05: Such an Idiot

dedicated to @neverrland for athena

05: Such an Idiot

            Dev’s Diner, on a Saturday morning, is buzzing with activity. The squeaky door which offers a divider between the ladies bathroom and main floor brushes heavily against the white linoleum, sensible black pumps stepping through it. Cassandra flies by, hot plates of breakfast in her hands, calling out for a “Table 7 with pancakes, hash browns and a full English breakfast”, to which a family of five raise their hands and signal for the food to be delivered to them. The squeezy bottles of ketchup and mustard are collected from a display against the far wall by a middle aged man, who then returns to his single table, pouring red and yellow all over his fries and burger, his stubby fingers gather the double cheeseburger in his hands, and when he finally takes a bite, his eyes flutter shut, and then he places the burger back on the plate, right next to the crispy fries, leaving remnants of mustard and ketchup around his mouth.

            The girl who has just exited the bathroom moves towards the counter, and moves the front of her foot to rub against the back of her bare leg, leaning against the counter towards the two out of three waitresses, Antonia, who stares back with blank eyes and red lipstick, she nods her head as the girl says something to her, eyes flickering to the door when it opens and Greg and Abel pass through the threshold, heading for a booth at the back where there’s an array of signatures and messages such as “Sexi Lexi spreads her legs” which have admittedly, had a decent attempt of being scribbled over or erased, but someone came back and re-wrote the original message in Sharpie. Antonia, waves her hand dismissively, turning back to the kitchen where plastic sheets which hang vertically are used as a door, as they move with her, the shouts from the kitchen and the movement of pots and pans reaches us.

            The third waitress, Siobhan, stands at our table, slipping a pen from her ear, pushing back her brown hair behind her small ears, and tapping the end against the top of the black notebook which is going to take our orders. “Tracey,” she smiles briefly at my Mom who sits perpendicular to me around the square shaped table. There’s another two empty seats with us, and currently, Mom’s bag is using one of them. “Are you two ready to order?” Her brown eyes flicker between each of us, still managing to keep a friendly smile on her face.

            Mom’s thin lips purse slightly as she scratches the back of her neck. “Actually, Shiv,” she says, glancing at the door behind her shoulder quickly, then turning back around when it’s only Jefferson entering and walking straight to the counter for his morning cup of coffee which he has to order now that his wife left him last summer and he’s useless in the kitchen. “We’re waiting for Fonts, we’ll order later.”

            “Of course,” Siobhan nods immediately, eyes drifting already to another table waiting to be served. “Don’t worry about it.” Once Siobhan has walked away from her table, already being summoned by another who have skimmed the breakfast menu and know what they want to order—especially after watching a table nearby get their food. I yawn into my hand, blinking slowly at my Mom. It’d taken a lot of persuading to get Fonts to actually go somewhere familiar, she’d been driving out of town to go somewhere where no one knew her, for the simple fact that no one would look at her with pity for being the Mom of that Dead Girl. It’s understandable, but Mom had been determined that she wasn’t going to watch her waste away, “God forbid,” she said running a brush through her hair this morning, “if something ever happened to you or your brother, I’d want someone there offering me the support that I needed.” So that’s exactly what she’s doing, in a messed up kind of way, offering Fonts the support she needs, not what is best advised.