The Beginning
It’s nine p.m., and the man at the counter refuses to leave.
His spoon keeps dipping into the pea soup he ordered nigh on two hours ago, scooping it up and slowly sipping away. He seems to be in no rush, but by God does Mrs. Mallory wish he was.
Watching him is boring.
She sighs, her red hair curled under her chef’s hat, peeking out from the kitchen with a scowl. “Lookit him. Takin’ his time, like people’s ain’t got nowhere to go.”
“I’m tellin’ ya, Ma,” whispered her beloved son, Stony, next to her, “let us take care of him. He’s just a drive-in, ain’t no one gonna even notice.”
She hesitates to let him. Not for any love lost towards the man whose aim seems to be in making them stay up to midnight for him to finish one simple bowl of pea soup, no, but more that...she doesn’t want to clean up.
She points her red acrylic nail into Stony’s chest, his green eyes-like his father-grinning up at him. “You be doin’ all the clean up, boy. Don’t you be dragging yer sister in with ye.”
“Don’t gotta tell me twice,” he says, sliding around her with glee. She huffs, turning back to her beloved kitchen as Sasha’s heels click after her, racing after her brother with a hiss of ‘unfair, unfair!’
Let them duke it out, so long as she’s not involved.
Instead, she hums a soft tune, wiping down a counter with a wet rag as the man at the counter lifts his head to the smiling twins who had pleasantly served him earlier.
“Sir, would you-“
“Most kindly-“
“Come with us?” they both say, smiling brightly, with teeth so white they shine.
The man, a little drunk, a little tired, is unaware of his fate as he accepts the strange request.
They both grin a little wider at that.
The pea soup is left on the counter, only to be thrown down the sink and washed away, gotten rid of just like its devourer.
Good riddance, Mrs. Mallory thinks, with a skip in her step and a smile on her face as she changes the sign to Closed and turns the lights off.
When the diner opens up in the morning, the place is clean, and smells of coffee and bacon. There is no residue of pea soup to be seen, nor any piece of the man around. When Mrs. Mallory mops clean the floor, she smiles at her reflection in the pristine flooring, her shoes making soft squeaking noises.
The door, with its flipped ‘OPEN’ sign, makes a dinging noise as the Sheriff steps through with a smile. “Morn, Missus Mallory. Suppose that coffee ain’t for me, is it?”
“Oh, Sheriff,” she croons at him, stepping away from the clean, clean, clean flooring, her curls bouncing about her head with each step, red lips widening in a smile, “if it weren’t fer ya, it wouldn’t be fer no one. Come on in, take yer seat, and we’ll get you set to rights.”
“Godsent, you are, Missus Mallory,” he says, and he settles on a stool with all the weight of a man who’s been through too much and seen too much.
She slides him a plate of eggs, pancakes, sausage, and two refills on his coffee. All is right in her little world as Stony and Sasha pile in through the door with peals of laughter, and she breathes a little easier now.
She heads to the kitchen as Stony takes up his usual spot, and takes up a bottle of bleach, heading to the pot sitting innocently in the corner with caked on red liquid inside.
Never a moment of rest...
