This is a story that I wrote for a creative writing class that I had last fall and I have made a few minor tweaks and corrections. Enjoy!
Catherine
stepped out of her car pulling on a jacket over the top of her black work pants
and neon green shirt, proudly declaring that the Route 26 Diner “has the best waffles
in the state of Oregon!”. The parking lot only had a few cars and did nothing
to diminish the barrenness of the space, despite the gaudy neon lights and
quicksilver chrome finish. The silence and intensity of the midnight darkness
pressed down on everything; in a constant battle to smother the diner’s lights
and slowly crush it with its dark gravity. Shivering, Catherine hurried through
the big double glass doors, nodding at Rachel, the third shift hostess, and
proceeded to dispense her personal belongings in the back.
As she walked back to the front of the restaurant,
tying on a black serving apron, she surveyed the dining area with a quiet sigh.
The tables had been wiped down and the menus placed behind the condiments, but
it had a superficial cleanliness. She knew better than to accept the contented
façade, because this self-contained diner had transformed from a job, to one of
her children and she knew all the tricks and games it played. As she walked between
the booths she straightened this or that, noting that exasperating space of
white tiles were a booth had once sat, contrasting with the worn, not-quite-white
tiles that had been treaded on faithfully for years. Here was the rip in the
upholstery that some students out after Homecoming had made, the edges fraying
and closely resembling an irritated cut she had on her arm. The windows had
vexing scratches, there was dust that stubbornly refused to leave the fake
plants by the door, plates and mugs that looked abused and exhausted, coffee
rings that lingered reminiscing over those Sunday morning brunches, or first
date conversations; sitting down on the tired red upholstery she wondered when
this child would grow up and stop needing her to soothe and clean every bump
and bruise.
A
touch on her shoulder pushed her out of the quicksand of her thoughts and
Catherine looked over her shoulder. Greg stood next to her with a knowing
smile, “Did I catch you dosing at the wheel?” Catherine stood up and walked
with him over to the long white Formica counter, pouring him a cup of coffee as
he sat on the opposite side. He removed his hat, exposing a worn blue bandana.
He seemed like the rough and mean type, but he had slowly warmed up to Catherine
after a few free slices of pie every now and again.
“Naw,
I was just thinking some about how much I absolutely love this place,” she joked, sliding the coffee over and pulling
over a menu. His thick grey eyebrow had risen with a questioning playfulness
and she slowly drew her hand away from the menu.
“Fine the usual then,”
Catherine smirked, “double stack of waffles with blueberry syrup and a side of spiced
potatoes.”
“That’s
my girl,” he chuckled, then taking a sip of coffee, “So how is the college reapplication
process treating you?”
Catherine
stopped writing down the order and shifted uncomfortably, “Well, I’ve started,
but I don’t know if it is the right time for me.” Greg’s tanned face turned solemn
as he ran a hand over his thick gray beard and waited for her to continue.
Hadn’t
it just been the other night that she leaned restlessly against the wall,
gazing out of that scratched window? It had been a clear, cold night, but a crisp
cold that could only be a sign that winter’s rains were coming. She had watched
her breath and the steam from her coffee mingle together and then advance onto
the chilled glass, only to be beaten and ebb back to her lips. An endless,
mindless battle against the icy unknown, and wasn’t she fighting too? Did she not
look at applications and pamphlets of universities and tech schools when it was
slow? Then she would grow bolder and stronger with each flip of a page; tonight
she could write your two week notice. Tomorrow she would start talking to the
banks; but then didn’t the unknown, in the guise of logic, push back? It is
almost Christmas, or shouldn’t you wait until Adam gets his promotion? In the
end, she was just down right scared. Catherine had laughed at that.
Even
though it felt like she would never leave this place, like she was magnetized
to it, and the harder she thought about leaving, the harder it pulled her back;
she was still scared. Catherine wanted
to say that she going back to college and finishing her degree, in anything,
just so she didn’t have to be here anymore. So she could stay home with Adam
after they put their daughter to bed, instead of pulling on her non-slip shoes
and slipping quietly out of the door to go to work. But she couldn’t because
she was too worried about how they would make it if she didn’t work full-time;
she was too scared she wouldn’t be able to find a new job, so she never
would.
Catherine
had lost track of time, Greg had already gotten back into his sixteen-wheeled and
started another new adventure, his bill folded neatly under the coffee cup.
Catherine cleared the dishes, wiped the counter, and pour herself a cup of
coffee. Then she walked over to the countertop stools and slid over the dull
upholstery. She started to relax, taking a slow drag of the semi-stale coffee, trying
to ignore the curious tingle on the back of her neck as she glanced at the
small TV on the wall. The sensation grew more insistent and as she reached back
to message her neck, her elbow brushed something soft. Quickly, she glanced down to see a young girl
standing impatiently at her side.
Her
wavy chestnut brown hair was being unsuccessfully tamed by a headband and kept
falling into her olive green eyes. Catherine’s motherly eye noticed the worn,
threadbare, more-gray-than-green shirt, and the scuffs of dirt on the little
girl’s khaki shorts; her pockets bulging with probably small rocks and secret
treasures. Smiling, she decided that this little girl would fit the description,
almost a little too closely, of her own daughter on any given day. She casually
glanced around the diner for the little girl’s parents. She looked like she had
just been playing doctor; a brightly colored stethoscope hung limply around her
neck, a pair of thick black framed glasses poked out of the pocket of Dad’s
old, dingy dress shirt that was now serving time as a lab jacket, and a small
stuffed cheetah resting loyally by her side. “So where are your parents?”
Catherine asked, trying to control the urgent swell of motherly concern and
annoyance at the disappearance of the irresponsible parents who would leave
their child alone in a diner at four in the morning.
The
little girl shrugged indifferently, “I had a question.” She jerked the cheetah
into her arms and started tugging on his ear, “Why do you work here? Did you
want to be a waitress when you grew up?”
“No, I just work here
for now.”
“Then
what are you going to be later?”
“Well,” Catherine started,
there was something about this girl that was nagging her, but she couldn’t
quite put a finger on it.
“Are
you going to be a Veterinarian? You know the kind that works out on the safari?”
She
looked down at the girl whispering, “I haven’t wanted to do that since I was
little,” Catherine turned away, starting feeling a little light-headed. Who was
this little girl? Was she hallucinating? Was it because she drank too much
coffee? She pulled herself up so she could look over her shoulder for Rachel,
but she wasn’t anywhere in view; probably out smoking a cigarette with the
cook. Catherine looked back down at the little girl, still chattering away,
demonstrating how what an amazing safari vet she would be on her steadfast
stuffed cheetah.
“Do
you want to hear a riddle?” She asked excitedly, “You can see nothing else when
you look in my face, and I will look you in the eye and I will never lie. What
am I?”
Catherine
started at her in disbelief. Couldn’t this little girl see that she was in the
middle of talking herself out of this caffeine induced hallucination? The girl
just stared up at her and Catherine watched as her face slowly twisted with
impatience as the minutes ticked slowly by. Eventually, Catherine answered, “My
reflection,” then forcing herself to take a long, deep breath, “you’re me, aren’t
you?”
The
girl laughed. “No, I’m Cat and I know what I want to be. I don’t know who you
are.”
“So if I go back to
school and become a veterinarian, I’ll be someone?” Catherine asked, suddenly
angry, “Well, I’m sorry it doesn’t work like that!”
“You’re
just a scaredy Cat and you know it!” she taunted, pushing the cheetah into
Catherine’s face, “You are just a scaredy me! Get it? Because my name is Cat?
And you’re a scaredy Cat!”
She could hear Cat’s laughter and she felt the shame and
anger start to crush her throat, the hot burning lump sat there in her chest.
Cat was right, but if Catherine didn’t let out her shame it was going to slowly
incinerate her from the inside out. “I hope you are happy about growing up into
a scaredy cat like me,” she growled, “because you are not going to be a safari veterinarian and you are never going to do anything with your
life, but work in this crappy diner for the rest of your life! Now get the hell out
of my face.” Catherine could feel the tears welling up in Cat’s eyes, rolling
down her own cheeks.
“You
are so stupid!” Cat screamed and started hitting Catherine with the stuffed
animal, “It’s your life too and you are going to punish both of us because you
are too stupid and scared!! I HATE YOU!”
Catherine
stood up violently, knocking over her coffee, “Well I hate you too! Now leave
me the fuck alone!” she cried, feeling the tears streaming down her cheeks as
she sank to the floor. She knew that she had made a mistake of settling for a
life as a waitress. She had just always ignored how much she had hated herself
for making the excuses to stay, for punishing herself for never finishing
school. She had known the whole time, but she had failed once, and she had been
scared that she would fail again.
Rachel suddenly walked around the booth glancing around, “Cather—oh
my God, what happened? I heard something break so I came in.” Catherine didn’t
hear her, sitting quietly on the floor with tears on her cheeks and her coffee
slowly seeping into the cracks in the tiles around her. Rachel helped her to
her feet after a few moments of gentle words and cleaned up the spilled coffee
and shards of ceramic.
“Catherine,
why don’t you take the rest of the night off? I am worried that you might catch
that bug that is going around because you never seem to sleep,” Rachel said
with a forced cheerfulness. Catherine could tell that Rachel was concerned
about her, like she was getting a little too close to being pushed off of the
deep end. She chuckled quietly; no it
was because she hadn’t pushed herself at all. She walked out into the brisk six
a.m. chill, the fog carpeting the ground, blanketing the hibernating earth. The
sky was dyed a salmon color and Catherine sat in her car and watched as the
earth’s phoenix shed its old fiery cloak for the soft golden rays of a new day.
But
it wasn’t a new day for her. Her day had started long before in the dark of
night, so the sun was her brilliant conclusion, the finale to the pyrotechnics
of her epiphany. She started up the car, letting it warm up before she headed
home for the day. Maybe she would chase her dream of becoming a vet, but she
didn’t think so; she had different dreams and ambitions now that she could
follow. All she did know was that she was certainly not going to step foot in
that diner ever again.
