happenstance

“So he rocks on up in this antediluvian hoopty but with swag, you know? So fuckin’ cool that he could have been riding his little sister’s bike and I still would have gone with him.” The girl paused and stared out of the diner window while she bit at the edge of her first finger. She did not look like the kind of girl who knew how to use the word ‘antediluvian’ in a sentence. The F-bomb fit, though, to a tee.

Her friend sat quietly, holding a spoon in front of her nose, clouding it with her breath, and then wiping off the condensation with her thumb. She was staring cross-eyed into the bowl of the spoon when she noticed that the other girl was looking at her expectantly.

“Yeah,” said the girl with the spoon, and then sighed.

The vinyl of the diner booth made a peculiar noise as the first girl pulled her bare thighs off the seat and then tucked her legs underneath her. She crossed her arms and leaned into the table, bringing her face closer to the girl across from her. Her voice dropped slightly and I had to strain to hear her.

“You know, Amy, I didn’t chase after him. I didn’t even know you knew him until like the fifth time he and I hung out. He sure as shit didn’t tell me y’all had been together, he just said he knew you." Still gnawing at her finger, the girl sat back, her chin thrust ever so slightly forward, defiant.

Amy showed no sign of chiming in. Apparently, her friend couldn't stand the silence. She plowed forward.

“What am I supposed to do? Carry around a questionnaire for every guy I meet? ‘Do you have any connection to Amy Morrison or, for that matter, any other female with whom I have developed a friendship over the past ten years? If so, please explain. Use additional pages if needed.’”

With that last sentence her voice took on just the slightest mocking quality, her expression hardening in frustration.

Amy looked up from her cloudy spoon.

“Fuck you, Dina.”

Dina's thin shoulders thudded against the back of the bench seat and her mouth hung open. She looked astonished but was not yet at a loss for words. Clearly the more talkative of the pair, she started up again.

“What the hell, A? I thought you would be happy for me. I thought you wanted to meet up today to hear about how I met him, how we got together, tell me about how you knew him…” Dina trailed off, looking miserable. Amy, on the other hand, looked like she wanted to clobber her. Instead, she let her spoon fall to the table. It clattered as it landed. Amy grabbed her black leather backpack and scooted to the edge of the booth. For just a moment she sat, looking down at the carpet, but then shook her head briskly, stood up, and walked out the door.

The door sounded loud as it shut behind her, the long strings of wooden beads hung at the frame undulating and clacking against the glass. Dina sat motionless in the booth that Amy had just vacated.

* * * * *

I sat alone at a little two-top just a few feet away. I hadn't been eavesdropping, really - it was next to impossible not to hear their conversation - but now I was curious. I’d already finished my meal. I was pretending to enjoy my now-cold coffee while I pushed the bone from my pork chop through the puddle of gravy on my plate, picking at leftover bits of meat stuck in the gristle.

Dina took a deep breath, rolled her shoulders back, and sat up straight. She closed her eyes. I saw one tear emerge and then slip down her cheek. She brushed it away.

Suddenly, she turned to face me. She cleared her throat and asked, “Do you want my picture?”

I was caught completely off-guard. However, now that she had addressed me directly I took the opportunity to really look at her. There was something about her, something so familiar to me.

“I said, ‘Do you want my picture?’” she asked again. “Because you’ve been staring at me for like the last twenty minutes and maybe it’d be less awkward if I just sent you a fucking selfie.”

She got up and walked to the register at the front counter. When the waitress gave her the change the girl put the coins into the big tip jar sitting by the pastry case. She came back and put two dollars on her table, grabbed her coffee cup, and sat down across from me.

* * * * *

"Just so you know," Dina began, hanging her shoulder bag over the corner of the chair, "it was really, really obvious that you were listening to us. I have no idea why you thought our conversation was so damned interesting but if you think you were being stealthy, you're wrong."

"You remind me of my daughter," I said. "Her name was Maggie. My name is Marilyn."

Dina looked at me as if I were the scummy guy bellied up to the bar trying his pathetic one-liners on every poor girl who walked his way. She pulled her scrunchie out of her messy, dark hair and shook her head, muttering, "I remind you of your daughter... Ooo-kay."

"No, really, Dina... It's Dina, right?" I asked, unusually eager to explain myself.

Dina nodded, pulling her hair back up into a high ponytail. She missed several strands and the tendrils fell, brushing against her slim neck.

I took a deep breath. "My daughter is dead. She died when she was twenty-two. That was almost ten years ago."

Dina's expression changed just slightly and I looked at her with raised eyebrows, pausing before I went on.

"I'm twenty-two," she said, and then added, "How did she die?"

I half-laughed, noting both the coincidence of her age and the baldness of her question. "You know, I tried for a lot of years to think of a nice way to explain how Maggie died. Finally, I got tired of trying to pretty it up when one word says it all: Drugs." I downed the cold dregs of my coffee and grimaced. "Ain't no putting lipstick on that pig..." I said, mostly to myself.

Dina sat quietly, looking at me. "Wow," she said.

"Yeah. You said it." It always stung. Always.

Dina looked as if she were going to begin saying something else but at that moment, the waitress came by with a coffeepot in hand, a couple of menus tucked under her arm. She had a little gold nametag pinned to her shirt. It said 'Pam'.

"Can I get y'all anything else before I bring the check? More coffee?" Pam asked.

"That would be lovely," I said. Dina nodded and Pam filled both cups. I looked at Dina and smiled. "I think you need a treat - anything in that bakery case look good to you?"

Dina rolled her eyes and I thought she was going to turn me down, but she replied, "Yeah, that chocolate cake does look pretty good."

"All right, then," Pam said, "Just the one slice of chocolate cake?"

I nodded.

"Well, then I'll bring two spoons so y'all can share." Pam winked at us and moved on to her next table.

Dina and I sat for a few moments in silence, sipping our coffee, perhaps both of us thinking how odd it seemed to share a piece of cake with a woman we'd only just met.

Pam came back and set the slice of chocolate cake on the table between us. Dina picked up a spoon and cleared her throat. She looked sheepish.

"I just want to apologize for being rude, earlier," she said. "It's just been... Amy and I, I mean, this guy Jason..." She seemed unsure of how to begin so I jumped in.

"Sweetheart, it's okay. I suppose I was being rude, too. Eavesdropping isn't exactly considered polite. So we're even...and now we have cake!" I picked up the other spoon. "May I?"

Dina nodded. "Yeah, of course," she said, "but listen, what I was going to say earlier, before..." She took a bite of cake and gestured vaguely towards Pam, who was wiping down a table on the other side of the diner.

"Yeah?" I said, wondering where she was going.

"My Mom is dead. She overdosed when I was fourteen, so like, about eight years ago or so? Anyway, I just thought it was kind of a strange coincidence about your daughter." Dina seemed to want to say more but she took a bite of cake, instead.

"Wow," I said, genuinely surprised.

Dina, mouth full of cake, laughed, "Right? Like I said."

* * * * *

We sat at that little two-top table for hours. I told Dina about Maggie and she told me about her Mom and the whole Amy and Jason dilemma and trying to get through community college while working a crappy job and her endless cycle of lousy roommates and a hundred other things. I wouldn't have suspected the girl had so many words in her. It was nice to be with her. She really did remind me of Maggie.

It had gotten dark and through the diner windows I could see only the lights of the cars passing; everything else was obscured by the reflection of what was happening inside the diner. I looked at my watch. "Goodness, it's almost nine o'clock," I said.

"Yeah," Dina sighed. "I should probably get going. I thought Amy and I were going to hang out tonight, right? so I asked for the night off but I guess you know how that turned out. But it's been really cool talking to you. I never even asked you...kinda embarrassing," she winced, "but what do you do? Like, am I keeping you from something important right now?"

I laughed. "If only! No, not at all - I'm here in town for work but I fly out tomorrow. My big plans for the evening consist of getting back to the Travelodge and making sure I don't forget my face scrub in the shower when I pack up."

"Geez," Dina said, "I guess I just assumed you live here."

"Nope," I said, "St. Louis."

There was an expression on Dina's face that was hard to read. "Well, I don't want to keep you up if you're flying out early," she said. She stood up and put her bag over her shoulder. "I'm going to run to the bathroom before I go," she added, "all that coffee...."

"I'll get the check," I said. Dina smiled. "Thanks," she said.

She turned and disappeared around a corner booth. I pulled a pen from my purse and wrote on the check, 'Thanks for your patience, Pam!' and pulled two twenties from my wallet. The bill was less than twenty dollars but we had been there for hours. Long ago I had waited tables, too, and I hoped that extra twenty would make Pam's night.

I wondered if I should write down my name and phone number and give it to Dina but it seemed sort of odd to do so. What for? I lived too far away to be much help to her and it seemed presumptuous, somehow, like I'd be suggesting that she wanted to keep in touch. Or worse, implying that she wasn't capable of handling her own problems.

I was still at the table when Dina reappeared, looking somber. "Okay, well...thanks for the cake and everything. It was really nice to talk to you, Marilyn." She smiled at me shyly. "Bye."

Before I could say anything else she turned and walked quickly towards the door. I thought about calling out to her, but I didn't. Just like Maggie, I let her go.