When I walked in, the first thing I saw was a tall bony girl throwing some kind of a fit.
“I am telling you,” she was saying to another girl, a curvy blonde with her hand on her hip. “If I get less than fifteen percent again tonight I am going to kill someone.”
“Uh-huh,” the blonde said. She was standing by the coffee machine, watching it brew.
“Mark my words,” said the bony girl. She had a short haircut with bangs straight across her forehead. She turned and looked toward the back corner of the restaurant, where a group of men in suits were standing up and pushing in their chairs, making leaving noises.
The blonde turned from the coffee machine and looked at me. She had on bright red lipstick. “Can I help you?”
“I need to order some takeout,” I said. My voice sounded loud in the almost-empty room.
“Menu’s right there,” she said, pointing to a stack right beside my elbow. She was staring at my lip. “Let me know when you’re ready.”
The tall girl brushed past me as she came out from behind the counter, then stepped aside as the suits left. One man toward the back was chewing on a toothpick, smacking his lips. The blonde settled in against the opposite side of the counter, watching me.
“Y’all have a good night,” the tall girl said.
“You too,” one of the men mumbled.
I went back to scanning the menu, all of it standard beach food: fried seafood, burgers, onion rings, the kind of stuff that had been banned from our house since my mother was born again as Kiki Sparks. It had been months since I’d had a french fry, much less a burger, and my mouth was already watering.
“I knew it,” the tall girl said from across the room. She was standing by the table the suits had just abandoned, a bunch of change in her hand. “A dollar seventy. On a thirty-dollar tab.”
“Well.” The blonde was clearly used to hearing this.
“Goddammit,” the tall girl said. “Okay, then. That is it.”
The blonde looked at me. “You ready?”
“Yeah.”
She took her time coming over, pulling out a ticket from the apron tied loosely around her waist. “Go ahead.”
“I’m not going to take this anymore,” the tall girl said as she started across the room. She had big, flat feet that smacked the floor with each step.
“Grilled chicken salad,” I said, remembering Mira’s request, “and a cheeseburger with fries. And onion rings.”
The blonde nodded, writing this down. “Anything else?”
“No.”
The tall girl stopped right next to me and slammed the handful of change down on the counter, one dime bouncing off to hit the floor with a ping. “I can’t take it anymore,” she said dramatically. “I will remain silent no longer.”
“You need ketchup with that?” the blonde said to me, ignoring her.
“Uh, yeah,” I said.
The tall girl was taking off her apron, balling it up in her hands. “I don’t want to have to do it,” she said.
“Mayonnaise?” the blonde asked.
“No,” I said.
“I quit! ” the tall girl announced, throwing her apron at the blonde, who reached up and caught it without even looking. “And now, I will go out and give those rude, inconsiderate fascists a piece of my mind.” She took two strides to the door, kicked it open with a bang, and was gone. The door swung shut, the screen rattling.
The blonde, still holding the apron, walked to the window and stuck my ticket on a spindle. “Order up.”
“All right,” a guy’s voice said, and then I saw Norman Norman poke his head out and grab the ticket. The blue sunglasses were parked on top of his head. “Where’s Morgan?” he asked.
“Quit,” the blonde said in a bored voice. She’d pulled out a Vogue magazine from somewhere and was flipping the pages.
Norman smiled that sleepy smile, then glanced toward the door and saw me. “Hey, Colie,” he said. “This for you and Mira?”
“Yeah,” I said. The blonde looked at me again.
“Cool,” Norman said, and he waved before disappearing back behind the window.
I stood there, waiting for my food; in the kitchen, a radio was playing softly. About ten minutes passed before the door creaked behind me and the tall girl—Morgan—came back in, mumbling under her breath.
“Already gone?” the blonde said in that same flat voice.
“Drove off just as I got out there,” Morgan grumbled. As she passed, the blonde gave her the apron, flipping another page of the magazine.
“Too bad,” she said.
“This is the last summer I work here,” Morgan declared, pulling her apron strings into a perfect bow. “I mean it.”
“I know.” The blonde turned another page.
“I’m serious.” Morgan went over to the soda machine and filled a cup with ice, shaking some into her mouth and crunching it with a determined look. Then she saw me. “You been helped?”
“Yeah,” I said.
“She’s Mira’s niece,” said the blonde.
Morgan looked at me with new interest, eyebrows raised. “Really?”
“You remember. Norman told us about her.” The blonde put down her magazine and turned her full attention back to me. “Kiki Sparks’ kid. Can you imagine.”
“I can’t,” Morgan said, but she smiled. “What’s your name?”