Cold Coffee

Cold Coffee

It was Friday night. No, actually it was already Saturday. The hand of the old, grimy analogue clock stood at just past midnight. The witching hour. And he felt like a ghost, sitting there the way he was. In front of his cup. The coffee in it long since cold. He stared at the dark, thin liquid, at his hands gripping the ceramic tightly. He was tired. Unbelievably tired. He could drink the coffee. That was why he had ordered it. To fight the tiredness. But he knew that no coffee in the world, least of all this watery slop they served here, would be able to do anything against the exhaustion inside him.

The waitress had been looking, it felt like every minute for a while now, alternately at the clock, then at the door, before letting her gaze linger on him for a moment. He knew she would ask him to leave soon. He knew she wanted to go home.

He wondered what her life outside this diner looked like. Sometimes he had trouble imagining that people kept on living once they left his immediate surroundings, as if they simply ceased to exist. This thought frightened him, which was why he had gotten into the habit of making up stories about these people.

He observed the waitress from the corner of his eye. She was wiping the last crumbs of the day from the worn counter with an air of irritation. In the background, some old country song was droning away. He thought he recognised Dolly Parton's voice. 9 to 5. He'd bet the waitress wished she had a 9-to-5 job too. She wasn't young anymore. He put her at late forties. Curly red hair, obviously dyed. Nature couldn't produce a shade like that on its own. It suited her. The short hair was carefully set in curls. She probably slept with a hairnet at night. On her nose sat a thick black pair of horn-rimmed glasses. They looked more like a statement than a visual aid. Her lips were deep red – or would have been, but after hours of working without the chance to touch up her make-up, the lipstick had faded by now. It gave her something sad. Like an old photograph of a once beautiful memory that had faded over time, not just on paper.

The old apron she wore over her uniform rounded off the picture of nostalgia and dust. With an almost elegant swing of her hips she turned around and disappeared with the cloth in her hand through the back into the adjoining kitchen.

He heard the murmur of voices. She was talking with the cook. He couldn't make out what it was about. Their voices sounded tired. Drained by another long, gruelling day in the food business.

Slowly he turned his gaze to the window beside him. It had stopped raining an hour ago. Only a few scattered drops were still visible on the window pane, and the full moon shone bright and clear on the car park in front of the diner, where only three vehicles remained. He guessed that the small, compact red VW New Beetle belonged to the waitress and the black BMW estate to the cook. But he could be wrong. These days anything was possible, and he still thought far too much in clichés.

Clichés. The waitress. What did she get up to when she left the diner, he wondered again. He imagined she might be greeted at home by a little mixed-breed dog. Maybe by a boyfriend or a girlfriend. Did she have children? Maybe she was married, and while she made sure extra money came in, her husband was at home making sure the children were in bed on time. Or had her children long since left the house? Her husband already in his second marriage to a younger, slimmer version of her, while she had been left behind alone, lonely, but at least free from patriarchal oppression?

"Honey, I'm terribly sorry, but we're closing now."

He flinched violently as her exhausted but strangely full-toned voice reached his ear. He hadn't heard her coming. He looked up at her, his pulse racing, and forced himself to take one deep breath in and out.

"You're welcome to come back tomorrow and order another cup of coffee to stare at," she continued, glancing at the cold drink. She shifted her weight impatiently from one foot to the other, visibly waiting for him to get up and leave.

"If I leave now, someone will die," he heard himself say. His voice was barely more than a hoarse whisper, and for a moment he wondered whether she had even heard it. Her eyes went wide as she took a minimal, barely perceptible step back. She stared at him in disbelief.

"What's that supposed to mean? Look, honey, if this is meant to be a joke …" Her head swung around; she looked towards the kitchen, clearly on the verge of calling the cook.

"I mean it." His voice sounded louder this time, but still hoarse. Dry.

She turned back to face him fully. The confusion on her features was still plainly visible. "What do you mean?" Her own voice sounded less steady now. "Who is going to die?" A realisation flickered across her face. "Do you need help? Should I call the police? Should I …"

"No! No police!" he interrupted her, almost a touch too sharply. He wondered whether she was aware that she had suddenly started addressing him more formally. "Please, no police. That would only make everything worse," he added weakly.

"I don't understand. What is this all about then? And why can't you leave?" Her gaze drifted outside. "Are you being watched? Is that what you're saying?" She began nervously kneading her apron.

"No, I'm not being watched." He shook his head, stared at the coffee, and felt the knot in his chest, the lump in his throat. "Would you …" he began. His voice failed him. He cleared his throat. "Would you sit with me for a moment?" He raised his eyes. Her eyes were blue as the sky. Like cornflowers. Strange that he should be thinking of cornflowers right now. "Please?" he added gently, when he noticed her hesitation.

She cast a brief, uncertain glance towards the kitchen. Then, with a sigh, she slid onto the seat across from him. The upholstery let out a short, creaking sound as she sank down onto it.

"Thank you," he murmured. He released his hands from the cup and laid them flat on the table, one on each side of it.

She sat there, visibly tense, waiting to see what would happen next. He wondered whether she was afraid. She must be afraid. She was a woman sitting across from a strange man in the middle of the night, a man whose appearance suggested he had seen better days. "Not all men. But always men," shot through his mind. Of course she was afraid.

"What's your name?" he asked, without looking up, his hands still pressed flat against the tabletop. Outside, the rain had started again. Heavy drops splattered against the pane and drowned out the tireless radio playing in the background.

She swallowed and shifted restlessly in her seat. Every movement produced another creaking sound. Finally she seemed to have made up her mind. "Doreen," she said quietly. She adjusted her glasses, then paused, took them off, and polished them with her apron. The routine action seemed to restore a little of her composure. "What's your name?" she asked in return. Perhaps it was a reflex, or perhaps she genuinely wanted to know.

"Daniel." A brief silence fell. "Nice to meet you, Doreen." He meant it the way he said it. Not a trace of sarcasm in his voice. "How long have you been working here?"

She was visibly puzzled by the apparent inconsequentiality of the question. "Just over ten years."

He nodded calmly. "The diner had only just opened back then, hadn't it?"

The scepticism in her voice was unmistakable as she answered him again. "That's right. I started here shortly after it opened." The tension in her shoulders eased a little, but it was clear she remained on her guard.

Good, he thought. As a woman, you can never be too careful. "Why?"

She paused again and at first seemed not to grasp the point of his question. She watched him through slightly narrowed eyes, her glasses back firmly on her nose. "Why?" she echoed. "Well, I suppose simply because I needed the money. You have to do something for work, don't you? And this job here …" she made a small, brief gesture towards the aisle, "is as good as any other," she concluded.

As good as any other, he thought, and immediately doubted those words. He tapped the fingertips of his left hand on the table; her gaze followed the movement.

"Do you really think that? That this job is as good as any other?"

She looked at him uncomprehendingly and was about to reply when he got there first. "Don't get me wrong, but are you really telling me that you never dreamed of doing something else besides waiting tables in a diner from morning to night?" His voice had regained some energy, and you could just make out the faint trace of a fire that must once have come to him quite naturally.

Visibly embarrassed, she lowered her head a fraction. "Well, maybe not exactly this, but …" Her hands began to knead her apron again. "You have to do something for work, don't you," she finished lamely.

He nodded again. "Right," he agreed in a monotone. The spark of a moment ago had completely vanished again, and the fingers of his left hand stopped moving. "Did you never dream of something different? Of there having to be more? More than this?" he began again.

He knew where this conversation was heading. He had had conversations like this thousands of times. With family, friends, strangers, and with himself. Most of all with himself.

She seemed to genuinely think it over. "Yes," she then said slowly, propping her arms on the tabletop and leaning slightly forward. "I wanted to go into radio. I wanted to be a presenter."

The answer surprised him. He had been prepared for many things, but not for that. He raised his eyes to look at her directly. His astonishment was obvious.

She flushed slightly, turned her head away in embarrassment to look out of the window – anywhere, just not at him.

"I'm sorry," he hurried to say. "It's just that most people usually give me a different answer." He wanted to add an explanation, but stopped himself. "A radio presenter, then." He nodded again. "That's why your voice is the way it is."

She looked at him in surprise and tilted her head.

"It sounds unusually full. Your timbre. It's … not like other voices." An "Oh" formed on her lips. "I'd bet you would have made a good presenter."

Again she flushed slightly. "Tell that to my parents. Or my husband. Or my friends. Jobs in radio, especially in presenting, don't exactly grow on trees. I tried. I did an internship at a local radio station after school. I enjoyed it. But everyone said it was nonsense. That I should do something sensible." Her voice had suddenly taken on an urgency. The words came tumbling from her lips like a waterfall, as if she had only been waiting for permission to let it all out. "Then I met Harry. I mean my husband, fell pregnant, and then again, barely a year after our first was born. Harry still had a good job back then. He wanted me to stay home and look after the children. I wanted to work. I still had the dream of radio, but I gave in. Everyone just kept telling me how lucky I ought to feel to have found a man like Harry who earned well enough that I didn't have to work." She swallowed; the rush of words had taken on a faintly desperate undertone, and she stared out of the window again for a moment.

"Ten years ago Harry lost his well-paid job. It was a hard time. The children were past the worst of it, but far from grown up. I had to work. I applied for a lot of positions. Nothing but rejections. Then the diner opened. Sally, the owner, is an old friend of my mother's. That's how I got the job, and I stayed. Some time later Harry found work again too. Not as well paid as the old position. Good, but not good enough for me to go back to staying home." There was a thoughtful expression around her eyes. Her lips had imperceptibly pressed together. A hint of defiance played about her features. Perhaps it was because she was at that moment justifying to herself why she had told a complete stranger so much about herself.

He knew the answer. Because it was easier. No matter how he reacted, it wouldn't hurt her the way it would if it came from someone she cared about. He knew that feeling all too well.

"Would you have wanted to go back to staying home?" he asked, leaning forward a little himself. He had unconsciously mirrored her posture as she spoke. From the outside one might have thought they had known each other a long time. The waitress and the regular. Nothing could have been further from the truth. But that was the thing about first impressions.

Without hesitating she answered him. This time the defiance was not merely a supposition, it was plain. "No! Absolutely not. It isn't what I wanted for myself." She looked around the diner. "The days are long, the work is hard. My feet aren't getting any younger. Neither is my back. All the same, I enjoy it. I get to meet people, have a chat with them. In my own four walls I sometimes thought I was going mad when I'd spent days talking only to the children, because Harry was too tired in the evenings." She sighed. It sounded resigned, but not hopeless.

"You still could. You know? Work with your voice, I mean."

She looked at him through narrowed eyes.

"I mean it. I like your voice. I'd bet people enjoy listening to you. I'll admit I don't know what it takes to work in radio as a presenter, but perhaps …" he paused to think for a moment, "podcasts?" He looked at her questioningly. "Not necessarily to make money. Not straight away, I mean, but as a starting point? Or recording audiobooks? I mean, why not? What could go wrong? You could try. There's no rule that forbids you from at least trying."

She laughed softly. It sounded more sad than amused. "Podcasts? Murder mystery?" she asked back in a mildly sardonic tone.

"Sure! Why not? Or whatever you like. It's just an idea. A direction, if you will." He didn't take the bait of her sarcasm. Instead his expression turned serious. "What do you have to lose?" he asked her in a clear, steady voice, every trace of hoarseness suddenly gone.

She wanted to say something. Her mouth opened, closed, opened. Then she fell silent and thought.

"You don't have to give me an answer. You don't have to give yourself an answer either. At least not tonight. But maybe tomorrow?" His voice sounded softer now, almost soothing, while she continued to look at him in silence. It took a while before she managed a sound of agreement.

"Ok," she said, and nodded once, firmly.

"Ok!" he replied with equal firmness.

Her posture had changed. She no longer seemed tense and exhausted, but resolute. Like someone who has just made a decision.

He reached into his jacket pocket and, without looking, pulled out a worn business card. "These are my contact details. When you've decided what you want to do – murder mystery podcast," he smiled for the first time that evening, still tired, but the rigidity had left his features, "or something else … Please let me know. I'd love to hear about it." There was an encouraging look in his eyes as he slid the card across to her.

She took it hesitantly and glanced briefly at it before tucking it into her uniform pocket. "Promise?" he pressed.

"Promise," she answered firmly.

"Good." He rose slowly and stood beside the table. Now she was sitting while he leaned slightly towards her. Roles reversed.

"The coffee's cold. It's late. You should close up." He smiled warmly as he gave her one last nod.

He turned towards the exit. He half expected her to call something after him, but she did nothing of the sort. She simply stayed sitting, without watching him go, absorbed in her own thoughts and possibilities.

He opened the door and stepped out into the rain. He felt the cold, heavy drops on his skin. He walked with heavy steps towards his old dark green Jeep.

Drawing level with one of the rubbish bins placed around the diner, he stopped. He reached into his jacket pocket again. This time he pulled out a large box. Somnalon. Sleeping pills. He dropped it in, paused for a moment, and looked up at the bright, full moon. Out of the corner of his eye he caught a shooting star.

Not tonight, he thought. Not tonight.

Then he walked on to his car. He was looking forward to hearing Doreen's voice again. For the first time in a long while he felt something like hope.

Read in the app, leave a resonance, discover more stories.