Mary Kubica - Don't You Cry - A gripping suspense full of secrets

It goes without saying that at least one waitress will spill a tray full of food. That nearly all of them will gripe about the inadequacy of the tips. That on the weekend, the morning customers will loiter around, drinking endless cups of coffee and shooting the shit until breakfast blends into lunch and they finally leave. But during the week, the only customers hanging around after 9:00 a.m. are retirees, or the school district’s bus drivers who double-park their Blue Birds in the back lot and spend the morning kvetching about the disrespectful nature of those in their care, namely all children between the ages of five and eighteen.

There are no unknowns this time of year. Every day is the same, unlike in the summer months when random tourists appear. Then it’s a crapshoot. We run out of bacon. Some egghead wants to know what’s really in the chocolate croissants, leaving Priddy to send one of us to drag the box out of the trash in back and see. Vacationers snap photos of the café name in the front window; they take pictures with the waitresses as if this is some kind of tourist attraction, a hot-spot destination, spouting on and on about how some Michigan travel guide claims ours is the best coffee in town. They ask if they can buy the cheap mugs that bear our name in an old-style font, and Priddy will up the price from the bulk fee she pays—a dollar fifty apiece—to $9.99. A rip-off.

But none of this happens in the off-season when every single day is a rehashing of the day before, the same of which can be said for today. And tomorrow. And yesterday. At least that’s the way the day sets out to be as Mr. Parker arrives with his two dogs and orders a coffee, black, to go, and Priddy asks him if he’d care for a croissant, which he says no to twice before he says okay.

But then at the end of the morning something happens, something abnormal, making this day different than all the days before.

My Dearest,

It’s one of the last memories I have of you, your arms clinging to her neckline, the gentle curve of her breast pressing into your skin through the thin cotton of a wispy white blouse. She was beautiful to say the least, and yet it was you I couldn’t take my eyes off of—the shimmer of your skin and the radiance of your eyes, the gradual curve of your lips as she traced over them with the pad of a forefinger and then placed her own to yours. A kiss.

It was through the window that I saw you. I stood there, in the middle of the street, not hiding in the shadows or behind trees. Smack-dab in the middle of the street, impervious to the flow of traffic. I’m surprised she didn’t see me, that she didn’t hear the blare of a car horn suggestion that I move. Recommending it. But I didn’t move. I couldn’t be bothered. I was too busy watching the two of you gathered together in a warm embrace. Too intrigued and too angry.

Maybe you did. Maybe you did see me, but only pretended not to see or hear.

It was nighttime, just after dusk as I pressed my face now to the glass to see inside. The curtains were open, every single light in the house on as if you wanted me to see. As if you were gloating, rubbing it in, exulting in your victory. Or maybe that was something she came up with all on her own: leaving the lights on so that I could see. It was, after all, her victory. Like a spotlight illuminating dancers onstage, the way you laughed, the way she smiled, no one noticing my absence because I’d already been replaced as if somehow I’d never even been there in the first place.

Except that you weren’t onstage at all, but rather in the living room of a home I was meant to share with you.

I have to know: Did you see me? Were you trying to make me mad?

All my love,

EV

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