Tea, sugar, hold the milk. Stir. Ones, twice, three times. Stop. Place the cup on the right-hand side with the handle facing away towards the kitchen and let it rest for exactly two and a half minutes before drinking. Not being able to sit at his usual table has completely thrown him off his mourning routine, but he cannot exactly chase people away in a public cafe. Everything else will just have to be perfect.
The waiter brings the menu. The same one as last time, per standing request. The same waiter as well. The small flecks of nail polish on his fingers that he would rather no one saw reassures the man of this without needing to look at the waiter’s face. Purple this time. The way the boy scratches at the nails while waiting for the man’s order makes him wonder when the boy is going to tell his parents. Such a sweet young boy, but with so much worry in him.
“Wednesday regular please.” He does not need to write this simple instruction down, but he does anyway, because that is how he has always done it. This clams the man, and he knows it. Such a sweet boy.
Pancakes, two scoops of cream and exactly half a tablespoon of honey. Knife and fork on the same side. Turn the cream away from him. Finish the tea. Everything is going so well he almost forgets he is at the wrong table. Almost.
Order another cup. Sugar, no milk, handle to the right. Eat.
he tips the waiter, pays his bill and leaves.
The man comes in at exactly 7:45. I tried to keep his table open, but a family sat down while I was busy with another client. I drop everything and show him to the closest available table that matches what he needs. No need for words. We have done this every weekday for a year. I know he’s not happy with this table, but I know he knows this is the best I can do for him today. I pour the tea and place the milk next to his cup even though I know he won’t drink it, but without drinking it he finds more comfort from that cup of milk than most people can find from all the tea they drink in a lifetime. I fetch his menu from the drawer we keep it in. I have no idea how he can tell that it’s the one, but he can. As always, he notices the small pieces of nail polish still left from the weekend I spent at “a friend’s house”. Nervously I scratch of a few more flakes of polish before writing down his order. I don’t really write anything; I just make the movement while holding my notepad and pen. There is no use in wasting a whole paper just to write down the day of the week. Not when the chef has already put everything aside for him, exactly how he needs it. I bring the food, then another cup of tea, and set a timer for exactly 14 minutes. When my phone vibrates in my pocket, I excuse myself from another table and give the man his bill. He pays. He tips as well. He always tips a very large sum “for my troubles” not realising that he is the easiest customer to serve most mornings. He gets up to leave and I go back to work.
Every weekday we repeat this exercise. I am told on days that I call in sick he asks when I’ll be back and leaves without ordering. Some would think that creepy, and at first so did I. But Fridays aren’t like all weekdays. On Fridays he comes back after work, and another waiter serves him, and he drinks coffee for the first time that week. Afterwards he sits in the parking lot for an hour before going home. During that hour we sometimes talk. That’s why I know when he asks for me he isn’t trying to be creepy. Those Friday talks are the highlight of my week. One hour of conversation where I don’t have to pretend, where I don’t scratch at my nails, where I don’t hide any of the marks in my neck. Oddly, even then, when he is at the most relaxed I have ever seen him, he still never talks about himself too personally. He worked at a construction site. That is a fact. He was no longer married yet still wears the ring. That is a fact. Why he comes to our café and askes to me? That is personal. That he never answers.
One day he doesn’t show up.
He doesn’t show up at all during the week. By Friday I am ready to file a missing person’s report. My manager is already trying to find a photo of him from the security camera.
His car is sitting in the parking lot. I almost don’t recognise it because it isn’t in his usual spot, but it is definitely him. I wanted to run outside and make sure he was okay but by the time I get outside I see him driving off. In the parking spot where he had stopped there is a neat, eggshell-white envelope. It is addressed to me.
“Listening to you talk during our Friday afternoons I realized how important it was to be able to let go of the storms of words in our souls. I took your lead and found someone who would take the storm of words and form them into stories, and so I started grief counselling. The counselling has helped me to move on with my life. This afternoon I am moving far away, and I doubt that I will be back here soon. Therefore, I have decided to tell you why. Why it was you and why it was this café. I have decided to share the story that came from my storm of words.
When my son was young, we brought him here for special treats. He had made a list of what he would eat if we brought him here on any given day, so much did he love eating here. More than a year ago, my son brought us here. My wife and I. He sat us down and told us that he had been hiding his true self from us for years. He told us about the boy we thought was his best friend. My wife did not take too kindly to this news. She called him a faggot and stormed out. I did not know how to react. I just sat there while he walked out crying. By the time I got home it was too late. My wife had stormed off somewhere out of anger and I wanted desperately to comfort him. To tell him that he should not listen to her and that I was proud of him, but when I got to his room, he was far beyond the point of counselling. He had painted his nails. He had done his makeup. He had dressed himself in the most amazing evening gown you could imagine and taken 3 fists full of sleeping pills.
I blamed myself for not comforting him in the café. I blamed my wife, for even in death she would not accept our daughter for who she was. We divorced the week after her funeral. I came here the day after the funeral and found you waiting tables here. You reminded me of all I had lost so I came back. Following the dietary rules scribbled in crayon many years ago after we came here as a family for the first time.
Now that my story has been told, I need to move on with my life. Away from this city and away from this caff. To thank you for all the days you helped me to live, find enclosed a gift.”
Inside the envelope was exactly a year worth of tips from his daily breakfast and a vial of manic panic pink nail polish. My favourite.