Page 37 of Fight for Me

There's a tap on my shoulder as I'm stacking dirty dishes from a table. The other waitress, Mary, motions with her thumb toward a table in the back of the diner.

“This one over there asked for you,” she murmurs.

Without looking to where she pointed, I refocus on my task and in a monotone voice respond, “That’s your section for today.”

Mary snorts. “Yeah, tell that guy. He was pretty adamant about it. Oh, he said his name’s Damon.”

I almost drop the dishes I'm carrying, and then whip my head to the side to see for myself.

“Great,” I mutter and eye a stiff-looking Brody from across the room. “Thanks, I’ll take care of it.”

She nods and moves away to take the next order from a new customer.

I go to dispose of the stack of dirty plates, and then nervously try to smooth my hair, before taking a deep breath and marching over to the table.

“Welcome to Gary’s, what can I get for you?” I chirp at Brody, squeezing the hell out of the notepad in my hand.

“I’m not here for the food,” he states and blinks slowly. “Can we talk?”

Ignoring his question, I respond with, “Oh, I’m sorry, sir, but this is a diner. If you’re not going to order anything, I’m going to have to ask you to leave, please.”

“Fine. Coffee, then,” he says, his nostrils flaring as he stares me down.

“Sure. Anything else?” I smile at him politely, my cheeks hurting from the exaggerated muscle use.

He takes a breath and licks his lips. “Yeah. You could cut the shit, Jen, and sit the fuck down, so we can talk.”

I look behind me to see if anyone is paying attention to us and then answer in a lower voice, “I’m at work. I can’t just sit around with random men and chatter whenever I want to.”

“Random men? That’s what I am now?” he questions with a hard expression on his face.

I sigh and scratch behind my ear, checking the surroundings once again. “You seemed as if you’d rather pretend not to know me in front of the station, so I was trying to respect it. Whatever it is that you want to talk about, I can’t right now.”

“Fine. What time do you finish?” he demands and starts to get up from his seat.

“Five, but...” I frown when he drops twenty dollars on the table.

Already walking past me, he takes hold of my wrist and squeezes it briefly once before letting go with a silent, “I’ll see you then. Thanks for the coffee.”

“I didn’t bring you any...” I say, but he’s already walking out the door. “What the hell?” I whisper and collect the money he left with a shake of my head.

––––––––

I WALK OUT OF THE DINER tired and overwhelmed. I had to keep my emotions in check the whole day, and the visit from Brody at my workplace didn’t help.

“I’m here, what is it that you want to talk about?” I ask without meeting his gaze and tap my foot impatiently after I lean on his car, that's been parked close to the entrance for the last hour.

He clears his throat. “I’m sorry about how I acted the day before,” Brody says slowly, and I glance at him before looking to the side again.

“That’s fine. We don’t know each other anymore. You don’t owe me an explanation,” I say with a raised chin and grab my keys out of my pocket. “If that’s all...”

“No, I...” He curses under his breath. “Could you at least look at me?”

Tilting my head slowly, I look at his tortured face and gulp.

Brody takes a step closer and says, “Look, I didn’t anticipate ever seeing you again. That part of my life was closed. Then I saw you, and it all hit me like a ton of bricks.”

“Sorry for the inconvenience...” I state and step away, ready to flee.

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