Grandma watches her. Every step. She knows. Grandma holding her with her eyes. Needing her. Families stick together. Grandma holding on because she needs Zoe. Holding on because Zoe owes her. So much owing. Owing for dark eyes and dark hair that tie Mama to Daddy forever. Owing for growing in a place Grandma thought she owned. Zoe always owing. But now…only just now, thinking there is some other owing, too. Zoe owing herself. Owing herself more than anyone ever allowed. Owing and taking, now. A room is not much. It is not arms holding you. Not a breakfast cooked from scratch. Not a filled seat in a bleacher. Not a phone call or a kiss goodnight. Not much at all.
She pushes open the glass door of Murray’s and rolls up close to the wall. Out of sight of Grandma, not yet in sight of Murray. She grips her sides and a jumble of remorse and rage collide somewhere in between. No words form in her mind, only a blind swirl of wants that explode in different directions. It presses her breaths against her ribs in uncontrolled jumps. Jumping breaths like she is seven years old.
“Zoe?”
Her eyes freeze on Charisse’s.
“You okay?”
She sucks in, controls her breaths. Okay? She hardens her chest, refusing a jerky breath waiting at her ribs. Hardens, so there is no jump at all. Controls, so her words come out smooth. Narrows her eyes to shut away her soul. Zoe, owning her air, owning her space. The hardening spreads upward to her mouth, and a thin smile lines her face. “Of course I’m okay, Charisse. Just breathless from running.” She doesn’t explain more. She doesn’t have to.
She pushes past Charisse, who is still staring, and begins her shift. She works, she delivers, she balances. She smiles, she returns, she wipes. There is nothing else to do. She pushes fish tacos for Murray’s sake, though she has never tasted them and never will. She regularly walks past the front window and looks out, keeping her car safe with her eyes. Anchoring it there with her will.
“Miss? Is it too late to change my order to a Philly?”
She doesn’t check the order. “Yes. Too late,” she answers.
She doesn’t keep track of her tips, and at her break she doesn’t count them. They are not enough.
They will never be enough.
She sits on a wooden crate in the alley behind Murray’s and draws deep on her cigarette. A remnant of light still brushes the sky a deep royal blue but darkness is seeping into the corners. She hears rustling behind the trash bins. Rats come alive with darkness. She blows out a gust of smoke and listens to their tiny secret sounds. Rustling, rasping, scratching, scratching, scratching. Echoing. They surround her, along with the sour smell of old garbage. The last swath of blue disappears, and the sounds grow louder. Darkness spreads like ink through the alley, and not a single star in the sky shows to make a difference. She sits in the darkness, listening, then mashes the butt of her cigarette in the grave
l and returns to finish her shift.
She checks the car first. It sits undisturbed, illuminated with yellow and red neon and the sometime shadow of the working pump. The slashing light sparkles on the chrome, like shooting stars. Stars on a starless night. She pushes away from the window. When hell freezes over. Ninety dollars isn’t that hard to get.
The evening rush that wasn’t becomes the dead calm that is. Murray disappears into the stockroom, and Charisse tops off water for her lone customer. Zoe cleans up the table from her last customers and thinks that Murray will soon let her or Charisse go for the night. She tries to look busy.
And then.
The sleazebag comes in.
Charisse looks up, but Zoe knows where he will sit. Always.
“What will it be for you tonight?” she says cheerfully.
He bites. Encouraged. A smile and tilt of her head. Easy.
“What’s your special?”
“Fish tacos,” she says, pouring him some water.
“That all?” His clumsy hands paw at the glass, and his lips suck at the rim almost daintily. She notices flecks of white in his thin starch-stiff hair when he tilts his head to sip. He sets the glass down and wipes his mouth like he is swiping foam from a beer. His eyes never leave her.
Her stomach convulses. Only a little. “That’s all.”
He orders his usual, sirloin with a side of slaw. The steak is tough, and she watches the chewing work a glistening line at the corner of his mouth. A forkful of coleslaw is shoved in alongside the steak and the line grows. She thinks of the fat wad of bills in his pocket. He could have ordered the filet. He could have anything he wants with that much money.
He leisurely finishes his meal, buttering his biscuit slowly, so every surface is covered. It oozes onto his stubby fingers, and he licks them with his lizard tongue. Zoe watches and he enjoys the attention, buttering up another one, this time asking for some of her sweet marmalade to go with it. She obliges.
When he is finished, she adds up his bill and slides it across the counter. He picks it up and pulls a five from his wallet. He reaches to set it on the counter, but she stops his hand with her own. “Are you all talk…or some action, too?”
His pupils shrink to pinpoints and his cheek twitches. Two gusts of breaths and his mouth finally works free.
“Plenty of action. I save the talk for after.”
“Then save your money for after, too.” She shoves the five-dollar bill back to him. “I’m taking off early. Meet me out front in two minutes.”