Now that Mason was working at the diner, Bobbie had reduced her number of hours. She was close to retirement, and she was enjoying her more leisure mornings with her wife, Jocelyn. Mason appreciated the alone time with the boss he was totally crushing on.
They settled at the long stainless counter, Lila with carrots and a peeler and him with a mound of potatoes and his own peeler. The radio played soft music in the background, and the sound cut off with white noise every now and again.
“One day, someone will have to explain to me while the electronics here don’t work too well sometimes.”
Lila shrugged. “There has always been a bit of strange interference in town with mechanical stuff, but it’s gotten worse this year.”
“Did no one look into it?”
“There was a big storm about eighteen months ago, and some of the townsfolk say that maybe a tower was damaged or something out in the hills.”
“Shouldn’t someone check it out?”
Lila shook her head. “Why? It’s not like there is anything pressing that happens here. In case you haven’t noticed, we live our lives to a whole other rhythm than the rest of the world.”
He laughed. “Well, maybe that’s true for the people who don’t run the diner.”
“That’s true.”
“Did you ever think of going on a vacation? Letting people fend for themselves for a couple of weeks while you take a break?”
Lila snorted. “Not a chance. My grandmother would have my head. She would try to come to work if I did that.”
“And that’s bad?” he asked. Lila very rarely answered questions about her grandmother.
“Yeah, that would be bad for her health,” she responded dryly.
“Got it. No holiday for Lila because she is busy making sure everyone else is okay.”
“That’s fine. I don’t mind.”
“Well, did you ever stop to think what would happen ifyougot sick?”
“No, I can’t think about that. If I can’t open the diner, I’m pretty sure the very fabric of town would rip in two, and then Nana would ripmein two.”
“Right. So there’s no pressure,” his tone was sarcastic, hedged with worry.
“None whatsoever.”
“What happened to your grandmother?”
“She’s old. Her health isn’t what it used to be.”
“And?”
Lila took a deep breath. “She has some memory problems. Sometimes, she thinks she is a young woman again. She asks where my grandfather is, and she tries to get out of bed to go to work.”
“Dementia?”
“Yeah. I think so.”
“What do you mean, you think so?”
“I can’t know for sure. She refuses to leave town. Every time I manage to get her into the car to drive her to a doctor, she somehow manages to get very lucid, and she runs away from me. I had to get the whole town to help me find her last time I tried to take her.”
“How come there is no doctor in town?”
Lila laughed dryly, but there was no humor in it. “You’re joking, right? No one wants to work out here. There are so few patients. The last doctor we had left. Didn’t last very long. People around here prefer other forms of medicine.”