Part 3 — The Sunday Shift
Marisol laid the dotted rolls out along the counter, side by side, all the way to the pie case.
“Sunday,” she said. “Every single short number is a Sunday.”
The kitchen was so quiet that I could hear the walk-in fan humming through the wall.
“Sunday is the night Ronnie closes alone, while the rest of us have off.” She put her finger on the last dot. “And Sunday is the night he drives to Wendover.”
Ronnie took the toothpick out of his mouth and set it down on the counter. His hand was shaking so badly that it rolled.
“I did not want to,” he whispered. “Clyde, I swear to God. Every Sunday I told myself, just this once.”
Earl, my dishwasher, leaned on the rack. Iris wiped her hands on her apron.
Thirty-five years of my own cheap rubber bands and Folgers cans had done what no lawyer could have done, because paper does not forget.
I called a lawyer on Monday. Mr. Delgado had handled our lease for years, and he sat with me at stool three and walked me through it. A partner who takes from a Wyoming business behind the other owners back is liable for what he took, and the tips belonged to the staff by federal law.
I did not want Ronnie in handcuffs. I wanted the staff made whole, the diner kept open, and Lorna to come home to a kitchen with her name still on the ticket.
Ronnie agreed to everything. He sold his half of the business to me for a fair price, minus what he owed, in a signed agreement witnessed by Delgado. The money went first to the staff, with the Christmas jar restored in full and interest for the whole three years.
He called the Wyoming helpline that Friday, with Iris sitting beside him, holding the phone. A counselor in Casper started him on a program that same week.
The cooler came out of the repaid cooler fund, installed in April by a crew who knew my name. The staff held a small party in the back, and Iris gave a toast to paper.
Lorna came home in May with a walker and a lopsided smile. I seated her on stool three and wrote the ticket myself, in capitals, the way I always had. LORNA, THE USUAL.
Marisol set a plate in front of her. One egg over medium, rye toast in triangles, coffee with too much sugar.
My wife picked up her fork, looked up at me, and said her first word since January.
“Clyde.”