Lost Souls. Lisa Jackson
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her apron, Kristi passed through swinging doors from the kitchen to the dining area and stopped fuming about Hiram. At least he’d finally called back. Kristi had been beginning to think the manager/grandson was a figment of Irene’s imagination.
So far, it had been a busy morning and early afternoon, but things were slowing down, thank God. Her feet were sore, her clothes feeling grimy from the grease and smoke that hung in the air and clung to her hair. After a few hours working frantically in her section, she’d wondered why she hadn’t taken her father’s advice and tried to nail a desk job at another insurance company. After all, it wasn’t as if she were getting rich on tips. However, just the memory of hours on the phone with complaining customers of Gulf Auto and Life had reminded her of her goal and her dream of writing true crime.
Her stomach rumbled, reminding her that she hadn’t eaten anything since downing a muffin on the fly early in the morning. After her shift she thought she might splurge on a Mercutio melt and a slice of King Lear’s key lime pie.
Happy New Year, she thought sarcastically as she grabbed a pot of coffee and refilled half-empty cups on the tables in her section.
A group of women strolled in and squeezed into the worn bench seat of a corner booth.
Snagging four plastic-encased menus, Kristi approached. The women hardly noticed, they were so into their conversation, and one of the voices sounded familiar. Kristi couldn’t believe it, but as she stared at the back of a curly head, she realized that she was about to serve Lucretia Stevens, her original roommate when she was an undergrad and living in the close quarters of Cramer Hall. Inside, Kristi cringed. She and Lucretia had never gotten along and had been as different as day to night. Kristi, in those days, had been a party girl and Lucretia a brainiac who, when she hadn’t been studying, had spent hours flipping through Brides magazine and munching on Cheetos. She hadn’t had any social life and had been evasive when talking about her boyfriend, who’d gone to another college. Kristi had never seen the guy and had often wondered if he’d only existed in Lucretia’s mind.
What goes around, comes around, she thought as she slid menus in front of the women and asked them what they wanted to drink.
“Kristi?” Lucretia asked, before anyone answered.
“Hi, Lucretia.” Geez, this was going to be uncomfortable.
“What’re you doing here?” Lucretia’s eyes were wide, probably due to the contacts that, when she’d worn them in lieu of her glasses, had always made her appear owlish.
“Trying to take your order,” Kristi said, offering a smile.
“Hey, everyone, this is Kristi Bentz, my old roommate when I was a freshman, oh, God, a kabillion years ago.” She laughed, then motioned toward a woman of about twenty-five with narrow-framed glasses and dark brown hair that fell to her shoulders. “Kristi, this is Ariel.”
“Hi,” Kristi said, shifting from one foot to the other.
“Oh, hi.” Ariel nodded, then glanced past Kristi to the door, as if she were looking for someone, at least someone more interesting than Kristi.
“And this is Grace,” Lucretia indicated her thin friend who wore braces and had spiked, reddish hair. The woman couldn’t have weighed a hundred pounds. “And this is Trudie.” The last girl, seated next to Lucretia in the booth, was heavier-set, had thick black hair pulled into a long ponytail, a smooth olive complexion and white teeth with a bit of a gap. All three managed smiles as Lucretia said, as if surprised, “Geez, Kristi, you look great.”
“Thanks.”
“Bentz?” Trudie repeated. “Wait a sec. Didn’t I read about you?”
Here we go, Kristi thought. “Probably about my dad. He makes the press.”
“Wait a minute. He’s a cop, right?” Ariel asked, twisting her head and squinting up at Kristi. She was suddenly interested. “Didn’t he crack that case at Our Lady of Virtues a year or so ago?” She shuddered. “That was soooo weird.”
Amen, Kristi thought, anxious to end the personal conversation about a time she’d rather forget.
“Weren’t you involved?” Lucretia was now serious. “I mean, didn’t I read something about you being injured?” Her forehead wrinkled as she thought. “The way the article was slanted it was as if you were almost killed.” She was nodding, her hair shimmering in dark curls beneath the overhead lamps. “Like before.”
Kristi didn’t want to be reminded of her close calls at the hands of sicko perverts. Twice already, she’d nearly been killed by a psychopath, and the shards of memory about those encounters were enough to turn her blood to ice. She needed to deflect the conversation and fast.
“It was a while back. I’m over it. So, the special today is red beans and rice, I mean Hamlet’s hash.”
But Lucretia wasn’t about to be derailed. She had everyone at her table and the surrounding area’s attention, and she wasn’t going to let go. “I think I read or heard that you died and came back or something.”
“Or something,” Kristi said as all of the women at the table, Lucretia’s friends who had been so animated a few minutes earlier, grew silent. The strains of an old Elvis tune ran over the clink of silverware, buzz of conversation, and hiss of the ancient heater as it struggled to keep the diner warm. She shrugged, relegating the story of her past to “who cares” status.
“Kristi’s used to it,” Lucretia said. “Lives the life.”
Ariel asked, “What does it feel like to have a famous father?”
Pen poised over her order pad, Kristi ignored the knot in her gut. “Quasi famous. It’s not like he’s Brad Pitt or Tom Cruise or even—”
“We’re not talking about movie stars.” Lucretia interrupted her. “Just local celebs.”
“Local celebs like Truman Capote and Louis Armstrong?” Kristi said.
“Dead,” Trudie said.
“My dad’s just a cop.”
Lucretia stared at her as if she’d just said she’d become a devil worshipper. “He’s not just anything.”
Kristi held on to her patience with an effort. That hadn’t been what she’d meant, but Lucretia had always had a way of twisting things around. Maybe it was because her divorced parents had hardly had time for her; they’d been so wrapped up in their own problems. Or, maybe it was something else entirely. Whatever it was, it was annoying and always had been.
“You’re right,” Kristi managed. “He’s great, but he’d be the first to tell you he was just doing his job.”
“How cool is that?” Trudie asked.
Time to end this. “So, anything to drink?” Kristi asked. “Coffee?”
Thankfully, Lucretia and her group picked up their menus and rattled off their choices.
“Two sweet teas, a Diet Coke, and a coffee. Got it,” Kristi said, thankful to hurry back to the kitchen. Who would have thought that Lucretia would have kept up with her, or her father? Kristi and Lucretia hadn’t kept in touch over the years; in fact, while living together, they hardly spoke. They’d had nothing in common before. Kristi doubted that had changed over the years.
“Old friends?” Ezma, a waitress with mocha-colored skin and impossibly white teeth, asked as she filled plastic glasses with shaved ice from a rumbling ice machine positioned near the soda dispenser. Ezma, barely five feet and a hundred pounds, was a part-time student and full-time waitress, a wife, and a mother of a precocious two-year-old.
“I guess.” Kristi took three of the glasses and filled two from the pitcher of sweetened iced tea, then pushed a button on the soda machine and filled the final glass with diet cola, holding the dispenser button a second too long. The soda fizzled over the top. Sweeping a towel from a nearby hook,