Not Perfect(32)

They were the last customers of the night. She’d always remember that. In fact, the order didn’t go through on the app—she’d cut off digital orders because she was out of food. But they had called. At first she said no, she was finished for the evening. But they said it was the man’s birthday, and this was exactly what he wanted. Also, they wanted to eat good food at home; he didn’t want to spend his birthday out at a restaurant. She said okay, she could put together one more order. She took their information, telling them it would be ready in about forty-five minutes, and got to work.

If they had gone the usual route, through the app, it would have prompted all the questions about food allergies and restrictions. She had thought about it so many times. Imagined saying: Just do it on the app, I’ll let it go through. Would that have made a difference in the end? She just wasn’t sure. She hadn’t listed the oil as one of the ingredients, somehow that hadn’t been done, a huge, unforgiveable mistake on her part, but maybe if they had seen it written out in the allergy section they would have said something. Maybe seeing it would have made her think to ask. What she really wanted, what she wished for more than anything, was to go back to the beginning of the call, and when they said, “The app isn’t working. It says you’re sold out, but we wanted to check just to make sure,” that she had said she was sorry, but it was true, there wasn’t any left. She wished she had said emphatically that she was finished for the night. If only she had said that, everything might be different now.





CHAPTER NINE

Levi Brewer didn’t really have plans to play Call of Duty with Butch on Saturday, despite what he told his mother. She was so easy these days, it was ridiculous. That was the only good thing about his dad being gone—it was easier to get away with stuff. She never would have let him walk alone before. Also, Fern had plans with Sarina—Levi thought they were going to some dumb water park in New Jersey, even though he knew Fern’s leg was still bad. What was his mother’s deal? She used to have them at the doctor’s for a stuffy nose and now with this, she was just ignoring it? She kept taking Fern’s word for it that it didn’t hurt! Didn’t she have eyes? But Levi was okay with the water-park thing, because when Fern was busy his mom was always more eager to let him go somewhere, too. It was like if they were both home, fine, but if there was the chance she could be alone, she’d pretty much do anything to make it happen. At least that’s how it felt lately.

So Levi left the apartment and walked through the Square, right to La Colombe, where he went through his usual ritual of looking at the money and the note. But that was only the beginning of his day. He had plans. For the first time, he was going to spend some of the money.

He had already talked to Nancy, and all he had to do was get to the school in Kensington. She was cooking all day and doing inventory, and she was so happy to have the help, she’d said. She did ask if Levi’s sister and mom were coming, too. It seemed like she would have liked that, but when he explained that they had plans, she didn’t ask any follow-up questions. That was a relief, because he was smart enough to know that it was usually the follow-up questions that got him into trouble.

He pulled out a ten and went to the counter. He’d been there at least five times and had never once ordered a thing. But he thought he’d look older if he had a cup of coffee in his hand.

“One small coffee, black,” he said, repeating exactly what he heard his father say so many times. He had no idea what it would taste like but, whatever, he wasn’t really planning on drinking it.

“Coming up,” a tall guy with a man bun said, taking his ten and giving back seven and change. That’s an expensive cup of coffee, Levi thought, but he accepted the change and the hot cup and walked out. At first he thought he could order an Uber, he even had an app on his phone that his dad had set up for emergencies. But when he went through it to see if it would work, he was told that the credit card on file was no longer valid. So that was out. A cab would probably cost him at least ten dollars there, ten back, maybe more. He would be almost halfway through his money then. But he wanted to do what his dad wanted, he wanted to be able to tell him about it when he finally came home. So he opted for a bus but had no idea how to find the right one. There were lots of buses on Walnut Street, but those were heading west. He wanted to go north—at least he knew that. So he started walking north, thinking he’d eventually see a bus. He carried his coffee out in front of him, pretending to take a sip every now and then.



Tabitha wanted to go to the Fox & Hound for the Michigan–Penn State game, but she couldn’t say no to Rachel again, so she put on a cute fall dress, even though all she really wanted to put on was Stuart’s rumpled Michigan T-shirt, and she left to meet Rachel at the Dandelion on Eighteenth Street.

“Hi, hi!” Rachel said, as Tabitha moved toward her through the small crowd in the foyer of the English-style pub. There was a fire burning in the fireplace, and suddenly Tabitha felt happy to be there.

“Hi!” Tabitha leaned in to kiss her on the cheek.

“They have our table ready,” Rachel said, pointing to a woman holding menus. They followed her up the carpeted stairs and turned left into the dog room which was decorated with photos of different breeds of dogs. They smiled at each other, since it was their favorite room in the restaurant, and took their seats at a comfortable corner table for two.