Deep (Pagano Family #4)(7)

Bruce smiled at her as she headed to the small staff area. “Hey, Bev. You look bright today. Gimme some sunshine.” Bev smiled, and Bruce put his hand over his heart. “Such a sight.”

“You’re a flirt. You better watch it, or Sheryl will be putting a whole different kind of wiener on the menu.”

Bruce winced dramatically, and Dink giggled, and Bev went back and to change into her uniform and clock in. As she came out, tying her gingham apron around her waist, Bruce, his face more serious now, asked, “Hey, hon. Can I get you to double up today? I know it’s last minute, but Ceci called in, and Sky’s been on since five this morning. I can’t ask her to close.”

Working open to close at Sal’s wasn’t even a double. It was like a double and a half. The diner was open from six in the morning until midnight, and the staff was on the clock an hour extra on either side, so it worked out to a twenty-hour shift. So no, asking Skylar to work the entire day would be inhuman.

But Bev had arranged to get help picking up her new sofa tonight after work, and it had taken her more than a week to get everything scheduled just right. “Sorry, Bruce. I just can’t tonight. I’m getting my sofa, remember?”

Bruce looked crestfallen. “Right, right. I forgot. It’s okay. I’ll call Brooklynn and have her come from school. She’s been looking to earn money, anyway. It’s a school night, but it’ll be okay. I’ll stay with her. I’ve worked full days before. And Sheryl’ll get over it.”

Brooklynn was Bruce and Sheryl’s sixteen-year-old daughter. He was working Bev, playing on her sympathies, but she saw through his little passive-aggressive display and only smiled. “Sounds like a plan. Maybe Sheryl will even let you keep your wiener.”

Bruce laughed. “You are a cold woman, Beverly.”

“Nah. I’m warm and cuddly. And also smart.” She kissed her boss on the cheek, gave little Dink an affectionate pinch on the arm, and went up to the counter. Skylar Berinski, also dressed in a peach-colored uniform, was clearing a table at the front window.

It was just before eleven o’clock on a pre-season weekday morning, and Sal’s was in the late-morning lull that was typical for this time of day and year. The only customer at the moment was sitting at the counter with a cup of coffee, an empty plate, and the Quiet Cove Clarion in front of him. Irv Lumley was the chief of the local police department, and he was a regular, coming in just about every weekday for a sugared jelly stick and about half a pot of coffee. Most of the town cops were frequent diners at Sassy Sal’s. They got their coffee bottomless and free. The chief got his jelly sticks free, too.

Bev brought the pot over and refilled his cup. “Morning, Chief.”

He looked around from his sports page and smiled. “Morning, lovely.”

“Anything good going on in the world?” She checked his cream pitcher and found it near empty, so she refilled that, too.

“Thanks, hon. Sox won last night. They’re starting off strong this year. But otherwise, it’s the usual gloom and doom.”

“Bummer. Get ya anything else? Another jelly stick?”

He chuckled and let go of a side of the paper to pat his nonexistent belly. “Better not. One of those a day is my limit. Man’s gotta watch his figure, y’know.”

She grinned. The front door opened just then, and a middle-aged couple came in. Bev grabbed a fresh ticket pad and passed Sky as she came out from the kitchen. Sky winked at her, and Bev winked back. That was all the greeting they needed. They got each other on a level that transcended words.



oOo



Bev and Skylar worked through the lunch rush together, and then Sky clocked out at two. Brooklynn came in at four, excited to get the gig. Except in the summer, dinner was their lightest meal time. They spent the first couple of hours wrapping silverware and filling condiments. When the dinner traffic picked up, Bev took all the tables and let Brooklynn shadow her, so she’d have the basics down by the time Bev clocked out at seven.

It wasn’t the first time that Bruce’s eldest kid had worked in the diner, but it was the first time she’d be waiting tables. She was tall and skinny, and there was no uniform that fit her, so she was slumping around in one that was far too large, from a waitress before Bev’s time. She kept getting the pockets caught on the corner of the counter. But she seemed to be enjoying herself.

Bev wondered how long that would last. She figured by the end of the summer, Brooklynn would not be so sanguine about leaving work each day smelling like a coffee-soaked deep fryer. With burns on her fingers from the heat lamps and bruises on her ass from jerkface summer men who’d left their manners in their city houses.

It was definitely her coworkers who made the job bearable.

By the time she clocked out and changed back into her jeans, t-shirt, and jacket, Bruce was sitting at his desk, looking a little frazzled. Mario was the cook on the clock.

“How’s she doin’, you think?” Bruce asked as Bev was packing up her uniform and Keds.

“Brook? She’s fine. She’ll be fine tonight. It’s not rocket science, as they say. If you made us do diner speak, that’d be one thing, but you’re too cool for that, thank God, so there’s not much to learn. What’d Sheryl have to say about her being here tonight?”

He chuckled. “Oh, I’ll be sleeping on the sofa for a while, but I think I’ll keep all my parts. Speaking of sofas, you better go get yours.”