Winter, 1998
I am a question to the world,
not an answer to be heard…
Eliot huffed a breath, watching his gusty exhale hang in the air before his face, white tendrils in the frigid temperatures. After a bated moment, airstreams stirred by the sputtering Chevy pick-up rumbling past whisked the respiration away. He coughed at the combination of cold air and burned oil that he drew into his lungs as he crossed the street.
He shook his head. It was a distinctive smell, that burning oil; meant the rusty old '79 needed new valve cover gaskets. It was a quick fix, an hour tops under the hood, and for pennies compared to the oil consumption the man would save a small fortune.
Eliot knew, because his dad's old '72 had always needed work over the years, and his father being ever the handyman and tinkerer was that claptrap's self-appointed mechanic. Eliot had known his way around an engine block since he was old enough to stand on a stool beside his old man and get greasy.
But some people just let a problem sit and sit and sit until the tiny fix is a truckload of collateral instead.
Blowing off the stupidity and a brief spark at his old man, he pushed into what Momma used to call a "penny café", a diner that served greasy food at poverty-level prices. As far as how bad it could be, he supposed he wasn't quite poverty level, but he was only about the other side, if he was home. His wallet was only getting thinner and had to last him two more days. He wasn't going to ask his dad to transfer more money, seeing as it'd been hard enough to get the penny pincher to part with what he'd given Eliot for this trip.
Eliot loved his dad, no doubt about it, but sometimes the man frustrated him beyond belief. At every turn, he was thwarted, his plans and his wants sidelined, and the teenager in him had more aggression and anger than he knew what to do with.
Losing one's mother the year before did that, complicated and compounded the hormonal changes and angst that just came with the territory of the age.
"One coffee, please," he held up a finger at the waitress manning the front as he chose a stool at the counter, five down from one end, six down from the other, three from the register, and directly in front of the rectangular opening where orders were passed from the kitchen to the front.
"Black, honey?" the kindly mid-thirties woman confirmed, offering him a smile. He'd been in for almost every meal he'd eaten the past three days, but he'd neglected to ever take note of her nametag. Something about her reminded him of his mother, despite the fact his mother had been a slim, dark-haired, three-quarter Cherokee, and this waitress was a plump auburn-haired Chicagoan whose ancestry was very much an obvious by-product of America's Caucasian melting pot.
Maybe it was that downhome, maternal nature that was so painfully missed in a motherless house.
He only nodded back in the typical fashion of his mute sullenness; he said only as much as he had to, but that never stopped the older woman from trying to draw him out of his shell.
"Of course." She winked at him. "Man knows what he wants. I like that. One black coffee comin' right up."
He didn't bother to reply, and when she returned with a white mug on a saucer, coffee pot in hand to fill it up, he tossed the needed change on to the counter without even sparing her much of a glance as the coins clanked on the mottled linoleum.
"You want anything else, hun?" she asked, standing with one hand against the counter, the other arm holding the pot propped elbow on hip.
He shook his head, shaggy hair flopping over his eyes. He sighed and flicked it back out. He needed a haircut, badly, but his dad was insistent on buzzing it this time, not cutting it like his mom used to, and Eliot wasn't ready to do that to his mother just yet.
"Special's stew and piping hot bread rolls. You look like you could use something hot and filling." She suggested.
Eliot shook his head again. No one made bread rolls like Momma, and he wasn't particularly hungry anyway. Hurting and alone did that to a fifteen-year-old boy's constitution.
"Alright, hun. If you're sure." She sounded uncertain, concerned if Eliot would let himself admit as much. "Just holler if you need anything."
When he was alone, he sipped at his coffee in hopes of the warmth spreading throughout him, but that cold knot in his chest and the hollow pit in his stomach couldn't be warmed, and he just burned his tongue instead.
Hissing then sighing, he set the mug down and stared through the window into the kitchen, watching the chefs churn out order after order at a fast, if somewhat chaotic rate. The two waitresses, his auburn-haired matron and a quiet twenty-something with too much make-up, kept the diner running efficiently, though, and made sure everything wound up where it was supposed to in a smooth manner.
The bell above the door tinkled and the ting-a-ling dropped into his consciousness, noted as its own distinctive sound apart from the din of the diner, but still filtered as part of the white noise. The blast of cold air made him shiver, but only registered as a sardonic note that it had gotten colder out there in the past ten minutes. So far, Chicago in winter had been disappointing more than anything, and the school trip was not note-worthy in any way.
But the dark form that sidled up to the counter and pulled itself up onto the stool three down from him, one from the end, and as close to the back exit as one could get without looking like they were distancing themselves from everyone else, caught in his periphery and stuck. His head twitched as he turned enough to glance down the row of stools at the twelve-year-old in clothes that didn't fit quite right and were tattered in every way possible. Even the coat the boy was in was grossly inadequate for the temperatures outside.
He turned back to his coffee, mentally shrugging off the plight of what was probably just some homeless orphan or kid whose parents were dirt poor who had come for a cheap meal. But when a small form that emerged from the back bathroom plodded up to the boy and tugged at his jacket, Eliot's attention zeroed back in.
His teeth clenched at the five-year-old curly pigtails, swimming in a jacket that reached mid-thigh and hung over tiny hands and clomping in boots that were too big for her, clearly meant for the twelve-year-old. Her dirty skirt barely reached scraped up knees, and there were no socks under the knee-high boots.
Then, in a glance, Eliot took in the jean cuffs that were too short for the boy, revealing cold bare feet swinging in slow, tiny motions of a subdued child whose actions were only due to the fact that his legs weren't long enough to reach the crossbars of his stool.
"Hardy?" he heard the whisper of a tiny voice and it made his blood run colder as that hollow place in his gut disappeared clear through the floor.
The boy hopped down immediately and hefted the dark-haired girl onto the last seat in the row, chattering in a way that was supposed to be reassuring to the five-year-old, but spoke directly to Eliot's big brother instincts of a boy who was vastly out of his depth.
"Just get you on up here, momma, and we'll get it all taken care of, okay? I'm told this is the best pickings for people like us, girl—we're gonna have ourselves a feast and put some meat on those little bones." Hardy tickled the girl's side, making her giggle quietly. It lacked the ease of a carefree child's, even though it had yet to be tainted by the same weight of one old enough to understand the harshness of a world against them.
And the world is always against them.
The boy pulled himself back up onto the stool and flagged a waitress, the twenty-something. "What can I get'cha?" the girl asked in a bored tone, blinking down at the two with an air of one with precious little patience for children.
"Yes, ma'am!" A dark head bobbed as off-whites stark against ebony skin flashed in a toothy, valiant smile. "How much for the Special?"
"Dollar-fifty," the girl replied blandly.
Hardy dug in his pockets, slender fingers with dirty, broken nails and pads pink with the cold dropping coins on the counter one after the other in painstaking detail. More copper than silver winked on the linoleum, the yellowy lights not even needing their sickly cast to paint the pile in a bad light and send Eliot's stomach lurching in a way he didn't quite understand.
Slowly, with eyes squinted to slits, creating fine lines around whites rimmed red by the cold, and mop-haired head ducked down close to the pile, Hardy counted out his money, scooting over one coin after the other into a new pile, occasionally picking up some dimes and pennies to peer very closely at them, blinking and concentrating hard on each disk before dropping it to join those already counted.
The waitress, meanwhile, seemed to be growing increasingly more impatient, deigning to wait in the most patronizing way Eliot had ever seen. And he'd seen his share of bullies, mostly in the way of punk kids who picked on his sister, but high school was proving that it wasn't to be outdone nonetheless.
From where he was, with his coffee left forgotten and getting colder, Eliot watched the boy count out two-thirteen. He watched the shoulders droop slightly, the anxiety at his amount flickering across that young face, and then the head lifted slightly, with a try for determined resolution.
"How-how much for a hot chocolate…Jane?" He had to put his weight on his arms to boost himself just a little bit closer and squint up hard to read her nametag. The boy obviously needed a strong prescription.
"Fifty cents," she answered shortly, "Look, kid, order something, I've got people waiting."
Hardy ducked his head, chastened. "We'll take one special and one hot chocolate, please."
Eliot swallowed tightly hearing it, a horrible suspicion he'd been trying to ignore digging roots into his gut.
"One special and one hot chocolate'll be out in a moment." She rattled off stonily, moving off.
Eliot glanced down at his cold coffee, turning it back and forth slowly in its little ring-shaped niche, listening to it clink with that cool, crisp ceramic sound. His eyes flicked back to the two as the girl tugged at the boy's coat.
"Hardy?" she whispered through big, smacking lips. "I want hot chocolate, too."
Panic flashed across the boy's face, eyes glancing to his pile of coins, far too short for another of the drinks. "Hot chocolate? But…" and then he looked back at the giant, innocent eyes peering up at him with imploring longing. "Okay," he sighed, trying to sound…brave, Eliot's mind supplied, "one hot chocolate for the butterfly coming right up."
And Eliot's stomach gave another lurch as that suspicion yanked at the confirmation, then his gut disappeared completely again, a hollow ache that turned his heart over and made him swallow hard. The boy was going to go without anything, his pile of coins coming up far too short for two meals, much less something warm to drink for the both of them.
The girl giggled. "Not a butterfly."
"You're not? But I saw you come out of that cocoon of blankets back in the alley, looked like a chrysalis to me."
"A kr-ih-ssah-ll…what?"
"A chrysalis; it's where butterflies live. Like you." He poked her nose.
"Not a butterfly, Hardy," she whined through another laugh.
Eliot looked to his coffee and picked it up. Jane would be back soon with their order, and with a sudden gulp of the lukewarm drink, he made the craziest decision he'd ever made. Getting up, he slid down the counter to the kids, flagging down the other waitress. She arrived at the same time Eliot did.
"Yes, hun?" Alice –he read her nametag finally- asked, glancing past him to the kids with a smile.
"Another special and hot chocolate, please," he ordered as he came to a stop beside Hardy's stool, and he sensed the boy glance up at him before ducking his head quickly. Eliot drew his wallet from his back pocket and flipped it open, pulling a few bills out of a disturbingly small number of them, and tossed them on the counter. He could feel his belt tighten metaphorically at the loss, but glancing at the two urchin kids, he figured it wasn't really a loss as much as it was finding a new home.
Alice's smile widened as she nodded, sweeping off to fill his order.
Hardy's fingers rapped nervously on the counter, arched and tap-tapping in a way that reminded Eliot of a typist. Large, unpretentious eyes in a cold-pale, thin cherubic face peered at the teenager over the shoulder of the boy whose attention was staunchly on the greasy glass of several framed permits on the wall opposite, and Eliot smiled at the girl as he leaned forward, one hand coming to rest on the back of the twelve-year-old's seat, causing Hardy to startle hard. Eliot's free hand reached forward.
"It's on me. Best put these back in your pocket, bro, and hold on to them," he said as he curled his hand around the pile and swept it forward, off the counter and into the quick cup of hands Hardy made to catch the change.
"Wha-what?" Hardy's eyes looked up, shock making them wide instead of squinted.
"Your meal's on me," Eliot told him, curling the boy's fingers around his coins. "So pocket that treasure trove you've got there."
"But-but—th-that would be charity, and Sheryl says not to accept charity from strangers!" Hardy protested.
"It's generosity, not charity," Eliot grinned, clapping a hand on a thin, bony shoulder, and trying not to notice the sharp point digging into his palm as he pushed the boy's hands close to his chest. "So like I said, best pocket that change before it gets away from you."
"And so should you," Alice announced, returned with two hot chocolates she set before the kids as she spoke, eyes twinkling at Eliot. "Well, some of it, at least; you can go half on the meal with me."
"Miss…" he paused, unsure how to address her, distracted in his periphery at the eager way the girl went for her drink, Hardy's free hand quickly slowing hers enough that she didn't spill before he let the five-year-old take over and sip at the warm, delicious liquid.
"White, but you can call me Alice."
"Alice, you don't have to—" He started, giving Hardy a small prod in the shoulder and a nod at his own hot chocolate when the boy looked up at him.
"And neither did you. So sit down, because three specials are about to be out."
That startled him, and he looked up at her, floundering. "But- I- uh-"
"What? Can't accept generosity?" Alice ribbed, eyebrows arched high as she put her hands on her hips.
Hardy sniggered into the mug he'd picked up hesitantly, but clearly unable to resist the enticing aroma; his snigger quickly turned into a cough as he inhaled the rich mix of hot water and chocolate powder. Butterfly-girl giggled at it.
Eliot mustered enough of a smile at Alice, which was more of a flat echo of what one should be, to pass for a tight-lipped almost-jeer. "For me, that's charity, and us country folk don't cotton to charity," he deadpanned sardonically.
"Well, that's fine then." Alice snatched up two bills from the four he'd thrown down. "You're paying for yours, and I've got their ticket." She gave him a high-arched, hard look, and was off before he could protest.
Eliot glanced at his watch and sighed, then reached forward to grab the two dollars left on the counter. He paused as he watched Hardy set his mug down and duck his head to pluck at his coat, widening the opening of a pocket to carefully drop his fistful of coins back in. Eliot glanced to the two bills, looked at the two kids, and all he could see was a twelve-year-old kid whom life had obviously handed a bad lot doing everything he could to be strong; was trying so hard to be brave.
In a way, he saw himself in the boy, but in a fashion and depth he felt he failed miserably to live up to.
Damn the money and his father and charity and Alice.
He folded the bills carefully and when Hardy turned away to talk to the little girl, Eliot reached out and slipped the two dollars into the boy's jacket pocket before he turned away.
Alice had said she'd go half on the meal. Since she had his half, Eliot had no reason to stay.
Without another word, he slipped back out the diner door, and hurried down the sidewalk as fast as he could, feeling that cold place inside of him warm a little in a way that helped make the Chicago winter chill suddenly feel less intrusive.
He couldn't explain why he'd done it; he'd just done it.
Momma always did he say he had the kind spirit of her ancestors, the soft heart of a people who had known pain and desolation and would not stand by for its perpetuation. That in him lived the memories of a people whose weakest and most treasured were destroyed, and that experience burned in him a fiery wrath for any injustice visited upon a woman or child.
She'd also said he had the ingenuity and practicality of his father, and his nature could not be balanced on its own.
Momma had said a lot of strange things.
He'd give anything to hear one of them again.
Lyrics by John Rzeznik or The Goo Goo Dolls (I'm Still Here). Up next in a few days: Nate - 2001