Billy’s Breakfast

The man was, Molly’s mother might have whispered, “flying low.” He stood by the counter of the restaurant with his zipper down, dressed in a khaki safari suit better suited for tracking rhinos in the bush than eating breakfast in Boston in February. Under his stool lay a violin case covered with stickers that were peeling off. Molly couldn’t tell how old the man was, early forties, maybe. She noticed his jaw gyrating, the sparse hairs of his beard jutting in and out like tiny black needles. He stared outside at the sky which sagged over the city, then turned from the window to face the table where Molly and her friend Ruth sat, watching as the waitress approached them with coffee.

“You ladies know what you’re having?” the waitress asked, pouring. Her dark hair grazed cheeks glittering with gold bronzer. A tattoo of Boston’s skyline rose inside her pale forearm; Molly could see the inked outline of the Zakim Bridge and the triangle of the Citgo sign above Kenmore Square. Storrow Drive ran parallel to her veins.

“What should we have?” Molly asked the waitress, glancing up from the menu to give her a smile. Ruth removed a fuzzy wool hat and shook out her curls as the waitress set down the coffee pot.

“Oh my God, the stuffed pancakes,” the waitress said, lifting her eyes to the ceiling and squeezing them shut as if in prayer. She inhaled deeply, blinked and turned to Molly. “They only make them Saturdays. It says pancakes on the menu, but we’re talking crepes, OK? Ricotta, cream cheese, vanilla for the filling -” the waitress made vigorous mixing motions with her hands “- then they roll ‘em up and put blueberry compote over the whole thing. Whipped cream on top, not the canned stuff but real. I’m telling you; you will die.”

“We just might!” said Ruth, chuckling. The waitress stopped smiling.

“I’m not kidding you.” The waitress appeared upset at the thought they might order eggs instead of pancakes. “Trust me, you will not be sorry. You will come back.”

“Sold,” Molly said, closing her menu. “Stuffed pancakes for me.”

Ruth ordered the avocado toast with a side of turkey bacon. She began to unwind a long, blue pashmina scarf from around her neck as the waitress gathered the menus in silence.

“You’re sure it’s what you want?”

“It’s my breakfast!” Ruth protested, as the waitress turned away. Molly sighed.

“What?” Ruth asked, putting away her reading glasses. “I can’t have what I want? When I’m paying?”

“I suppose, but it seemed so important to her,” Molly said.

“You are such a relentless people pleaser.” Ruth sniffed, moving the plastic salt and pepper shakers from one side of the table to the other. She peered at Molly, as if seeing her for the first time. “How can you possibly know what really matters to you if all you care about is making other people happy?”

All the crisp morning sounds, the sizzle of bacon, the clink of coffee spoons, a baby’s squeal, grew muffled. Molly had, in fact, glanced at the menu. But the thought of how delighted the waitress would be if she chose the pancakes mattered more to her than the breakfast order itself. A widowed image crossed Molly’s mind as she weighed the merits of Ruth’s indictment: a photograph of Shirley Temple on a float in the Rose Bowl Parade, the 1930’s child star beaming from a page in an old Life magazine. Shirley was smiling and waving to fans across Depression-era America, her corkscrew curls bouncing, eyes shining like sweet cherries. It was as if she knew it was her job to help people forget their hunger and sorrows. Was that such a bad thing, Molly asked herself, to want to make people happy, if only for a moment? She wondered if there was a difference between wanting to make people happy and wanting their approval.

Molly also wondered if there were any other judgements Ruth had withheld over the course of their twenty-eight-year friendship, edicts that would now be issued because Molly was, what? Running out of time to embrace her authentic self?

The man with his fly down approached their table.

“Excuse me,” he said. “Do you know where I can find a church?”

“What kind of church?” Molly looked up. “Methodist? Catholic?”

“A church I can walk to,” he said.

The restaurant was filling up, families standing by the door waiting for tables. A mother bounced a bundled baby against her hip, using her finger to draw outlines of cats with triangular ears in the condensation on the window facing the street. Molly and Ruth were seated near the front, wedged in on either side by groups at larger tables. On one side were four elderly men, their hands flailing in frustration as they groused about the newly painted bike lanes running up and down the neighborhood’s main street.

“The mayor’s gone nuts,” one of the men growled. “They claim they had all these community meetings. I never got a notice. Did you?”

“No, and that’s no accident,” another man replied. “They don’t want to hear from us. They think we’re all senile.”

On the other side of Molly and Ruth, a young father helped a toddler dressed in a duck costume navigate a plate of French toast. The duck’s plastic yellow bill protruded over the child’s tiny face.

“Charlotte, sweetie, quack, quack, no hands. Use your fork. That’s it! No. Daddy said no

more syrup.”

“I need to find God,” the man in the safari suit was saying.

“Don’t we all,” Ruth replied, taking a swig of coffee.

“Our Lady of Lourdes is a few blocks down on the left,” Molly said. “And the First Unitarian is a few more streets after that, on the other side. Big stone church.”

“Do Unitarians believe in God?” Ruth asked.

“C’mon, Ruth,” Molly said.

“I need to talk with God,” the man repeated, scratching his beard. He looked at the families by the door. “Because the way it’s going down, anything could happen.”

Molly and Ruth locked eyes.

“You take care of yourself,” Molly said, turning to the man. “I hope you find what you’re looking for.”

The man nodded and looked down at the black and white checkerboard tile floor. The waitress glided back to the table with Molly and Ruth’s plates balanced inside one arm, a coffee pot teetering in her opposite hand.

“Avocado toast,” she said coolly, depositing Ruth’s breakfast on the table. “I hope it’s what you want. It’s what you asked for.” She turned to Molly, placing the pancakes in front of her with a flourish. “You. You know what you’re doing.”

Molly looked up gratefully. The waitress poured refills on the coffee without asking if they wanted more and turned to the man in the safari suit who still stood by their table.

“Billy, go sit down,” she said.

“I was sitting down.”

“Go sit down again because these ladies need to eat.”

Molly thought about the twists and turns the morning was taking, like a Rubik’s cube, only she couldn’t seem to line up the color blocks. She turned to her pancakes, drowning them in an ocean of maple syrup. She took a creamy bite as a choir of blueberries sang in her mouth.

“Mine’s better than yours,” she sang, as Ruth rolled her eyes.

The man in the safari jacket stood by the table watching them eat. When the waitress said his name again and pointed to the counter, he went back to his stool. He leaned toward a man wearing a Bruins hat who had just taken the seat next to his and whispered in his ear.

“I have no fucking idea,” the man replied, lowering the hat and turning back to his menu.

Billy left the counter again and began making his way around the restaurant, stopping at every table as if he were a candidate running for office. He appeared to be handing something to each customer. Molly couldn’t tell from a distance what it was, a card of some sort. She glanced behind the counter to see if a person in charge might be observing the man’s movements but none of the teenaged help looked old enough to be the manager. Molly beckoned the waitress as she raced by.

“Is everything all right with that man?” she asked.

“That’s just Billy,” the waitress said. “You like the pancakes?”

“But is he OK? Yes, you were right, best pancakes I’ve ever had.”

“It’s just Billy,” the waitress repeated. She drew closer. “Billy is my friend. He’s not perfect but I’m not either. Back when I was doing so much blow my nose was, like, totally shredded” – she spread her fingers, making small circles in front of her face – “Billy was there for me.  My parents threw me out.” She grimaced. “I could have had a brain seizure.”

“Wow,” Ruth said. “I’m glad he has you for a friend and vice versa. But maybe Billy needs a hospital more than a church.”

“You are so wrong,” the waitress shot back. “They’d just drug him and put him back on the street. They can’t hold him. I mean, did he hurt you?”

“No,” Ruth admitted. The waitress rested the coffee pot against her thigh and put her hand on her heart.

“I’m loyal,” she said. “If you’re my friend, I accept you no matter what.” She sped off to another table.

“I’m not comfortable,” Ruth said, looking toward the families waiting for tables. “He could have a gun in that violin case.”

“You don’t know that.” Molly sighed.

“We can’t tell what he’s thinking,” Ruth replied, her eyes following the man. “Everybody always thinks nothing’s going to happen before it actually does.”

“If I was a total whack job, would you still be my friend?”

“Who says you’re not a total whack job?” Ruth grinned. Molly crumpled a napkin and threw it at her across the table.

They sat with their coffee, empty plates pushed aside, watching as Billy conversed with startled customers. The waitress flitted between the booths and tables and tried to coax him back to his seat at the counter. Ruth put her hand up to signal the waitress and mouthed the word “check.” She walked to their table shaking her head.

“You’re all set,” the waitress said. “It’s paid.”

“We didn’t get the check,” Ruth said.

“Billy paid.”

“Billy paid for our breakfast?” Molly asked, mouth agape.

“He paid everyone’s tab. Everyone in the place.”

Ruth looked aghast. “Why? He shouldn’t do that!”

“He’s feeling good today. Look at him.”

The peace of the Lord which passeth all understanding!” Billy shouted in the middle of the restaurant, spreading his arms wide like a falcon taking flight. The toddler in the duck costume waved her fork cheerily. The waitress stood by their table smiling as she watched Billy push out the door, violin case forgotten beneath the stool. Ruth put her wallet back in her purse.

“We should make a donation to a homeless shelter or food bank or something in his name,” Ruth said.

“Don’t be like that.” The waitress frowned. “Just be glad someone took care of you. I bet you ladies never get a free meal.”

*****

When she’s not writing fiction, Katy Abel covers arts and culture for the Provincetown Independent, an award-winning community newspaper. Her short stories have been published in the Wilderness House Literary Review, October Hill Magazine and the Smoky Blue Literary and Arts Magazine. In 2023, her work was selected by novelist Joe Okonkwo for a reading at the Provincetown Book Festival. A journalist by training, Katy has worked in both television news and in state government. Follow her on Twitter @KatyWriteStuff or Facebook/Instagram @katy.abel12.