burger coming up,” he said, whistling his way over to the grill behind the counter.”
“You’d better make it two, Ernie. And a cup of coffee.”
“Two burgers coming up,” he said, slapping the patties on the grill. “Name’s Toby, by the way. Ernie died a couple of years ago-- heart attack they said. I took the joint off Mae’s hands. Mae’s his widow.” He moseyed over to a fat stainless steel urn, where he poured the coffee into a white mug and, sticking a spoon in it, carried it steaming over to the table. “Never changed the sign ‘cause everybody said it was bad luck. Would’ve have made no difference one way or t’other, though, not after they shut down the hair oil factory up the street. Hurt the business, but I get by all right.” He gave Gary a quick once-over. “Must be new around here.”
“Well, it’s not exactly my neck of the woods” Gary said, stirring sugar in his cup.
“Looking for work, I s’pose?”
Gary shrugged.
“Like everybody else. Jobs ain’t easy to get these days. You got a trade?”
“I’m almost finished with school,” he said, blowing on his coffee. “I hope to be a teacher.”
Toby’s thick eyebrows lifted. “College boy?”
“In the meantime I could use a few dollars to help carry me.”
“Not cheap, I hear, them colleges. A couple of hundred a year?”
“At least.”
“Quite a hunk of change. You maybe could try your luck at one of the factories in the neighborhood. I heard they might be taking on some help at the cereal company down on Exchange Street.”
“I guess I can try that,” Gary said, looking toward the grill.
Toby took the hint and shuffled back behind the counter. “Yep, things are tough all over,” he said, talking over his shoulder as he flipped the hamburgers and set them sizzling anew.
Gary watched, fascinated, as, first one, then three more cars passed down the street. If, as he suspected, he had lost his mind and was living in some internal world, then insanity wasn’t as bad as he thought. He could think of worse scenarios, far worse. He stretched his neck a little to see a green truck pulling up to the curb in front of the houses across the street. An ice truck. A real ice truck! Just like Gramps described. And there were kids chasing behind and reaching into the bed to scoop up ice chips to suck on, just like he said. Clearly, he could see a man with white hair and a black, long-sleeved shirt sitting behind the wheel of what had to be at best a door-less 1930 model truck. It looked like an antique Ford.
Toby scooped the hamburgers onto the buns. “Anything on the burgers?”
“Just ketchup,” Gary said, watching the truck pull ahead a few houses.
Toby set the hamburgers in front of him and a bottle of ketchup. More coffee?”
“If you don’t mind,” he said, wincing against the cuts inside his mouth.
Toby picked up the cup and carried it around to the urn. “So where you staying?”
“I’m still looking. Any suggestions?”
“Matter of fact, my sister Elsie rents out rooms. Nice place, not fancy, but nice. Only a couple of streets over.” He set the fresh coffee on the table and sat on a counter stool across from Gary. “I can’t say for sure if she’s got any open now, but no harm trying. Just tell her it’s me that sent you.”
“Thanks, I will.”
“Things are tough all over, but Roosevelt’s gonna straighten it all out yet, wait and see.”
“Him or the war?”
“What’s that?” he said, leaning forward and cupping his hand behind his ear.
“Nothing. Just thinking out loud.”
“Been awhile since the Crash. I kinda thought by now things would come around, but--”
“That would’ve been…how many years ago now?”
“Ten years this October. How could anybody forget! Of course, then you had to be just a kid.”
“I should know anyway. You’ll have to excuse me. I had an accident. It left me a little bent out of shape.”
“Bent out of-- hey, that’s pretty good, saying it that way. College talk?”
“You could say that.”
Toby lit a cigarette. “I noticed you looked kinda rough when you came in. What happened… and what’s your name anyway?”
“Gary Tyler.”
“Tyler…Tyler… Any relation to Bill Tyler, William Tyler? Used to run a garage up on Cherry Street?”
“No, not that I know of.”
“Nice guy. Real nice guy. Moved away a couple of years ago, Arizona, I heard. For his health. TB, I think… So what happened, you get run over by a car or somethin’?”
Gary wiped ketchup from his fingers. “I stepped in where I didn’t belong and a gang of guys let me know it. They took everything except what’s in my pockets and my little package here.”
Toby looked him over. “Gotta watch those toughs… Those the only clothes you got, what’s on your back?”
The door squeaked open and Toby spun around on his stool. “Sebastian,” he said, rolling his eyes up. “Running a little late today?” he said, uncrossing his legs getting up and moseying around behind the counter.
Sebastian settled himself on a stool near the door and folded his hands in front of him. “Late, early, what difference does it make?” he said. “Yesterday, today, tomorrow, before you know it we’re all in the marble orchard pushing up daisies and making the worms fat.”
“Thanks, I needed some cheering up,” Toby said. “The usual?”
“If it’s beef barley, yeah, and make sure it’s hot.”
“How much do I owe you, Toby?” Gary asked, rising and moving over to the cash register.
“Thirty-five centavos.”
Gary slipped the silver dollar from his pocket and laid it on the counter.
“This’d burn the asshole out of the Devil himself,” Toby said to Sebastian, setting the steaming bowl of soup before him and coming over to the register, where he picked up the coin, pressed the levers that popped open the drawer and dropped it in. “And sixty-five centavos change.”
“About your sister’s place?”
“Oh, that, yep.” He took the stub pencil from behind his ear, licked the tip, drew a sketch on a napkin and wrote down the address. “Big white house on the corner,
