Sitting in the café across the street from the steakhouse was one of periods of my day where I could say I was truly happy. The other two fell in the morning and at night and were the times before going to and after coming back from work.
	My job was as a waiter in a popular chain of steakhouses, which I think are better left unnamed. My shift starts at 9 A.M. and end at 5 P.M. Why I have to be in work at nine in the morning to a restaurant that cooks its food almost exclusively by means of grill and deep fryer is a mystery to me and I don’t usually do any serving until 10:30 when we start to get the early-lunch and brunch crowd.
	Every Tuesday at 4 P.M. I get to be present for the weekly steakhouse visit by an elderly woman and her middle aged daughter with brain damage. The pair talk about mundane things, puzzles, movies, their individual support groups and both refer to me, excessively, by name. Which I am asked to repeat every time they visit. Today, Tuesday, at 3:57 P.M. they rolled into town per usual, sat at their booth, and chatted over iced teas and a platter of onion rings. It was the same old diner date, same old conversations, until I saw the two of them pointing and looking in the direction of a greasy gentleman with a stubble, jeans, and a sports coat, enjoying what was, based on their age, probably a late lunch. The woman with brain damage gave him a wave, he nodded back, then his wife turned and said something to him. His children both stared at their laps, uncomfortable, and I wanted nothing more than to know why. The old woman and her daughter went back to their conversations. Their faces hovered over the candle in the center of their table and leaned towards one another leaving only about half a foot between them. I wish I knew what was going on. I assumed the man was some piece of the woman’s pre-brain damage life. The old woman recoiled, stood up, tossed her napkin on the ground and walked in the direction of the bathroom.
	The greasy man walked up to the booth and talked to the woman with the brain damage. They laughed. He tossed his head back when he laughed and she sounded as if she were reading lines from a cue card
HAhAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAH
Very loudly
	He sat down and they talked. I saw the old woman come back from the bathroom and get about ten feet away before stopping. She kind of just hovered there, mentally fact checking her suspicions, neither of us within ear-shot of the table. I considered sharing my notes on the happenings with her but then relized she may not be too fond of my spying.
	I had spaced out and by the time I had refocused my attention on the table the man had already gone back to his angry wife and two ungrateful children. I went to deliver a tray of mozzarella sticks and two Tom Collin’s, and passed by the man and his family.
	I thought you we’re going to stop talking to Nicole, Roy.
	I told you Alex, she talked to me.
Oh how I wanted to stay and pry! But my manager called me over. I was worried he would tell me to stop ease dropping, or worse that he saw what I had written on the women’s room wall. But he just wanted to tell me to make sure I was ready for the holidays and that we would need my “team work and leadership skills more than ever”. He gave me a tooth smile and squeezed my shoulder. I shuddered a bit, I don’t know why I was so afraid of him.
	After I punched out and said goodbye to the staff in the back and went outside for the first time since my visit to the café this afternoon. I spotted the old woman and her daughter in the parking lot. They were sitting in their car. The daughter was crying. Her excessive makeup was smeared and clowny looking. Her mother sat behind the wheel. She held a cigarette out the open door and stared blankly into the distance.