The café door opened again, and Clooney sauntered in. In my opinion Clooney sauntered through life, doing as little as possible and appearing content that way. I, on the other hand, was a bona fide overachiever, always trying to prove myself, though I wasn’t sure to whom. If Clooney weren’t so charming, I’d have disliked him on principle. As it was, I liked him a lot.
Today he wore a Phillies cap, one celebrating the 2008 World Series victory. His gray ponytail was pulled through the back of the cap and hung to his shoulder blades.
“You work too hard, Carrie,” he told me frequently. “You’ll give yourself indigestion or reflux or a heart attack or something. You need to take time off.”
“If I didn’t want to pay the rent or have insurance or eat, I’d do that very thing,” I always countered.
“What you need is a rich husband.” And he’d grin.
“A solution to which I’m not averse. There just seems to be a shortage of candidates in Seaside.”
“Hey, Clooney,” Andi called from booth four, where she was clearing. She gave him a little finger wave. Clooney might be her great-uncle, but try as I might, I couldn’t get her to call him Uncle Clooney. Just “Clooney” sounded disrespectful to me, but he didn’t seem to mind.
“Hey, darlin’.” Clooney walked over to Andi and gave her a hug. Then he came to the counter and slid onto the stool next to Greg. He did not take off his cap, something that drove me crazy. I’ve developed this manners thing, probably because my childhood was so devoid of anything resembling pattern or politeness. I know people thought me prissy and old-fashioned, but I am what I am, a poor man’s Miss Manners.
Clooney pointed at a muffin, and I placed one on a dish for him. He broke off a chunk, then glanced back at Andi. “She tell you about that fool Bill?”
I grinned at his disgruntled expression. “She did.”
“What is it with girl children?” he demanded. “I swear she’s texted the news around the world.”
“She thinks it’s a compliment—her knight defending her.”
Clooney and Greg snorted at the same time.
“Slaying a dragon who’s threatening the life of the fair damsel’s one thing,” Greg said, actually looking at me. “Decking a kid for saying hi to a pretty girl is another.”
“Your past life as a cop is showing,” I teased.
He shrugged as he turned another page of the paper. “Old habits die hard.”
The door opened again, and in strutted the object of our conversation. I knew it had to be him because, aside from the fact that he looked like a very tanned football player, he and Andi gazed at each other with love-struck goofy grins. I thought I heard Lindsay sigh.
Andi hurried toward the kitchen with an armful of dirty dishes from booth four. She squeaked in delight as Bill swatted her on the rump as she passed. Clooney stiffened at this unseemly familiarity with his baby. Mr. Perkins tsk-tsked his disapproval.
“Can I have breakfast now?” Andi asked when she reappeared empty-handed.
The wait staff usually ate around ten thirty at a back booth, and it was ten fifteen. We were in the off-season weekday lull between breakfast and lunch, and the three men on their stools were the only customers present. I nodded.
Bill looked toward the kitchen. He appeared overwhelmed at the prospect of food, unable to make a selection. He draped an arm over Andi’s shoulder as he considered the possibilities, and she snuggled against him. Clooney’s frown intensified.
Bill was a big guy, and it was clear by the way he carried himself that he still thought of himself as the big man on campus in spite of the fact that he was now campusless and unemployed. As I studied him, I wondered if high school football would end up being the high point of his life. How sad that would be. Clooney drifted through life by choice. I hoped Bill wouldn’t drift for lack of a better plan or enough ability to achieve.
Careful, Carrie. I was being hard on this kid. Nineteen and undecided wasn’t that unusual. Just because at his age I’d already been on my own for three years, responsible for Lindsay, who was six years my junior …
Bill gave Clooney, who was watching him with a rather sour look, a sharp elbow in the upper arm and asked, one guy to another, “What do you suggest, Clooney? What’s really good here?”
Clooney’s relaxed slouch disappeared. I saw the long-ago medal-winning soldier of his Vietnam days. “You will call me ‘sir’ until I give you permission to call me by name. Do you understand, boy?”
Bill blinked. So did I. Everyone in Seaside, no matter their age, called him Clooney.
“Stop that, Clooney!” Andi was appalled at her uncle’s tone of voice.
“Play nice,” I said softly as I realized for the first time that I didn’t know whether Clooney was his first name or last. I made a mental note to ask Greg. As a former Seaside cop, he might know.
“R-E-S-P-E-C-T, darlin’.” Clooney gave Andi an easy smile. He gave Bill a hard stare. “Right, Bill?”
Bill blinked again. “Y-yes, sir.”
Andi took her beloved’s hand and dragged him toward the back booth. “Ignore my uncle. He’s having a bad day.” She glared over her shoulder at Clooney, who grinned back at her.
“She’s got spunk, that one,” he said with pride.
“How’d she end up living with you?” I’d been longing to ask ever since Clooney showed up with Andi just before Labor Day and asked me to give her a job. I did, and I guess I thought that gave me the right to ask my question.
Clooney disagreed because he said, “I think I’ll have one of your amazing Belgian waffles with a side of sausage.”
“I’m on it.” Lindsay headed back to the kitchen before I said a word. “Got it, Ricky?”
“Got it.” Ricky tested the waffle iron with a flick of water. He smiled as the water jumped and evaporated. He was a handsome kid with dark Latino looks of the smoldering kind, a young Antonio Banderas. Unfortunately for him, his smoldering looks appeared to have no effect on Linds.
Another victim of unrequited love.
Andi came to the counter and placed an order for Bill and herself. I blinked. We could have served the whole dining room on less.
Mr. Perkins eyed me. “Are you going to make him pay for all that? You should, you know.”
True, but I shook my head. “Job perk. He’s cheaper than providing health benefits and not nearly as frustrating.”
“So say you.” Clooney settled to his waffle and sausage.
I watched the parade of laden plates emerge from the kitchen and make their way to the back booth, making me reconsider the “cheaper” bit. Andi took her seat and stared at Bill as if he could do no wrong in spite of the fact that he leaned on the table like he couldn’t support his own weight. Didn’t anyone ever tell the kid that his noneating hand was supposed to rest in his lap, not circle his plate as if protecting it from famished marauders or little girls with ponytails?
“Look at him,” Clooney said. “He’s what? Six-two and over two hundred pounds? Jase Peoples is about five-eight and one-forty if he’s wearing everything in his closet.”
“Let’s forget about Jase, shall we?” Andi’s voice was sharp as she came to the counter and reached for more muffins. “The subject is closed.”
I grabbed her wrist. “No more muffins. We need them for paying customers. If Bill’s still hungry, he can have toast.”
“Or he could pay.” To Mr. Perkins a good idea was worth repeating.
Andi laughed at the absurdity of such a thought.
Ricky had left his stove and was leaning on the pass-through beside Lindsay. “Four slices coming up for Billingsley.”
“Billingsley?” I looked at the big guy as he downed the last of his four-egg ham-and-cheese omelet. With a name like that, it was a good thing he was big enough to protect himself.
“Billingsley Morton Lindemuth III,” Ricky said.
“I should never have told you.” Andi clearly felt betrayed.
“But you did. And you got to love it.” Laughing, Ricky turned to make toast.
“He hates it,” Andi said.
I wasn’t surprised.
Greg drew in a breath like you do when something terrible happens. We all turned to stare at him.
He was looking at the front page of The Press of Atlantic City. “Jase Peoples.”
“What?” I demanded.
Clooney grabbed the paper and followed Greg’s pointing finger.
I could see the picture and the headline above it: “Have You Seen This Man?”