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“Does this sudden lunch at the hospital have anything to do with Gabby?” Trish asked me softly as I handed her the money for my take-out order.
“While I’m there, I’ll probably ask around about her, but no, it’s mostly for Penny.”
“You’re a good friend, Suzanne, and we’re all lucky to have you in our lives.”
“I feel the same way about you,” I started to say when she interrupted me.
“Hang on. I wasn’t finished. Don’t pay the slightest bit of attention to what I’m about to say.” In a louder voice, she added, “This is the last time I’m letting you order food to go. I don’t like it, and what’s more, you know it. Do you understand?” As she scolded me, her back was turned to the dining room, and she added a wink at the end of her little speech to let me know that this outburst was for everyone else’s benefit, not mine.
“I’m sorry. I won’t let it happen again,” I said, sounding appropriately remorseful, or at least trying to.
“See to it,” she said as she smiled, and then, in a softer voice, she said, “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Not if I see you first,” I added, doing everything in my power not to match her smile. “Thanks for this,” I whispered.
“Anytime, for you,” she said. “If you see Gabby, tell her I said hello.”
“If I see her, and she’s awake, I will.”
“It’s bad, isn’t it?” Trish asked me.
“It’s not good,” I admitted. “Listen, you didn’t happen to spot anything unusual going on at ReNEWed over the last few days, have you?”
She started to answer, “Maybe. I thought I saw...” but then Nathan from the sporting goods store approached with his bill, and she shut the sentence off instantly.
“Suzanne, you’re playing with fire, girl. I can’t believe you had the nerve to order something to go, no matter how good friends you two are. I shouldn’t have to tell you that you don’t want to make Trish’s naughty list,” Nathan said with a grin.
“Neither do you, Nathan,” Trish said, barely smiling back.
The shop owner looked appropriately chastised. “No, ma’am, I do not.” Nathan pointed to my bag of cheeseburgers. “If you’re going to eat those, you’d better get going.”
“You’re right,” I said, reluctant to leave the Boxcar Grill until Trish could tell me what she’d been about to say before we’d been interrupted. “We’ll talk later?” I asked her as I headed for the door.
“You bet,” Trish said. She looked a bit troubled as I walked out. I had to wonder what she had been about to tell me. Had it been something important, or had it just taken on significance only after the gently used clothing shop had burned to the ground? I’d have to ask her later, but it was going to have to wait for now.
Nathan was right about one thing. I needed to get those burgers to the hospital so Penny and I could enjoy them while they were hot. After we ate and I delivered the donuts, I’d make my way to Gabby and check on how she was doing.
I hoped she was finally awake, because as every minute slipped by that she was still unconscious, my concern for her grew stronger.
“Dinner is served,” I told Penny as I delivered the cheeseburgers and iced tea to the outside table where she was waiting for me in front of the hospital. I hadn’t even had a chance to get into the building when I’d heard her calling my name.
“Are you sure you don’t mind eating outside? It’s such a beautiful day, isn’t it?”
“Gorgeous,” I said. “How’s your day been so far?”
“As far as I’m concerned, working in the hospital is tougher than being in a doctor’s office, and it doesn’t always necessarily pay any better, but it’s more exciting and fast paced, at least for me. How about you? How’s your day?”
“What can I say? I get up, I make donuts, I sell donuts, I go home, and then I start all over again the next day,” I said with a grin.
“Don’t lie to me. You love it,” Penny said as she took her first bite. “This is amazing.”
“I’ll let Trish know. As a matter of fact, I do enjoy what I do,” I admitted. After taking a bite of my own burger, I added, “I have no idea why Trish is so opposed to take-out. This is delightful.”
“She cares about what she does just as much as we do, and she wants folks to experience the very best she has to offer. You don’t sell donuts that are three days old, do you?”
“Are you kidding? I donate ones I don’t move the same day I make them if they don’t sell,” I admitted. “Not that I’m doing that to you. I’ve got six dozen fresh donuts in the back of my Jeep, and as soon as we finish eating, we can deliver them to the nurses stations around the hospital.”
“That sounds wonderful. I know they’ll love them. Thanks for thinking of us.”
“You bet,” I said. “How are things going otherwise with you?”
“Do you mean my love life?” she asked.
“I do.”
“It’s not going anywhere at all, truth be told, but I don’t mind. I’ve got a lot going on at the moment, and a man would just get in the way.” She looked at me a moment longer, and then she burst out laughing. “Okay, I wouldn’t mind one coming around every now and then.”
“Penny, you’re too good not to have someone in your life if that’s what you want,” I told her.
“That’s what I think, too,” she answered with a grin. “How’s Jake doing these days?”
“He’s currently helping the mayor remodel his lake house, and the two of them are having a ball doing it.”
“I’m sure they are,” she said as she took another bite.
After Penny finished eating, she leaned back and enjoyed a bit of sunshine. “I love this,” she said.
“My company, or the picnic lunch?” I asked her.
“Is there any reason that it can’t be both?” Penny asked with a chuckle, never opening her eyes. After a few moments, she sat back up. “If you’re finished eating too, let’s grab those donuts. Are you sure I can’t give you anything for them?”
“I’m positive,” I said as I took our trash and threw everything away in a nearby can. “Let’s play Santa Claus and start delivering our goodies.”
“It sounds like a blast to me,” she said.
After we delivered donuts to every station and also a box to two of the lounges, I gave Penny a hug. “I’m glad we could do this,” I said.
“So am I,” she said. “I’m proud of you, Suzanne.”
“Why? Not that I don’t love hearing it,” I answered.
“You didn’t ask about Gabby even once during the entire meal and our deliveries.”
“This lunch was about us, not her,” I said. I’d been tempted to ask her a few times during our meal, but I’d managed to restrain myself, and now I was glad that I had.
“Well, I have a few more minutes before I have to go back to work. Let’s talk about her now.”
“Are you sure?” I asked her.
“I’m positive. As a matter of fact, I’ve got something you might want to hear.”
“Go on, I’m listening,” I said, eager to hear what she had to say.
“Gabby came out of it for just a few seconds, and I happened to be nearby when she did,” Penny admitted.
“Really? Did she happen to say anything?”
“She was clearly still out of it, but I think I heard her say ‘fire.’ I couldn’t be sure, and by the time I bent down closer to her to hear better, she was out of it again.” Penny frowned. “It’s really no surprise, given what happened to her.”
“No, it’s not,” I said, a little dashed by the revelation. If I’d been in my shop and it happened to be engulfed in flames at the time, I’m sure the fire would be foremost in my thoughts.
“Gabby had just gone through a pretty traumatic experience, and her voice was barely above a whisper. She could have been trying to say any number of other things. Sorry it’s not more encouraging than that.”
“I appreciate you sharing it with me,” I said sincerely. “How’s she doing? Really?”
“Gabby’s official status is still critical,” Penny said carefully.
“I understand that, but what do you think her odds are of getting through this alive?”
Penny shrugged and considered the question before answering. “I’ll deny it if you tell anyone I said it, but at this point I’d say it’s a coin toss. I’m sorry, I know the two of you are friends, but you deserve to know the truth.”
“That means more to me than I can say,” I said as I hugged her. “Thanks for being honest with me about it.” I wanted to ask her to keep me updated on Gabby’s condition, but given the fact that I was there in order to mend bridges with her, I decided it wasn’t the right thing to do.
“Listen, if anything changes, I’ll give you a call,” she volunteered.
“I’d appreciate that, but you don’t have to do that. That’s really not why I came.” In the spirit of being candid, I added, “Well, not entirely. I was going to check on her after lunch, but I wasn’t going to ask you to keep an eye on her for me.”
“You didn’t ask; I volunteered,” Penny said with a smile. “Lunch was great, and I know everyone will appreciate the donuts, but I’ve got to get back to work.”
“Thanks for making the time for me,” I said. “I’ll try to be a better friend.”
“You’re doing just fine,” Penny answered, and then she hurried to make it back to her station in time to get to work.
It was just as well. I had a great deal to do myself. First of all, I had to go back and pick Grace up, and then we needed to go talk to Trish. She’d clearly seen something that had troubled her going on at ReNEWed, and I was determined to find out what it was.
“How was lunch?” Grace asked me after letting me into her place. It was as neat as could be, all except for her dining room table. That was covered with stacks of paper that went several layers deep, and there was a shredder stationed right beside it.
“It was good,” I said as I looked around. “Listen, if this is a bad time for you, we don’t have to do this right now.”
Grace waved a hand toward the table. “This? Don’t be fooled by the stacks. I have to do this once a quarter. We used to keep all of these reports on hand for years, but my new boss is trying to get us to go paperless, which would be fine with me if some of my staff actually knew how to use their computers. I thought the kids these days were raised on them.”
It sounded funny hearing her refer to her employees as kids, but then I realized that most of them were probably a good ten years younger than we were. “I’m willing to bet that’s true on a case-by-case basis only,” I said. “What are the paper mills going to do without your business if you ever manage to do away with it completely?” I asked her with a grin.
“Oh, I’m pretty sure they’ll be okay. The transition is going to take a while, and in the meantime, we’re doing our paperwork both ways.”
“Electronically and physically?” I asked her. “That seems like a lot of unnecessary work to me.”
“You don’t have to tell me that, but if I don’t reconcile the reports, I get two different answers to the same question from some of my people. No worries; I’ve got a system. The second I manage to get everything squared away, I shred the paper and keep the electronic file.”
“How often do the totals disagree?” I asked her. I’d never worked in an office, let alone for a corporation as large as the one Grace worked for, and it amazed me at times how much energy and effort they spent just communicating with each other. If I had something going on at work, I either told Emma directly, or I left her a note. Then again, I was sure it was a lot easier when only two people were involved instead of dozens and dozens spread out up and down the corporate ladder.
“That’s where those boxes come into play,” she said as she pointed to a stack of packing boxes just off the living room. She must have seen my surprised reaction, because she quickly added, “They aren’t full, so don’t look so stunned. Right now I have about thirty reports left to reconcile. These all get shredded.”
“Do you want some help?” I asked her. “That sounds like it could be fun.”
“You enjoy shredding documents?” she asked me incredulously.
“Hey, I look at it as making confetti that no one will ever throw,” I said. “What’s not to love? We can take half an hour and knock it out if we work together.” I was eager to investigate what had happened at ReNEWed, but I knew that Grace had her own set of obligations, so if I could help her with some of those, she’d be free to help me do a little digging.
“I’d appreciate that,” she said. “Go for it.”
As I flipped the massive shredder on, I asked, “Is there anything I have to watch out for?”
“No, this thing eats staples and paperclips like snacks. Chuck them in the chute ten or twelve sheets at a time and you should be fine.”
“I can do that,” I said as I started feeding in the reports and reducing them to scrap paper. That shredder was industrial strength for sure. Not only did it handle metal, but it shredded everything horizontally and vertically. There was something hypnotizing about watching the paperwork disappear, and I found myself caught up in the rhythm of the cutters.
After I finished clearing the table, leaving the top completely paperless, I asked her, “Is there anything else I can shred?”
“You really do enjoy that, don’t you?” she asked me with a smile. “Sorry, but that’s it for now. The rest I have to go through later, but you’ve been a big help.”
“It was nothing,” I said. “Are you sure you have time to help me?”
“I’ve got plenty of time now,” she said.
“What about those reports you still have to reconcile? I don’t want to pull you away if you need to work.”
“Suzanne, I’ve got to have something to do tomorrow while you’re making donuts, don’t I?” she asked me with a grin. “Come on. Let’s go.”
“All right,” I said.
Grace hesitated a moment. “Where exactly do we start?”
“That one’s easy. I was talking to Trish earlier, and I think she may have seen something at ReNEWed yesterday,” I said.
“Before the fire?”
“That’s my theory, but there’s only one way to find out.”
“Then let’s go have a chat with her,” Grace said. “While we’re there, I can grab something to eat.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t even think about your lunch.”
“Hey, I’m a big girl. I eat when I get hungry,” she said. “Besides, you don’t mind keeping me company while I have myself a feast, do you?”
“Not at all. In fact, I may even have a piece of pie, just to keep you company, you understand.”
Grace grinned at me. “You always were the politest person I knew.”
“Liar,” I answered with a smile of my own.
“Hey, if you’re having pie, then I’ll have some for dessert myself. Let’s go.”
Once we were outside, I asked, “Why don’t we walk over to the Boxcar? Once we decide what to do next, we can come back for my Jeep, but for now, I can work up an appetite for that pie.”
“That sounds good to me,” she said.
As we headed up Springs Drive on foot, I found myself hesitating at the donut shop before we followed the long defunct railroad tracks in the opposite direction toward the Boxcar Grill. The remains of Gabby’s shop beside mine were a reminder of just how close I’d come to losing everything myself. The hole between Donut Hearts and the old Patty Cakes building was like a missing tooth. The place had burned rather thoroughly, and I had to wonder how long it would be until the remains were bulldozed and hauled away. In six months, would anyone even be able to tell that Gabby’s shop had once stood there so proudly? It always amazed me how tenuous civilization was and how quickly nature reclaimed her own space.
“Hey, are you okay?” Grace asked as she touched my shoulder lightly.
“I’m fine,” I said as I shook myself slightly. “I think someone must have just walked over my grave.”
Grace shivered. “I always hated that expression.”
“Me, too,” I agreed. “Come on. Let’s go get you something to eat.”