The Crossroads Cafe

by Deborah Smith

  A loving, comforting biscuit. Wonderful.

  The nurse held up a handful of something. “Music CD’s,” she announced. She shuffled through them. “Bonnie Raitt, Rosanne Cash. And . . . The Log Splitter Girls?”

  “My new favorites!”

  “The Log Splitter Girls?”

  My foggy brain couldn’t form an explanation. I frowned as I sorted through the many fascinating things Delta told me every time she called. Since she phoned twice a day like clockwork during my debridement sessions, and talked non-stop to distract me, I had a lot of details to sort. One of Delta’s neighbors, a woman, was a berry farmer. In her spare time, she and her partner wrote songs and played acoustic guitars in a girl group. The Log Splitters.

  “They’re lesbians,” I finally told the nurse. “Lesbian musicians. Oh, and . . . berry farmers.”

  She laid the CD’s aside. “Who’d have thought it? With a name like ‘The Log Splitter Girls.’” Then she lifted two heavily taped, insulated containers from the package. “These appear to contain something perishable. One’s wrapped in a cool pack.”

  “Cool. I like ‘cool.’”

  More snipping, and she popped the lid on a cup, held it near her face mask, and sniffed. “This is some kind of white goo. I’m a non-dairy vegetarian, so all I can say for certain is this gelatinous white goo smells like there’s milk in it. Ugh.”

  My head craned a good two inches off the pillow. “Cream gravy!”

  She set the cup down, popped the box lid, shrugged at the contents, and tilted them up for me to peruse. “Biscuits.”

  “Biscuits!” My entire body hurt with excitement. Sinking back on the pillow, I gasped, “Break biscuit into pieces. Dip pieces in gravy. Bring here.”

  “But it’s all cold.”

  “Good. Nothing hot. Not anymore.”

  She put on fresh sterile gloves, fixed me a small dish of crumpled biscuit topped with globs of cold cream gravy, and brought it to me. I stuck my left hand into the dish, woozily grabbed a wad of biscuit and gravy, and, trailing IV’s like some kind of sunburned cyborg, shoved the food in my mouth. The nurse gasped and threw a towel under my chin. Biscuit crumbs and dollops of cold gravy rained down on it. I chewed happily, crying.

  Now I wasn’t so alone. I had Delta Whittlespoon, and Bonnie and Rosanne and the Log Splitter Girls, and Granny Nettie’s biscuits.

  Soul food.

  Chapter 5

  Thomas The Privy

  You lied to Cathy Deen. Deceived her. She’s probably figured it out by now. Probably thinks you’re just someone else trying to exploit her. God. How did you let Delta talk you into making that call?

  Half naked and hungover, armed with only a toothbrush and deodorant, I fought off a bestiary of regrets and a toilet full of wildlife. In primary colors.

  Almost everything about the café was a remodel or an add-on, including the outside toilet that jutted from a nook near the side porch. There were bathrooms inside as well, but the The Privy Of Fine Art, as everyone called it, was a landmark and a plumbing-endowed museum of folk art. Visiting artists had covered its white plank walls with a whole zoo of abstract animals. A Noah’s Ark scene roamed the ceiling, and a flock of purple turkeys lived in the narrow alcove where the toilet sat. Sitting in the cramped stall on a toilet painted with blue trout, while gazing at abstract purple turkeys, the average art lover was guaranteed a bowel movement in ten seconds flat.

  On the wall above the sink, milky quartz pebbles had been glued in a rococo arch over an old medicine chest and mirror. On the wall over the urinal, dozens of arrowheads were arranged in a collage that pointed to a papier-mâché sun wrapped in rusting barbed wire. Thus, the simple act of urination could become an exercise in surreal contemplation.

  The Privy Of Fine Art dated to the 1940’s, when Delta’s parents built the log grocery next to their farmhouse and installed gas pumps in their front yard. Back then, the Privy lured weary travelers with its flush toilet and electric lights, both of which were rare in the mountains. You could say the toilet was the Cove’s first modern tourist attraction. Now, it was a quirky legend and a folk art inspiration. Over in Asheville, almost every art gallery sold works celebrating the Crossroads Privy. Photos, paintings, and even, once, a 3-D model sculpted from toilet paper.

  I was in the Privy washing goat slobber off my face after a night sleeping with Banger in the truck, when Delta pounded on the rickety wooden door. The latch popped off the frame, which happens when you hit a sixty-year-old door decorated in pink-eyed green lizards. I thought about ducking into the toilet nook with the trout and turkeys, but since I was decent—in low-slung jeans, with an acre of brown beard covering my bare chest—I just stood there, scowling at Delta.

  “I’d shriek and blush, but I have a hangover,” I deadpanned.

  “Cathryn got the care package. She loved it!”

  “You’re saying she didn’t figure out that I was on the phone instead of her husband?”

  “No! She’s happy to believe everything you said! I’m sending her a package every week from now on. Biscuits, gravy and gifts. You have to help me think of other ways to cheer her up.”

  In Delta’s view, people always cheered up, eventually. I dropped a tooth brush back in my shaving kit and said quietly, “Maybe I can find her a time machine on eBay.”

  “No, but you can find a phone and call her, again.”

  I went very still. “Let’s not push our luck.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with telling a good lie at a bad time.”

  “I’m reporting you to Cleo. She’ll revoke your What Would Jesus Do? bracelet.”

  “What could it hurt to pretend you’re Gerald?”

  “It’s not fair to her. If her husband’s a bum, he’s a bum. I might even make things worse for her.”

  “How much worse can they be, Thomas? She’s a mess. She can still barely form a whole sentence—she’s on a lot of medication—but she mumbled something about how wonderful her husband was for putting me in touch with her. Thomas, what is that cold-hearted bull hump up to?”

  “Maybe he’s there, maybe he’s visiting and calling, and she’s just confused.”

  “Even a drugged woman knows when her man’s abandoned her. Thomas, please just—”

  “No. Eventually she’ll find out, and she’ll be hurt that a stranger invaded her life and took advantage of her trust. She’ll think I’m some kind of con artist.” I hesitated, looking down at Delta grimly. “And maybe she’ll think you are, too.”

  Delta gasped. She’d never thought of it that way. “Oh, Lord.”

  “I’m sorry. You don’t know how much I’d like to help her.” After a second thought, I amended, “Because I want the Nettie house.”

  “Have you seen the gossip magazines this week? All those awful headlines! ‘Scarred For Life. A Career Up In Flames. Horror On the Highway Leaves A Dream Girl In Nightmare.’ It’s all about horror and tragedy and mutilation, and they make it sound as if Cathryn’s worthless, now! And all the TV talking heads are debating ‘the culture of beauty’ and ‘the culture of fame’ and ‘the culture of celebrity,’ but I don’t think any of ‘em would recognize the culture of decency if it crawled out of their ten-dollar martinis and bit ‘em on the behind! They’re all showing pictures from that sleazy photographer’s videotape at the same time they’re turning up their noses and pretending to be appalled!”

  “Nothing that’s sold as ‘news’ surprises me,” I said quietly. “It’s about selling melodrama and making money. And propaganda for the political cause du jour.”

  “There are comedians on some of the morning radio shows making fun of her. Do you know what one lowlife said? He said, ‘Put a bag over her head. No sense wasting a good piece of tail.’ Why do you men talk that way?”

  “I don’t talk that way. Pike doesn’t talk that way. Or Jeb, or Bubba. Or my brother. Don’t paint us all with the same brush.”

  “I know, I know! But I just don’t understand the ones who d
o talk that way about women!”

  “They’re idiots. They run their mouths for the same reason apes hoot and beat their chests. Because they feel vulnerable around the female of the species, and they want her to be submissive.” Trying to lighten my diatribe, I clutched my shirt to my bare pecs. “Speaking of vulnerable and submissive, I could use a little privacy, here.”

  “Do you feel threatened by women?”

  “Absolutely. But my old man raised my brother and me to let girls hit us and never hit back. That rule is both literal and metaphorical and includes a laundry list of other rules of gentlemanly behavior.”

  “Good for him! I wish I’d known him. A good man. A gentleman. Men should be respectful of women! We’re all they’ve got!”

  “Women can be just as cruel as men. This obscene treatment of Cathryn isn’t about sexual politics. It’s about jealousy and money and power and the usual suspects. Society puts extraordinary people on a pedestal. Then it knocks them down.”

  “That doesn’t mean it’s fair.”

  “Do I have to say it? ‘Life isn’t fair.’”

  “How is she gonna feel when she comes out of her cocoon and realizes she’s the newest sick joke? And that there are people out here who are glad she got hurt. Folks who are making money off what happened to her! I can’t believe that photographer got off without any charges. Sure, she was speedin’, but he was chasin’ her!”

  Delta shook her head and walked out, slamming the door. I donned my shirt, then spent some time finding a new spot to screw the latch eye back into the pock-marked door frame. Her words rang in my head. I hated what was happening to Cathy, and I wasn’t fond of my fellow men, especially their willingness to fly commercial airliners full of innocent people into tall buildings filled with other innocent people. Maybe I should take up the ministry. I could preach on the evil nature of Man. Hallelujah. But I doubted the faithful wanted to hear what I had to say.

  Why did God give Cathy every gift a person could want then snatch it all away like a bad joke? Why did He allow children to die in goddamned horrible ways? Why had God, the universe, sheer bad luck—whatever we want to call it—come crashing down on Cathy Deen just as it came down on Sherryl and Ethan? Yes, give me a chance to preach. I’d tell people God didn’t care.

  If God even existed, if He had a plan for Cathy and for me, He’d have to give us a hint what to do next.

  Cathy

  A banner day in Crispy Actress Land. I could sit up. Well, halfway up. And instead of being naked I got to wear a lovely, chic hospital gown in a fetching style that covered the relatively undamaged side of my body, which was now peeling like the mother of all sunburns. If I weren’t taking enough steroids to supply an entire major league baseball team, the itch would have been unbearable.

  I slowly spooned Delta’s latest supply of cold gravy and biscuits into my mouth while gazing at the thousandth re-run of Titanic. I had other movies to watch, but I’d developed a strong affection for icebergs and water. Everything wet and cool. There are no fires in Titanic.

  A nurse came in. “Wouldn’t you like that food warmed a little?”

  “No, thanks.” I had also developed a small quirk about hot food. I wouldn’t eat it. Heat, in any form, could not be allowed near my body. So far, I’d been able to fake out the shrinks on staff. They kept warning me that irrational fears were common among burn survivors, that all manner of oddball ideas and reactions were normal. I kept mumbling that cold cream gravy was considered a delicacy in the South. Hah. I have them fooled.

  “You have a visitor,” the nurse said. She took my dish.

  Gerald, I thought. Finally. I lifted my left hand toward my face, instinctively checking makeup and smoothing hair, but the hand would only go so far before it hit the end of a tether. Occasionally it dawned on me that maybe my arm was tied down so I couldn’t rip off my bandages or find out what my face felt like. Plus I was still the bionic woman, hooked to various IV’s. “How do I look?” I asked the nurse brightly.

  She stared at me over her mask. “Better every day.”

  Hey, that sounded good.

  She opened the door, let an antiseptically uniformed stranger in, and left us alone together. I blinked and frowned. The stranger stayed across the room, as if I might be contagious.

  This wasn’t Gerald. This masked and gowned person had female legs and wore mascara. She carried some kind of paperwork in a clear plastic envelope. What I could see of my visitor’s face, around her eyes and forehead, beneath the sterile cap, was whiter than my bedsheets, and glistened with sweat. But her eyes didn’t waver. Shark eyes.

  Oh, God.

  “Either you’re an agent,” I said slowly. “Or a lawyer.”

  “I’m a lawyer, Ms. Deen. One of Mr. Merritt’s attorneys.”

  “I don’t know you.”

  “We haven’t met, before. I’m a ... specialist.” Oh, God. She ventured a few steps closer as she slid a document from her envelope. “First, Mr. Merritt has authorized me to relay the following personal message to you.” She cleared her throat and read:

  Cathryn, you and I had a partnership based on who and what you were. The basic contract of our marriage thus has been voided. You chose to drive recklessly. You chose to drive that embarrassing lowbrow sports car despite my repeated entreaties to consider your public image. You chose to leave your security people behind with complete disregard for protecting yourself and my investment in your future. I’m sorry, but you have violated my trust and now you must accept the consequences.

  The lawyer tucked the note back in the envelope and looked at me firmly over her mask. “Pursuant to the California statutes regarding no-fault, uncontested conditions and the arrangements of your mutually agreed upon pre-nuptial contract, Mr. Merritt is filing for divorce. I’ve notified your attorney. Here’s a copy of the filing.” She placed the plastic envelope atop the bed pan on my tray table. “Have a nice . . . sorry.”

  She left.

  The man who swore to love me forever before God, an ordained minister, and five hundred of our closest friends at a million-dollar ceremony overlooking the ocean on a private Hawaiian beach now decreed me a worthless investment.

  Maybe he’s right. It was all my fault, that accident. I’m ugly, and I deserve to be punished.

  After a while I realized I was moving my good hand just a little, gently patting what I could reach of myself, which was only my left hipbone. There, there. It’ll be all right.

  Even I didn’t believe me.

  Thomas

  Easter weekend was the unofficial start of spring tourist season in the mountains, and the café was a mad house. Wonderful aromas rose from the pans of a big steam table. Squash casserole and mashed potatoes with heavy cheese, meatloaf and creamed corn, turnip greens filled with chunks of ham, to name a few selections. “Jesus didn’t rise from the dead so all these people could go camping!” Cleo yelled as she grabbed full plates and headed back to the dining rooms.

  Delta grinned as she stirred a large pot of collards. “The Lord understands the need to commune with nature and eat my food.”

  As I cleared a full bus pan and began loading the dishwasher, Pike walked in. He tossed his sheriff’s Stetson atop a stack of clean pots and began helping Becka and Jeb pack big pans of peach cobbler into a box. Someone at the new golf club in Turtleville was holding an Easter picnic. Who knew Jesus had risen on the eighteenth green?

  “Texas Hold ‘em, nine sharp Saturday night at my office,” Pike announced to all of us in the poker gang. “Complimentary chocolate Easter bunnies all around.” Pike’s “office” was an old construction trailer out back. Its main features were a poker table, an old Coca Cola cooler full of beer, and a wooden porch across the back, where his guests could spit, smoke, and take a no-frills manly piss into a stack of firewood. In other words, it was perfect.

  “How much money did I win from you last week?” I asked.

  Pike grunted. “Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars and fifty-two
cents. You take another IOU?”

  “No, and I want two chocolate rabbits. Up front.”

  “Somebody turn that TV up,” Delta ordered as she slid a big pan of biscuits from the oven. “Entertainment Tonight’s coming on. Sometimes they mention how Cathy’s doing. She won’t watch it. I told her I’d report back to her if they say something stupid.”

  “They ever say anything on those gossip shows that’s not stupid?” Jeb put in, then dodged as his mother threw a biscuit at him. He caught the biscuit and retreated to a corner to eat it. Biscuits were never wasted at the café, even when used as weapons. At lunch and dinner Delta served them with fresh butter and honey. At breakfast she dished them out with cream gravy. Cream gravy with pieces of spicy sausage in it. If there is a God, he serves that in heaven. Sans sausage for the kosher angels and vegans.

  “Thomas, those dirty tables won’t wait for you wake up from your hangover,” Delta called as I methodically arranged more dishes in the dishwasher. “Get a move on.”

  “I’m not paid to take all this pressure. In fact, I’m not getting paid at all.”

  “You get free food and the fellowship of people who love you just the way you are. That’s what you get, Mister.” She held out a biscuit.

  A black hand intercepted it. “Why, thank you, Miss Delta,” said Anthony, the UPS man, who had just wandered in the back door. “Bite my crumbs, white boy.”

  “You’re in uniform. Isn’t it against the rules to eat my biscuit while on the clock?”

  “I made my last delivery in Turtleville thirty minutes ago. I’m heading home to Asheville as soon as Delta packs my take-out. I promised my wife a café dinner tonight.”