Read Online Going Where It's Dark by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor - Free Book Online Page B

the blue plate special, they gave it to him free. He was always hungry. “Anything you want t…to get r…rid of?” he asked.
    “You,” said Charlie, and they laughed.
    “Well, now, aren’t you something! Coming in here bold as brass, asking for handouts,” said his mom with a grin. She picked up a tray on the counter. “Let me get these dishes in the machine and I’ll see what we’ve got left in the fridge. Pork and sauerkraut, maybe. I’ll sit down with you in a few minutes.” She balanced one end of the tray on the palm of her hand, the other end on her shoulder, and moved through the double doors to the kitchen.
    As soon as she was gone, Mel came through the front entrance, one finger to his lips. Charlie grinned and dumped another handful of onions on the grill where they spit and hissed, their savory scent filling the air. The small man looked something like an onion himself in his white shirt and pants, and an apron even more stained than Mom’s. He was sallow-complexioned, and what little hair he had stood up in one gray tuft on the top of his head.
    It was several minutes before Buck’s mom came back, wearing a clean apron and holding a dish of bread pudding.
    “This is all we’ve got,” she said, setting it down before Buck, and then, to Charlie, “My human garbage disposal.” She nodded affectionately toward her son. As she straightened the salt and pepper shakers on the counter, she scanned the room, then fixed her eyes on a man who sat slumped at a booth in the corner. His head was buried in one arm on the table, the collar of his stained Windbreaker turned up around his ears.
    “When’d he come in?” she asked Charlie.
    Buck, perched on a stool, was glad he had a mouthful of bread pudding because it helped keep him from smiling.
    “Couple minutes ago,” Charlie replied, unsmiling.
    “Is he drunk?”
    “I don’t know. Don’t think so. But this is the last of the liver and onions, and if he don’t want it, it’s my supper,” Charlie said.
    At that moment a thin, straight-backed woman came through the kitchen door and looked over to where Uncle Mel sat sprawled at the table in the corner booth.
Holly,
the green embroidered letters on her uniform read. Her dyed black hair was scooped on top her head, held there with a comb, making her look even taller.
    She turned to Buck’s mom. “Who’s he?”
    “We don’t know, but he’s either drunk or asleep,” said Mom. She pulled her order pad from the pocket of her butcher-style apron and walked over.
    “You ready to order, sir?” she asked the man in the rumpled Windbreaker, whose breathing was now loud enough for Buck to hear.
    There was no answer.
    Buck watched his mom try again.
    “Good afternoon,” she said loudly. She leaned a little farther over the table and took the menu out from behind the napkin holder. “Hello?” she added, nudging Mel’s head with the menu. And when there was no response still, she said, “Sir?
Sir?
”
    Holly stuck her head in the kitchen and called, “Pearl? Come out here a minute, would you?”
    They were soon joined by a grandmotherly-looking woman whose blond hair didn’t quite match her face.
    “You know that man in the corner?” Holly asked.
    “How do I know if I can’t see him?” Pearl answered.
    Buck had to drop his chin down to his chest and hold his shoulders rigid against the laughter swelling up inside him.
    Pearl came out from around the counter and joined Buck’s mom at the corner booth. The two women stood looking down on Mel, and then Pearl reached out and lightly shook his shoulder. “Excuse me,” she said loudly, “but the kitchen’s about to close. Won’t be serving dinner for an hour. You want anything, you best tell us now.”
    Mel only grunted and Charlie rapped his spatula against the grill to disguise a chuckle. Buck wondered if Mel’s watch wouldn’t give him away, but perhaps the sleeve of the old Windbreaker kept it hidden.
    Mrs. Anderson turned toward