I worked the midnight shift at the truck stop on the west side of town, by the lake.
Before the truckers started rolling in and after the bar closing rush it was just me and Connie. I don't know if that was her name, but I thought she looked like one. Every week night, she pulled her pale yellow Chrysler Cordoba into the parking lot and angled it in where she could see it from her usual table, a booth in the corner. She could have parked it sideways, taking up five parking spaces by the front door if she had wanted to, there would be no other customers for at least an hour. I did not hand her a menu and show her to a table like I did everyone else. Instead, I gave her a small nod of recognition and followed her to her table. She always sat in the same place and never said a word to me other than, coffee. cream. please. My reply always, you bet, be right back.
She was tall and slim, with coarse, hay-colored hair that reached past her shoulders. It came down from her scalp in a fluffy bell shape, a cotton-candy lamp shade. Her eyes held no sparkle. She dressed simply in jeans and button up tops with tiny patterns on them that made me think of JC Penny. From far away, the pattern appeared to be polka dots. But up close, they became something else. Little birds one day, little flowers another. One time, tiny sail boats. No make up. No jewelry, except for a thin gold chain around her neck with a small cross.
She came to the diner to write and drink coffee. Pen to paper. Intent, focussed. Obsessed. Every few lines, she’d turn her head and look out the window, but not out the window. The night made the glass a mirror. She’d see what she was seeing, then continue to write as if she’d located a far away idea. Her hand movements, slow and controlled. She had the hands of a nail biter. I was interested in her but understood my role. Coffee getter. Coffee re-filler. But I wore a friendly, open look on my face just in case.
After five or six cups of coffee, she’d go. Leaving the table littered with empty creamer containers and sugar packets rolled up tight. Leaving a dollar and fifty cents to cover the bill and my tip. Leaving behind what she had written. The gold place mat covered in row after row of her neat cursive. Impressive, after all that coffee. Always the same words, I am a whore. I am a whore. I am a whore. I am a whore.
Every time I approach her table to clear it and reset it, I hope for different words. I fold the placemat in half and then in half again to add to the others.