“I think it looks great in red.Ich liebe es,” Morgan put in, and Avonlea had come with receipts.
“After we fixed the roof, we had professionals restore that whole wall,” she announced. “They were able to peel back the layers and they found that the original menu was painted in fire-engine red. We matched the exact shade.” She and Max had also bought a new road sign that mimicked the one that had hung at the restaurant’s opening. Avonlea had found a picture of it in the archives of our local newspaper. That image was black and white but the sign was the same red as the freshly painted menu, and I chimed in that it all looked great.
So did the new appliances, so did the grease trap (I believed that, but I wasn’t going to pull up the metal cover and stick in my head to look). They had probably already fixed the HVAC because they were methodical and, apparently, just as rich as Avonlea had told me. She had the money to get this done. But she was smart, too, and before they’d touched one thing in this building (besides tossing the rest of the rotten food), she’d had her lawyerclear up the ownership and debt issues. My dad was totally out of the picture and the slate had been wiped clean.
We were meeting today at one of the new tables to try to clear away even more of the to-do list, but Mom wasn’t helping much with her complaints. She obviously wanted to be a part of things and it was just as obvious to me that she didn’t enjoy how they didn’t listen to her. Well, they listened, but afterwards they did what they wanted.
“So, who have you gotten to wear these uniforms?” Morgan asked, studying the picture of the new T-shirt. “Have you hired anyone?” She glanced across the table at Max and then tilted her head, signaling toward our mother. “If you need a cashier, I might know someone.” She then pointed to make herself totally clear.
Max looked at our mom. “Would you want to work here again?” he asked uncertainly, and her whole face immediately brightened.
“Only if you really need me to,” she answered, nodding.
“It would have to be real employment,” Avonlea cautioned. “You would fill out tax documents and draw a regular salary. We’re not going to do the ‘oh it’s family, so we’ll feel free to cheat you’ thing.” She turned to me and shook her head. “You must be owed thousands.”
Probably. “I won’t be able to work here, even legally,” I said. I was busy.
We continued to talk and as our discussion drew to a close, my mom offered to stay back to settle any details about a job. “Ido want to be at Walter’s, despite the new uniform,” she said. She mumbled something about everyone looking cute in a white sailor hat, but Avonlea and Max pretended not to hear.
Her decision left Morgan without a ride, but I told my sister that I could drive her home. We had made up—nothing formal, just an undeclared truce. I had to get to the restaurant where I was working because yes, I hadn’t quit there. I had thought a lot about the job in Tempe and there were arguments on both sides, for and against me taking it. The ones on the against side had won out, and I had thanked them for the opportunity but said that I had decided to stay in Michigan.
My sister was looking up at the red and white “Walter’s Café, Estab. 1946” sign as we walked outside and she tripped over a deep rut in the gravel due to that distraction. The parking lot was one thing that hadn’t been repaired yet. “I love the new sign. This all looks good,” she told me as we got into the car.
“I’m stunned,” I admitted. “I can’t believe how much Max has done in such a short amount of time.”
“You mean, how much Avonlea has done,” she corrected. “Avonlea and her money.”
“However it happened, it’s great. Except…the kitchen.”
“Yes, exactly,” she said, nodding. We had been texting about that issue and it was one that our mom had privately voiced to me, too. Who was going to cook? It was hard to manage a short order kitchen, very hard. It was a job that you could learn if you were taught by someone who knew it well, or you could spend a lot of time observing and assisting. Our brother had experienced noneof that, but he was still insisting that he would run the show. I foresaw disaster but that was one topic that he and Avonlea had made off-limits. They refused to discuss the idea of someone else coming in to be in charge or even to help out.
My new role in Walter’s Café was what Shane called “an unpaid consultant.” I was offering ideas, support, and suggestions, but I didn’t have the final say in anything. This role as a consultant also meant that I didn’t have to suffer from the results of the decisions, so if the first lunch service was a disaster because my brother couldn’t handle the orders or deal with the new grill? It wasn’t anything I needed to worry about…except, I still was.
“I’m going to be pretty upset if this doesn’t work out,” I admitted to my sister.
She was nodding. “Same. I have high hopes that it will.” She hesitated. “Uh, speaking of things working out, I’ve been meaning to mention something to you.” She paused again and then blurted, “Dad and Mom are talking seriously about getting back together.” There was another moment of silence and then she turned in the passenger seat to stare at me. “Nothing? No reaction? I thought you’d get mad at her.”
“I’m not very surprised,” I said. “They’re kind of symbiotic.”
“We all are.” She sighed. “We’re enmeshed. Isn’t that what you called it? You’re the worst one out of all of us.”
“What?” Now I had a reaction. “I’m certainly not the worst!”
“You totally are and it’s the oddest thing,” she mused. “It’s so strange because you’re the most capable one, too. Max needed Avonlea to prop him up and I’m still living with Mom, trying toget through the day. But you could have taken off years ago and done great on your own.”
“I’m not some kind of lone wolf,” I told her. “I need people, too.”
“You could have found them outside of our family,” she explained. “You stuck around and let us drag you down.”
“I thought that I was doing the right thing. I didn’t really see that there was an off ramp,” I said slowly. “I loved everybody, even Dad. I was pretty sure that everything would fall apart without me and I didn’t want it to. I thought you would die. Literally,” I told her. “A while ago, you said that I should have left and that you all would have been better off. I never saw it that way but you were probably right.”
“Maybe I was,” she answered. “But I admire what you did, anyway.”
“It wasn’t selfless,” I pointed out. “I thought it was my restaurant, too. I might have benefitted from it.”
“It was ourfamilybusiness,” she said, imitating our mom’s voice and saying the words we’d heard so many times. “You were pulling us along but you were also going down with the ship. Thank you, Molly. Thanks for trying.”
“You’re welcome.” If those words had sounded husky, it was because tears had become my new normal. I had found myself crying more than I ever had before.
