The Diner

“Well, hello there, stranger!” Janice smiled from behind the counter, looking mildly surprised as Eddus entered the diner, holding the door open for Abbi.

They’d walked from City Park, and it was the only place Eddus could think of that would still be open at that late an hour.

“Do you live here, Janice?” Eddus laughed. He couldn’t remember a time he had been to the diner, and she wasn’t busy waiting tables. Usually, he came to the diner late in the mornings, and yet here she was, in the middle of the night.

“It sure feels like it, hun. One of the girls is on maternity leave, so we’re all helping pick up the slack.”

Leading Abbi to the corner booth and then waiting for her to be seated, Eddus sat down across from her.

“I’m guessing you must be Abbi.” Janice smiled as she approached the table, placing a menu in front of each of them.

“How do you know my name?”

“Lucky guess, hun.”

“Eddus, did you tell her my name?”

“He didn’t have to,” Janice said, with a twinkle in her eye. “A bombshell, in a little black dress, with no shoes on.” She looked to Eddus, giving him a wink.

“Janice! Why would you say that?” Eddus quickly looked at Abbi, his face warming, then back at the waitress. “You’re as bad as Mo.”

“Bombshell?” Looking surprised, Abbi knitted her eyebrows. “Eddus?”

“It was something Mo said, not Ed,” Janice told her. “And it just means that you’re a pretty girl, hun,”

“I know what it means,” Abbi laughed, looking up at the waitress, “and I highly doubt that Eddie would have said anything that. I just like watching him get nervous.”

Janice’s Eyebrows raised.

“So it’s “Eddie” now, is it?” She looked at Eddus with a knowing smile. “Two coffees?”

“Honey, please.”

Both Eddus and the waitress looked at Abbi.

“Honey in your coffee?” Janice asked her.

“Just honey, please. And water?” Abbi bit her lip as she looked up at Janet.

“No problem,” Janet said, “one coffee, and one water with honey. You want ice in that, hun?”

Abbi shook her head. “Hot, please. Like coffee, if it’s no trouble.”

Janet nodded and then made her way behind the counter.

“What are you thinking right now, Eddus Brandt?”

Slowly, Eddus raised his head. For several moments, he had been silent, looking at the table.

“I was thinking about how you’ve kissed me twice in the relatively short time we’ve known one another.” Speaking slowly, Eddus lowered his gaze again to the half finished cup of coffee in front of him, and then looked across the table at Abbi. “How do you do that?”

Abbi opened her mouth to respond, but stopped herself as the waitress walked past them. She waited a few moments.

“You were so nice to me the night we met,” Abbi said as soon as Janice was out of earshot. “I knew that I was making you uncomfortable, and yet you were still so sweet to me... and kissing you tonight was forward, I know. It was probably wrong of me, considering the circumstances.”

Eddus smiled, and waited a moment when she’d stopped talking. He studied her facial expression as she looked back at him. She had the look of a child trying to justify a wrongdoing.

“That is not what I meant,” he told her softly.

“Then what did you mean? How do I do what?”

“Every time you ask me a question... I seem to answer it whether I want to or not, and I usually end up saying more than I should.”

“More than you should? What do you mean?”

“I’m not really sure what I mean.” Eddus turned his head, looking through the window beside them at the empty street outside. “It’s not your fault. I just seem to speak more openly than I’m used to when you ask me a question. Like the answer I just gave you. It was exactly what I was thinking about when you asked me, but I doubt I would have given that answer had anyone else asked.”

Abbi shook her head, but said nothing, an amused expression on her face. Eddus emptied what was left in his cup and smiled at her.

“As I said, it’s not you,” he said, putting his hand in his pocket to retrieve his wallet. “Let’s get out of here.”

•••

“About kissing you,” Abbi said softly.

Eddus took the initiative and had taken her hand as they left the diner. He felt it was easier to continue their conversation outside as they walked. They’d walked about one and a half blocks without speaking before Abbi broke the silence. Eddus was surprised to hear what she said when she finally spoke. He’d given it no more thought after they left the diner.

“I didn’t mean anything when I answered you earlier,” he said. “I just told you what it was I was thinking.”

“We’re not so different, you know, pixies and humans...”

Not knowing how to respond, Eddus pursed his lips. What did that even mean? He didn’t want to think about it right then. He didn’t want to think about anything other than the young woman he’d met weeks before.

“Abbi, how old are you?”

“Eddus.”

“How old are you? You asked me what I was thinking about, and I was thinking about the two times you’d kissed me, as well as wondering if it was not inappropriate... That is, I hoped that...” Eddus took a deep breath. “I just don’t want you to feel any regret at our having met.”

“I told you that I am older than you think I am.” Abbi’s voice bordered on discomfort, and she avoided looking directly at Eddus. “Without going into it, may I ask that you please trust me?”

“Without going into it?”

“We’re adults, Ed. You’ve done nothing wrong, and I am not a young girl who needs protecting.”

“I just want to be sure. I need to be sure.” Eddus nodded, glancing down at her. They turned off the main street onto a smaller side street leading into the city’s shipping district.

“And I’ll never regret meeting you, Eddus Brandt.”

Eddus pondered her last statement, in relation to what she’d said when he asked her age. He wanted to trust her. He couldn’t think of a reason not to.

“You’re funny, Eddie.”

“In what way?”

“I literally showed you another world today. My world. I then tell you that I, myself, am fae- a pixie- and you don’t even ask me anything about it.” Abbi laughed. “But I kiss you, and you’re worried that I may regret something.”

Eddus looked down at her as they walked. She gave him a smile, shaking her head.

“I’m sure that I’ll have more questions than you can answer when I’ve had time to think about things,” he told her.

At the moment, he didn’t want to think about those things. To do so would be to open the floodgates.