An Order of Coffee and Tears (6 page)

“Sit down, sit down!” everyone began screaming. They continued waving their arms in the air. Tom raced through his Afghani/English translation book, trying to find the words. The twins weren’t looking at their parents anymore. They were laughing at the site of the figures hopping up and down along the edge of the road. One of the reports stated that the little boy and girl started to jump up and down in a mimic, playing along with what they saw. When they grew tired of jumping, they stopped, and then took another step.

“Ksséte, ksséte, ksséte,”
Tom yelled in Afghani to the children. He’d found the translation for
down,
and yelled it to the twins. The other men and women with Tom’s unit did the same. The mother and father stopped their arguing. Their color had paled, and their faces grew sullen and scared. The little girl called out to her mother, her fingers stretched outward, gripping handfuls of air. And then they took another step.

The chanting stopped. Everyone sucked in a breath and waited. Nothing happened, and then the parents started yelling alongside the soldiers. They called out “
Ksséte, ksséte, ksséte,”
in a corrected pronunciation. And this time, the children heard them. The little boy argued that he didn’t want to sit down, and that he wanted to come over to see the soldiers in their helmets and uniforms. He wanted to see if they had treats for them. His father directed him to stay. But the little boy shook his head, and, with his sister’s hand in his, they took another step. A gust of wind pushed sand and dirt into the air. The winds stirred up a heavy cloud, hiding the twins from Tom’s unit like a secret.

The men and women in Tom’s unit waited: some raised their hands in front of their eyes, expecting the worst to happen. When the winds and dirt settled, and when nothing happened, they joined in with the father’s demands. They stopped waving their arms and told the twins “down
”
. A few in the unit radioed back to the base, seeking instructions. Any demining help would be hours past their need, which was immediate. The little girl jumped up and down, calling out to her mother. She pulled on her brother’s arm, and they took another step. And then a second. And a third.

The unit’s report stated that Sandra’s son never hesitated. Tom didn’t request permission, or wait to see if a mine exploded under the feet of the children. He just ran. He was half way to the little boy and girl before anyone realized what he was doing. Tom didn’t try to jump to different points in the field – he didn’t watch the ground where his feet landed. He just ran.

His entire unit began screaming at him to get off the minefield. Orders were shouted, calling out for him to discontinue and rejoin the unit on the road. But Tom heard none of it. He’d reached the twins, scooped up the boy like a football, and grabbed the little girl by her arm. When he stopped and turned back to face the road, he stood and searched the field of dirt for footprints.

“What are you doing?” Someone screamed out to him. They all knew what he was doing. If he hadn’t run out to them, if he hadn’t done something, then the twins almost certainly would have been killed. Tom’s unit continued to yell and scream. They instructed him to find his steps and use them. Find his boot tracks, and follow them back out to the road.

The only sounds coming from the mother and father were prayers in whispered monotone words strung together in long breaths. They were kneeling on the ground, their hands brought together in front of them, pleading that Tom’s tracks would be shown to him as clear as he could see their children. Tom paced his steps, and worked his way back to the road. At some point, the little girl began to slip from his hand. Tom tried to hoist her into his arms as he hurried himself, but her body fell from his fingers, and she tumbled hard to the ground. She cried and yelled something in Afghani at him. He tried to stop, but he couldn’t. Momentum had his feet moving to the next boot track, and then another boot track, and then he was back on the road, dropping the boy and turning around. And the winds came again. The winds shouted louder this time, raising the dust and blinding everyone. More clouds of dirt and sand circled around the vehicles, the soldiers, and everything else, hiding the little girl whose cries were muffled by the sounds beating sands.

Tom was back to the girl a minute later – guided by her voice yelling to her mother, he ran and scooped her up in a tight embrace. The boot tracks he’d followed were gone, stolen by the wind. Reports state that Tom pulled the girl up in a hug, and simply raced for the road. He’d saved the twins.

Sandra’s words were mesmerizing. I felt my heart racing, and it wasn’t just the excitement of it, it was the pride. I could hear it in her voice. Amazing.

“You’ll have to stop back in during your drive home – I’d love to meet your hero,” I exclaimed, almost demanded, and beamed with a smile.

When the bell over the door rang, another chilly breeze fell inside the diner, as a balding man entered. His face was tired, his cheeks sunken. Dark gray pouches carried his eyes, which were blood shot and wet. He lifted his face just enough to see me and Sandra. Sandra turned, their eyes connected, and he gave a nod and walked toward us. When he reached the counter, he sat down. Tossing his keys to drop on the counter in front of him, he again lifted his chin just long enough to look at me.

“Coffee,” he said in a voice that was gruff and broken. The smell of whiskey carried with him. I wrinkled my nose to the smell of it when he spoke.

“Sure thing,” I answered, and poured the coffee. After a taste, he stood and told Sandra he was going to the restroom, and that he’d be back in a few minutes. He told her that they should get back on the road, that they had some hours left in their drive to Delaware. When he walked toward the restroom, I wanted to ask Sandra if he was okay. He didn’t look as though he’d had one too many at the Irish pub down the street, but he didn’t seem right. There was something more.

“That’s my husband,” she started to say. Picking up her purse, she fumbled through the contents and pulled out a tube of lip-balm. I thought she was going to cry as she squeezed some on her finger and rubbed it across her lips. Her expression changed for a moment, and she cupped her mouth and closed her eyes.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I don’t mean to intrude… but is everything okay?”

Sandra opened her eyes, put a hand on mine, and blinked away a tear.

“My son is a hero. We’re going to Delaware to pick him up today,” she proclaimed. When she sat up, she cleared her throat and pulled back her hand.

“My son is a hero. He saved that little boy and that little girl. He ran out of that minefield, and missed all the land mines. Except that last one. The girl survived, but my son died two days later.”

The local news stations in the Philadelphia area often cover what is going on in Delaware. It is there that you’ll find the Dover Air Force Base, and a mortuary for the fallen soldiers returning home from overseas. I’d missed the connection. This wasn’t a visiting trip to Delaware. They were going to Dover to receive their son.

“I am so sorry for your loss,” was all I could think to say.

“Just wish I had another chance. Just one,” she replied.

“Chance?”

“Tom enlisted to please his father. I know it. He wanted the approval,” she started to say, her voice echoing in angry sarcasm. Shifting in her seat, she gave the restroom a hard look, as though she could see clear through the walls. “I blame him, you know,” she continued.

“Ma’am, what your son did was an amazing and heroic thing.” It was my turn to receive the hard look, and I thought I’d overstepped with my words. Her face softened and relaxed, and she nodded in silent agreement.

“If I could do it all over again, I’d stand up and scream at Tom. I’d scream at them both, and say, listen, Mr. Thomas Grudin, you are
not
enlisting. I don’t care what your father says,” she huffed loud enough to turn the eyes of Ms. Potts. Sandra raised a hand to indicate she was okay. My heart fell deep inside as a sudden rush of sadness filled me.

“Thomas Grudin?” I asked, and Sandra nodded.

“Tommy?” I asked, and wondered if this was Tommy Grudin, a boy I’d grown up with. The boy who’d been my first kiss?

Sandra raised her brow and said, “My stars, we haven’t called him that in years. Up through ninth grade, he was fine with Tommy, but by tenth grade, he insisted we call him Tom. But how did you know?”

Memory bubbles surfaced, including the one I’d pushed down years before. This was Mrs. Grudin sitting across from me, my neighbor from my home town of Fairview, Texas. Was it possible? Could this be the same Mrs. Grudin, who, from time to time, bandaged my skinned knee and treated me to pop-tarts and milk?

“Ma’am, I grew up in Fairview, Texas. I grew up with a Tommy Grudin. My name is Gabby Santiago,” I told her. Sandra’s eyes opened wide as she reached and touched my face. A large smile blossomed as her cheeks turned red, and she chuckled with a sound of surprise and disbelief.

“Gabby? Gabby Santiago?”

“Yeah. It’s me,” I answered. My heart warmed, and I could feel a little glow of my own beginning to surface around my neck and on my cheeks. Mrs. Grudin pawed at my face, her smile stretching as she repeated my name a few more times. Memories rifled through my head, and a reservation doused my heart. This was the first person from home I’d had contact with since leaving Fairview. I’d lost my way, and there was a reason for it. I saw Tommy’s face in my mind, and the heaviness in my heart took all my thoughts.

“Tommy is dead,” I heard myself say, and wished I could have rephrased it.

“He was always so fond of you, Gabby. He really was. And look at you, now. Oh, my girl, such a beautiful young woman you’ve grown up to become. Oh, and your parents, they must be so happy and so proud,” she said, but then stopped, and I could see the questions forming. I knew what was coming. Mr. Grudin came back to the counter to collect his keys and drink down more of his coffee. Mrs. Grudin’s manner changed almost immediately. The questions she had were gone. Her face went without expression as she gathered her things. I considered what she’d said earlier: “He won’t finish, till he drowns it.” I’d wondered what she meant by that, but by now, I think I understood.

As I waved a hand to Mrs. Grudin, she broke her empty expression, and said, “We split our time between here and Fairview, and I see your parents a few times a month. I’ll make sure to mention seeing you,” she told me, and before I could tell her not to, she was already headed out the door.

6

Philadelphia didn’t see its first snow storm until we were well into February. By then, the weather thermometer mounted outside the diner’s door struggled to crawl out of the single digits at night. During the day, the feeling of the sun on your face was just a memory as the cold held the thermometer somewhere in the twenties. But on this particular week, the thermometer’s silvery finger stretched to reach almost thirty degrees as a new front came up the coastline. Having passed through the Gulf,
it’s a Nor’easter
, I heard a few say. At first, I thought I’d heard “North Easter” and even repeated it to a few who were interested in listening. A stout correction was quick and firm.
It’s Nor’easter
, I was told, and was sure to phrase it correctly the second, or maybe third, time.

Till now, we’d only seen a couple of small clippers that delivered a coating of the white stuff. There were also a few storms that spilled rain and caked everything in a thin sheet of ice, but we hadn’t seen anything like this. The latest forecast came with its own set of severe winter warnings and advisories. At first, I’d dismissed the warnings as just some news. Soon after, a small flutter of excitement woke in me, and it had an appetite for more. Two feet of snow was expected to fall over a period of just twelve hours: a fast storm with a lot of snow. Now, who doesn’t like that?

Growing up in Texas, I saw my share of spring storms. Some were the heaviest you could imagine, with lightning skating across dark skies, and thunder that rattled our windows. We even had a few tornadoes touchdown in our town, and felt the western reach of a hurricane’s hand. And once, we survived a flood that carried off one of our cars. But this was my first snow storm. I hated to admit it – I was a storm junkie, and I could hardly contain myself. A smile stayed fixed on my face, and the flutter of excitement grew warmer, keeping my feet moving. As I worked each table and met new faces, the same conversations were just a word or two away.

Did you hear about the weather coming? What’s the latest? When is it going to start?
I couldn’t get enough of it. When new faces sat down, I was sure to work the weather into the conversation. First, I’d take their orders, of course, but then it was my turn.
Heck of a storm coming, did’ya know?
I’d ask, and if they hadn’t heard, or wanted to know what the latest forecast was… well, I was more than happy to oblige and spill all that I knew. Sometimes I’d get clever and engage the neighboring booths. A real
provocateur
I was, churning up the excitement like a chef cooking for a king. Necks stretched and turned, elbows and arms cradled the back of the booths, amateur forecasts volleyed back and forth in a burst of heightened speculation.
I heard three feet… well, I heard snow will fall up to four inches an hour.
Delicious. I ate it up. Why wouldn’t I? By now, I’d seen some snow, but this was a storm – a massive storm.

There were those who saw the storm as a nuisance, or who thought the forecast was just hyped up news. Admittedly, there were some reservations, but I dismissed their commentary. How dare they spoil my excitement? Of course, I didn’t say that aloud. For most of them, like Ms. Potts, I thought they were putting on a front. I told myself that, deep down, they were stifling any excitement and waiting to see what happened. Maybe when there were a few flakes in the air or an inch or two, on the ground to kick your feet through, I’d see the enthusiasm, and they’d join in.