I bit back a smile when the rest of the ladies ordered the same thing. I wrote out the orders on tickets and hung them on the carousel. Miz Linda was smart for squirreling away her winnings. I knew that because I had learned to hide a portion of my own winnings rather than giving everything to ol’ Frank. He was a decent player, but not great. After he’d bought my first fake ID, I won most of what we had to live on.
“I’m so glad y’all are serving the traditional New Year’s meal today,” Myra said. “Hopefully, eating our greens will bring us good luck next time we go to Vegas.”
“That would be wonderful. What do you like to play? Slots, cards?” I could hear the wistfulness in my own voice.
“I hit the slots, but Linda is pretty good at blackjack,” Ellen Mae said. “I came away with a fifty-dollar profit after my bus ticket and hotel was paid for, so it was a good trip.”
“And we got to see the fireworks, didn’t we, Stella?” Linda asked.
That was five of their names, but I didn’t need to remember them any more than any of the folks who had sat around a poker table with me. In an hour or so, these sweet old gals would be gone and another group would sit on the barstools.
“It was beautiful,” she answered. “I hate to go back to the center, but at least we all get to live in the same place, and we can talk about the fun we had until we start planning the next trip.”
“Order up!” Rosalie called.
I shifted plates from the shelf to the bar. “Y’all been friends long?”
“Since we were in kindergarten,” Ellen Mae answered. “We have done crazy things, all got married within two years, and even had a bra-burning one night.”
Myra patted Linda on the shoulder. “We were all drunk, or we might not have thrown every single one that we owned into the bonfire.”
“I was not drunk,” Linda protested. “Maybe a little tipsy, but I had to be semi-sober to drive all y’all home.”
“You were drunk as a skunk,” Ellen Mae argued. “If you hadn’t been, you wouldn’t have gone to bed with that good-looking soldier.”
“My sorry-ass husband cheated on me first,” Linda declared.
I was almost green with envy. Friends were a luxury I had never had before in my life. Folks needed to put down roots to make lasting friends. From trailing along with Frank all those years and then striking out on my own, I had never stayed in one place more than a couple of days.
When the café was empty, Scarlett brought a fistful of bills to the bar and shoved them into a small wooden box under the counter. “We put all our tips in the box and split them three ways each evening.”
Pulling my last ten-dollar tip out of my pocket and putting it in the box with all the rest of the day’s tips was the hardest thing I had done in a very long time.
Chapter Three
When the day finally ended at three thirty, my butt was dragging so badly that we didn’t really need to sweep the floor. I had been awake for more than thirty hours, and it would be a while longer before I could fall into a heap in my new bedroom.
Rosalie cleaned the kitchen. Scarlett set the chairs up onto the tables and swept. I came in behind her with a mop. When we’d finished, the whole place smelled like lemon cleaner, probably the same type of stuff that Paula used. At least Rosalie didn’t grab a pair of disposable white cotton gloves and go over every surface and corner like Paula had done. I could handle Rosalie making the sign of the cross and looking up toward the ceiling to pray. But I would have drawn the line if she insisted that I drop down on my knees in front of a chair and listen while she thanked God—loudly—for giving her a good day at her café. After all, I was the owner of the Tumbleweed, even if Rosalie was the boss.
Scarlett took the tip box to the kitchen and dumped it on the table.
Rosalie counted the money, split it three ways, and then glanced at me. “You want to put your share in the safe each evening like I do, or keep it with you like Scarlett does?”
“I’d rather keep it with me,” I answered.
She handed Scarlett and me our shares. I tucked my two hundred dollars and forty-two cents into a zippered side pocket on my purse and slung it over my shoulder.
Scarlett crammed her money into her small purse and picked up a paper sack from the table. “These are leftovers for our supper tonight. We only have time to grab a quick bite at noon, but Rosie always makes plenty so we can eat our big meal of the day in the evening.”
Breakfast had always been my big meal, usually at one of those waffle places that stayed open twenty-four hours. Lunch was a burger or chicken strips on the road. Supper had been a bag of chips from a hotel vending machine and maybe a fistful of peanuts at the poker table. But I could adjust to this new schedule very well.
We went through a small room with a futon on one side and shelves loaded with supplies on the other. At the far end, I could see a bathroom with a tiny shower, a potty, and a wall-hung sink. They were all sage green, like the ones in the house where I’d lived with Mama.
Bright sunlight flowed into the building when Rosalie opened the next door. I shaded my eyes with my hand and blinked several times.
“Happens every time,” Rosalie said.
“What?” I asked.
