Her smile widened. “He’s got such a big heart, that boy. When he first came into the diner, he’d been an angry teenager. Mad at the world and everyone around him. He was polite, of course. But so…guarded.” Her saddened tone gripped my heart. “Bill didn’t come from the best home, so he recognized the signs. We let Max come in and sit here whenever he wanted, and it took time, but he slowly opened up to us.”
“Did he ever tell you what was going on at home?”
She shook her head sadly. “Not specifically, no. He had a lot of pressure on his shoulders. Then everything with his motherhappened, and he disappeared for a little while. But eventually, he came back. Right around the time Bill went to the hospital.”
I put a mental pin in what she’d said about his mother. “Max mentioned Bill had surgery on his leg?”
Her eyes widened. “Oh boy!” She laughed, leaning back in her seat. “He gave you the abridged version then. It’s a bit more complicated than that.”
“It was?”
With a bittersweet smile on her face, she nodded. “He probably wanted to spare you all the hard parts, but Bill had a massive heart attack. We almost lost him.”
“Oh my gosh, Diane, I didn’t know. I’m so sorry.”
She glanced toward the kitchen, her eyes falling on a spot in the back I couldn’t see from here. “It was terrible. He collapsed on a slow day. The three of us had been in the kitchen together. Bill and I were prepping things for the dinner rush while Max chatted about school. He always offered to help, but back then Bill wouldn’t let him.”
I pictured the three of them in there, smiling at the image that formed in my mind. “He still picked up skills in the kitchen thanks to Bill.”
Diane smiled again. “Yes, he was a quick learner. And thankfully, so. I don’t know what I would’ve done without him while Bill was recovering. Or that day.”
“What happened?”
“Bill was laughing at something Max had shared, and then he clutched his heart and jerked forward onto the prep table.” Her smile wavered, her eyes tracking back to the kitchen. “When he lost consciousness, his legs gave out. He would’ve knocked his head on the counter if Max hadn’t acted so quickly.”
I imagined what that must’ve been like for him, especially after everything he’d been through with his family. Andknowing what it felt like, when the family you had left was at risk, it hurt to think about it.
Diane pulled a napkin from the dispenser, folding it in her shaking hands. “The two of us started CPR, and we did our best, but we had no idea what we were doing. When the first responders arrived, they took over. And?—”
I reached across the table for her hand and squeezed it.
She forced a watery smile. “There wasn’t much hope. At one point, I really thought I might lose him.”
“Oh, Diane…” The three of us looked over at Bill, who’d walked into the kitchen from the back and stood whistling as he made our lunch. “That must’ve been awful.”
“It all worked out in the end. My Bill’s a fighter. Just like Max.” She smiled at her husband before returning her gaze to mine. “It’s often the quiet ones who are. I think that’s what Bill recognized in Max early on. And later, I think it’s what Max recognized in Bill. What finally let him open up to us.”
She smiled at the memory, even as tears bloomed in the corners of her eyes. Dabbing with the napkin, she shook her head while lost in thought.
Then she lifted her eyes to mine again.
“Seeing the way he was when you were here? It meant the world to us. No matter what happens with you two. We’re so grateful you got to spend those few days here together.”
“It meant a lot to me, too. Seeing him with you both.”
She squeezed my hand. “I know he’s not ours. Not really. But he feels like it. And we want him to be happy. After everything he’s been through and lost, he deserves it, but…he struggles to believe that.”
“He doesn’t think he’s enough. He doesn’t see he’s so much more than that.”
She nodded. “That’s the battle he’s fighting all the time, just like my Bill was when I met him. He’s trying to believe it. And,for the first time, it looked like…” She gave a little shrug. “Maybe he did.”
Emotion lodged in my throat, and I dropped my gaze to the table. “You saw all that? Even on the days he was brooding and surly?”
“Especially on those days.”
I lifted my eyes to meet hers again.
“Those were the days he was fighting the hardest.”
