At one o’clock Dante came through with a case of tomatoes and stopped at the pass. “Hi, Margo. How’s Mr. Klein doing?”
“He’s fine. Walking with a cane.” She flipped a sandwich without looking up.
“My grandmother had a knee replacement.” Dante shifted the case to his other hip. “She was back at bingo in five weeks.”
“Bernie doesn’t play bingo.”
“I’m just saying. When’s he coming back?”
She shrugged. “When his knee lets him.”
Dante went to the walk-in. Anna, refilling the coffee station, glanced over her shoulder. “Everybody asks.”
“Everybody can wait.”
“Mrs. Feldstein asked me yesterday if he was okay.” Anna set a stack of filters next to the machine. “She said Thursday lunch isn’t the same without him running his pools from the corner.”
“Mrs. Feldstein bets on his pools?”
“Apparently she’s been in the football one since October.”
Joey, who had been wiping down the pass, stopped. “He’s still running the pools. From his recliner. By text message.” He set the cloth down and squared it with the edge of the counter. “The data collection is compromised. He can’t observe behavioral patterns through a phone screen. Half his methodology depends on in-person assessment.”
“You know his methodology?” Anna asked.
“I’ve studied it. It’s flawed but internally consistent.” Joey picked up the cloth again. “The off-site administration is a separate issue.”
Anna looked at Margo. Margo looked at the grill.
At one-thirty, during the lull, Meg came through the front door with a bag from the hardware store and a coffee she’d picked up somewhere that wasn’t here.
“Outside coffee,” Joey said from the pass.
“I’ll recycle the cup.” Meg set the hardware bag on the counter. “New hinge for the gate. Luke said he’d come by Saturday.”
“The gate’s been sticking since August,” Margo said.
“Which is why I bought a hinge.” Meg pulled out a stool and sat at the counter and looked around the restaurant the way she always did—assessing, cataloguing, filing. Her eyes landed on the booth.
“Is that a Reserved sign?”
“Joey’s idea,” Anna said.
“It’s not an idea,” Joey said from the back. “It’s a policy.”
Meg leaned over to read it. “MR. KLEIN — INDEFINITE.” She sat back. “That’s actually kind of beautiful, Joey.”
There was a pause from the back office. “Thank you,” Joey said, in a voice that suggested he wasn’t sure if he was being made fun of.
“You’ve been going over there a lot,” Meg said, turning to Margo.
Margo flipped a towel over her shoulder. “He had surgery, Meg.”
“How often do you go?”
“Wednesdays. Fridays. Sundays.” She wiped the same spot on the grill she’d wiped ten seconds ago. “Someone has to make sure he eats.”
Meg’s eyebrows went up over the rim of her outside coffee. “That’s three times a week.”
