by the window.
Black coffee.
Half a waffle.
Extra butter.
The first time I waited on her, she squinted at my nametag.
“James,” she said. “You look exhausted enough to collapse face-first into my breakfast.”
“Long week.”
She snorted.
“Try being eighty-five.”
That was our beginning.
After that, she always requested my section.
She was sharp-tongued, stubborn, and impossible in ways that somehow became funny once you adjusted to them.
One morning she frowned at my face.
“You ever smile, son?”
“Sometimes.”
“I doubt it.”
Another day she pointed at
