alone together

Sylvie Burch is a garbage picker. That’s what they call her in town though the proper title is binner, according to the binners who collect bottles and cans behind the diner where she works. Sylvie used to help them out, putting the customer’s empties into separate bags when she cleaned up at the end of her shift and handing them out in the back alley. That’s how she found out about the money.

According to the binners, an industrious person could retire on their earnings if they were careful with their spending and knew the right places to look. Restaurants were obviously rich targets, but also schools and hospitals and business towers. Any place that had air conditioning and vending machines was a good bet. Air conditioning led to dry mouths and you can only drink so much water before the coke machine starts calling. And so she started collecting on the side as a way to feed her rapidly growing son. Who knew boys could eat so much cheese?

Since she started, the binners haven’t been as friendly. She can’t blame them. She keeps the empties for herself now, and they know she’s holding out. She bets they wish they’d kept their mouths shut about the money. She’s not making a lot yet, but it all adds up.

When Sylvie isn’t hunting for empties, she works as a waitress at a small Greek diner on the main drag. She works the lunch crowd along with three other single mothers with children much younger than hers. Most of the women are in their early twenties. Sylvie, at thirty-four, is the oldest.

Joe, the owner, likes to hire single mothers. The townspeople say it’s due to his magnanimous nature, giving these poor women a steady income but Sylvie knows different.

Yes, Joe revels in his role of benefactor, enjoying the nods and smiles in the stores, but what he really likes is how desperate the women are, how willing to work for any wage no matter how low, to work long hours without so much as a bathroom break, to come when called, to do anything to keep a roof over their children’s heads.

He likes to sit in a booth at the back of the restaurant when he’s taking a break between the breakfast and lunch crowds and watch the women work. He calls them his girls. He watches his girls clear off the tables, lifting up plates and coffee mugs, scrounging around for change. They’re supposed to put all the tips in a big cup under the till and split it with the kitchen which, let’s face it, is only Joe and his sorry mouse of a wife, but they always tuck the bills they find in their bras when no one’s looking. No one, except for Joe.

He doesn’t say anything about it unless they get on his nerves and then he brings them into the walk-in fridge and mentions, offhand, that he’s thinking of letting someone go, someone who’s not a team player, and did they know of anyone who might be a good candidate?

Sylvie hates Joe. Once she’s binned enough money for her son’s education, she’ll quit the diner and this town altogether. Maybe she’ll go to school herself, get her GED, get a job as a secretary or a bank teller; Some kind of office work where you get to dress nice and people treat you with respect.

In the meantime, she buys a lotto ticket every Monday and dreams about winning for the rest of the week. Can you imagine if she won? Can you imagine it? She’d walk into the diner and sit up at the counter, order herself a cappuccino which none of the girls know how to make well but she’ll order it anyway. And a slice of  New York cheesecake covered in cherry sauce. She’ll ask for extra whip. And whip in her cappuccino too, why the hell not. And Joe would be looking at her from the back of the diner, eyes squinty, jaw set, but he wouldn’t say anything because she’s a customer now, not some poor waitress who has to put up with his shit.

She’ll eat her cheesecake and drink her coffee slow and leisurely and, after she’s finished, she’ll give all of the waitresses the biggest tip the diner has ever seen. Bigger, even, than Joe makes in a week. And he’ll have to watch the girls pocket the money, money that’s not his, that he has no control over, and he’ll have to wonder, is this the day that all of them finally have enough of him, finally walk out?

Sylvie fantasizes about winning the lottery every week from Monday to Friday. Then the numbers are called. Then she takes her bottles and cans in on Saturday morning and adds the take to her son’s education fund. Sunday, she washes her floors, sticky from pop and booze leaking out of the garbage bags. And, Monday, it’s back to the diner, stopping along the way to pick up another ticket.

For eight years she’s kept to this schedule. Eight years of digging around in other people’s garbage, trying to get ahead. Surely, her time is coming. Any day now. 

originally published by Vocamus Press

“Beauty!” says the wheat blonde man with his checkered shirt tucked into the back of his sagging jeans. He’s inspecting a statue: carved oak, fringed and feathered, one hand raised like a visor, skin stained red.

Another man, white haired, looks up from a chair under a blue tarp next to a jacked up four by four.

It’s the last Antique Market of the season and the white-haired man needs a sale. He advances slowly, sussing out the customer with a wary eye.

“Where’d you get it?” asks the blonde man.

“Oh, at some auction or other.”

The white-haired man stands beside the statue and slaps a hand down on its wooden shoulder.

“You don’t see a lot of these anymore,” says Blondie. He shakes his head.

“No, well, you know. Like I said. It was an auction.” Whitey juts his chin out, stands tall, buries his fists in his front pockets.

They eye each other for a moment, the statue between them.

“My granddad used to have something similar when I was a kid.” says Blondie with a nervous chuckle.

“Issat so?” Whitey’s posture relaxes. He looks at his watch, looks up at the setting sun.

“Yeah. Part of a wild west theme he had going on in his den. He was a real collector. I grew up just over there off Gilmour.” Blondie looks in the direction of the road and Whitey turns and looks with him.

Standing side by side, they could be brothers.

“How much are you asking?” Blondie looks the statue up and down, his gaze lingering here and there, settling on the stoic mouth. He leans into the face, notes the curve of the nose, raises a finger and traces the war paint on its cheeks.

“I’m asking a thousand.”

“A thousand? That seems steep for what it is.” Blondie rubs the flat top of the cigar bundle in the statue’s hand. “Needs a fresh coat of paint.” He’ll put it at the front door, use it to catch his keys when he comes in.

“I’ll give you five hundred.”

The other vendors start packing up. Whitey sighs and says, “Eight hundred. Any less and I might as well keep it myself. Take it over to the Falls next month where I can get twelve.”

Blondie shifts from foot to foot, kicks at the dirt, considering. Eight hundred is a lot for what it is. But he nods. He’ll take it. And Whitey smiles and heads over to the truck to get his iPad.

“Do you have a tarp?” Blondie shouts. “Don’t need any trouble on the ride home. You know how some people are.”

“Sure thing,” says Whitey. He gives Blondie a sympathetic pat on the back. “No extra charge. Where are you parked? I’ll help you carry it over. It’s a bit of a beast.”

They both laugh.

“Thanks, man. You’re a good guy.”

“Thanks,” says Whitey. “I try to be.”