It was not quite full dark outside, and the family of outsiders had finished their meat loaf and fried chicken. The little girl was beginning to pick on her younger sibling, and the mom was casting desperate looks toward the kitchen. Madonna was cooking, to judge from the sounds of pots and pans and the sizzle of frying, and Creek hurried out with the plates for the two men sitting together. She put them down, gave the men an impersonal smile, and scurried over to the booth to take the payment tucked into the black plastic folder the dad was extending.
Just after the sun set, the bell over the door chimed as Bobo walked in with a man Manfred had never seen. As Manfred had noted before, his landlord was lucky enough to have a pleasing color palette; his hair was golden blond, his eyes were bright blue, his skin was a golden dusky tan. And he was tall, robust. His companion was more like—Bobo bleached and dried and shrunken. Instead of blond, his hair was platinum: the same shade as Manfred’s, but the newcomer’s hair was natural. His eyes were a pale, pale gray. His skin was . . .
“White as snow,” Manfred whispered, remembering the old fairy tale Xylda had read to him. “His skin was white as snow.”
Joe glanced at Manfred and nodded. “Be cool,” he said, very quietly. “That’s Lemuel.”
Manfred planned on being cool as cool could be, since he wasn’t sure exactly what Lemuel was—but no one had given Nice Normal Family the same memo. The children fell silent as the newcomer glanced around the room. He smiled at the children, who looked terrified. At least they were too frightened to speak, which was almost certainly a good thing. The two visitors kept their eyes down on their plates after a quick glance upward, and they very deliberately did not look up.
The Rev didn’t even stop reading his Bible.
“This is beyond weird,” Manfred said in a voice no louder than a whisper, but the bleached man looked at him with a smile.
Good God, Manfred thought. He had a ridiculous impulse to jump to his feet and interpose himself between the bleached man and Creek Lovell, but it was really fortunate he didn’t act on that. Creek returned with the family’s change, and after she placed it on their table, she flung her arms around the bleached man’s neck—which Manfred wouldn’t have done for any amount of money—and said, “I haven’t seen you in so long, Uncle Lemuel! How are you?”
Released from their table by Creek’s return, the mom and dad gathered all their belongings and shepherded the two kids, still openmouthed and staring, out the door of the Home Cookin Restaurant as quickly as possible. Manfred followed them with his eyes. Once outside, the mom stood on one side of the car, gripping the daughter’s hand, the dad on the other side with the boy in his arms. They spoke to each other briefly and intensely across the hood of the car before piling in and speeding away.
“Uncle” Lemuel (if he was Creek’s uncle, Manfred was an insurance salesman) gingerly embraced the girl and gave her a kiss on the hair. Lemuel was not any taller than Manfred, and even more slightly built, but his presence was bigger than his body. The eye could not pass over Lemuel; it was caught and fascinated. Manfred thought, I could have skipped getting all this body art if I’d dyed myself dead white, but he knew that he was simplifying.
The two strangers by the window had finally looked up now that Lemuel’s back was to them. They looked determined not to flee or flinch. The scene seemed frozen for a long moment, and then Lemuel’s eyes met Manfred’s and held. It was like being fixed in place by an icicle.
Bobo started forward, gently nudging his companion, and the connection was broken. Thank God, Manfred thought, an acknowledgment he didn’t make very often.
In seconds Bobo and Lemuel had seated themselves, Lemuel at Manfred’s right and Bobo in the seat between Lemuel and Fiji. I can almost feel the cold coming off him, Manfred thought, and turned to look welcoming. He registered that the girl Creek had hustled over to ask the two men by the door if they needed anything, before pausing by the Rev’s table. After that, she buzzed over to find out what Bobo would like to drink, and Manfred got to enjoy her nearness, but his pleasure was muted by Lemuel’s proximity.
After opting for sweetened iced tea, Bobo said, “Lemuel, meet the newest guy in town. Manfred Bernardo, meet my basement tenant, Lemuel Bridger.”
“Pleased to meet you,” Manfred said, extending his hand. After a slight pause, Lemuel Bridger gripped it. An icy chill ran up Manfred’s arm. He had to fight an impulse to yank his hand from Lemuel’s and cringe back in his chair. Out of sheer pride, Manfred managed to smile. “Have you lived here long, Lemuel?”
“Almost forever,” the pale man answered. His eyes were fixed on Manfred, intense with interest. “A real long time.”
His voice was not anything like Manfred had expected. It was deep and rough, and Lemuel’s accent was just a bit unfamiliar. It was definitely a western accent, but it was like a western accent interpreted by someone from another country. Manfred was on the verge of asking Lemuel if he’d been born in America, when he remembered that asking personal questions was not the style in Midnight—and he’d already asked one. Lemuel released his hand and Manfred lowered it into his lap casually, hoping the feeling would come back soon.
“How are you going with your box schedule?” Bobo asked Manfred. “Still opening three a day?” He was smiling a nice warm smile, but Manfred knew that Bobo was not a happy man in his heart.
“I have a day left,” Manfred said. (He’d realized long ago that most often you had to react to what was on the surface.) “Then I’ll be done. My bad luck that all my files and paper stuff must be in one of the last three boxes.”
“You don’t go by what’s in them?” Joe said. Creek was smiling, just a little, to Manfred’s pleasure.
“Nope. I just open the next three boxes in the stack,” Manfred confessed. He could read the complex of thoughts on Fiji’s face: She had the impulse to tell him she would have helped; she had the awareness he didn’t need or want her help; she made the decision to keep her mouth shut.
His grandmother had taught him how to read faces, and because of his natural aptitude, it hadn’t taken long to develop his skills. While Fiji was an easy subject, and Bobo, too, Creek had depths and undercurrents. Joe and Chuy registered as agreeable and warm, but reserved. Lemuel was as opaque as a wall. Manfred struggled not to turn to his right to stare at his new acquaintance.