Dream Lover by Suzanne Jenkins

worked there. He didn’t say anything to me at that time, but I noticed him watching me out of the corner of his eye. It was a new job, but I had waited on tables in the past. Before I was married, I waitressed for a short time. I didn’t work while I was married, but then when my husband, Paul died I discovered that he had lost all of our money gambling in Atlantic City. I never even knew that he had left the state! And all along, he was taking the bus down there every Wednesday, losing his paycheck. We were living on credit and I didn’t know it until he died. Jack came in alone for breakfast the next day and teased me about getting his order wrong.
    “I wanted wheat toast with roasted peppers and this is roasted rye with black pepper. Are you new here?” My husband had died less than a year before, so what I was new at was flirting. Jack was born to be flirted with, however. Even though his order was perfect, I reached over for his plate, getting just close enough so he could smell my perfume.
    “Oh I am sorry! Let me change that for you,” I said.
    He grabbed my arm. “I’m just kidding! You didn’t answer me. Are you new here?”
    He was so handsome that I started to shake a little and could feel the sweat forming in my armpits. How attractive!
    “Yes. I’m new here.” I looked over to the counter, hoping someone needed me. No luck.
    “Have coffee with me,” he asked. “The boss won’t mind.”
    “No, sorry, it’s against the rules.” I turned to walk away from him. There was a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach, like I got caught doing something illegal.
    “Wait! Meet me after work, then.” He was persistent. I continued walking away from him.
    Then curiosity got the best of me. I turned around and walked back to the table. I looked him in the eye to see if he was kidding me again, but there was a simmer going on behind those dark eyes. Don’t answer him, the still-small Voice said. But I was sucked in, so I ignored it. My women’s intuition was always right on target, and for some reason, I allowed my yearning for attention get the best of me that day. To make matters worse, he was younger than I was. Not by much, but just enough that it made me self-conscious. It made me feel like a charity case. And for years, that would define us as a couple; me, the older widow with a special-needs child, and Jack, the knight in shining armor come to save us. I conveyed the delusion that he was helping us to my daughter, Katherine. All through her teen years, she would wait for him as if she was waiting for a date. “Is Jack coming today?” she’d ask, pulling the blinds apart to look down on the street.
    He’d usually tell me in the morning if he would be able to stop by. Every day, he came into Gwen’s for breakfast, and on Wednesday, he’d come with his mother for lunch. I knew he was married, so I had to keep quiet about us in front of her. It wasn’t easy, even after all that time. I was so hungry for information about him. When I got older, I knew I should be making plans for my future. Jack put money in trust for Katherine’s care after I was gone, and that was a huge worry off my mind. But what about me? My ego was so damaged for some reason that I didn’t figure into the equation. I didn’t allow myself to think about what would happen when I could no longer wait tables, or when Jack retired and left the city for good, moving to Long Island with his wife. I chose to live in the moment.
    That day has come. Jack is gone. I went into work as usual that Monday morning. Evelyn, the manager, handed me an obituary she’d cut out of the New York Times on Sunday. I read the paper, but I didn’t read the obituaries—hadn’t since Paul died. I saw Jack’s name, his full name. Seeing it in print with the names of his wife and children made me physically ill. I needed to throw up. Evelyn knew about Jack and me; I had waited tables there for half my life, practically. She saw the relationship