Want Some Coffee?

Personal Yummy #71

It’s two-thirty in the morning.

Shane, Jack, Bianca, Nina (our main hostess), a crew of regulars, and I, after having had some beers and shots at The Grill, have walked over to Shane’s apartment on Darlington Road, just about a block away, to hang out and talk.

Shane lives there with his roommate, Doreen, a pretty, skinny, pale, reddish blonde, friendly, mild-mannered girl. She often comes to the bar with Shane on his days off, and they relax in one of the booths, talking and smoking, their eyes resting on each other.

Two large, perspiring drafts sit in front of them. A thin, brown cigarette lies gently between the index and middle fingers of Doreen’s right hand, floating in front of her face, her elbow against the table. A thicker, ordinary white cigarette is held more firmly between Shane’s thumb and index finger, the rest of his fingers rounded downward, his forearm taking a break on the table.

They have a comfortable, roomy apartment. As you walk through the front door, you immediately enter a hallway. Two bedrooms line the hallway, to the right. At the end of the hallway there is a small kitchen, which contains a round, wooden table, with a few wooden chairs, not leaving much more space for anything else but the refrigerator. Off of the kitchen is the living room—a rather spacious room with a fireplace, a few overgrown plants, a worn-in couch, a couple of pictures on the wall (one of forest animals, and the other of a garden scene), and a bunch of large, cushy chairs placed in this and that corner, or wherever, which are now filled with talkative, happy, tipsy young people listening to The Police at one moment and Alice in Chains at another.

“This is an awesome place to hang out,” I say to Jack, who is lounging on the furry, used-to-be-green carpet, as I’m practically swallowed up in a huge brown recliner, a tear or two quite evident but not marring its comfort at all.

He takes a gulp of his icy Rolling Rock. “Yeah, I’ve always enjoyed hanging out here. Shane and Doreen are great hosts,” he replies, as he glances around at everyone.

A little later, with more and more empty beer bottles and over-full ashtrays collecting on the end tables, and with Sting making himself heard through the chatter every now and then, there’s Nina—in her short black bob and a short black skirt—walking toward us, with what looks like a Captain Morgan and coke in her hand. “Hey, you two,” she says. “A few of us are going to hang out in Shane’s room for a few minutes,” she continues, motioning in that direction with her head. “You want to join us?”

At first I have no clue what she’s talking about. But when I see the spark in Jack’s eyes, that quickly changes. I finally realize all too well why people have been in Shane’s room off and on all night—with the door shut—and understand why I haven’t been feeling myself, but much less inhibited, since I got here.

“Not me,” I say, without a second thought. (Getting it secondhand has been quite enough. I don’t need to venture any further.)

Jack is about ready to stand up, but then he glances at me and his expression changes. “I think I’ll pass this time, Nin,” he says, and digs in his pocket for another cigarette.

Nina shrugs her shoulders. “Okay. You got it.” She motions to Bianca, who is sitting on the couch with her new love interest, Vic, an attractive, ash-blond, long-haired, mustached guy who works at Heads Together, a really cool, eclectic underground bookstore, video store, gift shop, and card store on Murray Avenue. “You coming?”

“Yeah, I’m coming. I’ll be there in just a minute,” she says, as she leans over and gives Vic a kiss.

Just then, Doreen opens the refrigerator door, takes out an icy Iron City, holds it up in the air, and says, as she looks into the living room over her shoulder, “Anybody need another beer?” Before even one of us can answer, however, Shane plops down heavily in the middle of the living room—malleable as a piece of dough—his shoulder-length, golden blond hair loose and disheveled. I immediately glance at Jack, a questioning look in my eyes. But he doesn’t look back at me. He is squinting, his forehead is wrinkled, and he’s staring not just at Shane and the sly look he has on his face, but also at the backpack lying in Shane’s lap, his focus alternating between the two. It’s true that the backpack does look very, very odd—almost swollen, in fact.

We stare for a while longer, wondering what he’s up to this time, but then he attempts to say something. It doesn’t escape very easily, though, because he is giggling profusely, and apparently at nothing at all. But then he lets us have it.

“Forget the beer!” he exclaims, as he quickly unzips his backpack. “Anyone want a good cup of coffee?”

Tumbling forth, all over his lap and the floor, are small, shiny, silver packs upon packs of ground coffee, an avalanche of Java surrounding him.

“Shane!!!” Jack yells, and the entire room explodes with laughter.

There is no need for the purveyor himself or anyone else to explain where he has gotten that stash, for we all know its source.

******

The above excerpt is from my coming-of-age novel—The Grill on Murray Avenue: A Story of Innocence—about the inhabitants of an unassuming bar-and-grill in Squirrel Hill, a vibrant neighborhood in the east end of Pittsburgh. The story is told by Jenna, a young waitress who dreams of becoming a professional dancer.