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Chapter Thirty Three - Neil

Mateo and I were bullshitting the whole day.

We picked up lunch for everyone at the site, ate, then dipped.

It had been a long day, so I brought Mateo back to where he was staying for the moment and we chatted for a little while before I went to the diner to see if Esther needed a ride home, only to find Benny working the counter.

"Aren't you too old for this?" I joke, taking a seat at the bar.

He grunted, "You'd think I was. Carol ran into the city for god knows what. She asked me to cover."

Benny's age-spotted hand reached for a glass and filled it with ice and water, setting it down on a coaster napkin for me.

I nodded in appreciation, this was better service than what his daughter offered.

'He's cuter too.'

In the middle of my sip, I choked and coughed while I tried to regain my breath.

"You alright, son?"

"Oh, just peachy. Why does she just leave you high and dry like this? Did you call Esther?"

"Of course I did, she said she was busy though."

Busy?

"Did she specify, or...?"

Benny shook his head, topping off another customer's coffee near me.

What could she be doing on her day off?

She didn't have plans to take Will today.

"You need some boiled peanut pie, Neil."

I must have given him a disgusted expression, because he was pleased enough with himself that he began laughing from the gut.

"Please tell me you're joking."

"Absolutely not. It's even got that gelatinous texture I know you like."

I could gag.

"Benny."

He waved his hand in between us, not being able to keep himself from chuckling for too long.

"You're no fun to kid around with."

"If you ever offer me something like that again, I'd have to kill you. That is horrendous."

I drank most of my water, the chillness soothing my throat from talking loudly over all the noise at work.

"I think I'm gonna head home then, if you don't mind. I'm gonna see what Esther is actually up to."

I received another grunt with a different tone, his own language, "Do you not trust her or something, Neil?"

My glass was all of a sudden not my focus, but it was the wrinkled face in front of me.

Why did he have to switch around so quickly?

Was it because a ton of elderly people are so blunt and will say what's on their mind, or did he have ulterior motives?

"What do you mean," I stated, rather than asked.

He was accusing me of something.

"I just, well your previous relationship, I heard a little about that."

'Esther bitches to him about it.'

There was no way, she would have talked to me about it if it was bothering her.

'Would she have, though? You're unapproachable.'

"It's just rumors, probably."

Benny took my now empty glass from me and dumped out the ice, setting it into a hard plastic dirty dish rack behind him, "It was the paper, if I'm not mistaken."