In the last installment, Bill and Kittie are woken up early in the morning by Homeland Security at their crash spot, so the two decide to head to Miriam’s Kitchen for breakfast. After enjoying coffee, tea and a bowl of Cheerios, Bill puts in an order for dress clothes in preparation for his meeting with Ms. Bell regarding Frank’s estate.
I looked over and noticed that the clothing line had started to form. If I was to meet with a power lawyer like Ms. Bell, I needed to upgrade from the dirty T-shirt and jeans I’d been wearing the last few days, so I got in line. When I got to the volunteer standing behind the lightweight wooden podium, I put in an order for a button-up collared shirt, tie, slacks, dress shoes and socks, as well as a clean pair of drawers.
As I went back to my seat, the roll-up blind in the window that separated the kitchen from the dining room slid up, and Catherine announced the breakfast menu in a loud voice.
“Thank you for coming to Miriam’s Kitchen. Today’s breakfast is buttermilk pancakes, with your choice of strawberry or maple syrup; scrambled eggs, plain or with ham and cheese; your choice of homefries or grits; salad, fruit, and your choice of pastries. Thank you again for coming to Miriam’s everyone, and enjoy your breakfast.”
Tyrone walked over to the front of the line to call numbers and collect the plastic number cards from those who were in line to eat. When my number was called, I got maple syrup on my pancakes, eggs with ham and cheese, grits, and a chocolate muffin with chocolate chips.
As Kittie and I devoured our breakfast, a volunteer dropped off my clothing order in one of those reusable grocery bags you get from Safeway for a dollar. After I washed down the last bite of my muffin with a hefty swallow of coffee, I walked toward the bathroom with clothes in hand.
I stopped by the hygiene cart stationed next to the bathroom, where the volunteer manning it handed me a hotel-sized bar of soap, a washcloth, and a disposable shaving razor. I also got a multivitamin and a couple of Tylenols while I was there. The Tylenol was to help dull the ever-present aches and pains which come from sleeping on concrete and marble every night.
Walking into the men’s bathroom at Miriam’s Kitchen for the first time can be a bit of a shock. A row of men in various states of undress were sponge-bathing in front of the row of sinks to the left as I opened the door.
I saw that the sink at the end of the row was vacant, so I walked over, stripped down to my birthday suit, and cleaned three days of filth off myself. I put on the fresh pair of boxers, slacks, socks, and shoes, but remained topless as I shaved the slightly-more-than-stubble of my facial hair, using the wall-length mirror behind the sinks to guide me. Freshly-shaven, I buttoned up my new shirt and fastened the tie, which was emblazoned with images of hundred-dollar bills, in an over-and-under knot around my neck.
“Got a hot date tonight, Snowflake?” the naked man next to me spoke without taking his eyes off the mirror in front of him. “‘Cause if you do, I can show the Ms. Pussycat of yours a real good time.”
Without blinking an eye or skipping a beat, I grabbed him by his right wrist, wrapped his arm across his back, and slammed his hand between his shoulder blades, applying a perfect hammerlock. He instinctively bent over the sink to try to relieve the pain shooting through his left shoulder. With my other hand, I grabbed his right elbow, and yanked it away from his back, making the pain unbearable to most. Times like these make me glad I wrestled back in high school.
“If you EVER say another derogatory word about Kittie in my presence, I will rip this arm out of its socket, and you’ll be jerking off southpaw for the rest of your miserable life!” I threatened in a low, intense voice that would scare the bejesus out of Batman himself. “Do I make myself clear?!”
“Yeah man, yeah. Just let me up, please!” he begged.
The pain in his right shoulder flared one more time as I yanked his elbow again to make sure the message sunk in. Then I let him go.
“Make sure you do,” I told him as I left the bathroom before Tyrone decided to make a sweep of it.
I went back to the table and found that Kittie had been nice enough to get me a fresh cup of coffee. We grabbed our bags and headed out the door for a cigarette. While we were smoking, Kittie told me she was going to Georgetown while I kept my appointment with Ms. Bell. Knowing her, she’d come back with at least 20 bucks. I’ve seen her charm a guy literally out of his shirt before, just because she thought it’d look better on me. I figured she might have a surprise next time I saw her. We agreed to meet back at Miriam’s in the late afternoon when it reopened for dinner. Tossing the butt of my cigarette to the ground and crushing it with my heel, I gave Kittie a goodbye hug and a quick closed-mouth kiss before I headed off to Ms. Bell’s office to get down to the bottom of Frank’s mysterious estate.
