Automat

Automat

         

Even though the day was dark and dreary Casey still traveled to the lonely automat.  The illuminated lights were flickering; they drove her crazy and the radiator made creaky noises ever so suddenly.  The noise would make the little hairs on her neck stand up.  Casey was all alone, except for the occasional fruit fly, which did not bother her.  It was just her, her cup of hot chocolate and the empty chair looking, glaring, staring right through her as if she wasn’t even there.  Sometimes if she thought very hard she could see the picture of me sitting in front of her in the empty chair, then leaving all of a sudden.

         The days slowly went by like clouds moving in for a huge storm.  Before the day that changed her life, everything was perfect.  She was engaged to marry a very handsome man, and I was very excited to walk her down the aisle.  My wife had left us when Casey was only 4.  The day her life changed, the flowers had just finished blooming, and the leaves on the ground still were a little crisp.  The day was full of color and delicious smells.

         “I remember holding his hand and him picking me up as if there was no tomorrow.”  But there was no tomorrow for me.  She was starting to sound a little crazy; she was talking to a goddamn empty chair.

Casey looked very glum when she came in.  She looked as if she was missing something.  She sat down at the usual table where we used to sit, got up to get the usual cup of hot chocolate and put one spoonful of milk to cool it down a bit, and five marshmallows making a smiley face, just as I had taught her.  Her hat was yellow, and drooping, it must have been a hard night.  She was wearing the green-velvet jacket that I had bought her years before.  I told her I had got it from a fancy store, but really I had bought it from a bum, to make my little girl happy.  Her legs were not covered up from the cold she was still vulnerable.  Casey was wearing her mother’s old red camisole, her nail polish was black.  She doesn’t wear much color unless she’s going out.  She brought an extra coaster over, maybe she thought that her one true love would come in and find her.  My little girl has always been very pretty, but recently I have seen her come in with more makeup on, her hair looking very nice, looking very upper-class.  She’s living all alone now.  She must not be making much money, she is missing a glove. 

         When Casey was little and we came to the automat to get a cup of hot chocolate on a chilly day, we would always move the bowl of fruit to the windowsill, so she could always see me.  She still does that to this very day.  I saw her leave the next minute and I followed her to the graveyard.  I saw what she was looking at, the other glove.  She left it on my grave.

My little girl Casey is not such a little girl any longer.