Watching Joe Go

Watching Joe Go

I ducked quickly when I saw the man with the camera. Good catch! I last thing I needed was someone spotting me in the background of some innocent picture. I’ve seen that in TV crime shows enough.

I rushed to catch up with Joe. I wouldn’t lose him; he was extremely predictable. Leave the apartment at seven twenty-five, stop for coffee at Atlanta’s, take Elm street then Rose, then stop at the park to drink the coffee and eat his muffin, then off to work.

I made a circle through the alley and over to the park, he had just gotten to the bench when I got there. I casually ducked into the bus stop. I would look like I was waiting for a bus. Really I just wanted to see Joe sitting on the bench drinking his coffee, eating his muffin. I smiled.

Joe hated my coffee. He mentioned it practically daily. I used to try to make better coffee for him but eventually realized it would never be good enough. Just like my housekeeping, my clothes, my “pitiful excuse for a job.” I was a librarian. The only thing he liked were the muffins I made, from his mother’s recipe.

Oddly enough, being a librarian gives a person an incredible leg up on other professions. Want to learn to cook, look it up in the library! Want to dress better? Look it up! Want to make better coffee? Look it up! Want to find a poison that would dissipate before anyone could tell the person hadn’t just had a regular heart attack? Look it up.

I watched Joey pull the clear plastic bag out of his coat. It contained the muffin I made him, from his mother’s recipe of course, but, with a small addition of my own.