It was early. The diner already smelled like bread.
It was hot in here.
Sarah slid another loaf onto the cooling rack. They had enough to carry them through Sunday.
Main Street was empty except for Pete Landry’s truck parked beside the feed store. The lights in the drug store were still off. Moisture was pearling against the diner’s windows.
The bus was due at 11:14. Assuming the checkpoints south on 63 were moving today.
Earl was carrying a crate of eggs through the kitchen.
“We’ve got enough bread.”
“You always say that.”
Sarah could remember when she’d arrived. One of the first to get out, when Brenham’s heat warnings had only been weekly, not daily.
After days of shelters and transfer stations, and the buses with AC turned too cold. The smell had reached her before anyone spoke - and it made her feel like someone knew they were coming, and gave a shit.
Nobody called it policy anymore.
Nobody remembered who’d written the rules. When people started flowing through from down south. Needing to stay.
Seven things the town owed anyone who arrived hungry. Item three was “fresh bread.”
It was nearer twelve when the bus pulled in. Brakes creaked, and the door sighed as it opened.
Three people stepped off.
A man with a bag, the corners silver where they were covered in duct tape. A woman shuffling a little, hands on her lower back. And a little girl following her, holding a stuffed rabbit.
The bus dropped a suitcase, and pulled away.
Sarah went outside.
“Hi.”
The woman looked up first. Tired.
“Have you eaten?” Sarah asked.
The little girl looked up.
“No,” the man said.
“C’mon, we’ll fix that. Welcome to Moberly.”
The diner was warm, and Earl was already cooking bacon and eggs on the flat-top. The coffee was brewing, too. The little girl climbed into a booth. Rabbit first.
Sarah poured coffee for the adults.
“There’s creamer and sugar on the table.”
The woman shook her head. Drank it black.
Earl always scrambled the eggs a little too hard. But add black pepper and butter and they still tasted good. The toast was thick cut from the loaves she’d been baking.
The little girl watched as Sarah set down the plates.
Outside, Pete’s truck rumbled to life and he backed up from the feed store. Rolled past the diner slowly, his window down.
Sarah waved.
He didn’t wave back.
Pete said the town didn’t know how to end what it had built. Said that they were making systems people would depend on. After a while, he stopped coming to the meetings.
He still drove by every Tuesday after the bus dropped off.
The family never looked up from their food.
Sarah helped them carry their suitcase across the street. The key to the old guesthouse rattled. Room three was on the second floor, smelled like furniture polish, and old wood warmed by the sun. There were clean sheets and towels.
There was a stuffed turtle sitting against the pillow. Faded green.
The little girl looked at Sarah.
Sarah shrugged. “I found him at the church donation table.”
She’d picked it out four days ago from a cardboard box in the fellowship hall because it looked like something a kid might want.
Pete had parked his truck beneath the oak tree outside the courthouse.
Sarah stood at the window a moment and lifted her hand.
Pete looked back at her but still didn’t wave.
Article photo by MATHEW RUPP on Unsplash.