Twenty Years Ago

Bonesick Prologue Part 1

You heard it here first friends, I’m back(-ish)! Last episode I mentioned that I’d be on a Bonesick summer hiatus because my Side Hustle Season gobbles up all my spare time.

Well, I lied, kinda.

Let’s back up a sec. A fellow Substacker I follow

Tobi Ogunnaike

had mentioned back a few months ago that he got a writing boost with help from the good people at Foster (writing community + editing/feedback app). When I read about his Season 2 experience, I was so enamored, I immediately signed up to be notified for the next season.

And of course, they rolled out Season 3 during my busiest time of year, of course.

But, I kid you not, within seconds of receiving the announcement email, in the passenger seat of our van, traveling 80mph down I-39, I applied anyway. My gut told me it was a very good idea. Sometimes you have to take on just …one …more …thing.

Because here we are. It’s July 6—the workshop’s Closing Ceremony when we’re all invited to hit the “publish” button on what we’ve crafted all month—and I’m super stoked that I packed this workshop into my packed world.

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Let me introduce you to the first of three parts that will comprise the Bonesick prologue. For my brand new subscribers (oh, HI!), this prologue will provide you with a boatload of additional context that will help set the tone, the theme, the “what’s the point and why should I care” flavor that set the stage for Tarot Card Zero and beyond. For my O.G. readers (heeyyy!) who already care about Toby, Pam, and the gang, the 8 story-slices I’ve written up to this point will make more sense.

Grab a beverage. Settle in. Let’s do this thing!

Twenty Years Ago

Bonesick Prologue Part 1

“Wait, so is the cat dead or alive?” Toby questioned Angela as they plopped into the slippery booth. Burnt potato hung in the air; its salty char punctuated the clamor from the back kitchen. 

The Biskit Basket, a classic all-American diner, was named after its specialty menu item: butter-soaked pillows of flour fluff dished up by the Springers for fifty years. The family’s matriarch opened the establishment during the town’s Steel Industry heyday. After the industry collapsed and decimated the town, some Big Food conglomerate took over but let the Springer kids run it. The locals would’ve rioted otherwise. The diner remained an institution, successful because it was just off the interstate, midway between the town’s now ghosted main street and the thriving metropolis next door. A half-century of age revealed itself in every seat cushion’s peeled vinyl, grime that took up permanent residence inside the cracks of the black-and-white floor tile, and amber waves of oil that coated the walls. But this never deterred the hungry folks who crowded the vestibule to wait for a table. Toby and Angela had to wait about seventeen minutes for theirs.

Angela was about to answer Toby about the cat, but he interrupted her, distracted by the nostalgia, “I can’t believe this old greasy joint’s still open.” He grazed his hand along the speckled Formica table and kissed his thumb and fingers together. “Same ol’ stick.”

“Toby, be nice.” Angela summoned her loudest eye roll for the waitress who was waiting for them to get settled. “It looked just like this when we were kids.”

Darlene popped her gum and slung back at Toby, “Sorry, hon, this ain’t the Ritz. I’ll getcha wiped down in a sec. You two want something to drink?”

Toby turned over his coffee mug. “Darlene, you know I’m just messin’.”

The waitress was everything you’d expect from a gal who’d worked diners her whole life, right down to the slick-tight hair bun, garish shade of red lipstick, and plastic name tag, chipped on all four corners. It read “Darlene,” a name her broke parents dumped on her at birth when they probably just assumed she’d grow up to don an apron, carry a pencil behind her ear, and make minimum wage while throwing back snark at teenage ruffians like the lanky one sitting in front of her with the snide remarks.

“Milk for me, please,” Angela ordered with extra etiquette.

“One milk for the lady, one coffee for the punk,” Darlene gave Toby a wink. “I’ll be back with that rag.” She scuttled off to the next booth to ask about dessert. This was the kind of diner where the locals always ordered dessert after breakfast.

Toby eyed his girlfriend of five years this coming Tuesday. Angela was wearing her hair natural these days, his favorite, full and thick like a plush dark chocolate halo around her delicate face. She studied the menu, just as sticky as the table, with a certain intensity. Toby nudged her foot with his own and tapped her dark brown wrist with his pale white pinkie finger. “Whatcha lookin’ at, Ang? You always get the same thing.”

Angela sighed as she looked up. “Yeah yeah. I guess it’s just nice to know I have options.” She flipped the menu closed and slipped it back into its holder at the edge of the table. The metal wires were rusted with specs of ketchup all over the bottom. Although, in this town, red flecks could mean anything.

“You know, back in the day when my dad would take me here after church, he’d order something new every single time.” Toby grabbed the back of his booth seat to stretch his head around dramatically. “I bet no one here has tried the whole menu,” he announced.

Angela whispered, “Toby, you know these are all just city hipsters.” Through the east window, she noticed a couple of them eyeing up her parked motorcycle. It was a ‘68 Scrambler she inherited from her older brother who didn’t survive the gift of a gunshot wound on his 16th birthday. She just had the bike painted a creamy white with money she saved from her paychecks. Had her brother survived, he definitely would’ve dropped dead knowing she covered up the classic orange two-tone. When she and Toby took long rides out to the country, he never minded riding bitch behind her. She loved the comfort of his arms wrapped tightly around the exhilaration in her guts.

“Well, at least we grew up here!” Toby bellowed again into the breakfast crowd. Angela dropped her face into her hand.

“This kid bothering you, hon?” Darlene was back with milk, a fresh pot of coffee, and a sopping wet cloth that smelled of chemicals.

Angela just shook her head and grinned. “I guess I’m just destined to be both desperately in love and completely embarrassed every minute of the day.”

Darlene laughed loud enough to draw the attention of the adjacent booth who had refused dessert. Not locals. “Well, at least he’s cute, right?” She winked again as she poured Toby a cup and wiped the table down. “The usual? An Elvis, extra pig, and a Honey Bunny?”

The two nodded with their arms tucked in their laps below the table, waiting for the wet streaks to evaporate. Someone started up the jukebox, a 1972 Wurlitzer Americana 3700. The sleek silhouette with its rounded corners and robin’s egg blue and faux wood casing clashed with the ‘50s doo-wop vibe of the rest of the diner, but it played great. Toby sang along with the patron’s selection, which Angela didn’t mind because he had a deep, soothing tenor that would often lull her to sleep after a nightmare.

 “...But in my heart I’d be a king…” Toby looked into her eyes and laughed at himself.

Angela met his sweet gaze. She tapped her foot against his. Tuesday, they’d swing by her job on her day off to celebrate their anniversary. They had a silly little tradition, which they practiced each year since she said yes to his persistent requests for a night out—her official acceptance of the awkward shift that makes adult lovers from childhood friends. They’d sit down in the bookstore’s cafe with a pile of square napkins. And one by one, they’d write out their names, surrounded by hearts, of course. Then they’d slip them inconspicuously into random books throughout the store. Well, Toby picked random books, but Angela sought out meaningful ones that she’d remember to check the following year. If the napkins survived, maybe they would too.

When Toby wrapped up his crooner duet with Tony, a small wave of sadness lapped at the shore of his face. “My dad would play that one for her,” his voice drenched with both grief and regret.

“I know.” Angela tapped his foot again, more gently this time. She watched as that small wave opened up into the troubled sea she knew all too well by this point in their relationship. There was no stop to the tidal crash. 

“God, it’s just … I want to shake it, Ang, I really do. It’s been ten years. I was just a dumb, little kid. It shouldn’t matter to me anymore. I should be over it by now.” Toby grabbed a napkin from the metal dispenser, also speckled with a dried red substance, and began to tear the paper into long skinny strips.

Angela let him tear his strips. “Babe, these things take the time that they take. As I always say, ride easy. They’re just thoughts. Don’t gun ‘em down.”

Toby’s tone shifted, “Well, lately it seems like it’s all I ever fucking think about. I mean, ever since you told me—” he stopped and clenched his jaw. He glanced away at the jukebox where a new patron scanned the title tags of the 45s.

Angela dropped her eyes down to her belly.

Still locked onto the jukebox, Toby carefully admitted, “I can’t help but think I’m the worst possible dude for the job here. What if I’m in some vicious circle? What if I’m just like him?” Angela looked up, fear pooled in her eyes.

“Don’t say that, Toby,” she pleaded. “There’s no circle. You’re not him. You’re here, aren’t you? With me now?” Her eyebrows furrowed with a flare of urgency.

Toby’s shoulders fell. He returned to her, softened with a sense of defeated resignation. “I don’t know, Ang. What about all the looks we’ll get? I mean based on the garbage everyone already tosses our way, but now full dumpster. You want that?”

Angela sat up very straight in that slippery vinyl booth and interrupted him in a hush, “Listen here, Tobias. I swear to the Holy Trinity itself, you better not back out on me in the middle of some cheap breakfast at some sad-ass diner today.” Angela noticed the waitress grab their food from underneath the strip warmer. She snatched up the torn strips of napkin and hid them in her lap. “Can we do this later? Even this nonsense you’re dishing up can’t put a dent in this appetite of mine.”

Toby nodded. After Darlene set down the steaming plates, he thanked her kindly and told her to give the line cooks his chef’s kiss of approval. Then he placed a piece of bacon on Angela’s plate. “For the little guy,” he smiled.

Angela’s face brightened. She took a bite and added, “Or girl?”

“We’ll see.” He tapped her foot twice.

Toby and Angela took anxious, but famished bites from their plates, lost in thought, soothed by fat and sugar. Otis was up next on the jukebox. They looked up at each other and traded knowing smiles. This song was her dad’s favorite. He had played this album every Sunday in their small Edison-style house when she was in elementary school. Angela’s father was gone too, but he didn’t leave like Toby’s did. Her mom said it was his broken heart that did him in.

As noon approached, the rowdy din of the breakfast crowd settled to a couple of coughs, the rustle of the Sunday news, and forks scraping up the last bits of syrup. The hipsters had all left for their city condos. Toby and Angela would stay and share a slice of French Silk pie.

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References:

I’ve crammed quite a few pop culture snacks into Part 1. “Elvis, Extra Pig” is a grilled Peanut Butter & Banana w/ Extra Bacon is a sandwich probably featured in a hipster diner near you. “Honey Bunny” is a Pulp Fiction nod (aka Yolanda, aka Amanda Plummer in the diner scene). And my diner drawing is based on the one in Moonlight, which features THE best movie-diner-complete-with-poignant-jukebox-song scenes.

There’s a 1972 Wurlitzer Americana 3700 jukebox that currently sits silent in my home; tragically, it does not work (…yet). The Tony song is Tony Bennet’s “Rags to Riches” and the Otis song is Otis Redding’s “Try A Little Tenderness.” The latter has been on my top five songs list for over twenty years and will never leave. If you’re not doing Duckie while it plays, you’re doing it wrong.

The Biskit Basket diner family name comes from Finis Louise Springer, who had worked on the housing abandonment problem in Gary, Indiana for decades. She helped rehabilitate many of the derelict homes there and raised funds for the Horace Mann-Ambridge Neighborhood Improvement Organization. She passed away just last year and left behind an incredible legacy for the city of Gary.

Prologue Part 2 is a weird one but absolutely necessary to build the Bonesick world.

EXTRA THANKS to the following Foster Folks who helped edit this piece to make it better: Jude Klinger, Sarah Ramsey, and Nick Drage — your feedback and fixes were exactly what I needed to polish ‘er up. And a round of applause for

Sara Campbell

my coach this season and

Lyle McKeany

who let me in 😂