He'd been coming in for perhaps six months. Some weeks he'd be there two or three times, some weeks not at all. But he was a regular, insofar as the little Greek-American restaurant Susan worked at had regulars. He always had coffee, and usually an omelette (even if it was three o'clock in the afternoon), and no matter what the dish was he'd get hash browns on the side. He'd sit, drink, eat, and smoke British cigarettes while perusing the paper or a book he'd brought. The books she'd seen him reading belonged to that ample category of books she'd heard of but never read. Foucoult's Pendulum. Where I'm Calling From. American Tabloid. Eco, Carver, Ellroy: authors she might read someday, if she got around to it. But she was busy with When Fathers Ruled and After the Curtain Fell and the latest set of photocopied excerpts her professors made her buy at a copy shop.

She wasn't exactly attracted to him, but he was one of the regulars, so she paid attention.

He was picky about his coffee, but quietly so. He took it with cream and sugar. When he finished a cup, he'd put cream and sugar into the empty cup so it'd be ready for a refill. He didn't like it when a waitress filled the cup up to the rim (making it hard to add the condiments without making a spill) and was only half-pleased when a waitress filled a partially-full cup back up, since that threw off the mix. But he never complained, always smiled, and always (she noticed) said "thanks" quietly when she stopped by his table. She'd quickly learned to pay a little extra attention to the state of his coffee, and never added more when there was still some left unless it was almost completely gone. He almost always tipped two dollars, which was usually slightly more than fifteen percent. Sometimes he left cash, sometimes he put the tip in the check, sometimes he added it to his credit card bill. These were the kinds of things she filed away, month after month, as he came, ate, and left.

She didn't know his name.

He was tall, maybe six feet four inches. He wasn't skinny, wasn't chubby, just somewhere in between: like the personal ads said, HWP. He had long fingers and short hair, and he always had a mustache and sometimes a full beard.

He didn't talk much, didn't engage her in conversation, and responded with polite but minimal interest to her occasional efforts at small talk. He seemed to find the restaurant to be a respite, and often stayed for more than an hour, drinking, smoking, and reading.

Once she noticed that he was writing, on a napkin. He was hunched over the table, writing slowly and precisely, and occasionally he seemed to shake. The next time she came by, the napkin was wadded up on the plate, soaking up grease and tahini sauce, and he was gone. Curious, she took the dishes back to the kitchen and unwadded the napkin to read what was written there:

How could this happen? How could she act like this towards me? She knows I love her. We mean so much to each other. In all the time we've been together, I thought we existed in a state of bliss. What went wrong? Why am I alone? Time to go and get drunk again.

She bit her lip tightly, and read the napkin again. She felt like a voyeur--hell, she was a voyeur. He'd written these words to express what he was feeling, never meaning for someone else to read them. Quickly, she wadded up the napkin and threw it in the trash. But she thought about it the rest of the day, and occasionally during the next week as she sat bored in one class after another.

The next time he came in while she was working, his eyes were red and he needed a shave (this wasn't one of his full-beard periods). He wore a black wool trenchcoat, and his hair was unkempt. He started smoking as soon as he sat down, and gulped down two cups of coffee while looking at the menu. He ordered the fettucini, which took additional cooking and preparation time--meaning that he'd be here a while. While he waited for the food to arrive, he fidgeted over the newspaper and smoked another cigarette. The lemon rice soup came and he lapped it up immediately, washed down with a third cup of coffee. After the soup, he took out a pen and began scribbling on his napkin again.

Other customers came and went, and Susan was kept busy. She glanced his direction every so often, but another waitress had taken over that table while Susan was dealing with a large group in the non-smoking area. When the man left, she hurried over to the table and found the napkin, wadded up on the plates. She grabbed it and stuck it into her apron pocket, then went back to her customers.

A little later, she had a minute or two free. She went into the restroom, locked the door, and sat down on the commode. She took out the napkin, opened it up, and read:

She ignores me. She refuses to talk to me. I'm going out of my mind. She was everything to me, my perfect and most true love. This is hell--knowing what could be and knowing that it can not be, all at once. Doesn't she see things the way I do? I want to kill myself, or her. At this point, everything is flatlined and nothing is worth paying attention to.

Susan got up from the commode (she wasn't here to use the restroom, just to find privacy) and put the napkin in her back pocket. She left the bathroom in a hurry, feeling guilty and fascinated at the same time.

That evening, Susan lay in bed, half-asleep. The napkin lay on her dresser a few yards away. She'd thought about the man all afternoon--but not constantly, just off and on. She always knew her customers led lives outside of their encounters with her in the restaurant, but this was the first time she'd had a real glimpse of that life and it fascinated her. Shy and anti-social, Susan realized that she felt a stronger connection with this man whose name she did not know than with anyone she'd met in college. She didn't get out much, didn't have a boyfriend, didn't go to parties. She went to class, she worked, she read, she ate, she slept. Nothing unusual or particularly interesting had ever happened to her, but through the napkin on her dresser she was at least a party to something unusual and interesting that was happening to someone else. That was something.

Lying in bed, Susan thought of speaking to the man about his problems. He seemed kindly, and intelligent, and probably didn't deserve to be treated by his girlfriend the way he had been. She was probably one of those stupid sorority types, or else some sort of cold intellectual who couldn't appreciate how nice it was to eat at the same place again and again. Susan could understand that aspect of the man's habitual patronage of the restaurant: it was like coming home, again and again, but on your terms--no emotion, no involvement, just a simple exchange of rituals. Arrival, order, service, payment. These things appealed to Susan in their simplicity, and in their remoteness from the entanglements of life and relationships. No doubt they appealed to this man in the same way.

Projecting her own vulnerabilities and preferences on the man, Susan came to feel a kinship with him. Lying there in bed, she imagined his long fingers running over her body, imagined his stubbly chin against her belly, imagined their legs intertwined in the bed. She understood him, understood his pain, would take it inside her and transform it into something new and different.

Susan went to sleep, thinking of him. The napkin on her dresser regarded her impassively.

She didn't see him again for almost two weeks, two weeks in which she spent her entire working time looking at the door every time it opened, to see if it was him. Finally he did come in, his beard growing full. He looked as haggard as before, perhaps more so. He ordered an omelette with hash browns, coffee, and garlic toast. He smoked and read nothing. When Susan brought him his meal, he looked as if he'd been fighting back tears.

She brought him two napkins, so that he could write on one and use the other as needed. She watched his coffee carefully, paid attention to when he put cream and sugar into an empty cup, filling it with more coffee only at that point. She said nothing extraneous, but smiled at him when she approached his table, looking into his eyes and saying with hers all that she wanted to say. When he left, both napkins were wadded up on the plate. One had writing on it.

She took the plates to the kitchen to be cleaned, and hurried to the bathroom with the napkin he'd written on. Someone was in there, and she fidgeted nervously outside the door until the woman had left. Then she went in, locked the door, and read the napkin:

At this point, I desire nothing but closure. The simple passage of time will not suffice. I must bring an end to this situation. I must bring an end to her. It can be done simply. A meal, a few exchanged words, and then the knife will go into her throat. She'll tell no more lies. I see no other option.

Susan breathed sharply and heavily. She'd hoped that he might be getting better, that he might be ready to move on and find someone new. Part of her had hoped that he wouldn't even write on the napkin this time, since that would be a sign of healing, but she had also longed to know his thoughts at this point in time. He was in trouble, and needed help. He needed someone who would understand, who would accept his anger and help him transform it into something good, something true and loving. He needed her, she decided, and she owed it to him and to herself to do what she could. It was time, she decided, to act.

He came in again the next day, ordered another omelette with hash browns, drank another cup of coffee, smoked another cigarette. Susan brought him what he needed, doing the best job of waitressing she was capable of doing. She wanted him to be favorably disposed towards her when she made her move. It was up to her, now: she could take him from the path of unhappiness he now occupied and bring him into a world of happiness. They could be together, they could ignore the world, they could eat at the same restaurant again and again and rejoice in the newness of the experience, in the novelty of each other. It was time.

She brought the bill, and laid it on the table. Then she sat down opposite him.

He looked at her, mildly surprised. His eyes were furtive, reacting to this breaking of a taboo: the waitress is not supposed to sit down at the table with the customer.

"Hi," she said.

"Hello," he replied, a trifle formal, a trifle sardonic, his tone of voice implicitly stating that he recognized the slight absurdity of their having this sort of exchange, waitress and customer. He took a bite of omelette.

"I've been reading your napkins," she said. "I'm sorry, but I couldn't help myself."

His expression turned grave, but accepting. "Hm. Okay."

"My name's Susan. I guess I know a little about what you've been going through, from reading the napkins I mean."

He flinched, distractedly working on the omelette. "Not the most pleasant reading, I suppose."

She smiled. "It's okay. I didn't mean to invade your privacy, but I guess I was curious. I'm sorry you're feeling so down."

He took another bite and smiled. "It happens."

She shook her head. She had to say more. "I wanted to say that I didn't think you deserved to feel like that. I feel like you deserve better. I wanted you to know that."

He chewed, and cut another bite with the utensils. "Thanks, I guess. I didn't exactly intend those writings to be committed to posterity."

"Oh, I know. I know I'm intruding. But...I thought maybe you'd want to talk about it. I thought maybe you'd like to go get coffee someplace when I get off work. I mean, maybe not today, maybe you're busy, but, you know, sometime."

He chewed on the omelette and didn't say anything.

"You deserve better, really, you do. I hope you know that. The world doesn't have to be such an unhappy place. Good things can happen."

He remained silent, chewed some more, swallowed.

"Look, I don't know what all is going on with you and her. I don't know what's happened. But I know you're unhappy. You don't have to be like that. I don't know who she is, but I think she's made a terrible mistake."

He regarded her for a moment. "That's surprising to hear."

"That she made a mistake? I know, I don't know everything about this, but--"

"No. Not that. That you don't know who she is."

He looked into her eyes for a moment, seeing everything, saying everything.

"She's you," he said. His hand, the one that held the knife, moved too fast for her to react.