The storm came sooner than we thought it would. By late afternoon, the sky had turned dark, and by nightfall, snow was falling quickly and heavily, sideways. I didn’t plan to open the diner that night because no one in their right mind would be out in that weather.
I nevertheless pulled into the lot, even though the wipers on my old pickup weren’t working right. By the time I parked, the world around me was already a white blur. I sat there for a minute with the engine running and watched the wind hit the glass.
I wanted to go home, lock the door, and wait it out with a blanket and tea. But then I saw them: headlights gleaming through the snow. There was a line of eighteen-wheelers parked on the side of the road with their engines running and their tail lights scarcely visible.
There had to be at least a dozen, and maybe more that we couldn’t see. The roads were closing fast. These people didn’t have anywhere to go.
One of them trudged through the snow with his coat covered in white grit and ice in his beard. He knocked softly on the glass door, his face stiff but polite. He asked, “Is there any chance we could get a cup of coffee?” The glass made his voice quieter.
“Roads are closed.”
I gazed at him for a second, then went back to the empty diner behind me. No lights. There was no coffee made.
There were just rows of booths and no noise. I wasn’t sure. These past few years have been hard enough for me to run this firm on my own, and since George died, it’s been considerably harder.
The loneliness crept in like rust. On some days, it felt like I was keeping the doors open only because I didn’t want to quit up. But then I heard my grandmother’s voice, like if she were there next to me.
“Feed people when you’re not sure,” she said. I opened the door then. The first driver came in and stomped the snow off of his boots.
He called the others on the radio as I made coffee. It took less than twenty minutes for the diner to fill up. People were sitting on chairs with coats piled on them, drying their boots near the heat vents, and sipping mugs of steaming coffee.
The cold began to fade, and in its stead came the soft murmur of people talking and laughing. I didn’t have a whole menu, so I prepared scrambled eggs, grilled bacon, and warmed up what I had in the freezer. It wasn’t fancy, but it was hot, and it was something.
Roy, one of the truckers, was a huge man with a Tennessee accent and a laugh that shook the walls. He replied he would help with the dishes. Another guy got out an old guitar from his setup and played old country tunes till the coffee pot was empty.
Someone else took over the grill while I rested my feet. It didn’t seem like work anymore. By daybreak, we weren’t strangers anymore.
The storm kept going. There was more snow and more cars on the second day. It must have been on the radio.
There wasn’t enough food, yet no one said anything. The men assisted without being asked by shoveling the walk, clearing the roof, and repairing a window that was letting in frigid air using duct tape and a truck tarp. I found some cans of beans, potatoes, and tomatoes and made a stew with some aid.
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