Unexpectedly, Milo - Matthew Dicks [96]
Kelly Plante lived at 9 Summer Street.
Milo had no way of knowing if any of these people were related to Tess Bryson, or even to one another, but he thought it was a good start, and based on the size of the town, he thought his chances were excellent that at least one was related to Tess. In truth, he hadn’t expected to find a single Plante or a Bryson in the entire town, so he considered finding three an absolute boon.
Most surprising, Milo spent less than thirty minutes gathering this information, and with little expertise on his part. As he sat in traffic on the George Washington Bridge, he had begun wondering how much more he could have uncovered with the help of a private investigator. Probably a lot.
In the twenty years since Tess Bryson disappeared, the Internet had made information of this kind readily accessible to any novice researcher, and he couldn’t help but feel bad for Freckles, who probably could’ve acquired this same information at the time of Tess Bryson’s disappearance had the Internet existed in its present form.
In the same vein, did Tess Bryson even know that her mother was dead?
So much pain and uncertainty simply because of a lack of information. Still, there was no telling if these names, addresses, and phone numbers would prove to be fruitful, or if, once again, Milo’s hunch was right and Tess Bryson was still alive.
Milo chose the Town Chef over the half a dozen or so diners and restaurants that lined the five miles of Main Street because it had the fewest cars in its dirt parking lot (just two). His hope was to engage in conversation with one of the waitresses and he thought that if there weren’t many customers, his chances of speaking at any length with the waitress would be better.
“Sit wherever you’d like,” the redheaded woman said in a distinct southern drawl, motioning to the right, where the restaurant extended thirty feet like a greasy finger. The Town Chef consisted of a tiled counter wrapping around the far end of the restaurant (where Milo had entered) and extending halfway down the length of the side wall, where it gave way to an area of booths and tables. Behind the counter were coffeemakers, a soda dispenser, stacks of white plates and racks of glasses, and a swinging door that presumably led to the kitchen. Short, vinyl-covered stools were spaced along the counter, which was cluttered with napkin dispensers, sugar bowls, paper place mats advertising local businesses, and (much to Milo’s horror) ashtrays. Two men were sitting at the counter, both silent and drinking coffee. The rest of the restaurant was empty.
Milo chose the booth closest to the end of the counter. Though sitting at the counter would’ve been ideal, allowing for more frequent contact with the waitress, he feared that the waitress would be less willing to speak about private matters in the presence of others. Distance between him and the two men at the counter would be important if a meaningful conversation were to take place.
The waitress approached a moment later with a menu, which amounted to a single sheet of paper, printed on both sides and laminated. It appeared to be about a thousand years old, and Milo tried desperately to disguise his disgust as the filthy thing was dropped into his hands. It was still sticky around the corners with pancake syrup from the morning’s breakfast, or perhaps from a breakfast served on the morning of Kennedy’s assassination.
There was simply no telling, and neither did Milo really want to know.
“Hi. I’m Macy,” the woman said, bending at the knees to bring her nearly six-foot frame into better view. “It’s you and me tonight, hon. Can I get you something to drink?”
“Water, please. Thanks. I’m Milo, by the way.”
“Nice to meet you, Milo.”
Macy departed, leaving Milo to plot his next move. In the films, this busty redhead, who couldn’t have fit the bill any better, would undoubtedly be the town gossip, knowledgeable about all of Chisholm’s deepest, darkest secrets. But Milo suspected that this real-life version might not live up to her fictional counterpart.
Even so,