Zed’s face popped up in the window. “Find out what?”

“Your meat loaf is my favorite food. What’s yours, Uncle Zed? I don’t think we ever talked about what you like.” Harper went back to sweeping.

“Hot dogs. That was a real treat when I was a little boy, and me and Annie always got us one at that little drive-by joint when we went to the doctor. I like mine with sauerkraut and she likes hers with mustard and relish.” He sighed. “I mean, liked hers. It’s still so hard to think of her gone.”

His face disappeared from the window, and in a few seconds the aroma of bacon wafted through the whole dining area. Harper winked at Brook and went back to sweeping.

The breakfast rush had died down by ten o’clock, and Harper had been gone to help out for at least an hour to the laundry room until the lunch run started arriving. Zed pulled out a couple of chairs. Sitting in one and propping his feet on the other, he thought about his birthday on Monday. He and Seamus and Annie had run up and down the Neches River together as children, but he’d never been invited to their birthday parties. He’d asked them to come have his mama’s carrot cake and homemade ice cream with him one time, but they didn’t show up. That might have been the first time any of them realized what that big word prejudice meant.

Annie had been truthful when she told him that her daddy said she couldn’t go to his house. He’d never forget what she said next: “But someday I’ll be a big person and then I’ll do whatever I want and we’ll eat ice cream on your birthday.”

And they had, many, many times. When he came home from the military and went to work in the café, she never forgot his birthday. Not one single time. There might not have been home-churned ice cream like his mama made when he was a child, but there was always ice cream and a store-bought cake that said “Happy Birthday, Zed” right on the top. Chocolate ice cream and white cake. Annie would laugh and say that was symbolic of their friendship.

He was so deep in his thoughts that he didn’t hear Brook come into the café. When she spoke, not a foot from him, it startled him so badly that his old heart came nigh to jumping out of his chest.

“I came to get us a couple of to-go cups of sweet tea. It’s hot in the laundry room this morning,” she said, unaware that she’d almost given poor old Zed a heart attack.

When opportunity knocks, you invite it in for chocolate cake. You don’t slam the door in its face and then have to chase it down the road for a mile.

“I’ve got something for you, honey. Been meanin’ to give it to you for a while, but it kept slippin’ my mind,” he said. “Come on back here in the kitchen with me. I keep it in the safe.”

“What is it, Uncle Zed?” She danced along beside him, sniffing the air. “There’s nothing like hot, homemade rolls to make a place smell like home. Save a couple for when me and Tawny come over for lunch. What is this surprise? You should be the one getting the presents since your birthday is coming up.”

“It is, but there’s not much an old man like me needs except happiness. You girls have brought that to me this past month. Don’t know how I’d have gotten through Annie’s passing without y’all around me.” He slung open the safe and handed her a pretty hair comb with pearls scattered over the top. “It’ll look real good in your hair on your weddin’ day.”

“Uncle Zed,” she giggled as she took it from his hands. “That’s eons away. You should keep this until that day gets here and then you can put it in my hair right before you walk me down the aisle at the church.”

Tears as big as dimes rolled down his wrinkled cheeks.

She grabbed a paper towel and wiped them away. “I love the comb. It’s beautiful, but I want you to play the part of my daddy when I get married and it can be my something old. Tell me where it came from.”

“It was given to my grandma by her mama on the day that she got married. Then she gave it to my mama when she got married, and since I didn’t have any sisters, my mama gave it to me to hold for my daughter or granddaughter.” He inhaled deeply, trying to get his emotions under control, and it brought on a coughing fit. When he could catch his breath again, he said, “The pearls are real—my great-grandparents lived down in the Mississippi Delta and my grandpa did some oyster fishin’ to make a few dollars.”

“Uncle Zed, this is too precious for you to give away.” Brook fingered the pearls, all different sizes, some even lopsided and misshapen.

He took it from her hands and deftly pulled up a strand of hair from each side of her face. Carefully putting it in her hair, he said, “There, now I’ve put it in your hair and you are going to take it with you. If I’m still around when you get married, I’ll walk you down the aisle with honor, and I’ll even tuck it back into your hair. That’s a promise. Until then, you put it in a nice, safe place and take it out every now and then and remember all the good times we have here at this place.”

She wrapped her arms around his waist and hugged him so tight that it almost brought on another coughing fit. “I will, Uncle Zed, I promise, and thank you so much.”

“Just passin’ on what was passed to me.” Zed patted her on the head.

When she’d filled two cups with sweet tea and left, he closed the safe and sat down on the stool. “Well, Annie, that’s two of my four possessions. I told you that if I felt like they were going to stay, I’d give each of them a little something from my side of the family. We might not be blood kin, but . . . don’t fuss at me. I can already hear the lecture you’re gearin’ up to give me. That a feller can be a grandpa even if he’s not kin to the kid. I’m right glad for that.”