Chapter 85

When we were ready to leave Paul's office, Jack started packing the laptop.

"Where do you want this? Back in the file cabinet?"

"Don't be silly. You take it. I trust you."

Jack just smiled at him. "Thanks."

So, Jack had the strap over his shoulder as we went into the security office. The guard told him he had to examine it before we left the premises. I could see from the look on his face that Jack was offended but he didn't say anything; he just put it down on the counter.

"Could you open it up, please?"

His jaw got a little tighter but he still didn't say anything, unzipped the bag and pulled everything out. He held the bag up and shook it a couple of times to show that it was empty.

The guard said, "You can put it away now."

Jack did so, his movements exaggerated, taking twice as long as he needed. Once he had it back on his shoulder, he looked at the guard and said, "Are you sure you don't want to examine the doll? We could be smuggling diamonds out of the mall."

"That won't be necessary, Sir."

As the guard held the door open for us, Jack said, "Let that be a lesson to you, Jill. If you want to steal something from here, do it during business hours when the guards are too busy to harass people."

After the door closed, Paul clapped Jack on the back. "Sorry about that. He's new. I'll talk to his supervisor the next time I come in."

Jack said, "I've seen that look before on guys who have a little bit of power that goes to their heads. That man's dangerous. It's a good thing he doesn't carry a gun."

Paul chuckled. "I'll talk to his supervisor."

It was 9:45 when we left. We had parked on the north side of the mall and came out at the far end of the east side. We had to walk the whole length of the mall, turn, then another half of it to get to our car.

After we'd been driving a bit, I noticed Jack was taking a different route than we normally did.

"Where are we going?"

"I want to stop someplace for ice cream. The problem is it's too late for 31 Flavors or Dairy Queen."

"We can always get a scoop of something at Denny's. They have shakes, too."

"That sounds good. You ready for some ice cream, Laurie?"

"Uh huh."

We found a Denny's and went inside. There were about five tables going. A couple out on a date, a group that looked like high school or a church group, some more from college, and older couple and a family with a couple of kids 6 — 8 years old.

There was a 'seat yourself' sign so Jack started heading toward an empty booth.

"I want to sit there." Laurie was pointing at the counter.

Jack looked at me and I shrugged. "Fine," he said.

A waitress came into the room carrying a tray filled with drinks. She looked like her feet were killing her and she was going to collapse at any moment.

"OK if we sit at the counter?"

"Sure Hon. Wherever you want."

Laurie chose the stool she wanted to sit on and Jack and I sat on either side of her.

Jack grabbed three menus from the holder next to the napkins and gave me one. He took one and found the deserts, putting it down in front of Laurie.

"These are..."

"I want that one," she interrupted, pointing at the Oreo Blender Blaster.

"OK. How about you, Jill?"

"I'll have a banana split. And a cup of coffee."

I looked up and the waitress was on the other side of the counter from us, attempting to swipe a strand of hair into place with the back of her hand.

"Rough shift?"

"Yeah. They sent my help home a couple of hours ago. Not going to have that many customers the evening before the holiday. As soon as the manager drove away, they started showing up. That table over there with all the drinks? Separate checks. And I bet you a buck they'll all stiff me. Oh, one or two will leave fifty cents, then the rest will figure the tip's been handled. And they're supposed to be Christians. Sorry about that. What will you have?"

Jack said, "This little lady will have the Oreo Blender Blaster, the lady on the end will have a banana split and I'll have a chocolate shake. And we'll need two coffees, no cream or sugar."

"Anything to drink for your daughter?"

Laurie giggled and put her hand up to her mouth. I said, "She's my sister. You want anything to drink, Laurie?"

"No, Mommy." She giggled again.

"Oh, you think you're real funny, don't you." I tickled her as she continued to giggle while nodding her head yes.

When I lifted my head, our waitress was back, pouring our coffee.

"I'll bring you your desserts in a few minutes."

I took a drink of coffee, then said to Jack, "You know, I didn't think. The cook's not going to make our stuff; she has to. Make sure you give her a good tip, Jack."

"Yes, Dear. I was thinking a quarter for each of us."

"You better not."

"That reminds me. I'll be back in a minute."

He went over to the table our waitress had been complaining about. He put both hands on the edge of the table and was leaning over talking to them. A couple of girls on one side scooted in to make some room for him to sit down. They seemed very interested in what he was saying to them. After a few minutes he got a few napkins and wrote something on them, handing them out to three of the girls. Then he said something else and they looked more serious, paying attention to everything he said. A few of them were nodding their heads and the rest looked thoughtful as he slid out and got up.

He came back over and sat down. He ruffled Laurie's hair and took a drink of his coffee.

"Well?"

"Well, what?"

"Are you going to tell me what you were doing over there?"

"Just talking."

"And?"

"And I gave me email address to a couple of girls. And yours to another one."

"Oh."

"And I told them about Jesus."

"You? Jesus? This I've got to hear."

"Don't be so cynical, Jill. They're all members of a youth group from Faith Chapel, that big building off the freeway. So I asked them if they heard of Jesus turning the water into wine and they all said yes and then I asked if they knew about turning the bread and fish into enough to feed the masses and they said yes. So then I told them that he was always very generous when he ate and that they should keep that in mind when it came time to tip the waitress. I told them to take a good look at her when she came back. She's been working hard and they haven't made it any easier giving her eight individual orders from one table. And that they should give her eight individual tips. And that the going rate is 18 — 20%."

I leaned over Laurie and kissed him. "That was very nice of you, Jack."

"I know. Actually, it's something they probably had no idea about. It's not like they teach tipping in school. Just think. Fifty years from now they'll be telling their great grandkids how some guy came up to them one night and lectured them about tipping their waitress. And then he took this wonderful picture of me."

"We can only hope. Whether they do or not, it was a good thing you did, Jack."

The waitress brought our desserts over. Laurie licked her lips and said, "Uhhmmm," when she saw her shake. She leaned back, held her cherry over her mouth, then lowered it until she could bite it off the stem. After making a big production of eating it, she started in on us, begging for our cherries.

Jack said, "OK, OK, you can have mine. But only if I get to feed it to you."

She agreed and he told her to lean back and close her eyes. He dipped the cherry in his whipped cream and slowly lowered it, while saying, "Ready? Ready? Here it comes. Don't peek now. Almost there."