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Nina and Dan
Charles Haddox Nina and Dan’s mom died a few years back, but at least they have nice foster parents. Still, they’re just a couple of misfits in a dork wrapper. Dan used to stand outside the mission at sunset, after polishing off a greasy, high carb dinner, facing the ocean. His lips would move as he whispered to himself. I thought he was praying, but Nina told me he was hallucinating, talking to their dead mom. We had missed dinner at the mission, so at midnight I led Nina and Dan to the back door of Chick’n n Donuts to help with the dishes and the kitchen breakdown. In return for our help the cooks served us heaping trays of chicken and candied sweet potatoes with mini-marshmallows and hushpuppies and coleslaw, under the bright florescent lights and neon blue bug lights. It was cold outside, so we ate standing up in the steamy kitchen, over by the walk-in, instead of outside on a bench facing the train tracks that ran behind the place and were faintly illuminated by streetlights surrounded with rainbow coronas of late-night fog. I had dragged the two teen siblings along with me to Chick’n n Donuts after a night of serious boosting. I knew they were straight edge, but their particular permutation apparently didn’t preclude shoplifting. They were foster kids of a poor couple who had inherited a big house in Alexander Heights. Their own kids were grown and they were good foster parents—not too on top of things, but not mean, either. Nina and Dan would always want to tag along with me if there were going to be eats at any point in the evening, mostly because they didn’t care for the Mexican food that their foster mom fixed. They generally ran on candy and oily popcorn they made themselves in a popcorn popper Nina got at a Christmas party that Social Services put on for the foster kids. Man, those two chunky punks in black loved that stupid popcorn popper! I knew that after closing time the leftover chicken at Chickn n Donuts would either end up in our mouths or in the trash, so eating it was like a community service. The cooks just wanted to head out, especially Muhammad, a Haitian guy who had family at home. “Hurry up, so I can mop you out.” Dan and I were carrying a twenty gallon trash can we had just emptied into the dumpster outside. “Dude, let me put in a liner. Then we’ll be outta your way.” I had met Nina and Dan at the mission, where I’d eat whenever I was down on my luck. If I helped with the kitchen cleanup, the cook would give me an extra dessert. Dan got wind of the deal and started to help out with the cleanup as well. After I had gotten to know Dan and noticed how weird he was, I mentioned it to Brother Bob, one of the cooks, and he said to me on the sly, “You think he’s an uber freak? Wait ’til you meet his sister.” That night at Chickn n Donuts the two of them worked hard in exchange for the free meal, and Muhammad was impressed. He asked them if they wanted to come around and do some dishwashing on the evening shift. “I’ll talk to the boss about it. Come by tomorrow before five. You’ll get minimum and a free dinner.” “What?” I said. “How come you never asked me if I wanted work here? I bring these two kids around and right away you’re puttin’ ’em on the payroll.” “Hey. I know you. You’d show up for t’ree days and then you’d be gone.” I couldn’t argue with that. "What do you think?" he asked Nina and Dan. “Sure, we’ll give it a try,” Dan said, and Nina nodded. “So what are you going to do with all the money you’ll be makin’ at your new job,” I asked them as we climbed a steep hill to get to their house in Alexander Heights. I didn’t want to walk the whole way with them because I knew they were going to be in trouble for staying out so late. “Give it to my foster mom,” Dan said. “And go to the movies,” Nina added. Man, those two were hopeless. Poor foster kids. We said, “Later,” and I started back down the hill. As I headed over to my sisters place, I thought to myself that Nina and Dan were just about the most clueless pair I had ever met. It started to sprinkle. I picked up the pace. And though I could scarcely admit it, even to myself, I was also thinking how much I really liked that pair of misfits. |
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