Chapter 8 Liberty Diner Pittsburgh Pennsylvania 2:30 PM Monday October 22, 2018 Debbie Novotny was seated at the first booth, from the front door, at the Liberty Diner drinking an iced tea. Deb had spent several hours trying to make the payroll come out the way it was supposed to end up. The young, blond, blue eyed, waiter that normally did the payroll, who usually finished in 30 minutes, had called in sick that morning so she had to fill in or there would be a Diner full of employees, pitching fits, the next Monday when their paychecks weren‘t ready. It was at times like this that Deb almost wished that she was still a waitress instead of the owner of the business. Deb had looked up when she heard the bell on the front door make it’s annoying noise. A small blonde woman, obviously out of place, had entered the diner and was looking around like a deer caught in headlights. “Can I help you?” Deb asked without getting out of the booth. This is going to involve Sunshine since there’s a definite family resemblance, she’s too old to be his missing mother so I’m guessing grandmother. “I don’t know, I hope so.” I’m so out of my depth, how could have I been so stupid for so many years? Maybe it’s been too many years and I should give up trying to find a son who didn’t want to be found. “Come over here and sit down. We can talk more in a more civilized manner that way. Jose bring the nice lady some hot tea.” It’ll be interesting to see her reaction to Jose and his dish cloth. “Thank you, as you can probably tell I’m not comfortable here but I don’t know what else to do.” I’ve accepted that my son and grandson are gay so why does it still bother me to see men making out in a diner? “What’re you trying to do, if I may ask?” I hope it’s a good thing since I’m too old to have to fight to protect another one of my boys, of course I’ll fight if I have to. “I’m trying to find my grandson, my investigator told me that he was working here a few weeks ago. I‘m hoping that he’s still working here and that I‘ll be able to talk to him.” I hope he’ll take me to talk with his father. Jose, the waiter on duty, brought the cup of hot tea and sat it on the table. The blonde woman couldn’t help herself and stared at the huge bulge in the young man’s pants as he left the table. “Don’t be embarrassed, that’s why the boy stuffs his pants with a rolled up dish cloth, he wants people to look. I’ve tried to tell him that everyone knows it’s fake but he won’t believe me. What I would give to be young and foolish again. Hi, I’m Debbie Novotny and I’m the owner of this Diner. I’ve worked here for almost 50 years so I know pretty much everyone who works or lives anywhere on Liberty Avenue. But I’m not going to tell you about anyone without knowing why you want to know.” But I know that in the end I’ll tell her everything I know about Sunshine and his Dad. “I’m Jennifer Taylor and I understand your position but my story is so embarrassing. But what the hell if I can admit to myself how stupid I’ve been for almost 20 years why should I have any problems telling a complete stranger my story?” That was easier than I expected. Both women just looked at each other and started giggling like school girls. “See it won’t be that hard.” She’s got the Sunshine smile. “I guess the easiest way to tell this story is to start at the beginning.” I don’t know why, but I trust this woman. “That usually works best.” It’s probably a good thing that Sunshine isn’t scheduled to work tonight. Of course he might try to sneak in with Gus since they won’t expect me to be here. It still surprises me that those two haven’t figured out a place where they can fuck. It’s so obvious that they can’t wait to get into each other’s pants but neither is willing to do so in anything but complete privacy. On the other hand they have no problem with hand jobs and blowjobs in semi private places. I don’t know why my family members forget that I eventually hear about everything that happens on Liberty. Both of them have hinted that I have a spare room or two but I’ve just played dense and pretended to not know what they were trying to ask. I don’t know what I’ll do if they ever get the courage to just ask me if I’ll let them fuck in my spare bedroom. Of course I’ve wondered who would top. My guess is that one will top and then immediately roll over and let the other one top. “I only found out a few months ago that I had a grandchild.” How could’ve I believed Craig’s stories about why Justin left New York. How could’ve I believed a word that bastard told me from the day we met? “How can that be? If I may interrupt your story.” Like I thought this is going to be very interesting. “My asshole of a husband had a stroke about 4 months ago and I was given access to his papers by his lawyer and I found out that he lied to me about what happened to our son.” Fucking asshole who ran our son off because he couldn’t admit to having a gay son and he never told me that there was a grandchild involved either. “Go on, this sounds interesting.” “My son, Justin, graduated from High School in 2001 and was going to start summer school at NYU that July. I had to go to my parent’s house in Maine since my mother was having surgery and my father couldn’t make himself a peanut butter sandwich if his life depended on it. Craig, my husband, always had an excuse for why Justin wasn’t home when I called and Justin was terrible about keeping his phone charged or not taking it with him when he left the house so I didn’t really realize how long it had been since I talked to him. Then my mother died and before I could get that settled my father had a stroke so I had to stay and take care of him. None of my sisters were willing to come and help. My father wasn’t the nicest man in Maine and I really didn’t blame them. Before I knew it a year had passed and in June of 2002 my father died and it took me another 6 weeks to straighten out his estate. When I finally got back to New York I found out that Justin was gone and had been since the summer before. My husband told me that he and our son had a fight and that Justin had just stormed out of the house and he hadn’t seen him since. When I asked him why he hadn’t told me he just laughed and said that I was too busy with my parents to have to deal with our faggot son running away from home. I should have left the bastard that night but I was too weak. I tried finding Justin but he had been gone too long and hadn’t been in contact with any of his friends. Craig insisted that he had no idea where Justin was but it had surprised him that Justin had stayed away from home after their fight. I had been worried that Craig would find out that Justin was gay, not that I knew for sure, and that the two would have a fight over it. I just never thought that Justin would leave and never contact me. So I didn’t do anything and before I knew it years had gone by and then Craig had his stroke and the lawyer gave me the key to his safety deposit box and I found out the truth about Justin leaving.” It feels good to finally tell someone this story even if it is a complete stranger. “Well don’t leave me hanging there, this is very interesting.” If his mother was worried about Sunshine’s dad being gay then how did Sunshine come about? “According to the papers I found in Craig’s box Justin didn’t run away from home Craig made him leave since he couldn‘t have the Taylor name ruined if people found out that Justin was gay. The bastard did set up a trust fund so that Justin had some money available to him every year. But the fund was set up so that I couldn’t use it to find my son. So after packing Craig off to a nursing home in central Nebraska, I found a private investigation firm and they started looking for my son.” God it felt good to finally tell someone the whole story. “Wait a minute, why did you send your husband to a nursing home in Nebraska?” This has been an amazing story. “After I found out what he did I certainly wasn’t going to keep him in our house with private nurses like he expected. I sent him to central Nebraska because I didn’t think any of his friends and business associates would bother going that far just to see Craig.” I was right about that too, not one of his dear friends has gone to see him. “Didn’t anyone ask why you were sending him to Nebraska?” This is my kind of lady. “Yes but I just told them I had family out there and that I didn’t plan on staying in New York and that it would be easier for everyone if he was out there. He gets excellent care but for some reason I haven’t found the time to go visit him and I forgot that my relatives moved from the Tri-Cites area to Omaha fifteen years ago.” Considering most New Yorkers think Omaha is a little town they wouldn’t even consider looking in a city like Kearney or Grand Island. “You know Jennifer you sound like my kind of gal. What did your investigator find out about your son?” “Part of the reason we couldn’t find Justin was that he never stayed anywhere much more than a year. He first went to Boston, then Philadelphia, DC, Atlanta, and then several more. From 2003 the investigator found that every mention of Justin also listed an Alex Taylor, we thought that maybe Justin had gotten married but then the records in Jackson Mississippi proved that it was a child since Justin enrolled Alex M Taylor in Kindergarten. According to every school that my grandson attended he was years ahead of his class and could’ve skipped many more years than the one he did skip. He also developed physically much faster than normal.” When I found out it amazed me that my little boy turned out to be such a good father. “If your investigator found out that your grandson was working here didn’t he find out where Sunshine’s Dad is working too?” This story is just getting more and more interesting. “Yes, but I thought that if I met my grandson first he would take me to my son. I’m afraid that if I show up at Justin’s house or workplace he’ll just run away again without giving me a chance to explain my stupidity. Sunshine what do you mean by that name?” “I haven’t met your son, he’s one of the few gays in Pittsburgh who’s never come to this Diner, but I’m guessing that he looks very much like his son since you look very much like your grandson. I call Alex Sunshine because the room lights up when he smiles. Didn’t your son ever give you a similar smile?” I wish I could let Gus and Alex into the Diner at the same time since that smile Alex gives when he sees Gus would lessen my electric bill but Gus needs to learn how to control his jealousy. “Then Alex did work here? Yes Justin had a beautiful smile and now that you say so Sunshine does seem like a very good name for him too.” I can’t get my hopes too high but I think I might be seeing my son in the near future. “Yes Alex works here, he started very soon after school started. I started him as a busboy but he was doing waiter work by the end of the first week. The only problem I’ve had with him is that I had to ban his boyfriend from the Diner any time Alex is here.” I hope she understands my reasons for that banning. Alex understands and I think Gus does but he just doesn’t want to admit that he shows his jealousy so easily. “Why did you ban his boyfriend? Is there something wrong with this boyfriend?” I hope Alex has better luck with love than Justin has had. “No, Gus is a wonderful young man. I’ve known him since the day he was born. He just gets so jealous about Sunshine it was hurting Alex’s tips. I mean if a guy so much as looked in the general direction of Alex Gus would give him a Kinney death glare.” It was funny to see some of those big mean Bears run out of the Diner with their tails between their legs just because an 18 year old twink gave them the Kinney glare. “You’ve lost me, what’s a Kinney death glare?” “Gus’ sperm donor is Brian Kinney who was the best friend of my son Michael. For some reason I’ve never been able to understand Brian signed his parental rights to Gus over to Melanie and hasn’t been in his son’s life since then. Melanie was Gus’ mother’s lover, at the time. Brian was so afraid that he would be as bad a father as his Dad had been that he didn’t want to risk hurting his son by being in his life. I tried to convince him that he was wrong but I couldn’t get through his thick skull. Anyway Brian can stare a hole through a wall and Gus is almost able to do so as well.” I hope that sounded more clear to her than it did to me. “It’s nice that my grandson has someone that loves him that much. My husband certainly wasn’t that jealous of me and he certainly wasn’t completely faithful either. I just hope that my son has had some love in his life.” Justin why didn’t you ever try to contact me? “Like I said earlier I’ve never met your son. He’s never been to the diner but from everything Sunshine has said to me about him he’s a wonderful guy and a great parent. But Alex does worry that there hasn‘t been a serious guy in his Dad‘s life that he can remember. He‘s also wondered how he came to be since he says his Dad is totally gay and he can’t understand how he ever got a girl pregnant. That as open has his Dad has always been with him that is one subject he’s never talked to Alex about.” There’s something fishy in the state of Pittsburgh but the hell if I can figure it out. “I wondered about that too when I found out that Alex existed. While I didn’t know for sure that Justin was gay, I knew that he was gay. If you know what I mean?” Why didn’t I just take the bull by the horns and tell Justin to not let his father find out about his sexuality until he was out of the house? “Oh yes I know, I actually told my son that he was gay.” That had to surprise her. “What?” “Yes, on his sixteenth birthday I told Michael that he was gay and that he didn’t have to be ashamed about it. Actually he knew but I told him so that he didn’t have to tell me. Brian, Gus’ dad, and my son were best friends from the day they met when they were 14 until the day Michael moved to Portland to be with his lover. Michael always lusted after Brian but Brian was too afraid of losing Mikey as a friend if they slept together to ever allow it to happen.” I never really understood why Brian was so afraid of losing Mikey but he was and I wasn’t going to do anything to cause Brian any more pain than he already had to deal with because of his asshole parents. “Do you see your son very often?” “Not as often as I would like since they live in Oregon but they try to come back here at least once a year.” “They?” “Yes Michael and David, Hank their son, well David’s son, Hank’s wife Marilynn and their two adorable twin girls. I never expected to have a grandson let alone great-granddaughters but it’s wonderful even if technically they’re step relatives.” I can never thank Hank enough when he told Mikey to quit acting like a stuck up housewife and come and see me once in a while. “Well it sounds like you have a great family even with a gay son. I just hope I can get back into my son’s life. I have to be able to explain to Justin what happened. I also want to meet my grandson and find out everything about him too.” I just hope that Justin doesn’t run away when he finds out I’m looking for him. “Tell you what Jennifer, I’ll talk to Sunshine about you and see if he wants to talk to you. You’re going to be staying in Pittsburgh for a while aren’t you? I’m sure that Alex will want to talk to you.” Alex wants a mother in his life so I’m sure he’ll be happy to finally have a grandmother. “I’ll stay as long as I have to. Can you recommend a good hotel?” “I can recommend the best; Casa Novotny.” Now that caught her by surprise. “I couldn’t stay with you, we hardly know each other. I wouldn’t want to put you out.” That certainly came from out of the blue. “It’s no problem, to tell you the truth I get lonely staying there all by myself. My husband died about 10 years ago. Carl and I had a good 10 years together before his heart attack. Sunshine’s scheduled to work tomorrow night so I’ll talk to him then. If we’re lucky then he’ll come home with me after his shift and get to know his grandmother.” Of course he might want to spend the time with his hazel eyed boyfriend. I suppose I could offer him the use of my spare room. But I doubt if he and Gus would be willing to fuck in the same house his grandmother is staying in. With her last thought firmly in her mind Deb gave Jennifer a sunshine smile of her own.