It was the fall of 1942. After spending pretty much all Saturday night binge watching random shows on Netflix, at around 10:30 pm, I felt hungry and decided to go out to eat. At that time I was living around Spring Street and 6th Avenue where nobody could tell the name of the neighborhood. It was a dark and cold fall evening. I put my suit and hat on and walked towards Greenwich Village to find a diner where the youngsters hadn’t turned into a club yet.
I was at a corner that today, I can not recall where exactly it was. All the shops around were already closed. There was no one on the street when I saw the diner with soft but bright light and yellow walls like a hospital inside, there were three people. Two sitting outside and one inside a triangle solid wood bar. A man who was wearing almost the same suit as mine. A red hair woman in a beautiful red dress. And one waiter in his white work uniform with a white hat that looks like the hats of the marines.
The diner had an odd entrance. From the corner, you could not see any door. All two side of the diner had large window displays like a fur shop. I thought they must be spending a lot of money to replace those windows every time a kid throw a red brick to check if there are any coins in the register. It was the 1940s, those incidents were quite common so the insurance companies wouldn’t cover the shops with large window displays.
I turned around the corner and walked in from the main door which the diner shared with the barbershop next to it. Then walked in the diner from another dark yellow door.
It was before Bloomberg. The guy was smoking inside. For a moment I thought I should leave my hat and jacket outside since I had taken them from dry cleaning that morning and I hate cigarette smell on my clothes. I decided to keep them on me and leave them on the little balcony I have in my apartment before going to bed. I wished no rain for the night.
The waiter was washing the dishes and talking with the guy. He had the facial expression as he was listening something painful. You know when you keep your teeth close and inhale to make that sound mix of wind and spit. The woman was bored and fidgeting. I sat on the other corner of the bar, had pulled my phone to check Instagram till the waiter finished his conversation and gave me the menu.
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