NIGHTSHIFT COOK AT THE KALAMAZOO KOFFEE KUP
Mark P. Furlong
[This true account was part of a 1982 Kalamazoo College English project]
The large neon coffee-cup-shaped sign lights up its part of Portage Street announcing Bill's Koffee Kup, the only late-night sign or life in this industrial area of downtown Kalamazoo. Inside, the Koffee Kup rules are clearly spelled out, threatening to bar anyone for the following reasons:
Too loud - Too drunk - Not cooperating - Stealing - Failure to pay Profanity - Destruction of property and or fixtures - Table hopping -Loitering
Sue, the night shift cook, leans against the bus stand drawing long slow drags on her cigarette. In her red polyester waitress blouse she seems as much a part or the decor as the fifty coffee cups which await a rush on their section on the stainless steel counter. The yellowed Coca-Cola clock that always runs fifteen minutes fast reads two forty-five.
Bill and Ed, two fortyish city workers, shuffle in the back door in greasy blue and green work clothes and skull caps and take their usual seats at table three. Bill calls out to Sue, “Hey singer, want your money?”
Sue lights up with a “Sure!” She bustles over to their table. She takes Bill's quarter palm up and asks, “What about you Ed? I gotta have money to play the jukebox.” Ed good-naturedly mumbles, “I’m giving you all my quarters to run that damn jukebox!” Don, a slightly drunk second shift worker, joins in, “I bet she's got an interest in that jukebox. She don’t care about the music, she just wants all them quarters.”
Sue triumphantly carries her quarters back to the jukebox and selects some of her favorite tunes. The atmosphere takes on a different tone as the air is filled with the country beat of Ronnie Milsap and Tammy Wynette.
Don, a thirty-year-old off-duty policeman dressed in hip-Californian-thirty-year old style, walks in with his blond mustache and receding hairline, past the ten red vinyl counter stools, to the last stool where he can sit and chat with Sue at her usual perch.
“You want your usual, Don?”
“No, just a cup of coffee tonight.”
“Oh-kee-doke.”
After their usual ''how was your day” etc., they cover several loosely connected topics such as TV commercials, scary movies, and various people. The topic of conversation becomes Ralph, another cop who frequents the Koffee Kup. Sue babbles, "He’d been coming in here in uniform for a while and we were getting along pretty good-- I mean he bought me a Christmas present, you know, we were kind of like friends, you know-- so anyway, he comes in here one time with jeans on-- I'd never seen him in jeans before-- so I walk up to his table-- Hiya Ralph, howya doin?-- and he just looks at me like I’m nuts or something-- I was heart-broken, you know, thinking-- What, doesn't he like me anymore?-- Anyway, he called later from the station to explain that he was undercover and wasn’t allowed to talk to me. Since then I just sort of act cool and pretend I don't know ‘em when cops come in undercover. But I'm glad all the cops come in here. We haven’t been robbed since I've been here-- three years-- and Lucille on the day shift has been here seven and she can't remember ever being robbed. Everyone knows about all the cops in here so nobody pulls any shit on us.”
Sue walks between the orange Formica customer counter and the stainless steel cooler/counter past the BunnOmatic coffee maker keeping two pots of coffee warm, past the orange and grapefruit juice dispensers, past the stainless steel shelf with bowling trophies, several pictures of race cars and race car drivers, a rack of Rothchild's roll candy, a rack of Bic disposable lighters, a plastic bin of combs, Alka-Seltzer and Bromo Seltzer displays, and a bright red Hav-a-Hank display, past the cooler with day-old looking slices of blueberry, apple, banana cream, chocolate cream and pecan pie, past the wide selection of cigars and pipe tobaccos, past the locally made BeMo potato chip display to the old mechanical type cash register which looks like it could be the original from when the Koffee Kup opened twenty-five years ago. She adds up Bill and Ed's check on the accompanying adding machine and punches the total into the register. As they part, Sue tells them, “You have a good evening now, okay?”
They nod “You too.”
Before Sue returns to her perch, Don saunters down the aisle to pay his check. After Don leaves, Sue comments, “I’m glad Don comes in here or I wouldn't make any money'' referring to the tip he left. ''But no, I like talking to Don because he's happily married and I got nothing to worry about.
A few stools down from where Don was sitting sits Randy, a lonely twenty-nine year old looking for someone to talk to. Sue and Sharon, the waitress, don't seem interested in his story which they've heard before, so he tells it to the college kid eating bean soup next to him. Randy's light blue eyes seek an approving look or a nod and he smiles and laughs nervously when he receives one.
He begins, “I spent over a hundred dollars today…”
“Oh, on what?”
“You know, plates for my car, old speeding tickets and then I had to give money to my girlfriend—but I owe so much money…”
“Oh, to who?”
“Mostly to the courts…”
“For what?
“I owe about $30,000 in court costs and lots of hospital bills, like
$2,800, my knee got infected over at the county jail so I had to go to Bronson
to have it taken care of—a lawyer I know wants me to sue the county, but I
can’t afford the court costs—and I got no job—They canned me when I got
thrown in jail for drunk driving. The
courts made me see a psychiatrist and won’t let me see my fiancée.
She lives on the North Side, she’s black—I get along better with
blacks than with my own kind—I’ve never been robbed up on the North Side
because I know a lot of them—but I’ve been mugged four times here in
Washington Square where I live. Can
I have another cup of coffee?”
“I’ll have to charge you for this one.”
“Let me see if I got it first.”
Randy takes out a handful of nickels and pennies and carefully counts to find that he barely has the thirty-five cents he needs and Sharon pours him another cup.
While Randy sips his coffee, Sue explains why the Koffee Kup regulars keep coming back. "This place is different. Most of these people have been coming in for years. Anybody likes it when you say 'Hey Joe, how ya doin? You want your usual?' I mean they come in for coffee to start the day—they could get coffee at home-- so I bullshit with them a little bit, laugh a little and it makes their day-- they come back. People know you can get a couple laughs here. It's free entertainment and it's always here.
''I guess basically people are lonely, all they want is somebody to listen to them. Everyone who comes in here has a story-- just bring your Puffs with you every night. People spill their guts without us asking for it. People need somebody to listen and it's easier when you don't know somebody because you're not worried about being judged. They're not looking for an answer, it's more or a sounding board.”
Sue turns around and cracks a couple eggs on the grill for Fred the trucker who always orders scrambled eggs. She turns back for a moment, pointing to the mess of greasy eggs and asks, “Why would anybody want these eggs? There must be some reason they come in.”
She laughs and slaps some American fries on the back center of the grill. She is in control of all the action on the grill and waves her arms like a conductor in front of a symphony. She flips the burger in the right front corner with a spzzzz of hot grease. 'The orders are quickly assembled, put onto plates and set on the waitress stand.
Sue returns to her spot and resumes. “Basically the world is pathetic.” She laughs and continues in a more serious way. “Like that guy who tied up that sixteen year old girl for four months and never let her out. I mean what happened to that guy to give him that much hate? People are too quick to judge-- There must be a reason. People didn't take time to listen or say 'I love you'.'
She pours herself another cup of coffee, takes a deep drag off her cigarette and blows the smoke high into the air.
“That’s the problem with working eleven to seven, I drink too much coffee and smoke too much.”
There is a pause as she takes another drag off her cigarette.
“There are guys who come in here drunker than skunks and they fall asleep in their food and I got to lift their heads up off their plates. I just laugh. But I don’t take any shit from anyone. If somebody is acting like an asshole, I say ‘Hey! you're acting like an asshole!’ and usually they think about it for a minute and realize I'm right and stop acting like an asshole.”
Fred the trucker agrees, ''Yeah, I suppose at one time or another, Sue told ‘em all to go to hell.”
Sue adds, “Either I do that or else I treat 'em nice or just took at ' em and laugh-- that really gets 'em.
“We get fights here too, but I just laugh. One time these two guys were getting into it over at table one, right by the window. These two women at the next table-- they were big women-- I mean they were Two-Ton-Tillies-- pick up their plates and stand over there by the cash register and keep eating. I couldn’t believe it. They couldn't just move, they had to stand there eating, watching these two guys fight.
''Or guys come in here with the S.O.S., you know, the Same Old Stuff, pledging their love 'Oh baby I love you, you're the only one' and they'll come in the next night with another woman and say the same thing. And they know we know what they're up to and they just give us a look like 'You’d better not say anything', So I go over to the jukebox and play 'Who's Cheating- Who' and just laugh at 'em and think ‘you’re so stupid.
“I see a lot of ugly stuff here too. There are lots of hookers who come in. Like these two girls over there, one of them is only eighteen. It’s kind of sad. And there’s another one, a big black girl who works alone. She comes in and is always telling us about her tricks. It’s sad.
“I learn a lot about people working here. People tell me sometimes, ‘You’re a good waitress, you should work at a good restaurant.’ But I wouldn’t make it at Brown Derby or even Denny’s. I don’t like fake plastic people who are all worried what other people think. They won’t give themselves a chance. I just want to ask them, ‘Why don’t you do what you want to do?
“But all types come in here—bums, winos, businessmen who are drunk—I’ve been proposed to 15,000 times for marriage.
“I like people. I enjoy people and conversation… Yeah, this is a good job.”
As Fred finishes his meal he shouts, “Hey Sue, you got any Tootsie Rolls yet?”
“You ate ‘em all Fred.”
“You mean you don’t have any Tootsie Rolls—that’s the only reason I come I here.”
“I told you, you ate ‘em all, what are we supposed to do with you eating ‘em all?”
Fred pays his check with a smile despite the absence of Tootsie Rolls. As he walks out the door, Sue winks and bids him, “Don’t run into nothing on the way home.”
Sue returns to her resting place at the bus stand and the Koffee Kup awaits the morning rush that comes with the sunrise.