Breakfast

Soft-white fluorescents lit the Egg Nest Diner, which had only a few tables where customers could sit comfortably in the summer. It was hot, and the dining room’s recently renovated air conditioning blew cold from the corners to compensate for the outdated space’s poor circulation. People who came in dressed for the outdoor heat and were unfortunate enough to be seated near a fan would eat their meals with their legs tightly crossed for warmth, rushing to finish their eggs before the food cooled. 

The restaurant thrived off weekend crowds – Saturday night drunks and Sunday morning churchgoers – but it served a steady stream of loyal locals and truckers throughout the week. In the rush hours of 4 a.m. to noon, people would filter through the tables to buy a breakfast they could make in minutes and pancakes they could bake from a box. It would take about half an hour into the business day for the smells of batter, bacon, and coffee grounds to cover that of the dining room’s teal-colored carpet, which had absorbed decades of cigarette smoke, spills, and shoe soles.

Three men sat in one of the comfortable booths, neither too cold nor too hot. Two of them wore tailored suits over their tall frames, which were still scrawny from youth. Both had fair hair, though one’s was slightly thinner. His shoulders slouched, and the skin under his eyes sagged slightly under an often wrinkled forehead. Across from him, the other man sat with his back noticeably straight. His wide, kind eyes and high cheekbones angled sharply into a small mouth. 

To his left, the third man sat tall, bony neck bent forward under his head of combed, sporadic strands of grey hair. His face was aged with spots, marks, and pores resembling the texture of a dry sponge. His nose was his most prominent feature, as it concaved deeply on the sides and then hooked downward toward his lips. He wore a maroon button-down loosely tucked into black pants. 

The three had spoken little before a waitress approached and took their orders. The old man watched her as she walked away from their table toward the kitchen.

“How’d you ask for my eggs?” he said, abruptly.

“Soft-boiled,” said the straight-sitting young man next to him. 

“Oh,” said the old man. “Well, I might need them fried.”

“You’ve always gotten them soft-boiled, dad.”

“Hm,” his father squinted his eyes. “Well, I’m not sure about that one.”

Recently, the father had been saying “I’m not sure about that one” quite often. Whenever he “wasn’t sure,” he furrowed his brows, bushy and unkept, down into his narrow eyes, leveling his words so they cast uncertainty into whoever he was speaking to.

“He’s not sure about his eggs anymore David,” the tired one said from across the table, direct and cold, not looking at the old man. Their table jetted from the eastern wall of the diner, which was lined with large windows that let the rays of a still-rising sun warm the auburn leather benches.

David looked down at the table and opened his mouth as if to speak, though he stayed quiet. The waitress passed and set three hot mugs of coffee on the table, and their steam rose and dissolved fast in the sunlight.

David’s father picked up the coffee in front of him, held it under his nose, and set it back down.

“I wish it wasn’t so hot,” he said. “Where’s Ansel?”

 “He lives at the monastery now,” David said. 

“Really? Hm. Well, he always liked religion.”

The third, youngest brother had moved to the monastery permanently a year prior after routinely visiting the monks while living with the old man. It was no secret he had moved, and he visited his father frequently.

“Anyway,” the old man said abruptly, “I’m not too hungry.”

“You should eat, dad,” David said, not lifting his eyes, which were set on the handle of his mug.

“When was the last time he was hungry?” asked the tired one, addressing his brother in a quiet, toneless voice that could hardly be discerned over the diner’s clinks of silverware and murmuring of conversations. David looked back at him for a moment, then at his father, who had turned to watch a family of four sit down at a table across the restaurant. The tired one started speaking again.

“Ansel told me the other day that when he was visiting him – this happened just the other day – he took him to the steakhouse downtown. And while they were waiting for the food, dad just stood up and walked out of the building. Without saying anything. Ansel left some cash on the table and ran out after him, and found him walking down the street. When he asked him what was wrong, he said they were taking too long, and he wasn’t hungry.”

Listening to the story, David kept his eyes down on his coffee. A few minutes passed, and the coffee’s steam slowed. The food came – two omelets and one plate of three, soft-boiled eggs still in their shell.  The old man studied his meal and furrowed his eyebrows. He cautiously grabbed one egg and tapped it firmly against the table to crack the shell, then started to start slowly peel it off.

“What I mean to say is,” the tired-eyed one started speaking to his brother again in the same, toneless voice, “it’s not just his appetite that’s gone. It’s not worth your money – and you know I won’t help pay for it – to fix his stomach when in a few months he might forget to chew.”

“You don’t know he won’t chew,” David said solemnly. “Right now, when he doesn’t eat, and when he hardly drinks, his mind can’t be expected to work right. The surgery could fix both.”

“It’s only been six months since I visited last,” the tired one said, absently glancing at his watch, as one naturally does when they mention the time and want a distraction from an unavoidable difficult conversation. He looked out the window and continued to speak. 

“Six months ago he wasn’t eating much either, and you told me then that the doctor said he was fine – he was normal. He played cards and joked a lot with Ansel. I remember. He laughed. Six months, and now, that man is gone. Another few months and… surgery or not–”

The tired one’s thought was interrupted – the table suddenly shook as their father let out a quiet cry. Both sons looked over at him. On the old man’s thumb that had been peeling the egg, a small trickle of blood was slowly forming on the wrinkled skin. 

“This damned shell,” the old man said, shaking his head and casting his eyes to the floor.

“Dad!” David took the half-deshelled egg from his father, grabbed the cut hand, and pressed a napkin against the wounded thumb.

“This is why,” the old man said, still watching the floor.

“What?”

“This is why I wanted fried.”

“This is not why you wanted fried. This has never happened before.”

The tired brother had taken a few bites of his omelet, and he now looked down at the small pile of shells left on his father’s plate next to the three eggs.

“There’s also the inheritance; you need it,” he said to his brother.

The old man drew his hand sharply from David, who then placed the slightly bloody napkin into his suit pocket.

“Soft-boiled is a waste of money too,” his father said. “Half the egg drips out everywhere.”

This statement was especially out of character coming from the old man, who had spent his life eating nearly raw soft-boiled eggs, proudly boasting how he could do so without letting a drop of yolk touch the plate. David’s wide eyes stared at his father, and for a second, saw only a wrinkled face whose body had outlived its mind and was no longer representative of the confused person inside. He stuttered to speak.

“The same thing happens with fried eggs, dad,” was all he managed to say.

“Well I… but with fried eggs you could cook it more, so the yolk gets firm. Or you could use some toast to wipe your plate,” the old man spoke loud now in defense. His brows were furrowed deep so that his eyes appeared shut. Of course, one could also cook a soft-boiled egg longer and achieve the same effect, but his son did not want to press the argument.

“You should talk quieter,” David said.

The room had gotten silent, as a large family who had contributed greatly to the background noise had just walked out the front door. The air conditioners seemed to hum louder from their cold corners.

“Eggs are a waste of time anyway,” the old man said, starting to pick up and peel the shell again. 

“A waste of time,” the tired one mumbled.

“They take 10 minutes to get here and five minutes to go cold. I’m not hungry anyway.”

“Eat the eggs, dad,” David said.

“I don’t want to,” his father had stopped peeling the shell again and set the egg on his plate, crossing his arms like a child. “And I’m not going to pay for it either.”

“I was always going to pay for it, dad.”

“It’s a waste. Don’t pay for anything.”

“Don’t pay for anything,” the tired-eyed brother echoed, forking a bell pepper from his omelet.

David looked down again at the table.

“I’ll pay,” he said. “I have to.”

“For how long David?” The tired one spoke with reserved animation now. “What are you holding out for? I’m surprised you took his keys – that was good. You put the car on the market, right? You haven’t? Put the car on the market, David. He won’t need it again.” 

His brother opened his mouth to protest but stopped before speaking. The tired one continued.

“He won’t need it again, David.” The tired one turned to a passing waitress. “Can we get the check?”  

“A waste,” the old man said. “I never asked for the eggs.”

“He never asked for the eggs,” the tired one stared at his brother. “But you ordered them.”

David looked up at his brother, then down at the blood-stained napkin in his suit pocket, then over at his father, whose shaky hands were still folded against his maroon shirt. He looked down at the soft-boiled eggs that the workers had cooked, that he would pay for, that would go uneaten. He wished he hadn’t suggested the brunch, and that he hadn’t driven his father to their old diner. He wished he hadn’t mentioned the possible surgery to his brother, and that his brother hadn’t visited to check on their father, who wouldn’t eat, couldn’t peel an egg, and couldn’t remember that his son was a monk. The son who saw their father aging faster than anyone else did, and knew he didn’t want to watch the rest. Not without religion, at least.

“I should’ve joined him,” David thought. “But then again, I’d have to adjust to monk food. They don’t have omelets. That’s a lot to sacrifice.”

It felt good to joke with himself. He hadn’t touched his food, and he was reminded that the only reason he liked omelets at all was because of this diner. There were the old times when his father would take him and his brothers out to brunch when they were boys, and they’d sit in the only comfortable booth.

His father shifted in his seat and crossed his legs awkwardly under the table. 

“I told you I wasn't hungry anyway,” he said, looking away across the restaurant at the family of four. Even from behind, the outer hairs of his eyebrows could be seen raised high on his forehead. 

“Don’t pay for the surgery, David,” the tired son stared at his brother, speaking in a softer tone. “It won’t bring him back to anything.”

They sat silent again. The air conditioners blew against their fair hair and cooling eggs. A ding from the entryway welcomed another family. The smell of hot syrup followed a waitress who walked by with a carafe of coffee. A distant pot clanged from the kitchen. The sun was above the window now, but still showed dust spiraling in the air around their omelets. This wasn’t the last time the father had eaten brunch with his sons; this was the only time the old man had visited the diner with the brothers.

David breathed a long sigh and brushed his hand across his head, holding it at the back of his neck. With his other hand, he pulled a wad of cash from his pocket and counted out the money for the food. His father stood up.

“Okay!” the old man smiled. “Thanks for getting me to breakfast, boys.” 

For a moment, his eyes lit up as he smiled and put his hands on his stomach as if he had just finished a meal. The tired one’s face went expressionless again, and he yawned and looked at his watch as he moved to leave. The old man watched his tired son stand up and shake his hand. The son kept his head down on the old man’s shirt and mumbled goodbye.

David’s eyes followed his brother out of the diner, then he stood up and smiled at the old man. His father had a doctor’s appointment later that hour, and David anticipated that he would persist in going for the whole drive there – a new routine. The old man had grown increasingly annoyed by the frequent consultations.

“Well,” David thought as he sighed. “It’ll be the last one then.”