Fogged Windows

There was a gravelly sound as Jill scooped the ice into a ball and dropped it into the paper cone. She and her three friends worked in concert, each one contributing their hands and eyes to the work. They rotated throughout the day so that no one got tired of their task. Right now Jill was working the scoop, taking the ice, running it through the grater, and fitting her hand around the metal half-sphere that molded the ice into shape so it would fit in the Ice Hut's trademark paper-cones.

She'd pass the cone on to the next girl in line, the youngest of them, Mary, who stood out in the group of girls by being the shortest and the only one with dark hair. If Mary was behind, or simply busy, Jill would drop the snow cone into a plastic rack that was filled with three rows of holes to stand the cones up. Kristine was working the register, the natural skill that helped her breeze through Algebra class let her work quickly. She could assist Mary in squeezing out the syrup during the register's downtime. When Mary left early to go to her confirmation class at church, things would be a bit harder, but the three girls were working together smoothly now.

The three had to work quicker than ever before since Frank had installed a drive-through window on the side of the little enclosed kiosk. In the middle of the parking lot there were plenty of people driving cars who were willing to stop by and get a snow cone as long as they didn't have to step out of their air-conditioned cars and into the sticky Texas heat.  

Thankfully, the cooling was turned up in the Ice Hut even higher then it was in the cars outside, the difference in temperature fogging up the windows. That was why Jill didn't notice the figure standing outside.

"Hey Jill," Kristine looked up from the register and pointed at the silhouette pacing in front of the Ice Hut. "Isn't that your mom?"

Jill shot a look over her shoulder and shrugged before turning her attention back to the scoop. There was no one in the store but the line of cars outside the Hut was getting so long that one of the surrounding store owners might complain if they didn't hurry it up. "I don't know. Could be."

Mary turned around to take a look. Jill's mom was friends with all of the girls and she drove them home at closing time. Mary squinted. "It sure looks like it's your mom, why's she out there but not in here?"

Jill shoveled another sphere of crushed ice into a cone, dropping it at the end of an entire row of filled cones in the rack. "Mary, we need to keep the cones going out. You're really behind. Come on." Having entered her teens three years ago last mont, Jill wasn't sure if she was supposed to get excited about seeing her mom anymore, even if Mary was. Kristine, two years younger, was looking over at her and she didn't want to look like a kid.

Jill turned and smiled at Kristine.

"Hey Kris, why don't you help Mary out with the syrup?"

Kristine froze for a moment. She was the youngest in the grade and often felt like some social protocol restricted her ability to talk with anyone else. Kris had only started hanging out in Jill's circle when they both began working at the Ice Hut. Before that, Jill hadn't even noticed her, even though they were both in the choir. She shrugged slightly, smiled back, and walked over to the wall next to Jill where the syrups were.

"What are the next two orders?"

Jill paused and bit her upper lip, rolling her eyes slightly up as if the answer was painted where the wall met the ceiling. She let Kris wait a little.

"Ummmm," she cut herself short, her speech teacher always marked her down for adding 'ummms' to the beginning of her sentences. "Blue and pineapple."

Kris turned back to grab the stool from where Mary had left it when she had used the register. She shoved it up against the wall and pulled Pineapple down from the top shelf. Then she took the bright blue bottle off the middle shelf, checking to make sure it was blue and not blueberry, two completely different flavors. Mary had the crooked-topped bottle with strawberry in it and was squeezing out the syrup into a large cone.

The chime sounded as the door opened.

The three girls all looked up as Jill's mom came in, looking as composed as only someone who had lived their entire life in Texas heat could on a day like this. Only a year ago, Jill would have jumped out to giver her mom a hug. Now she didn't want to look like a kid in front of Kristine. She had even considered calling her mom Judy, her first name, to sound more adult, but  after the pastor gave an hour-long sermon on 'respecting out elders' she thought better of it.

"Hey mom."

Jill only glanced over her shoulder to greet her mother, not stopping the process of grinding the ice.

Mary, on the other hand, dropped the cone she was working on back into the rack and ducked under the gate to run up and give Jill's mom a hug.

"Hi Mrs. Warren!"

"Hey Mary," Jill's mom crouched to return Mary's hug.

"Hi, Jill, Kris," Mrs Warren waved half-heartedly, with a concerned look in her eyes.

Mary had already forgotten about the silhouette at the window, now back to flavoring the snow cones, but Jill and Kris were both wondering why Jill's mom had taken so long to come in.

"What are you doing here mom? Do you want a snow cone?" Jill was often purposefully passive-aggressive, just to irritate her mother.

"No, I'm fine without a snow cone honey," Judy Warren stood back up. Though she wasn't particularly tall, she was still, if only barely, taller then her daughter.

Kris was standing at the register and was the only one facing forward. She was surprised to see Jill's mom open her mouth to say something and then stop.

"How are you girls doing?" Mrs. Warren said instead.

"Busy," replied Jill.

"Well, don't overwork, you aren't Whataburger."

"There are a lot of people," Jill replied with a wash of annoyance. "We've got to get to them all."

There was a pause and Kris shifted uncomfortably. Mary kept squeezing syrup into the ice cones, getting spray on the rack and on her hands, which were slowly turning blue.

"Well Mom," Jill put down the ice scoop, Mary was pretty behind anyway, and turned to look fully at her mother. "Why are you here? We've got a lot of work to do and we don't need to be watched over, you know." She was rewarded with a spasm of emotion over her mother's features.

"Jill-" Judy bit her lip and turned away, blinking rapidly.

Jill was suddenly worried.

"What's going on mom?"

She saw her mother droop a bit. Jill lifted the gate and walked out from behind the counter, letting it come down with a heavy click.

"Mom?"

"Girls, why don't you all come over here?"

The other two girls walked out, following in Jill's path. Mary abandoned the cones on the rack and left the squeeze-bottle full of syrup, ducking under the counter. Kristine, who had been watching Jill, came out from behind the register.

Mrs. Warren knelt down, just short of the blue and white tiled floor.

"Something happened this morning," Jill's mom began.

"What?" Mary asked.

Jill's mom licked her lips and, for a half-second, bit down on her upper lip.

"Girls, I've just come from the hospital. Frank was in an accident."

The girls all looked at each other, brown meeting blue meeting brown, stifling down gasps. All of their eyes were wide.

"He was in a motorcycle accident."

Frank had taken a sort of perverse pride in the faded green Honda motorcycle he traded his car in for when gas prices started becoming high. He wasn't the sort of person who would ride a motorcycle and took pleasure in doing it anyway.

"What happened to him?" Kristine asked.

Well, he was driving and he fell. They're not sure why. He was hurt and they took him to the hospital," she tried to keep her voice somewhat light, trying to reassure the girls with her tone. "He was in pretty bad shape."

There was a collective breath from Mrs. Warren and all three girls.

"He may be in the hospital for a long time."

Mary looked like she was about to cry. Judy Warren did too. Kristine was just in shock and Jill wasn't sure what to do.

"I'm not sure what's going to happen to the Ice Hut," Mrs. Warren said, trying to shift the topic slightly." She looked around the Ice Hut and Jill could see that she was on the edige of tears.

"We'll keep it going," Jill decided. Her mom looked up at her from bent knees.

"Jill put her arms around her mother and squeezed her tight. The other two girls joined hands and huddled together over Judy Warren.

Jill squeezed her mother tight. "We're going to keep it going. Everything is going to be fine."

"Everything is going to be fine, her mom repeated after her.

Jill brought the other two girls tighter around her mother and nodded.