Coffee Shop Days
In a follow-up essay to his earlier piece, "Supper at Scribners," Michael A. Gonzales recalls his time in the mid-80s working at Miss Brooks, a cafe in midtown Manhattan.
*This essay is a follow-up to the author’s earlier essay, “Supper at Scribners,” published last November.
While delivering packages in 1984 for Archer Courier Service in Manhattan, I patronized a cafe called Miss Brooks. Located on the corner of 56th Street and 6th Avenue, its staff wore green t-shirts with the shop’s name on the left breast pocket, and the smell of coffee wafting through the shop reminded me of when I was a boy returning home from church on Sunday mornings as grandma’s tin percolator released that splendid aroma throughout our Harlem apartment.
One evening, tired of trooping through the city as a messenger, I decided to try getting a job at Miss Brooks. I was 21-year-old barely published writer who desperately needed a full-time gig after dropping out of college. I approached the blonde cashier, who was one of the managers. She introduced herself as Tina. After filling-out the application, I was hired minutes later.
Tina asked, “Can you start next Monday?”
“Yes, of course,” I replied.
She assigned me the 4 pm to 12 am shift with Thursdays and Fridays off; I was expected to be at work every weekend morning at 8 AM.
Come Monday, Tina introduced me to some of the staff including lanky Xavier, the gay short order cook; Amber, a full-figured black Goth and Ajay, an Indian actor who studied at HB Studios. That first day Ajay stared poison darts at me. He had been the only straight guy working there and thought I might be a threat. We eventually became friends, but in the beginning there was much disdain and sarcasm coming from him.
Tina taught me the basics of serving, how to place the hot food orders (burgers, omelets, stir-fries) with Xavier, as opposed to fixing the cold salads (chef, garden, tuna) myself. We served cafeteria style, but if the wait was too long we brought items to the tables. “Would you like me to serve it to you raw?” Xavier snapped if a customer tried to rush him.
One evening, tired of trooping through the city as a messenger, I decided to try getting a job at Miss Brooks. I was 21-year-old barely published writer who desperately needed a full-time gig after dropping out of college.
My first week I learned how to work the grill, operate the dishwasher, swing a mop and refill the coffee urn. The owner, Sandy Brooks, a former McDonald’s executive, was demanding, but not mean. She owned three locations and before I quit a year later, I worked in them all.
Throughout the day classical music played, but seconds after closing, Tina switched to WLIR, the new wave station out of Long Island that played Culture Club, Duran Duran, Eurythmics and other U.K. synthesizer bands as well as a few Americans, including Talking Heads, Prince and R.E.M.
While cleaning-up the first night, Tina asked, “Do you want to go out with us for drinks?”
“Is it someone’s birthday?” I asked.
Tina laughed. “We go out for drinks every night, to a place on on 54th Street.”
With its green neon sign, Blarney Stone was difficult to miss. The bartenders talked with Irish accents, drinks were cheap and the jukebox was well-stocked. After midnight the usual blue-collar crowd was gone and we had the place to ourselves. Xavier put quarters in the juke and played Luther Vandross’ version of “A House is Not a Home.” It might’ve been a tribute to a lost lover or dead mother, but no visit passed without him playing that maudlin song.
Throughout the day classical music played, but seconds after closing, Tina switched to WLIR, the new wave station out of Long Island that played Culture Club, Duran Duran, Eurythmics and other U.K. synthesizer bands as well as a few Americans, including Talking Heads, Prince and R.E.M.
Everyone at the table lit a cigarette. (Back then bar customers could smoke inside, and we all lit up cigarettes.) Tina bought the first round with cash she proudly proclaimed stolen from the register. I ordered Jack Daniels and Coke, which became my ususal. After a couple of vodkas, buzzed Tina told us tales about her native Yugoslavia. “My family moved to Astoria when I was a little girl,” she recalled, “but I still have family over there.”
One night Brit singer Joe Cocker was sitting at the bar when we came in. A few days before I’d seen him on TV performing “You Are So Beautiful” with Patti Labelle. “I thought Patti was going to blow you away, but you held your own,” I said, shaking his hand. “Very kind of you, mate,” Cocker replied. A few midnights later, the same bartender wouldn’t serve a man because he spoke with what he thought was a British accent. I suppose the only Englishman he liked was Joe Cocker. “But, I’m Australian,” the man insisted.
Xavier and I lived a block away from one another, so we usually rode uptown together on the D train. He rented a room on 151st Street between Broadway and Amsterdam. Sometimes I went to his place and smoked a joint. Raised around Mom’s gay friends, I didn’t have any issue with Xavier’s sexuality. Originally from the Bronx, he was a nice guy who had little fashion sense, often dressing in dirty sneakers and too big jeans. He liked to talk, but revealed very little about himself.
I soon became best friends with another co-worker, Amber, who’d moved to town a few months before from Detroit. A light-skinned, voluptuous woman, her dad was a political big shot in the Motor City and Amber was a hard drinking Wayne State graduate who resembled Siouxsie Sioux and had forgotten everything she’d learned during her debutante years.
One night Brit singer Joe Cocker was sitting at the bar when we came in. A few days before I’d seen him on TV performing “You Are So Beautiful” with Patti Labelle. “I thought Patti was going to blow you away, but you held your own,” I said, shaking his hand. “Very kind of you, mate,” Cocker replied.
That first Saturday after she arrived, we worked the morning shift together. There was a steady flow of customers, but the highlight was when singer Tony Bennett walked through the door. I recognized Mr. “I Left My Heart in San Francisco” the moment he stepped inside. He smiled when I told him my mom was a fan.
“Can I get an autograph for her?”
“Of course,” Bennett said. I passed him a pen and a napkin. “What’s her name?”
“Frances.” He wrote a sweet message and passed the signed napkin back. Famous people came through Miss Brooks regularly, including singer Roberta Flack and actor Anthony Michael Hall, but Bennett was the only one I bothered. After giving the crooner his coffee, I returned to the chaos of regular people.
When we got off work, Amber asked, “Want to hang-out before you go home?”
“Sure,” I said. “I’m down.”
She lived on 97th Street and Columbus Avenue. We’d put our coins together and bought Old Grand-Dad Bourbon and a liter of Coke. With two glasses, a bucket of ice and the bottle, we sat in her bedroom as Billie Holiday sang in the background. Steadily drinking, we discovered that we were both doomed romantics who enjoyed reading, writing and behaving badly.
Hanging out with Amber marked a continuation of my habit of befriending women with messy lives. At work, she began messing around with Ajay. They might snip at one another for the shift or sneak away to God only knows. He also had a skinny blonde girlfriend who sometimes popped in.
There was a steady flow of customers, but the highlight was when singer Tony Bennett walked through the door. I recognized Mr. “I Left My Heart in San Francisco” the moment he stepped inside. He smiled when I told him my mom was a fan…“Can I get an autograph for her?”…“Of course,” Bennett said.
While the neighborhood where Miss Brooks was located was affluent, I was surprised by the prostitutes that walked the block after dark. On chilly nights they came inside for warmth and hot drinks. There was one beautiful sad faced Black woman who came in daily. She was polite, but always looked as though she might start crying. After ordering, she’d sit staring into space between coffee sips. I wondered what memories haunted her, but we never spoke beyond counter pleasantries.
One Sunday after work, Xavier and I were walking past Carnegie Hall on the way to the subway when we were stopped by two white cops. They jumped out of their ride like Starsky & Hutch, flashed badges, and one of them pushed Xavier against the wall. I wore a long black raincoat and had my hands in the pockets. “Take your hands out,” the cop ordered, “slowly.” I did as instructed.
“Why did you stop us?”
“We got a report that two Black guys stole a car.”
“If we stole a car wouldn’t we be driving?”
“Oh, you’re a smartass.”
“Look, officer,” Xavier screamed, “we work around the corner. We can take you back there and show you our time cards.” The cop looked at me, snickered and told his partner to release Xavier. After they drove away, both X and I lit cigarettes. “Damn, I thought they were going to arrest us.”
“For what?”
“Since when do they need a reason?”
***
As an expert eavesdropper, I relished the conversations of Miss Brooks’ patrons including a young white couple who were regulars. They passionatey discussed the art they’d seen at MoMa. The woman’s thin fingers were always spotted with paint. Her soft-spoken husband was always dressed in a suit. Often I noticed scratches on his hands and face. Their constant companion was a wild-haired Einstein lookalike. Sometimes when he came in alone I saw him scribbling madly in a tiny notebook while exhaling smoke from his Gitanes.
The Einstein look-alike was another regular, Arie Goldberg, a New York intellectual who had gone to Bronx Science High School and earned an English degree from City College. He’d developed a crush on Amber, who had zero interest. Taking a break one day, I sat in the dining room reading The Postman Always Rings Twice, a recent purchase from the Mysterous Bookshop up the block, when Arie interrupted.
“I noticed you always have an interesting book.”
“I’m a print junkie,” I said. “I can’t pass a bookstore without buying something.” Arie laughed and introduced himself officially. He, too, was a writer. Though I suspected Arie became friends with me to get close to Amber, he surprised me by extending a dinner invitation. “Bring some white wine; I’ll make pasta with clam sauce.”
One Sunday after work, Xavier and I were walking past Carnegie Hall on the way to the subway when we were stopped by two white cops. They jumped out of their ride like Starsky & Hutch, flashed badges, and one of them pushed Xavier against the wall. I wore a long black raincoat and had my hands in the pockets.
Days later, I arrived at 314 West 49th Street and went up to his fourth floor apartment. It was a bohemian pad with a creeping cat and shelves of books. Arie had a 1950s style couch in the living room and a Formica kitchen table and chairs pushed against the wall. “Whenever I have company, I have them come early, because there’s a disco on the other side of the wall.”
“A disco?”
“Didn’t you see the Better Days sign? They start playing music at eight. They soundproofed the walls, but I can still hear it.” Arie’s eyes gleamed when I mentioned that author Samuel R. Delany was an influence. “I went to Science with him,” Arie said. He got up and looked through the bookshelf until finally finding the high school lit-mag, Dynamo, that had published Delany’s first short story “Salt” in 1960.
“What’s up with that art couple you hang out with?”
Arie laughed. “They’re both painters. She’s rich and kind of crazy. She beats him.”
“Really?”
“Yes. She gets jealous, thinking someone likes his work more. He’s the real artist, but she has all the money.”
***
Days later Amber invited me to her new apartment. She’d relocated to 48th Street between 9th and 10th Avenue, across the street from Hell’s Kitchen Park. Crack had recently crash-landed in the city, and in the park a few heads sparked glass pipes. Amber greeted me warmly. She went into the kitchen and returned with water glasses filled with Old Grand Dad and ginger ale. We turned off the lights and spent the next hour puffing Newports and getting sloughed.
“You know Arie really likes you,” I said.
“You a pimp now?”
“Why you gotta talk like that? I’m just saying.”
“Arie creeps me out, so…no,” she said. “I’m leaving Miss Brooks soon anyway. I’m going to train to become a dominatrix.”
“Get out of here.”
“For real. There’s a lot of money to be made doing that.”
“I got enough ass whippings as I child. I’ll let the rich white guys have that.”
***
In the spring of 1985, Tina quit and was replaced by an older Black woman named Robin Bryant. A full-figured beauty from Atlanta, she was naturally sexy, but never flirty. She was the color of cinnamon with pretty brown eyes and curly reddish hair. We worked a few shifts together, and our exchanges were always professional. On those rare nights she worked late, Robin always declined our bar invitations. “I have a family I need to get home to,” she said as though we were ragamuffins in a Dickens novel.
The Einstein look-alike was another regular, Arie Goldberg, a New York intellectual who had gone to Bronx Science High School and earned an English degree from City College. He’d developed a crush on Amber, who had zero interest.
One night we stood in front of the window. She told me about her husband, Keith, and their two sons. She had gotten married in 1965, two years after I was born. I asked, “What brought you to New York?”
“Keith’s brother,” she said. “They opened a garage in Crown Heights.”
Suddenly a group of little girls walked by the window dressed in lace gloves and long costume necklaces. “What the hell?” I blurted. Robin laughed. “They’re going to the Madonna concert at Radio City. The ‘Like a Virgin’ tour.” For the next few days, the neighborhood was invaded by mini-Madonnas squealing as they made their way towards the venue.
Two weeks later, I put a bag of coffee in the urn. As it brewed, its lingering aroma made me smile as I walked down the stairs. Robin was sitting in the office with the door open. She looked at me, held her gaze and strolled over. What began with a simple glance turned into an embrace, morphed into a passionate kiss, and led to us sharing a bed in a Times Square short-stay hotel a week later.
At 42, Robin was twice my age, but I’d long been attracted to older women including a few of mom’s friends. One I’d written a love poem to when I was 9 explaining that she was “fine as cherry wine.” Days later, mom told me her friend loved the poem. “But her husband said he’s going to kick your little ass.” That should’ve been a lesson learned, but it wasn’t.
Robin was only my fourth lover since losing my virginity a few years before. Sex with her was fiery and sweet, but still nasty enough to be interesting. As a former altar boy I felt a tinge of guilt, but the pull of the Devil was strong. Lying in the dark hotel room hugging her tight, I wished that moment could’ve lasted forever.
During our second secret rendezvous Robin confessed that I was only her third lover: her first never made it home from Vietnam. There was sadness in her voice when she told me that. The second lover she married.
For the next two months, we snuck around, but by mid-August, I realized that I’d made a mistake. I had no idea why Robin decided to cheat on her husband, nor why she chose me. Robin was a wife and a mother, but she admitted she was falling in love with me. She even bought me a shirt.
“That’s the girlfriend shirt,” my friend Jerry said. “You know, when things start getting serious, some women start buying you clothes. That shirt doesn’t look like anything you would for buy yourself, but that’s the way she wants you to dress.”
At 42, Robin was twice my age, but I’d long been attracted to older women including a few of mom’s friends. One I’d written a love poem to when I was 9 explaining that she was “fine as cherry wine.”
One night, as we lounged inside our hotel room, Robin confessed that, because of me, she didn’t want to make love to her husband anymore. I chuckled, “Are you serious? I thought we were just in this for fun and games.” Robin’s face dropped. Obviously she had other plans, even if she wasn’t sure what those plans were. When it was time to leave, I felt terrible and Robin cried.
When we worked together the following day we were civil, but 15 minutes before the end of her shift a tall, muscled Black dude came in. “That’s Robin’s husband,” Xavier whispered. I gulped like a scared cartoon character as I imagined how a man who lifted car engines for a living might hurt, maim or kill me. Robin came upstairs, grabbed her husband’s hand and in a honeyed voice, said, “Good night.”
Walking out the side door, she turned around, glared at me and our affair was over as abrubtly as it had begun.
In the morning I called Sandy Brooks and explained that I would be leaving immediately. She promised to mail my last check. Two weeks later I was working behind the cassette counter at Tower Records on 4th and Broadway blasting Lisa Lisa & Cult Jam and Prefab Sprout tapes. Amber and I stayed friends until 1999, but I never saw the Miss Brooks crew again.
Still, damn near forty years later there are times when the smell of brewing Bustelo triggers memories of those coffee shop days and the people that made them special.
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Loved this! Also waited NYC tables almost 40 years ago. Funny to mention & clarify how much indoor cigarette smoking was okay w everyone
I swore I was only going to glance at this and get back to my own work...but I got totally absorbed. What a beautiful story, relatable and moving. Coming of age in a way that's not preachy or judgy. Really without a moral to the story, which I like. Great descriptions and dialogue. I could see the scenes (and smell!) - the inside of Amber's place, the hotel room, the cafe. Thank you so much. It was a good 10 minutes I took out of my day!