"There has to be a girl," I thought. So I started to sketch her in my mind. She would be tall, but not as tall as he. Dark hair brushed back. An oval face with just a faint splatter of freckles.

"Jenny."

I don't know where the name came from but it felt right as soon as it popped into my head. The girl's name was Jenny. I wrote it on my pad. With the name came more details. I hurried to write them down before they were lost. I could see her clearly, as though she were standing right in front of me, but I could not yet tell what the connection was between them. Was she a girlfriend? A sister? I sat back and looked at the rain falling on the patio outside. "Jay. She calls him Jay." Where that came from I did not know. But I must have said it out loud.

"We have been here for two hours and you are just now getting an inspiration?" My wife wasn't complaining; just making an observation. "We need to think about moving on. If we stay here any longer, Claudette is going to charge us rent for this table."

Claudette is the assistant manager. She knows us well. That reminded me, "Have you seen her today?"

That question is not as strange as it may sound. I was sitting facing the door. The counter was behind me. My wife sat across the table from me and had a view of all the action. "Yes, she is back there," she said. "But she has been busy. Why?"

"I want to see if she knows somebody." I got up and went to the end of the counter. When she had a moment, C joined me. I asked her about the boy.

"I saw him there, but I don't know who he is. I'll ask the kids." She touched her finger to her headset and spoke quietly. A moment later she said, "Anne Marie knows him. She'll be right over."

"That was Jason Madson. He was a year ahead of me in high school. He doesn't come in here very often." Anne Marie didn't think he had a sister. "If he did, she was much younger." I wanted to ask her more but just then she put her hand to her headset and listened for a moment. "I have to get a muffin," she told me. "I think he works at Longhorn. I saw him there one night." I thanked her and went back to the table.

My wife was already gathering our stuff. "What was that all about?"

"I'll tell you in the car." I picked up my pad and pen. As we walked out the door I shivered and it wasn't because of the damp air. There was something surreal about how this story was coming together. I may have imagined the details about Jenny but there was one thing I could not have known.

The boy's name was Jason. She called him Jay.