The storm came faster than any forecast had warned. By the time I turned my old sedan into the diner’s lot, the world was nothing but swirling white.
I hadn’t planned to open—who’d be driving through this mess?—but then I saw the trucks. A dozen eighteen-wheelers lined up along the shoulder, headlights glowing like dying embers, their drivers huddled against the wind.
One man knocked on the door, face raw from cold, beard crusted with frost. “Ma’am,” he said, breath clouding in the air, “any chance we could get some coffee? Roads are closed. We can’t make it to the next stop.”
I hesitated. Running the diner alone was hard enough on a slow day, let alone during a blizzard with a dozen hungry men. But then I heard my grandmother’s voice in my head: When in doubt, feed people.