I couldn’t move.
“The fries were real,” Marcy said quietly. “But that’s never been the real reason Chloe brought him here.”
“I don’t understand.”
Marcy smiled.
“Neither did we at first.”
She told me what had happened during Leo’s earliest visits. The service bell bothered him. Sudden questions overwhelmed him. Once, Marcy touched his shoulder from behind and startled him enough that he asked to leave. At first, she’d assumed the diner simply wasn’t a good environment for him.
Then Chloe asked a different question. She didn’t ask how they could make Leo adapt to the restaurant. She asked how the restaurant could become better for Leo.
So they started small. Nobody touched him without warning. Servers gave him a few extra seconds to answer. They warned him before loud sounds whenever possible. They learned what bothered him without treating him like a problem.
