On his 65th birthday, Charlie Graham retired from Winterland Burgers.
Charlie knew everything about fast food. He had been a fryer for the company since the age of sixteen. In his 49 years of service, he had never been considered for a management position.
“You are too valuable in the kitchen,” he was told whenever he suggested to the assistant manager that he was interested in applying for a promotion.
“Thank you, sir,” he would reply, a feeling of pride in his self-worth gradually supplanting the disappointment.
Had Charlie not taken off his apron and announced his retirement on the day of his 65th birthday, Winterland Burgers would probably have kept him on until the Lord of Death dropped by to claim him. He was as much a part of the establishment as the plumbing that had weakened over the years from the strain of its daily load.
“Your benefits will continue until the end of the month,” he was told by the smiling human resources manager before the final handshake that severed his relationship to the company.
It was sometime in the following month that Charlie Graham suffered a heart attack.
“You are safe for the time being,” the doctor said as Charlie put his street clothes back on. “However, you need to decide what we are to do with you in the event this sort of thing happens again.”
“What do you mean?” Charlie asked?
“This is no free clinic. Your insurance ended last month and, under the terms of your limited Med-Aid coverage, you cannot be treated twice in the same year for the same condition.”
When Charlie died from a second heart attack that summer, there was no next of kin to claim the body.
Winterland Burgers had been his only family.
