dipshits at the drive thru.
His words were actually having the desired effect. He had not escalated the confrontation. The more time he was giving me to reflect on my actions the better able I was to bridle my mental state, such as it was. I actually might have been able to salvage this encounter, if Becka’s pimply-faced countenance hadn’t taken this inopportune time to peek out from her workstation.
“Oh shit Tonya. The half-wit came in the store! You should see his clothes, he looks like he’s eaten but couldn’t tell exactly where his mouth was. I know right?’ She laughed. “He’s got ketchup all down his legs! It’s hilarious, Tonya. Hold on I’m going to take a picture and send it to you.”
Becka began to walk out from behind her work window, her phone lining up to take my most unflattering photograph since the DMV.
“Becka.” Don began. “Don’t you have some work you could be doing?”
‘Oh please’ her expression dripped. The sour look did little to dissuade Becka from her present course of action. I was too shocked to do anything as Becka took not one but three pictures of me. I heard that at least two of them ended up on the internet.
Don and I both shared a moment of commiseration as we stared at the retreating form of the laughing Becka. “I’m sending it now Tonya, let me know when you get it! GET OUT!” She shrieked. “Bobby Ricci asked you out!” The rest of the stimulating teenage-ese dialog was lost to us, as Don and I again resumed our parley.
“You could start helping me, by firing her.” I pointed vehemently to where the demon spawn had retreated.
“She’s the best of the last seven people I’ve had working there” Don answered me back, his tone laced with dejection.
And like that the heat of my anger ebbed, Don was as much if not more of a victim in this whole affair than I was. He had been dealing with irate customers seemingly his entire professional life.
“Samir.” One of the fry cooks shouted from behind us. “What the hell is a fried salad wrap with M&M’s?”
Don put his hands over his face. If he had access to anything sharper than a plastic butter knife I think he would have taken the opportunity to perform hari-kari on himself.
I wanted this encounter to be over with and out of here before it got any more bizarre. Sometimes I amaze myself with my flashes of prophecy. “Listen.” I said hopefully. “I just want to get my order and get out of here.” Don didn’t respond, I somehow took that as a good sign. “Ok.” I said nervously licking my lips. “I’d like to get two quarter pounders with cheese meals, a crispy chicken sandwich meal, two big Mac meals, and the two cheeseburger meal with extra pickles. Oh yeah and all of them with coke is fine.” Don still hadn’t moved, not to even put my order into the not-so-idiot proof picture laden register. At first I was sort of impressed that he would have the ability to memorize my whole order. Still nothing was happening. “Don?” I asked cautiously.
“YOU WANT! YOU WANT! What the fuck about what I want!” He screamed. The entire restaurant stopped and stared, even the nearly useless work staff. “You think I want to manage a bunch of zit pocked, hormone infused, spoiled brats that would rather be at home jerking off than making an honest living? And do you think I can get any of them to wash their hands after they’re in the bathroom for a half an hour doing God knows what?” I heard distant retching as one of the customers realized what they might be eating. One of the sandwich assemblers laughed out loud as he realized that he had just been called out. I noticed with disdain, the nearly full box of sani- gloves next to his workstation that were going completely unused.
Customers began to leave in droves as if they could sense the oncoming explosion, why had my prophetic self picked this time to desert. Of my entire order why he focused on this part I’ll never know.
“You want some extra fucking pickles!” He yelled.
I nodded dumbly. Eyes wide open along with my gaping mouth.
“I’ve got your fucking extra pickles right here!”
I can’t express to you how relieved I was when he didn’t pull his pants down and expose his ‘male pickle’ to me. My respite was short lived though as he picked up a ten pound jar of pickle slices and began to hum handfuls of the tangy sandwich slices at me. I stood dumbfounded as the rippled briny preserves slapped against my entire body, I guess I should be glad they were the sandwich slice variety as opposed to the spears. (Poor joke, I know but how much further into absurdity could I travel.) I walked out of the store under a hail of fire, slices stuck to my face, neck and head. The sun began to instantly brown them as I dazedly strode to my car. I cannot recall the rest of the ride home. It wasn’t until I walked in the back door and Tracy ‘greeted’ me, that the day began to come back into focus.
“Where’s the food?” She shot out, her initial anger at my becoming unemployed still highly evident. As she began to look closer at the near comatose expression on my face, the ketchup on my pants and shoes and the pickle slices that dripped to the floor that her demeanor changed. “Oh Talbot how do you get into these messes?” I would have aimlessly argued that I had nothing to do with it, but her ensuing laughter was like the siren call to sailors of lore. I joined in with her wholeheartedly. After heavy moments of out-of-control laughter we locked into a vinegar infused kiss that temporarily made all of our earthly concerns melt away. For twenty beats of my heart, the entire day had been worth the pay out.
CHAPTER 17 
“You’re probably right.” I said answering her original question back in the here and now. But I still looked longingly at the rapidly departing, true King of Hamburgers. My heavy sigh, went unnoticed or ignored didn’t really matter which, I wasn’t getting any golden bronzed dipped in sunlight French fries no matter how much I pouted.
We were still hours away from Carol’s and the weakened winter sunlight was doing its best to retreat into the west ahead of the frigid night. We had some choices, none of them particularly grand. We could push on through the night and get to Carol’s in the blackest part of the evening. My feelings were that entering into that nightmare during the brightest part of the day might make it minutely more palatable. So we could cross off option number one. Number two consisted of pulling off to the shoulder of the road and sleeping in the car, one look at the depleted gas tank gauge revealed that we would not be able to keep the car and subsequently the heater running for the entire night. Of the ‘choices’ we were contending with, we would have to pick the one that was the least unsavory. That doesn’t mean it was a good choice, just better than the rest. It’s like the choice to eat chocolate covered ants or caviar. They’re both choices but they both suck. Kind of like having to vote for either candidate in a presidential race, no matter which way you go you’re guaranteed taxes will increase and the winner will blame the losing parties ineptitude for the necessity of the increase.
Option three involved pulling off the highway, getting some much needed gas and finding some sort of safe haven to sleep the night away. Our luck at safe havens had been largely devoid these last few nights. I had my doubts that would turn around tonight. I pulled the van over and waited for Brendon to come up alongside. I laid out all my thoughts, hoping that someone might potentially have a better idea or possibly dissuade me from my present course of action. I’m a control freak in the strongest sense of the phrase but only in so far as a situation can be controlled. I’ve yet to come across a zombie that ‘heeled’ when I told it to.
“How long would it take to get to Mom’s?” Tracy asked with a strange mixture of hope and resignation.
“Shit maybe four hours.” I said rubbing my eyes. “I’m exhausted though and we’ll still need to pull over somewhere and get gas.”
“What about finding a motel or something like that?” Brendon asked. “We could stay on the second floor, there’s usually only one or two stair cases that we would have to defend.”
What he omitted, probably unintentionally is that one or two staircases meant only one or two escape avenues. Our lives depended on me always keeping vigilant. But it was still a decent idea. We had to stop, that was not the issue. We might as well be as comfortable as humanly possible, while we were still humans.
The stress I felt everyone exuding was tangible. It had a texture, a thickness to it. When we were moving we were safe. Every time we stopped the danger caught up to us. Only Justin and Tommy thought stopping was a good idea.
My hope was that Justin wanted to stop to give his low grade fever a chance to dissipate, I would not dwell any longer on any wild theories that I could not prove, but could still feel, in the depths of my soul. Damn him, the warring factions in myself were mere children throwing stones to what was going on in his head. He might be the biggest threat to all of our survivals and he was my son. My soul wept, my essence raged, nothing changed.
