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liquidmcgarnagle · 5 years ago

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Que piensa; What do you think?

The diner was just another hole-in-the-wall built in to the Tower District. One young and very beautiful woman was the only one on shift tonight even though there were seven people at the bar, and nearly all the booths were full. He felt disgusted with the fact that she should have to put up with this as he snapped his finger in the air for service. He hoped she hadn't actually seen him do it, but she was there right away with a fresh face.

“Are you survivin' the night?” he asked. “This place is packed!”

“Well, I like to think that I'll never get jaded, but I do get a little from a friend.” She places her left pointer curled against the right side of her nose. The thumb presses against her cheekbone and outward, opening her nasal passages and she sniffs cleanly in. “It ain't so bad, just gotta keep on keepin' on ya know? More coffee?”

“Thanks...” he squints at her chest, taking time to look without seeming pervert-y. “Delia? Delaila? Diladid? No wait...” She chuckles. He tilts his head to the side like a bird getting another vantage point for its food. You know how they do.

“Cute...” she wants to roll her eyes, but she does so rapidly enough that no one notices. Hard to fake sarcasm on the go.

“You know I can never tell when someone in the,” he air-quotes “service industry is having a good time with me, or just after tips.” Gretchen sinks lower in to the booth reading Nietzsche. It almost pissed him off the type of stuff she was reading these days, like she would start dressing in all black any minute now.

“Ah, gotcha” double-tapping a click to his teeth like a check mark. She worked hard even though she had substantive support. He hated waiting on people; she must put up with a lot. Jesus, He knew the owner too, and he was a dick. Literally... his name was Richard.

“So, you good then?” she sniffs. He can still see a little bit of white Halloween in the crevice between her thumb and forefinger. He was always observant regarding psychoactives. Why? It was like something like that always finding him and staring straight in to his eyes. Staring him down almost

“Um, naw, we're ok. You doin' ok honey?” She took off quickly emptying the coffee pot in to three different cups.

“Miss, I had decaf” one of the patrons at a booth said.

“Then just drink a little bit Henry,” she retorted. “Besides, I've always given you regular... you tip better when I sneak ya some.” Henry shrugged his shoulders.

“Don't address women, like that, or anyone for that matter. It can be perceived as demeaning Dad.”

“Well, shit, maybe you should start calling me Mr. Dad?” He was slightly embarrassed at the remark, but maybe she was right. The times were changing and change made him very uncomfortable. He thinks about all the changes in his life that he fought tooth and nail against and how they bit him in the ass. The change happened and he didn't like the fight. Ugh, he thought. He missed not caring. He missed the booze. He missed the fun times he thought he had.

“Are you familiar with honorifics Pop?” she asked snootily, knowing he had no idea.

“What do you think daughter?” curling roughly the way he called her to show he was a little pissed off at the educational lecture he was about to endure.

“In Japanese culture, politeness is key. After the feudal era, the status of people was highly important to contrast the lack of order during war.” Stephen rolled his eyes. Pissing him off gave her fuel for some reason; medieval fuel for a modern era. She would 'sophen' him up a bit to get him pissed off enough to go to work today... this time.

“So, honorifics are expressions of respect and endearment like the nature of a relationship when people talk with each other. Like, if I was a student and you were my teacher, I would refer to you as senpai. You would call mom, mama-chan. I would call someone in a grade below me kohai. You would refer to everyone around you as bozu cuz you hate everyone.” She enjoyed teaching her father random stuff at random times. He couldn't take it otherwise. Knowledge had to be peppered on to him as if from the mill. She couldn't tell him this or else he would figure it out and be shut out permanently; or at least until he forgot.

“This is too much shit honey... fuck... shit... goddamnit...” he smacks the table hard, rattling the dishes. You hear the spoon next to his daughter's cup of coffee. She drinks it black referring to it as Mississippi Mud. Mmm, smacking her lips every time she takes her first sip. She falls in to her seat. 'that ain't right he says to himself.'

“I am only saying that this is another way to think. And it's nice, right?”

“Yes. Yes it is Gretch. But that kind of stuff would never fly here. Everyone is just sitting in their own shit, thinking their better than everyone else, waiting for the right time to strike when the iron's hot and the people, ripe for the picking. Let's talk about something else. What'd you do in school today?”

“They had us take apart owl pellets.”

“What the hell are those?”

“Ok, you know, owls catch mice and eat 'em and stuff? It's not like they have a knife and fork with their bib tucked in when they go to town,” she eyes how ridiculous her father looks with his done in. It would be nice if the whole Beethoven look was still the style, but it's not. “Well, they regurgitate whatever is left over from the carcass. Owls eat the rodent. Then, after their body sucks all the meat and nutrients out of it,” she imitates vomiting “Ughaah ughaah!”

“Oh, that's cool! Not! Haha,” he laughs at himself tritely. “What the hell's the point? I feel like they are wasting their time with this kinda shit. My taxes pay for someone to go out, catch fucking shit-ton of owls, and go through their shit?!?”

“Our tax dollars daddy.” responding slowly to make sure he doesn't feel so alone. “And besides, that's not how it works.”

“Whatever,” he looks away and throws his arm in the air.

“Alright what else?” he regretfully asks, but these are his fatherly duties, to know what's going on in the life of his offspring, especially at such an early age. It's only our current cultural climate of capitalist consumerism that has begun to lay the tile of family disruption.

“Well in health class after seeing all of those fucking STD's! I find that sex can be summed up into this: 'a stinky yellow discharge.' And that's on both sides!” she doesn't care what she said.

“I told you to stop swearin' like that Gretch.”

“I like to think that I have a spice rack that sits on my tongue. You haven't taken me Costco for a while. And I'm all out of “like, really? damn and cun---”

“Stop right there young lady! Goddamnit! Sometimes I wish your mother was here to teach you how to speak proper. But then I remember how big a' cunt she is.” looking off in the distance he moves his eyes towards her to make sure she knows he's fucking with her.

“How else am I supposed to put some flavor on what I say?” snickering.

“You're smart, I know you'll think of something.” He sighs with his forearms propping up his entire upper-torso. He feels the weight of being a father in his brain. It's emotionally exhausting. What were the payouts? What was the reason he had a kid in the first place? Oh yeah.

Such weird juxtaposition. The dissociation of church and state. The association between church and state. Dangle the lusty lace in our faces while those we were supposed to love tell us what we think is wrong. Just gotta explore. Just gotta find out... find out... find out... for yourself.

“You need any money for school tomorrow before I forget?” Stephen asks her squarely, and then immediately nonchalantly. Gretchen looks around, slightly unsure, slightly disgusted, but she says something anyway.

“I don’t know. Look at everyone.” Stephen looks around. “What, you don’t see it?”

“See fuckin’ what?” he tries to take out the meat of the fuck as he speaks.

“Look at how sad they all are. We all come here to get something. To get something we have to give something. We feel bad that we have to have this exchange; always feeling that we’re being cheated, scammed, or not getting our money’s worth. This has given life to this negative connotation with even receiving something for free, like ‘What do you want?’”

“This is the way the world works Gretch. Scratch my back, I scratch yours. Quid pro quo. Nothing is free, except freedom. They like to say it isn’t but that’s just one more piece of bait. Tradition!!!” he imitates Fiddler on the Roof.

"I don’t want to accept it. That cannot be the final say of how we turn out; hating the fact that we have to get together just to hate each other through barter. And then! And then we retreat back to whichever hole we found to hide from them,” she is enamored with the anger and logical emotion she produced.

“Look, I just don’t want people thinking I’m a deadbeat Dad.” An obvious tweaker stumbles in like an electron firing in every direction. The camera speeds up and slows down, like in Donnie Darko as the montage music plays. The camera pans for the first time through Middlesex school depicting the main characters how the director wants you to see 'em. His body parts flail while still seeming like he's about to fall over any second. He walks toward the bathroom and stops dead. He turns around looking at Stephen. He collapses with his ass out and his elbows on their table, jumbling the words “How much?”

Stephen sticks his hand down his pocket, grabbing an ugly wad of cash and lots of change. Gretchen grabs her backpack and stands on top of the trampoline-like pleathery booth. She weighed practically nothing compared to the bounciness of the seat. Stephen turns with the fist full of money and plows the presently degenerate right in the face as the cash flies everywhere. The faces of the patrons all looked up at the scene, like a frozen applause. Gretchen jumps in to the air towards her father as he's shaking his fist in painful disgust. “Gretch!” he yells. “Fuck that hurt!” He catches her and tucks her under his arm like a football; she and the backpack flailing beneath at the mercy of her father's panicked and happy gait.

The camera pans upward: -25 to -32.5 degrees, quadrant IV of basic geometric circumstance... Aside from the third dimension, vantage vector is at y=-1/3x +1, where the y axis presents the door, and the vantage point is just a few feet in front of and below Stephen and Gretchen; with Delia halfway out the glass door, waving the coffee pot in her outstretched and snowy appendage. This is slow motion of course...

He says panting in run “I wish that pot pie place hadn't close hun.”

“I know Pop, we'll find another place soon. I'll find somewhere we've never been before. A unholy, holier hole in the wall, K?” her voice staccatos with every bounce, like when a baby is trying to make noises when you bounce it on your knee. It sounds funny.

“Fuck, that's the third place this week.”

“I know Dad.”

You know I love you Gretch. Everything ”

“I know Dad.” They are both smiling while he sprints heavily away with his most prized possessions.

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