He waits for her at that diner on the corner. He orders a diet soda like he has been doing since he decided to lose all that weight. He hopes to lose a lot more. He’s never been to this diner but he’s thought about it. It’s the perfect hole-in-the-wall place, he thinks. Perfect to let her try something new. Perfect for no one to see them together for the first time, a place just for the two of them. He looks at the door every couple of minutes. Pretending not to notice his cold, sweaty, and shaking hands. The waiters look at him, taking a glance at him as much as he at the door. They think to themselves if he’s waiting for his date. They start to bet amongst themselves if he’ll get stood up or not.
He gets a call. But it’s not from his date. It’s another girl. This girl on the phone called to ramble about something her friend told her. Or was that a friend of a friend? She talks how most girls talk about other girls, layered story after layered story, always starting with a compliment, “She’s nice and all, and I love her to death…†before she gets to the things she really wants to say, before the meat of it all. And the meat is raw. It’s rare. Pink all over. It takes a while to chew and even harder to digest. She goes on until she doesn’t. Until she reaches that point where she’s said too much and a little bit more. She says she’ll call again later.
The waiter comes back and asks if he wants another drink. What the waiter really wants to say is she’s not coming. Leave now before things get worse. The waiter takes the glass and gets another drink for the man. The girl arrives. Finally. The man gives out a smile as though to say I’m glad you’re here and I haven’t been waiting long. The girl apologizes. She says traffic was horrible. But traffic is always horrible. They sit down and continue to talk about how traffic is always horrible. The waiter returns with the drink along with a couple of menus. The girl says she’s not that hungry but orders steak anyway. Rare.
They met about a month ago at another one of those new malls that seem to pop up every three months. She was part of the marketing campaign and he went to accompany a friend. They were introduced and got to talk about a certain celebrity’s sex scandal. The woman felt bad for the disgraced starlet. She tells him that the actress was caught in an awful circumstance and got the short end of the stick. The media can be such vultures she says. But honestly the man did not hear a word. All the while, he kept thinking about wanting to bring this beautiful woman to this diner he’s always wanted to go to. They spent half the night talking, getting to know each other for the first time. He was glad he accompanied his friend to this mall he’ll never go to again.
I feel like I’m in the ‘60s the woman says. She loves the vintage jukebox at the corner of the restaurant, right beside the corridor heading to the bathroom. She loves the old soda pop ads graced all over the walls. She likes that it’s small, that it’s quaint, that it is what it is. She tells the man she usually goes to clubs with modern furniture and dark-lit rooms. It can be too tiring she says with all that noise and all those bodies. She says this is new. She likes that it’s new.
It’s been an hour since the girl arrived. Thirty minutes since the steak she ordered came. The date seems to be going well but the man doesn’t know for sure. Just then, the phone in his pocket vibrates and vibrates again. It vibrates a third time and he knows someone is calling. But who? The date is finally happening and he doesn’t want any interruptions. He doesn’t want it to stop. He waited too long, sat too long, and ordered more drinks than he’d care for to let this all mess up. The call stops. Then the phone vibrates again. The girl notices. She asks if something is up but the man says he just needs to go to the bathroom. Why did I lie, the man thinks. Needing to take a call instead of going to the bathroom seems like a better answer. Now he’s confused and is headed to the bathroom for no good reason at all. He looks back at his table to find the girl checking her phone.
The waiter drops by again and asks the girl if everything is okay. Yes, the girl says. He asks if the lady wants another glass of wine. Probably later, she tells him. She asks how long the restaurant has been here. Too long, the waiter says. He started working here five years ago and quit two years after and came back six months ago. He likes the job but it’s a job. Tell me about it, the girl says as they share a laugh. The first laugh made at this table tonight.
Across the room, the man in the bathroom hears the sound of laughter and thinks nothing of it. He checks his phone and sees two missed calls. He answers back those two missed calls with a text: Still at the office. Will be home late.