WordPlay

For dinner, I decide to eat at the Sizzler.  I don’t even know why.  Part of me thinks it’s some sort of trained reaction, almost habit.  Sizzler was where we stopped to eat everytime I went with my parents on roadtrips out west.  It’s familiar.  On the other hand, other restaurants require a drive and I loathe to concept of spending more time in the car today.  Of course, being Sunday everything looks dead.  One might argue a ghost town to be a livelier place.

I peek inside.  The door is unlocked but I don’t see any hours.  ”Hello?”

“Hello!” A voice responds from the back.  ”I’ll be out in a moment.”

“Okay.” I shout back.  I wonder why I’m shouting.  I occupy myself with the menu.  I remember the way Sizzler is set-up.  It’s a combination of a sit-down casual restaurant with the impersonality of a fast food joint.  Plus, you can’t even get a cheap, crappy beer here.  It probably pre-dated a lot of the fast-casual restaurants which have sprung up in the last decade or so.  The voice has short blonde hair and wears a green shirt with black pants.  She reminds me of a past life.  She looks like my old boss in appearance except this girl’s a lot more conservative than my boss was.  I wonder if this girl might be my ex-boss’ evil twin or if my boss was this girl’s evil twin.

“Are you still open?  I can go if you’re closing up.”  I’m suddenly aware of Linda, 2700 miles away, giving me a dirty look as I try to avoid inconveniencing another person.

“Don’t worry about it.  It’s just Sunday.”  She sounds like someone who’s in a perpetual good mood.  ”Sunday evenings are super slow.”  She smiles as if acutely aware of how awkward I’m feeling being the only one out here.  ”So what can I get you?”  I place my order and she hands over my salad dish and my fountain drink.  I take a seat in a booth nearby.  I figure it’ll be less awkward if I try not to hide and besides I prefer sitting in a booth.  I don’t like leaving my back exposed.  It is the wild west after all, you never know what gunslinger might roll into town with a bone to pick with you.

As I’m eating my salad, my thoughts drift to the girl.  I wonder how someone ends up in a place like Cedar City.  I guess the idea of where people end up kind of fascinates me as I try to digest the next transition in life.  I can’t imagine someone settling here unless they needed to hide from something or someone.

She slips my entree in front of me.  I look at it, it looks like three meals on one plate.  ”I think you might need to prep a to-go box for this one.”  She laughs.  I think she’s more amused by the flabbergasted look on my face than the actual statement.  She takes a seat across from me.  

“You don’t mind if I sit for a bit?”  I shrug.  It’s not like I can tell her to get up or to go away at this point.  The company isn’t unappreciated, I just feel weird being the only one in the conversation stuffing my face full of food.  ”You’re either a long way from home or close to it.”  She seems to comment on my Rockies hat and my Syracuse t-shirt.

“Kind of.  I’m heading out to Los Angeles for an internship.”  I learned to just avoid mentioning writer’s mentorship.  It makes it less complicated to explain what I’m doing.  I’m sure she’s heard this story too often by people passing through.

“Neat.”  This response seems fairly common.

“So what brings you out here.”

“It’s more like why haven’t I ever left.”  

“So why haven’t you?”  She exaggerates her arms.  I’m worried I’ve crossed a line.

“I like it here.  It’s nothing special but the familiarity of home makes the rest of the world more exciting.”  I nod.

“So you’ll just stay here when you…”

“Finish school.”  She finishes for me.  ”Yeah.”

“What are you studying?”

“Education.  I want to be a teacher.”

“A noble profession.”  She shrugs.

“I think I’m just being selfish, you know.  This way I can just stay here and convince others that this place isn’t the worst place in the world.”  I chuckle.

“As long as it isn’t in a Sizzler.”

“As long as it isn’t in a Sizzler,”  she echoes.  The door opens and a family comes in.  She gets up and heads out to greet them and tend to their needs.  I’m finished with my entree anyways and go to get some dessert.  

I take some soft serve ice cream and think about Rekha and her bad experience with soft serve.  I wonder if I too will develop a phobia for soft serve just by association.  I smile to myself as I spoon some strawberries over my ice cream at the way Rekha would cringe just at the mention of soft serve – not in an exaggerated manner – but perhaps she curls her toes inside her shoes.

I sit down and take a spoon of ice cream.  My hand shakes as I hold the spoon.  I think it’s just weariness and stress but I remember how my father trembles when he holds his eating utensils.  Everyday, I pick up these little unconscious movements from my parents.  ”Stop shaking.”  I hear my mother shout in my head.  ”What do you have, Parkinson’s?”  I have to set the spoon down and laugh to myself for a moment.  I regain my composure and finish my dessert and leave.

On the walk to the hotel room, I wonder why I’m trembling.  Am I sick?  No.  I’m scared.  It hits me for the first time.  I’m leaving behind familiarity for something unknown.  I’m arriving at the next horizon soon and I don’t know what I’m going to find there.  I’m scared.  I have no control over what’s next but I’m scared of safety, too.  I fear my own capacity for complacency.  As I step into the hotel room, I’m starting to believe I’d rather die terrified than live forever.