Chapter Two: Dinner For One
By the time he made it out of the building and into the suffocating night air of South Florida, it was ten o’clock. Jonas paused by the oddly-shaped giant scrap metal sculpture in the courtyard, glanced at his watch and saw the truth with his own eyes. Realizing his favorite food stop has been closed for an hour, he tilted his head back, closed his eyes and yelled several profanities to the sky (mostly concerning the sexual orientation of Warren Bright).
Jonas made his way to his car, a 1985 Isuzu I-Mark Diesel that his brother gave to him as a gift when Jonas graduated college, fiddled with the car door lock and started up the engine. The engine stuttered to life with a “put-put-put-put” sound and a small plume of black smoke rolling out of the tailpipe. Looking around the modest interior of his free car, he realized that this old car was the embodiment of his life so far- plain looking, cheap and foul smelling.
At this point being so tired and dreading the thought of getting up at six AM and doing it all over again, he decided to just go home pet his cat and go to bed hungry. The thought of a giant bowl of Wheaties first thing in the morning was oddly comforting right now. He made his way down the 20th Street corridor where Mackey was located and took the turn down the palm tree-lined Providence Boulevard which takes him directly home fifteen miles away.
Jonas noticed that Providence was exceedingly quiet traffic-wise, but attributed it to the time of night. “It’s usually not this dead though, even at like three in the morning”, he said to himself. Of course he hit every red light on the way home making his drive home just as long as it would be with normal traffic; it’s just been one of those days. He decided to focus his racing mind on the number of red lights to go before he can finally get home, “Wow that is seriously the 6th red light in a row, incredible”
As he pulled up to the next to last traffic light before he reaches home (this light is red too of course), he looked to his left to the sad sight of Hai Lo’s windows shuttered up for the night. As he thought about how hungry he was he muttered to himself, “Fuck Wheaties, I’m hungry now.” Just then something caught his eye; on his right directly across from Hai Lo’s, another Chinese restaurant. But unlike the one across the street from it, this other restaurant had a blazing orange and green sign screaming “OPEN”. He had been driving up and down this street for the past two years and had never in his life seen this restaurant before. Jonas sat in his car staring at the sign in the window until he was jolted back to reality by a car’s horn honking from behind him. The light was green and probably had been for a little while. Not caring where this restaurant came from or how long it had or hadn’t been there, Jonas made a sharp right turn and pulled into the parking lot.
Getting out of his car and walking from the side parking lot around towards the front door, he noticed a few things that didn’t make much sense. First, he didn’t smell any food cooking. Usually even when you drive by a place with your car windows down you can smell whatever they’re cooking, even when passing by at 65 miles per hour. But Jonas was only five feet away from the door and there was nothing; no aroma of egg rolls in the deep fryer, no trace of boiling wanton soup, no bouquet of sautéed garlic green beans. The other thing he noticed when he pulled into the parking lot was that he was the only one there. Okay, maybe that had something to do with it being ten o’clock at night but hell even Denny’s has four or five cars in the parking lot at all times of the day. “Fuck it,” he said to himself as he pushed open the door. He was concerned more with the gnawing hunger in his stomach than any stupid inconsistencies his tired mind was cooking up.
“What in the hell is this?” he uttered probably a little too loudly.
From the very back of the room behind the window where food comes out of the kitchen came an old, croaky male voice, “Oh hello there you sit down at table I be right with you!”
Considering the fact that there was only one table in the entire restaurant, Jonas figured that the voice he heard was telling him to sit there. “Maybe this place is so new that they only have had time to set up one table?” he told himself trying to make this situation a little less weird.
Other than having only one table in the entire place, the room reeked of a typical Chinese buffet- pan flute music played in the background, odd paintings of weirdly-proportioned Asian men wrestled tigers, even the table where Jonas was sitting had one of those Chinese astrological charts on it. While waiting for the man who called to him to come out of the kitchen, he decided to find his sign. “Figures,” he said, “I was born in the year of the Cock.” From the very back door which he assumed led to the kitchen, a tall thin Asian man came gliding out towards Jonas holding a glass of water and singing something in what he’s guessing is Chinese.
“Helllllo Mister, how you todaaaaay?”
Jonas, amused and taken aback a little by what he was seeing said, “Uh fine, how are you?”
The waiter or owner or whoever he was looked like the stereotypical Kung Fu master- long white hair, long white beard and wearing a long, flowing dark blue silk robe of some kind. His speech went up and down in octaves like he learned to speak by listening to bad musicals.
“Oh Mister, I am very fiiiiine. You like to eat Chineeeese food?”
Jonas, thinking he must be on one of those hidden camera TV shows, tried to stifle a laugh, “Yeah, that’s why I’m here I suppose.”
The tall Asian man put the glass of water down on the table in front of Jonas, bowed, and in his sing-song diction said, “Ohhhh you must be Chiiiiinese food veteran. You tell Dong what you like eat.”
“Ok… Dong… I just want your buffet.”
Dong looked puzzled by Jonas’s request. “Buffet? Noooo my sir, you order food I bring to you right awaaaay.”
Hoping he was going to be able to get in and out of here as quickly as possible, Jonas was a little frustrated by the lack of buffet. “Fine, if I were to order some General Tso’s Chicken, Pork Fried Rice and an egg roll, how quickly could you have that done?”
A yellow toothy grin creeped across Dong’s face in a way that made Jonas wish he had never pulled into the parking lot. It is best described as the kind of smile a pedophile probably has when he sees a young child on a swing set alone in a park. “Oh mister, I could have your food ready immediately. You sit here, food coming.”
With that, Dong bowed, turned and walked away towards the kitchen singing what sounded like the same song he was singing on the way out. Jonas was losing his appetite quickly and was disturbed by the fact that the last thing Dong said wasn’t like the rest of the conversation they were having; it was in a low monotone that conveyed a seriousness that defied the situation. What the hell is going on here? Nothing, it’s just Chinese food. Yeah, Chinese food from an episode of the Twilight Zone.
Waiting for food was something Jonas hated to do, hence one of the reasons for his love of buffets. Waiting caused him to think about things. Thinking about things inevitably led to him thinking about his life which only pissed him off. He thought about the six long years of college he went through to get his degree. He thought about how optimistic he was when he signed on with Mackey, and how horribly that has turned out so far. He thought about his shitty apartment. He thought about his love life, or rather, the lack thereof. He thought about…
“Fooood is ready!”
Jonas looked down at his watch and saw that it had literally only been two minutes since Dong disappeared into the kitchen; yet here he came holding two plates full of steaming food. “Wow Dong, that was incredibly fast… you keep everything made and just warm it up when someone orders it?”
Dong looked surprised and hurt, “Oh noooo sir, I make everything here from scratch. You don’t believe me you tryyyy it!” With that, Dong sat two plates down on the table in front of Jonas. Jonas, skeptical because of the short amount of time it took to make the food was amazed at the amount of food and how deliciously appetizing it looked. Something like this couldn’t have been made and then warmed up; remember, he was very familiar with buffet food. Jonas took a deep breath, inhaled the steam coming off of the two plates before looking up at Dong. Dong just smiled that toothy yellow grin again and nodded handing Jonas a pair of chopsticks. “Enjoy.”
Jonas started eating. He quickly decided that this could possibly be the best food he had ever eaten, anywhere. The General Tso’s Chicken was tender and spicy, the Pork Fried Rice was seasoned just right and full of pork and vegetables, while the egg roll wasn’t full of grease like the ones he was used to getting at the shitty place across the street… whatever it’s called. Even the ice water Dong brought out to him was lightly sweet in taste; like it had a few big slices of lemon submerged at the bottom of the glass yet there weren’t any. Before he knew it, he’d been sitting at the table for an hour and had eaten two helpings of everything before he decided he had had enough.
This whole time, while he hadn’t been in the kitchen or bringing more food and water out to Jonas, Dong had been sitting in a lone chair in one of the back corners of the restaurant in pitch darkness; the only thing which gave his presence away was the bright, hot end of a cigarette he smoked while watching Jonas eat five pounds of food. Jonas noticed Dong in the corner, the light at the end of the cigarette growing and fading with each drag, and deciding he was done eating cleared his throat and said, “Umm, Dong, can I have my check now?” With this question, Dong stood up, took one more long hit on the cigarette and threw it down on the bare floor next to him.
“Oh sir, did you liiiiike the food? Did you eat enough food?”
Dong approached Jonas slowly while asking the questions, kind of like how a carnivorous beast draws up slowly on its prey. Jonas noticed this latest idiosyncrasy and stood up as well, ready to fight the gangly old man or run out the front door. “Um yes Dong, everything was great. I just want to pay and go home, it’s getting late and I have to be at work early.”
Still walking towards Jonas slowly, “Not a problem my friend. One more thing first before you go.” Dong reached into one of the pockets on his robe and pulled out something Jonas couldn't see. It wasn't large enough to be a weapon, he was sure of that much.
“Your fortune cookie, sir. You cannot leave until you get your fortune, it is tradition.”
Dong now stood within reach of Jonas, and Jonas could see that what Dong had pulled out of his pocket was indeed a fortune cookie. Unlike fortune cookies from other restaurants he went to, this one isn’t wrapped in plastic wrap. It was still warm, like it was just out of the oven which made no sense at all considering Dong had been sitting in the corner for at least a half hour with that cookie in his pocket.
“Remember, you must read the fortune before you eat the cookie. It is tradition.”
Jonas noticed Dong was back to using the serious, lower-toned monotone he used earlier when for some reason Dong decided Chinese food was serious business. As stupid as it sounds, he wished he would use the annoying sing-song voice right now. Jonas lifted the cookie up closer to his face and breaks it in half. Inside, as expected was a small strip of white paper with print on it. He strained to read it but because it was so dark in the restaurant he couldn't.
“It’s ok mister, you eat the cookie now and read the fortune when you get in your car. Lights no good in here, can’t read it now. But remember you must read it, it is tradition.”
Jonas put the slip of paper in his pant pocket and asks, “Ok, so can I pay now? I really have to get home.”
“Oh yes my friend, you give meeeee two dollar we call it even.”
“Wow that’s really cheap for such good food, are you sure?”
“Oh absolutely,” Dong said waving his hand in front of his face like he was swatting away flies, “you pay no more than that. Thank you for coming in, goodbyyyyye.”
Jonas gave him two dollars and quickly walked out the front door. He hurried through the parking lot and to his car because this wasn't the best part of town and it was pretty late. Looking at his watch he couldn't believe what he saw, “No freaking way, it can’t be one in the morning!”
He opened the car door, plopped down in the driver’s seat and slumped back into it closing his eyes. Jonas sat like this for probably five minutes just absorbing all of the weird shit that just happened in the restaurant, when he remembered the slip of paper in his pocket. Digging around in there, he finally found it and pulled it out to read it.
“You like Chinese food.”
Jonas slammed the fortune down on his dash in disbelief. “That’s fucking it?! You would think this fortune was going to reveal some deep secret about mankind’s future by the way that old fucker was acting!”
Tired, full of Chinese food and a little pissed off, Jonas started the car and headed toward his apartment where his cat was waiting for him. Tomorrow was Friday at least, so he only had to deal with one more day before the weekend came and he would be able to decompress for two days before doing it all again on Monday. Unless, that is, someone made him come in on Saturday.
Jonas made his way to his car, a 1985 Isuzu I-Mark Diesel that his brother gave to him as a gift when Jonas graduated college, fiddled with the car door lock and started up the engine. The engine stuttered to life with a “put-put-put-put” sound and a small plume of black smoke rolling out of the tailpipe. Looking around the modest interior of his free car, he realized that this old car was the embodiment of his life so far- plain looking, cheap and foul smelling.
At this point being so tired and dreading the thought of getting up at six AM and doing it all over again, he decided to just go home pet his cat and go to bed hungry. The thought of a giant bowl of Wheaties first thing in the morning was oddly comforting right now. He made his way down the 20th Street corridor where Mackey was located and took the turn down the palm tree-lined Providence Boulevard which takes him directly home fifteen miles away.
Jonas noticed that Providence was exceedingly quiet traffic-wise, but attributed it to the time of night. “It’s usually not this dead though, even at like three in the morning”, he said to himself. Of course he hit every red light on the way home making his drive home just as long as it would be with normal traffic; it’s just been one of those days. He decided to focus his racing mind on the number of red lights to go before he can finally get home, “Wow that is seriously the 6th red light in a row, incredible”
As he pulled up to the next to last traffic light before he reaches home (this light is red too of course), he looked to his left to the sad sight of Hai Lo’s windows shuttered up for the night. As he thought about how hungry he was he muttered to himself, “Fuck Wheaties, I’m hungry now.” Just then something caught his eye; on his right directly across from Hai Lo’s, another Chinese restaurant. But unlike the one across the street from it, this other restaurant had a blazing orange and green sign screaming “OPEN”. He had been driving up and down this street for the past two years and had never in his life seen this restaurant before. Jonas sat in his car staring at the sign in the window until he was jolted back to reality by a car’s horn honking from behind him. The light was green and probably had been for a little while. Not caring where this restaurant came from or how long it had or hadn’t been there, Jonas made a sharp right turn and pulled into the parking lot.
Getting out of his car and walking from the side parking lot around towards the front door, he noticed a few things that didn’t make much sense. First, he didn’t smell any food cooking. Usually even when you drive by a place with your car windows down you can smell whatever they’re cooking, even when passing by at 65 miles per hour. But Jonas was only five feet away from the door and there was nothing; no aroma of egg rolls in the deep fryer, no trace of boiling wanton soup, no bouquet of sautéed garlic green beans. The other thing he noticed when he pulled into the parking lot was that he was the only one there. Okay, maybe that had something to do with it being ten o’clock at night but hell even Denny’s has four or five cars in the parking lot at all times of the day. “Fuck it,” he said to himself as he pushed open the door. He was concerned more with the gnawing hunger in his stomach than any stupid inconsistencies his tired mind was cooking up.
“What in the hell is this?” he uttered probably a little too loudly.
From the very back of the room behind the window where food comes out of the kitchen came an old, croaky male voice, “Oh hello there you sit down at table I be right with you!”
Considering the fact that there was only one table in the entire restaurant, Jonas figured that the voice he heard was telling him to sit there. “Maybe this place is so new that they only have had time to set up one table?” he told himself trying to make this situation a little less weird.
Other than having only one table in the entire place, the room reeked of a typical Chinese buffet- pan flute music played in the background, odd paintings of weirdly-proportioned Asian men wrestled tigers, even the table where Jonas was sitting had one of those Chinese astrological charts on it. While waiting for the man who called to him to come out of the kitchen, he decided to find his sign. “Figures,” he said, “I was born in the year of the Cock.” From the very back door which he assumed led to the kitchen, a tall thin Asian man came gliding out towards Jonas holding a glass of water and singing something in what he’s guessing is Chinese.
“Helllllo Mister, how you todaaaaay?”
Jonas, amused and taken aback a little by what he was seeing said, “Uh fine, how are you?”
The waiter or owner or whoever he was looked like the stereotypical Kung Fu master- long white hair, long white beard and wearing a long, flowing dark blue silk robe of some kind. His speech went up and down in octaves like he learned to speak by listening to bad musicals.
“Oh Mister, I am very fiiiiine. You like to eat Chineeeese food?”
Jonas, thinking he must be on one of those hidden camera TV shows, tried to stifle a laugh, “Yeah, that’s why I’m here I suppose.”
The tall Asian man put the glass of water down on the table in front of Jonas, bowed, and in his sing-song diction said, “Ohhhh you must be Chiiiiinese food veteran. You tell Dong what you like eat.”
“Ok… Dong… I just want your buffet.”
Dong looked puzzled by Jonas’s request. “Buffet? Noooo my sir, you order food I bring to you right awaaaay.”
Hoping he was going to be able to get in and out of here as quickly as possible, Jonas was a little frustrated by the lack of buffet. “Fine, if I were to order some General Tso’s Chicken, Pork Fried Rice and an egg roll, how quickly could you have that done?”
A yellow toothy grin creeped across Dong’s face in a way that made Jonas wish he had never pulled into the parking lot. It is best described as the kind of smile a pedophile probably has when he sees a young child on a swing set alone in a park. “Oh mister, I could have your food ready immediately. You sit here, food coming.”
With that, Dong bowed, turned and walked away towards the kitchen singing what sounded like the same song he was singing on the way out. Jonas was losing his appetite quickly and was disturbed by the fact that the last thing Dong said wasn’t like the rest of the conversation they were having; it was in a low monotone that conveyed a seriousness that defied the situation. What the hell is going on here? Nothing, it’s just Chinese food. Yeah, Chinese food from an episode of the Twilight Zone.
Waiting for food was something Jonas hated to do, hence one of the reasons for his love of buffets. Waiting caused him to think about things. Thinking about things inevitably led to him thinking about his life which only pissed him off. He thought about the six long years of college he went through to get his degree. He thought about how optimistic he was when he signed on with Mackey, and how horribly that has turned out so far. He thought about his shitty apartment. He thought about his love life, or rather, the lack thereof. He thought about…
“Fooood is ready!”
Jonas looked down at his watch and saw that it had literally only been two minutes since Dong disappeared into the kitchen; yet here he came holding two plates full of steaming food. “Wow Dong, that was incredibly fast… you keep everything made and just warm it up when someone orders it?”
Dong looked surprised and hurt, “Oh noooo sir, I make everything here from scratch. You don’t believe me you tryyyy it!” With that, Dong sat two plates down on the table in front of Jonas. Jonas, skeptical because of the short amount of time it took to make the food was amazed at the amount of food and how deliciously appetizing it looked. Something like this couldn’t have been made and then warmed up; remember, he was very familiar with buffet food. Jonas took a deep breath, inhaled the steam coming off of the two plates before looking up at Dong. Dong just smiled that toothy yellow grin again and nodded handing Jonas a pair of chopsticks. “Enjoy.”
Jonas started eating. He quickly decided that this could possibly be the best food he had ever eaten, anywhere. The General Tso’s Chicken was tender and spicy, the Pork Fried Rice was seasoned just right and full of pork and vegetables, while the egg roll wasn’t full of grease like the ones he was used to getting at the shitty place across the street… whatever it’s called. Even the ice water Dong brought out to him was lightly sweet in taste; like it had a few big slices of lemon submerged at the bottom of the glass yet there weren’t any. Before he knew it, he’d been sitting at the table for an hour and had eaten two helpings of everything before he decided he had had enough.
This whole time, while he hadn’t been in the kitchen or bringing more food and water out to Jonas, Dong had been sitting in a lone chair in one of the back corners of the restaurant in pitch darkness; the only thing which gave his presence away was the bright, hot end of a cigarette he smoked while watching Jonas eat five pounds of food. Jonas noticed Dong in the corner, the light at the end of the cigarette growing and fading with each drag, and deciding he was done eating cleared his throat and said, “Umm, Dong, can I have my check now?” With this question, Dong stood up, took one more long hit on the cigarette and threw it down on the bare floor next to him.
“Oh sir, did you liiiiike the food? Did you eat enough food?”
Dong approached Jonas slowly while asking the questions, kind of like how a carnivorous beast draws up slowly on its prey. Jonas noticed this latest idiosyncrasy and stood up as well, ready to fight the gangly old man or run out the front door. “Um yes Dong, everything was great. I just want to pay and go home, it’s getting late and I have to be at work early.”
Still walking towards Jonas slowly, “Not a problem my friend. One more thing first before you go.” Dong reached into one of the pockets on his robe and pulled out something Jonas couldn't see. It wasn't large enough to be a weapon, he was sure of that much.
“Your fortune cookie, sir. You cannot leave until you get your fortune, it is tradition.”
Dong now stood within reach of Jonas, and Jonas could see that what Dong had pulled out of his pocket was indeed a fortune cookie. Unlike fortune cookies from other restaurants he went to, this one isn’t wrapped in plastic wrap. It was still warm, like it was just out of the oven which made no sense at all considering Dong had been sitting in the corner for at least a half hour with that cookie in his pocket.
“Remember, you must read the fortune before you eat the cookie. It is tradition.”
Jonas noticed Dong was back to using the serious, lower-toned monotone he used earlier when for some reason Dong decided Chinese food was serious business. As stupid as it sounds, he wished he would use the annoying sing-song voice right now. Jonas lifted the cookie up closer to his face and breaks it in half. Inside, as expected was a small strip of white paper with print on it. He strained to read it but because it was so dark in the restaurant he couldn't.
“It’s ok mister, you eat the cookie now and read the fortune when you get in your car. Lights no good in here, can’t read it now. But remember you must read it, it is tradition.”
Jonas put the slip of paper in his pant pocket and asks, “Ok, so can I pay now? I really have to get home.”
“Oh yes my friend, you give meeeee two dollar we call it even.”
“Wow that’s really cheap for such good food, are you sure?”
“Oh absolutely,” Dong said waving his hand in front of his face like he was swatting away flies, “you pay no more than that. Thank you for coming in, goodbyyyyye.”
Jonas gave him two dollars and quickly walked out the front door. He hurried through the parking lot and to his car because this wasn't the best part of town and it was pretty late. Looking at his watch he couldn't believe what he saw, “No freaking way, it can’t be one in the morning!”
He opened the car door, plopped down in the driver’s seat and slumped back into it closing his eyes. Jonas sat like this for probably five minutes just absorbing all of the weird shit that just happened in the restaurant, when he remembered the slip of paper in his pocket. Digging around in there, he finally found it and pulled it out to read it.
“You like Chinese food.”
Jonas slammed the fortune down on his dash in disbelief. “That’s fucking it?! You would think this fortune was going to reveal some deep secret about mankind’s future by the way that old fucker was acting!”
Tired, full of Chinese food and a little pissed off, Jonas started the car and headed toward his apartment where his cat was waiting for him. Tomorrow was Friday at least, so he only had to deal with one more day before the weekend came and he would be able to decompress for two days before doing it all again on Monday. Unless, that is, someone made him come in on Saturday.
posted by Cursed at 9:47 AM
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