"Aren't you going to serve up the chili?"
"Not till they're through with whatever nonsense they do about the drinks."
Rainie loaded the drinks onto the tray and headed back to what she was now thinking of as the Boys' Table. Whatever it was that Douglas Spaulding and his friends had turned into, it was suddenly a lot more interesting to her, now that she knew that at least some groups in the town disapproved of it. Evolution and paganism? It sounded like it was right up her alley.
She started to load off the glasses at each place, but Tom beckoned her frantically. "No, no, all here in front of me!" With one arm he swept away the salt and pepper shakers, the napkin dispenser, the sugar canister, and the red plastic ketchup bottle. "Right here, Miss Ida, if you don't mind."
She leaned over Tom's left shoulder and set down the whole tray without spilling a drop from any of the glasses. Before she stood up, she glanced at Douglas, who was right across from Tom, and caught him looking down the neck of her dress. Almost immediately he looked away; she didn't know whether he knew she saw him looking or not.
My boobs may have sagged a little, Minnie, but I still got enough architecture to make the tourists take a second glance.
There were other customers, but while she was dropping off their orders she kept an eye on the Boys' Table. Tom had been creative, after all -- he had packets of Kool-Aid in his suitcoat pocket, and he made quite a ritual of opening them and putting a little of every flavor in each glass. They foamed a lot when he stirred them, and they all ended up a sickly brownish color.
She heard the mechanic say, "Why didn't you just puke in the glasses to start with and avoid the middleman?"
"Drink, my beloved newts and emus, drink!" cried Tom.
They passed out the glasses and prepared to drink.
"A toast!" cried Douglas, and he rose to his feet. Everybody in the cafe was watching, of course -- how often does somebody propose a toast at noon in a smalltown cafe? -- but Rainie kept right on working, laying down plates in front of people.
"To the human species!" said Douglas. "And to all the people in it, a toast!"
"Hear hear!"
"And to all the people who only wish they were in it, I promise that when I am supreme god, you will all be human at last!"
"In a pig's eye!" shouted the mechanic joyously.
"I'll drink to that!" cried Tom, and with that they all drank.
The mechanic did a spit take, putting a thin brown Kool-Aid and Seven-Up fog into the air. Tom must have had some inner need to top that; as he finished noisily chug-a-lugging his drink, Rainie could see that he intended to throw the glass to the floor.
Apparently Minnie saw the same glint in his eye. Before he could hardly move his arm she screeched at him, "Not on your life, Tom Reuther!"
"I paid for it last time," said Tom.
"You didn't pay for all the lunch customers who never came back. Now you boys sit down and be quiet and let folks have their lunch in peace!"
"Wait a minute!" cried Douglas. "We haven't had the song yet."
"All right, do the song and then shut up," said Minnie. She turned back to the chili and resumed dipping it out into the bowls, muttering all the while, "... drive away my customers, spitting all over, breaking glasses on the floor ..."
"Whose turn to start?" somebody asked.
The mechanic rose to his feet. "I choose the tune."
"Not opera again!"
"Better than opera," said the mechanic. "I choose that pinnacle of indigenous American musical accomplishment, the love theme from Oscar Meyer."
The boys all whooped and laughed. The man next to him rose to his feet and sang what must have been the first words that came into his mind, to the tune of the Oscar Meyer weiner jingle from -- what, twenty years ago? Rainie had to laugh ironically inside herself. After all my songs, and all the songs of all the musicians who've suffered and sweated and taken serious drugs for their art, what sticks in the memory of my generation is a song about a kid who wishes he could be a hot dog so he'd have friends.
"I wish I had a friend in my nostril."
The next man got up and without hesitation sang the next line. "In fact I know that's where he'd want to be."
And the next guy: "Cause if I had a friend in my nostril."
"Cheat, cheat, too close to the first line!" cried Tom.
"Bad rhyme -- same word!" said the mechanic.
"Well what else am I supposed to do?" said the guy who sang the line. "There's no rhyme for nostril in the English language."
"Or any other," said Douglas.
"Like you're an expert on Tadzhiki dialects or something," said Tom.
"Wastrel!" shouted the mechanic.
"That doesn't rhyme," said Douglas.
"Leave it with nostril," said Tom. "We'll simply heap scorn upon poor Raymond until he rues the day."
"You are so gracious," said Raymond.
"Dougie's turn," said the mechanic.
"I forgot where we were," said Douglas, rising to his feet.
The mechanic immediately jumped up and sang the three lines they had so far:
I wish I had a friend in my nostril, I know that's where he'd really want to be, Cause if I had a friend in my nostril ...
Rainie happened to be passing near the Boys' Table at that moment, and she blurted out the song lyric that popped into her mind before Douglas could even open his mouth:
He could eat the boogers I don't see!
Immediately the men at the table leaped to their feet and gave her a standing ovation, all except Tom, who fell off his chair and rolled on the floor. The only people who didn't seem to enjoy her lyric were Minnie, who was glaring at her, and Douglas, who stared straight ahead for a moment and then sat down -- laughing along with the others, but only as much as conviviality required.
I'm sorry I stole your thunder, Rainie said silently. Whenever I think of the perfect clincher at the end of a verse, I always blurt it out like that, I'm sorry.
She went back to the counter and got the chili, which Minnie had already laid out on a tray. "Are you trying to make my customers get indigestion right here in the diner?" Minnie hissed. "Boogers! Eating them. My land!"
"I'm sorry," said Rainie. "It just came out."