Tuesday, October 30, 2007

The Whereabouts of Scott No. 517 -- Installation Eight

(fiction; continued from previous)

“Sorry,” the woman [she is generic] apologized, “I gotta fix your tie.”

“Aw, that’s alright—”

“You look really sharp.”

“Seriously?” Scott No. 339 stopped dancing so that she could straighten his tie. He sounded shocked.

The woman’s hands [she is afraid of being generic] touched the silk and the action felt so caring, so domestic that her hand stopped moving. She gave a half hearted tug so that she didn’t appear a complete nutcase [she is afraid of being the generic little wife] and waited for her sanity to return. She didn’t know how long it would take for it to come back as it had taken off at a pretty good sprint when she realized what she had been doing.

“I went down into the costume shop to see what I could dig up.” [He needed help.]

She laughed. “You got this out of the costume shop? Out of that dingy room in the basement came something this nice?”

“This is far nicer than anything I actually own. So I just take things from there.” [He needed help but generally refused it.]

“So every morning you roll out of bed and go get dressed in the costume shop?” [He needed help to be normal but generally refused it.]

He furrowed his brow. She just laughed at him.

“Are we going to dance?” Scott No. 339 held his hand up and they continued.

* * *

Scott No. 331 always took his coffee black. This was true when he was at an all night diner where the coffee was always greasy and slightly weaker than coffee should be.

Scott No. 331 always took his coffee with creamer. One scalloped packet of half n half per cup filled. This was true when he was at a greasy spoon which was not an all night diner where the coffee was only mildly greasy and often a smidge stronger than coffee should be.

Scott No. 331 always added flavored powdered non-dairy creamer to his coffee before toping it off with 2% milk. This was true when he was at work pouring coffee that was too strong from a pot that had not been washed in recent memory but still made the coffee taste like soap.

Scott No. 331 never took his coffee from Starbucks. He did not believe that sugar or other fluffy shit should be added to coffee. Nor did he believe that having someone dress his coffee up in frills and lace is a reason to spend three to five times the daily wage of the average Indian worker.

Highly Recommended