Doing Lunch

An editor and his best friend have lunch and discuss projects...

 “I got a million just like that.” 

David Fencer held his egg sandwich in a double paw bear grip and stared at his friend over the bread crust. His near sighted eyeglass prescription enlarged his dark, deep set eyes behind the lenses. He chewed his bite of sandwich in a sideways-circular motion resembling a cow chewing its cud. David registered no expression nor gave a response. 

The waitress came over and paused to listen while holding a steaming coffee pot before pouring warm-ups. Dish clatter ricocheted out from the kitchen. 

     “If you don’t like that one Davy, I can spank it around a bit and have a new testament on Thursday.” 

David Fencer took another bite of his egg sandwich and didn’t care when some yoke dripped to his plate. He kept chewing and staring at his friend Ralph who he met almost two years ago when he first moved to Chicago. David motioned to the waitress by lifting one finger off his sandwich and pointed at his coffee cup. The waitress poured and raised an eyebrow at Ralph, as she motioned the pot in his direction. 

     “You kiddin’ Cheesecake? I got enough rocket fuel in me to make a couple orbits around the moon.” 

The waitress shrugged her shoulders and moved to the next table. David kept chewing cud silently. Ralph was like a bulldog with a bone, once he started gnawing on an idea, it was impossible to get him to drop it. David sniffed and studied where he’d take his next bite of sandwich. 

     “Davy boy, you never got back to me about that sci-fi piece, I think the plot is right up the Comet’s alley.” 

David got a job as editor of the local newspaper a month after moving to town. Ralph originally brought the position to his attention. To this day David couldn’t figure out if his best pal had ulterior motives for the suggestion. He didn’t feel very obligated though, as being a Comet editor wasn’t much more than a part time job. As a side hustle, David also deciphered legal fine print for a public defender firm. 

David sniffed again and laid his half eaten sandwich on the plate. He reached for a glass of water and gulped half the contents at once. After putting the tumbler down, he rapidly scratched behind his right ear and shook his head. 

     “So, buddy, whadda ya say?” Ralph asked leaning forward and wiggling his eyebrows. 

David sighed and considered picking up his sandwich again. A short, older waitress passed their table with two plates of corned beef stacked high on rye and blimp sized kosher pickles. Lunch hour was almost over but customers were still coming through the front doors. 

     “Ralph-"

     “I know what you’re gonna say. My stuff is too deep for the newsprint crowd. But this space opera is real John Q stuff. Mabel could read it to her grandkids. If-“

     “Ralph. The Comet isn’t taking anymore creative fiction, there just isn’t any page space. They’ve allotted more column blocks to advertising. It's not about literature or art anymore, its all economics now. You understand, right?” 

Ralph rubbed the stubble on his chin and sat back in his chair. David bet even money on whether he actually understood or not. Their waitress came over and filled his coffee cup. Ralph didn’t comment. David wiped egg yoke off his sparsely bearded chin and asked for a doggie bag for the rest of his sandwich he planned to polish off later at the office. 

     “No more stories in the Comet, eh?” 

     “Nope, sorry fella.”

     “Hey Davy, listen man… you gonna eat the rest of that sammich?”

Author's Note

sketching today... couple edits... made me hungry for a fried egg sammich.... Critiques and comments welcome.

Reviews

[Samuel Dickens]

I couldn't help but transport the whole scene to more familiar territory--a ship's chow hall. There, everyone eats like David. Tis best, you see, to not scrutinize what you're eating too close. Bo weevils, grasshopper legs, mold, boogers... you get the picture. I once found a rather large bolt in my beans, which was impossible to ignore. (Really. No s**t)
Weeeeooooo... back to the diner. It seems to me that communications on all levels are somehow sullied in that place. Possibly, a little green man is angry he won't be written about and is blanketing the space with an industrial strength ray of indifference.
A great little tale. I like it.

[roarke]

Yeah, bolts can't be ignored, Sam, but with my eyesight, the rest is protein. Another friend commented: So where's the rest of it... lol Well this diddy goes in the ten year simmer pot until I think or the rest of it. Scenes and moments coalesce until there is a "rest of it" lol But to your point, indifference is all there is in a big city...

[roarke]

Oh, and thanks for the read and comments, I think your comment had the beginnings of a story, so GET WRITING. lol

[Coyote Poetry]

Food and talk. Always the best conversations. I did enjoy this conversation. Hello my friend from cold and icy Michigan. Thank you for sharing the entertaining story.
Coyote

[roarke]

C. You are eating up my writing today. Thank you. Save some room for desert. Lol

[Coyote Poetry]

I miss the lunch time talk. This is when we can decide if our friends are crazy or not? You are welcome my friend.

[Delmar Cooper]

No problem with the table manners. Some people eat that way and some writers are observers. The story boils down to: Two colleagues meet in a diner and a pitch is rejected. The rest is furniture. Some of the furniture is pretty comfortable, but a reader does not come to your page to lounge about.
What I would like to see: Dialogue at least half the story, okay, okay say thirty percent. More information, stated or implied about Ralph. Loose the last line, it does not work being stated just after Davy has asked for a doggie bag, of course he wants the sandwich, do we think he really has a dog?

[roarke]

heh, so lunch ain't over eh? There's not much more to this story, but I do agree it needs a little more. The last line is the last line, I just didn't get to it well enough, without Dave, Ralph doesn't eat...employment wise. So back to banging the keys. BTW thanks for the read and great comments.

[Delmar Cooper]

Yeah I know, sometimes I have an ending and write the story to it. When I do that every word in the story has to lead to that ending like a gut leads to an anus.

[barleygirl]

This is a delicious bite-sized read that leaves the reader feeling complete. In a little way, I feel you go too far when describing how the guy chews & stuff like that, passages which are choked with descriptives . . . but on the other hand, it's so much better than the skimpy s**t I've been reading at the cafe. I want to teach some writers to use descriptives along with dialogue to convey a fulsome scene & not only the stripped down words that people say to each other -- this piece would be an example of how to embellish dialogue & stick to the immediate scene, not going so far off on a tangent that the reader forgets what the last piece of dialogue was about. In short, well-balanced (((HUGS))) Fondly, Margie

[roarke]

Thanks M, I was hoping to show Dave's character by the way he eats... needs work. lol How long is long, how short is short... a writers dilemma, but short pieces can be a palate cleaner for readers, and publishing short stories doesn't mean that all have to be 40 pages long... there are so many opinions out there eh? I'm very glad you read this piece as I intended and enjoyed it. That's all it was about. Thank you.