All right, sure, the restaurant was busy, but this was absurd. They had handed their menus back forty minutes ago and there was no sign of the appetizers anywhere.
"So," Jon's mother said awkwardly, "Sarah, do you have any plans for your career?"
"Oh yes," his girlfriend said. "I'm trying to work my way up through management. I think I'm up for a promotion soon. Which means more money and time for Jon," she said sweetly.
"That's good," his mother said with that look that screamed that she was tired of small talk.
The waiter blessedly came over then and apologized for the delay, again. He passed around the salads and laid out the calamari in the center of the table. He handed Jon his soup and quickly rushed off to deal with an angry customer at the next table.
"Wait," Jon called after him, but he was gone. Whatever this soup was, it was decidedly not corn chowder, but there was no hope of getting that scatter-brained waiter's attention again. It was some red broth with strange vegetables he'd never seen before. Was it some kind of soy? It looked Asian. There were bits of black things in it that looked not quite but almost like pepper.
He took a sip. It tasted like nothing he'd ever had before. It had a sickly sweet quality, almost like the smell of death, but not unpleasant. And it was incredibly spicy. He wasn't sure if he liked it and yet found himself craving more with each sip.
Oh my god, this dinner is so boring, his mother said. He looked up but his mother had a mouthful of salad and obviously hadn't said anything. How odd.
His brother was singing the lyrics to Baby Got Back on full volume for no reason at all. Which was weird because he, too, had a mouthful of food.
I hate this family, Sarah muttered angrily.
"What?" he asked her. She looked up, confused.
"I didn't say anything," she said. He has such a stupid look on his face. He's such a dipshit.
He stared open-mouthed at the ridiculous things he was hearing her say. No, think. He was hearing her thoughts. Her thoughts.
Slowly, he became aware of the absolute cacophony surrounding him. The couple behind him was on a first date. She thought it was going well, but he was having raunchy thoughts about his ex. A young teenager across the restaurant was strongly considering rubbing one out in the bathroom, and his mother was pretending not to notice. A college student was on the brink of tears as her father asked her questions about her studies, and she had to break the news that she had flunked out. Her brother, meanwhile, was waiting for the right moment to tell his parents that they were going to be grandparents. Jon's waiter had been working for nine hours and was cursing out some customer for wanting their steak medium-rare, even though they ordered it medium. His roommate had just left him with no notice, but he was more scared that he wouldn't have money to feed his dog. Jon's father was having very graphic thoughts about one of the waitresses, and then his mother, and then imagining both of them together. Oh dear god, shut it off, shut it off, shut it off.
Jon shoved the nearly empty bowl of demon soup away.
He doesn't look well, his mother thought. "Jon, are you all right?"
"Just lost my appetite," he muttered, trying very hard to concentrate on anyone's thoughts but his father's.
You've been complaining about not getting our food all this time and suddenly you're not hungry? What a fuckhead, Sarah thought.
"Holy shit, do you have a problem?" he snapped at Sarah. The table stopped and stared at him.
His brother was about to ask what happened when a tremendous noise came from the kitchen. A chef was screaming at a waiter for some terrible mistake. It was something about a soup. The chef's thoughts were a terrible jumble, but from what he could tell, the waiter had served a soup to the wrong customer.
He wasn't sure what exactly was happening, but he had a sudden feeling that everything was about to go very south for him. He pulled out his credit card, handed it to his mother, said, "Give the waiter a two-hundred dollar tip," and ran out of the restaurant.