The Law

 

(Nurse Ken has a lead foot.)

Yesterday, I woke up at 4 p.m. because Nurse Ken was arguing with his grandmother out in the kitchen. My oldest son is very loud. You can hear him from a mile away. Rice-Boy Larry, on the other hand, is soft spoken. He rarely speaks a word, and I often wonder if he’s semi-autistic.

I said, “What’s all the screaming about?”

Nurse Ken said, “Screaming? Who’s screaming? That’s simply the way I talk.”

Mom said, “He got another speeding ticket. That makes four in the last eight years.”

“It wasn’t my fault. Blame it on that goddamn state trooper who was lurking in the weeds. The son of a bitch.”

I said, “You gotta be careful. Your car insurance might go up.”

Ken’s granny covers the nut for his monthly insurance bill. She also bought him a Lexus a few years back, and it’s a hell of a nice car for a kid his age. Mom has a special relationship with Nurse Ken. She feels he got the short end of the stick because of the Dragon Lady. In her mind, my wife loves Larry more than her first-born son.

Yet here’s the actual truth. Narcissistic mothers frequently have a golden child and a scapegoat. But being the golden child is by far the much heavier burden. Ken managed to escape when he was sixteen whereas Larry had to fight it out till the bitter end. For instance, when we were living in China, my wife drained the bank account and ran away. It was Larry who spent a penniless week on the mainland until payday rolled around. Not Ken.

Anyway, the issue got resolved when my son finally promised to stop driving like an asshole. He swore that he would now mend his ways and follow all the traffic rules. I don’t actually see that happening, but I will keep my fingers crossed.

Later that night, I arrived at the Waffle House at 9 p.m. And guess what. It was bedlam as usual.

One guy’s card got declined, and Pork-Chop Jane screamed it out so that the entire restaurant could hear that the dude was a deadbeat. However, it turns out that the man had accidentally locked himself out of his own account and Jamaal helped him with the technical issues. So in the end, he managed to pay his bill.

All’s well that ends well, right? Not true in this case. The poor man left the restaurant mortified, but when he came to his senses, he made a U-turn to hash is out with Pork-Chop.

I greeted him as he walked through the door. “Hello, sir. Is everything OK?”

He shook his head. “No, everything is certainly not OK. Where’s that little waitress who was serving me?”

I looked around, but she wasn’t anywhere in sight. In truth, she was probably smoking dope out back by the dumpster.

I said, “It appears that she’s on her break. Can I help you with something?”

He defiantly held up his smartphone. “I want you to look at my bank account.”

I did as he asked. He had $2,500 on deposit.

I smiled at him. “Sir, you don’t have to show me. It was all a big misunderstanding.”

“There’s no reason for her to embarrass me like that in front of everyone.”

“I understand completely, and let me apologize for her behavior. It won’t happen again.”

“That’s not good enough. I want to speak to the manager.”

So I walked to the back and got the boss’s phone number. He has it tacked up on one of the bulletin boards for situations such as this.

The guy sat in one of the booths and talked for about ten minutes, carefully explaining why Pork-Chop Jane acted like a giant cunt. Yet I doubt if there will be any consequences. You can’t fire everybody, or there will be no one left to serve the hash browns.

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