Nocturnal
Tendencies
Continued
by Tim Bugansky
photos by Michele Lenni
Waiting for the Drunks
It is after 1:30 a.m., and the mood in the smoking section has toned down considerably. Solitary customers now outnumber the larger groups. Classical music can be heard distinctly over the conversations. An hour ago the opposite was true: Tiny patches of music barely pushed their way through the din.
Steve had left to take Lisa home, but now he and his cousin are back. It's 1:53 a.m., but he isn't ready to call it a night yet.
"We've decided we're going to stay up all night," he says, ordering a cup of coffee
Just before 2 a.m., Allison pauses to look out the window. She spies a trio of men, dressed in going-out clothes, staggering slightly as they walk toward the door.
"Here they come," she sighs. "The drunks. I hope they're nice. I hope they're happy drunks instead of angry ones. For some reason, all the angry people in the universe seem to go to the same restaurant at the same time. They hate the world and think it's my fault."
As the night has progressed, the customers and waitresses alike have mentioned the drunks. Because it's a Saturday night, what goes on will not be a pure picture of Country Kitchen because of the added dimension of the weekend drunks, they say.
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"For some reason, all the angry people in the universe seem to go to the same restaurant at the same time. They hate the world and think it's my fault." |
They describe them in almost horrible terms, as if the drunks pour from the bars of downtown Kent and invade Country Kitchen like barbarians.
Not that the regulars don't drink. Many do. It's just that Country Kitchen is their everyday place. It's not their 24-hour detox center only useful for its strong coffee and skillet breakfasts.
The bar rush can happen anywhere from 2 to 4 a.m. The initial drunks Allison spied through the window are actually behaving themselves. This turns out to be a good omen. The packs of drunks don't descend upon Country Kitchen this night. It's cold out, some regulars muse, maybe they just stayed home.
So Allison fills the void of the drunks' absence by recounting past experiences. The things that can occur in a Country Kitchen full of tipsy twentysomethings, she says, would never happen on a day shift.
"Since it's third shift, it's OK to bring all the sick people and stick food down their throats," she says, her voice full of sarcasm."
But Allison won't play nurse or janitor along with being a waitress.
"I don't get paid to clean up their bodily excrements," she says. "I give them the towels and I say, 'This is for your friend's puke.' And I walk away. They wouldn't go to Applebee's with somebody who's going to throw up and shove a hamburger in their mouth."