“ ‘Two eggs,’ he said slowly, remembering, getting it perfect, ’scrambled. Orange juice. Toast. Coffee,’ he said.
“ ‘Wouldn’t you rather have milk, Harve?’
“ ‘Sure.’ He grinned. ‘Milk.’
“ ‘Sounds good,’ I told her. ‘Bring me the same.’
“We stopped off for ice cream, stopped off for Coke. When we filled up in Kentucky I gave Harve three bucks. He offered me candy when he came out with the bag. I told him, ‘No thanks, Harve.’ You know what kids eat. Crap from the space age — sugar fuels, fizz. Candy with noises, a licorice that whistles, a licorice that whips. Panes of sugar so brittle like cracked glass in your mouth. Pop drops and doodads, candy like toys. ‘Your mother would kill me, she saw what you got.’ I made him promise to save some, not to fill himself up.
“He was sitting up front now. More like it, you know? We got into Nashville just after five.
“ ‘This is Nashville,’ I told him, ‘where they make all the country-and-western records. Nashville is famous.’
“ ‘Sure,’ Harve said, ‘Motown.’
“ ‘No, Motown’s in Michigan, Motown’s Detroit.’
“ ‘Where they got all the niggers.’
“ ‘Christ, where do you get that stuff? Your mother doesn’t talk like that, I certainly don’t. Black people are just like everybody else.’
“ ‘They’re poor,’ Harve said.
“ ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘many of them, many of them are.’
“ ‘Chicken George, Kunte Kinte. Slavery’s bad.’
“ ‘That’s right, Harve.’
“ ‘That’s why they kill us. That’s why they steal. That’s why they set fires and rape old white ladies and take our bicycles. That’s why they’re lazy and cheat on welfare.’
“ ‘Harve, that’s bullshit. You’re a bigot, you know that?’
“We were downtown now, stopped at a light. Some people were waiting on line for a bus.
“ ‘Your mama!’ Harve called from the car.
“ ‘Roll up that window! Goddamn it, Harve!’ ” George Mills was giggling. “We could have been killed,” Messenger said. “We could have been jabbed in the eyes with their hatpins, we could have been slashed in the guts with their shivs.” Enhanced, he began to laugh. “They could have pulled us out of the car and OD’d our asses with bad skag. They could’ve done us an injury with their Saturday Night Specials. Oh Jesus!” He wiped his eyes, licked his fingers. “Delicious,” he said. “Weeping delicious and laughter delicious too. All, all of it delicious.”
“Did you find the place?” Mills asked.
“The Holidome?”
George nodded.
“Oh sure,” Cornell said. “But we didn’t order from room service. Harve decided he’d rather eat in the restaurant.
“I was ready for him. I mean things had gone better. He’d been sitting up front with me, and cooled it on the sound track. Things had gone better, but I was ready for him. Before she even came over I laid down the ground rules.
“ ‘All right, Harve,’ I told him, ‘that was a cute one you pulled at lunch. I give you that one. Anything you want, anything.’
“ ‘Anything?’ he said. He had this sly, shit-eating grin on his face.
“ ‘Absolutely,’ I said, and dropped the big one. ‘But you can’t have eggs! You can’t have toast or juice. You can’t wait for me to order and tell her “Same here.” What I did this afternoon was a gesture. Ordering eggs, ordering juice. Do you understand me, Harve? It was a little salute from me to you because you used your head and you tricked me. That was smart, Harve, but it’s not helping you read. Sound it out. When the girl comes over and gives us the menus we’ll just tell her we need more time. Sound it out. I don’t care how long you take, Harve.’
“ ‘Not out loud,’ he said. ‘I’m ashamed.’
“ ‘Not out loud,’ I agreed. ‘To yourself. Whatever you want.’
“So when the waitress came over and left us the menus he knew where he stood. I have to admit. He certainly studied the thing. He touched each letter with his finger as if the menu were printed in a kind of Braille.
“She asked if we were ready.
“ ‘How about it, Harve? Are you?’
“ ‘You go first,’ he said.
“ ‘All right,’ I said, ‘sure.’ I drew it out, chose, changed my mind, talked it over with the waitress, asking in Opryland, ’is your swordfish fresh, your poached salmon?’ Not wanting it even if it was, you understand, just giving Harve time, not wanting to embarrass him in public. Just giving him time, letting him rehearse whatever it was he’d so painfully sounded out. Harve finally looked up. I smiled at the waitress.
“ ‘Shrimp cocktail to start, please. Bring lime, not a lemon. You can get a wedge from the bartender,’ I told her decisively. ‘Kansas City strip. Medium rare. Baked potato. Have the chef remove the aluminum foil in the kitchen. You have a house dressing?’ She nodded. ‘House dressing. Coffee. We’ll see about dessert later.’ I looked over at my son. ‘The ball’s in your court, Harve,’ I told him.
“ ‘Milk,’ he said. ‘I’ll have milk.’
“I was staring at him, but sure enough there it was, his finger under the beverages at ‘Milk,’ pressing his finger down on the page, holding on to the word as if, if he let go, it would take him forever to find it again.
“ ‘Anything for starters? What for a main course?’ the waitress asked. Harve looked over at me.
“ ‘The lady wants to know if you feel up to an appetizer, Harve. She’s waiting for your decision vis-à-vis the entree.’
“ ‘Milk,’ he said, ‘just milk.’
“The waitress looked at him sympathetically. ‘Too much Opryland, sweetie?’ she asked. ‘You swallow too much chlorine in the Holidome?’
“Harve shrugged.
“ ‘Where you from, darlin’?’
“ ‘St. Louis,’ Harve said.
“ ‘You drive all that distance with your daddy today?’
“Harve nodded.
“ ‘That’s a long drive,’ she said. ‘No wonder your tummy’s all sour. How about two nice soft-boiled eggs and some unbuttered toast? The chef don’t like to do that this time of night, but maybe if I tell him it’s for you he’ll make an exception. Tell you what, if he puts up a stink I’ll do it myself.’
“Now I really have to give him credit. He could have made me the hard guy, I might have had to take this fall. I mean all he had to do was look over at me for permission, for God’s sake. Because I wouldn’t have given it to him. He knew that. I wouldn’t have given it to him. I’d have looked like a shit in that nice waitress’s eyes with her damned Southern hospitality. There I am, George. Practically praying to God that the kid wouldn’t do it, that he’d start making his F-15 noises again instead, that he’d dive-bomb, strafe the fucking civilians, drop the big one on the niggers, anything. But I have to hand it to him. I do. He never took his eyes off that waitress’s face. He never even blinked them. And when he spoke, which was at once, he was as southernly hospitable as the waitress herself, as gracious and charming, giving it back to her in spades who couldn’t read a menu but who’d picked up in five minutes at the registration desk the actual idioms and inflections, perfect pitch not just for machinery but for the United States of America, maybe for the whole world.
“ ‘No, ma’am, no thank you. I don’t really crave eggs this evening. I’ll just have that milk if it’s all the same to you and that chef don’t mind pouring it.’