"Bit of fried rose, maybe?" reaching pale fingers in, bending as if to sniff coffee.
"Fried rose?"
Mark holds a petal so greasy it makes his fingers shine. "It's like a delicacy. You behead them and fry them in oil, and eat them."
Tom stares at both Mark and himself, lighting a 100 the way a cigar is lit, torching it, so that the end gets ravaged.
"Try one. I get them from somebody pretty trustworthy. They're better than they look. Try one. It'll pick you up."
He looks at it. "I think I'd rather drink bong-water than eat something that looks like that."
"Bong-water's a totally different issue."
"You're sure?"
"Just one. Try it. You look like hell. You can wash it down with Jolt, won't even taste it."
No inappropriate comestibles for D.L., though. D.L.'s psychic was dead-set against fried roses. Hors d'oeuvres to a meal you don't even want to think about, she'd called them. It was she who told D.L. she might be seen only in Datsuns. That the Death card was basically an OK card. But to consult her before ever leaving home. To wear amber resin instead of perfume, it's good karma, opens the third eye, plus smells good, like distant orange cake. D.L. wears amber:
"Excuse me? I heard only doughnut. A Nissan, then. We will, no, not be driving it out of state. We'll be taking it only to Collision, just West of here. Is Collision just West of here? Steelritter, yes. We're here for the Reunion of Everyone Who's Ever Appeared in a McDonald's Commercial" (caps hers). "The ultimate McDonald's commercial. A kind of logarithm of all other McDonald's commercials, a spot so huge the brochure, here's the brochure, the brochure says 'New equipment will have to be designed even to try to countenance the union of all the thirty years' actors consuming, to attempt to capture a crowded and final transfiguration that will represent, and so transmit, a pan-global desire for meat, a collective erection of the world community's true and total restaurant.' I know, Steelritter Advertising tends to talk that way. And Mr. Steelritter wasn't here to meet us. We were late. We. My husband and friend are both" — looking—"my husband is in the lounge, just across, facing the window, you can just see him. Mark Nechtr, spouse. With a ch and no vowel. He should go down first. Next D.L. Eberhardt, introduction of the McDonaldLand outdoor-eating and family-fun areas, winter, 1970. I sliding down a compactly curved slide, my possibly bare little bottom shrieking fric-tionally against very very cold metal. I innocently offering the Hamburglar a burger he doesn't even chew, swallowing it whole as I recoil. The poor man was bulging out of his costume by the time Steelritter was satisfied with the shot. He was a perfectionist.
He and the actors who wore costumes didn't get along well, was our impression. Our. A Thomas Sternberg should go down, too, as a possible driver. He's from the introduction of the Drive-Thru option, winter, 1970. He petitioning a smiley-faced intercom for a FunMeal while the actor at the wheel reaches down to tousle his hair. Relishing the break he'd deserved that day. That's probably more information than you need. It's just that we're tired, we've flown in all the way from the East Coast, we haven't had quality sleep, or been met, and we would so much just like to get there. With minimal hassle. We are late, and have transportation needs, and the credit to satisfy them. And our national credit card of choice is: Visa. You're right, that's not technically our name on the card. The card's technically in my husband Mark Nechtr's father's name. He's in detergent. Steelritter doesn't handle his firm, I'm afraid."
There is narrative movement. Sternberg sits, fearful, trying to lift his shoes from view. He fingers his forehead in further fear and indecision as the smell of what what he's consumed produces rises around him. Elsewhere, red-toothed, Mark idly flips his arrow up and over and down and into the lounge's round table, where the razor-sharp Dexter target-tip sticks. He's good at this — it's a lounge trick — just hang the nock and part of the cedar shaft over the table's edge, give it a carefully casual slap from below, and the thing goes up, end-over-end, and comes down straight, to stay. The bartender, who wouldn't be pleased at punctured tabletops, is however engrossed in what the menacing Orientals, now in leather, are doing to an occidental nun.
"Is this because J.D. Steelritter, who probably owns this whole airport and everything in it, doesn't handle detergent?" D.L. demands. "Well no I'm trying to tell you it is our card, it's just in his father's name. Wedding present. We're practically newlyw— but why does it need to be in our name? I'm over twenty-one, I'm twenty-five, for Christ's sake — look at the license. I'm pregnant. I have a spouse. No, Mark does not have a Visa in his own name.
He's just a graduate student. We're only just now establishing credit. Tom Sternberg I know doesn't have a credit card. He uses only money. Not even a checking account. He pretends it's a political idea, but really he's afraid he'll get confused, overextended."
The Avis representative chews empathetically as she explains that renters need cards in their own names. That she's only relating company policy. That there it is in black and white. Legal thing. Have to establish that you're accredited adults who can assume responsibility for someone else's high-velocity machine.
"But Miss this Visa has unlimited credit. Look — it's got 'LIMIT: SKY' printed right on it. Embossed."
On Mark's table are his upright Dexter aluminum, his Ziploc of Ambrose's fried roses, a tall thin bar-glass of cola, and an untended 100 that refuses to die in its ashtray.
"Let me understand you," D.L. tells the anvil-haired Avis attendant as the mood of the line behind her moves beyond ugly and restless into something more like at peace and sort of awed, watching the exchange. "Though the credit is unlimited," she says slowly, "it's not ours, you're saying. It's unlimited, but it's not about responsibility, and so in some deep car-rental-agency sense isn't really credit at all?"
The Avis lady, whose name is Nola, chews a bit of chocolate glaze, nodding with the genuine empathy that got her the job in the first place.
D.L. turns to no one in particular: "This is an outrage."
And it is, sort of.
"Can I help, perhaps?" It's the young man with the soft beard, crisp bills and crammed clipboard, holding a vending machine's paper cup of coffee by its flimsy fold-out handle, exchanging pleasant nods with Nola, of Avis.
"Are you affiliated with the Reunion of Everyone Who's Ever Appeared in a McDonald's Commercial?" D.L. asks.
"No," the guy admits, sipping.
D.L. turns her lime-green back. "Then no," she says. "Miss," she says, "what then do you propose we do? Is there any sort of public transportation in Central Illinois? Don't laugh. We're in real trouble. We have a severely limited amount of time to get to Collision and the Funhouse discotheque that J.D. Steelritter, who just by the way does own this airport, doesn't he…?"
"J.D.?" the mild-eyed man asks.
"J.D.," D.L. says, not turning around, too pissed even to recognize recognition. "And we're not even sure where Collision is, from this airport. How far West of here is it? Is it walking distance? Is there a road? All we've seen is corn. It's been disorienting, windblown, verdant, tall, total, menacingly fertile. This entire area is creepy. We have transportation needs. I'll bet the insects here are fierce. Is your state bird the mosquito? Is this snake country?"