Influx: Part 2

Part 1


The influx orders coffee.

They are in a booth on the other side of the diner, sitting there, drinking their coffee when Tony and Boris come in. Boris is Russian. This is when I get my truck keys from the hook behind the counter and slip them into my shirt-pocket. Boris does not like black people. He does not come from a place where there is the polite compromise to keeping your mutual loathing to yourself. Boris stands in the door staring at them for about 15 seconds before he comes in, meanwhile Tony, who is behind him, is getting soaked, but too afraid of Boris to push him out of the way and come in. The girl and the old man have their back to the door, to Boris. The young black man, on the opposite side of the table, looks at Boris, but keeps the smile in check. You can see him controlling himself.

The Russians around here have always struck me as dangerous, seeming on the verge of exploding with their new freedom. One of them beat the shit out of Mike Bennick in his hardware store a black from here when he told him he was making too much noise and disturbing the other shoppers. They were driving around town in a big new SUV and making noise, and everybody was too afraid to say anything to them, including the police. This set of Russians, they came into America like teenaged boys bent on proving their manhood.
So Boris and Larry and Tony are at a table on one side, thinking of how to let these people, this influx, know how they felt and in doing so feel better about themselves, feel like men, feel like they had earned the right to call themselves men. Boris and Tony haven't said
The black guy, he gets up and goes over to the jukebox, which is over by the Boris-Tony-Larry booth, about three feet from it, in fact. He walks slowly over by their table, a little closer than he had to, goes to the jukebox and puts his money in. The song starts when he goes past their booth again, Paradise by the Dashboard Light by Meatloaf. He looks at Boris, Boris looks at him, he stops walking, stands there for a few seconds, continuing to stare. Boris begins to turn really red. The young black man goes back to his table. While he was at the jukebox, the girl changed sides at the booth, now she is sitting beside him. I would say that she is about 27 or 28 years old, would be pretty like a model except for the fact that she is a little heavy. Not unattractive heavy, though. She isn't wearing make-up. The sleeves on the shirt she is wearing, a man's shirt, are rolled up showing more of her tattoos. She opens her mouth and he spits into it. He spits into her open mouth. Tony and Boris stare in disbelief. Boris is just staring and getting even redder. He gets up and starts walking quickly towards them. I take up the cordless phone I keep under the counter. I dial 911 but I don't hit send. I move to the right side of the counter where the door the store-room and the back exit is, but I don't leave.

Part 3


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