Spoon Bottom

The bonds are secure, but not uncomfortable. The server hasn't tied the ribbons too tight this time. Regular attendance has its perks.

Truth be told, too much freedom will make dining unpleasant. The upside is when your dining companion is also held in place, you must rely on conversation to carry the encounter, rather than gestures or postures.

Her dining partner seems happy with his ribbons, having chosen purple, the least abrasive. Even with his chest, neck, and head immobilized, he looks relaxed, his breathing steady, his eyes shining. 

The clock on the sparse table reads "20 minutes", the time allotted to complete the meal, not including signing the bill and leaving the gratuity. 

The bus staff scuttles about the table, placing water, bread, and butter out of custom.

And bandages, just in case.

But no flatware.

Knives, forks, spoons are not welcome here. That is handled otherwise.

The server, chosen for a steady hand, awaits the sommelier, hired away from a private Carribean island resort known only to 362 people, 43 of which were dining here this morning, the odd duck being the prick Christian Magnusson, choosing once again to eat alone.

The sommelier arrives and starts the clock. Her ensemble is a simple black shirt, vest, trousers, socks, and shoes.

She foregoes the traditional tastevin for a delicate platinum straight razor etched with the date she first tasted wine. She stands table-side as Gladys and......("Shit. What was his name again?, Gladys thinks, "Ahhh, Sirle. Sirle, a Brazilian, he) Sirle looked as best they could at the wine list held precisely between them to prevent peripheral eye strain.

"Has our menu been chosen yet?", says Gladys to the server.

Sirle remains silent, as is expected.

Beggars cannot be choosers. 

If he wants to eat, he needs to remember his station. Time is sparse.

The sommelier produces a bottle of Pezzi King Merlot, ignoring the question.

"This will go well with the menu……”

Gladys starts to speak, but is cut off.

“……REGARDLESS OF THE HOUR.

She pauses for effect. This is her time. She attended an over-priced, sparsely-attended writers workshop in Bemidji, Minnesota to craft her presentation. Many 2 ounce shots of whiskey helped the process. The pain of a searing hangover helps to remove unnecessary distractions. Spot weld a need onto the desire to die, slap on some reins and ride.

"Imagine, please, a diamond goblet filled to the top edge with the finest rubies.”

(She moves the bottle to catch the light from different angles)

“Then imagine those rubies poured into the core of a dying star, melting into a pure red liquid, all deformities removed.” 

("GET THE FUCK ON WITH IT!" Gladys screams in her head)

"Then imagine that liquid cooling as it returns through time and space to our galaxy, our solar system, our humble planet, to our wine cellar where it is aged in a cask fashioned from an oak grown only in secrecy, then cut down, its root removed from the earth, charred, and the blackened stub used to coat the barrel made from its offspring, the red liquid introduced, sealed, then aged for a time known only to the the vintner, then bottled, to be unsealed This. One. Night."

The time spent on the description reduces the time of the dining experience, but was part of the process of excitement, of fear.

"No glass made by man or woman can do justice to the wine, so we pour it straight into your gaping maw as a mother bird feeds its fledglings."

The server puts the bottle to Gladys' lips and tips up the bottom. Gladys needs to extend her bottom lip to accommodate the liquid. Most of it spills on the nylon vest used to hold her in the chair. 

Sirle has no problem with the wine.

This is not his first time dining at "Restraints". He uses his lips and tongue as a perfect tunnel, the Merlot gliding. 

The amount he received was less than Gladys' because most of Gladys' portion was staining her vest and pantaloons.

They each were given enough to warm the palette and, yeah, sure, why not, get a good buzz going.

The server is in charge now.

The sommelier is just decoration. 

The bus staff chomps at the bit, waiting for a crumb or an errant drop of blood.

The first serving is a combination of bacon and sausage taken from the same pig, a Swabian-Hall swine, skewered on a syringe filled with curare. 

Gladys and Sirle bristle with anticipation and white fear.

This is why they come.

Gladys and Sirle open their mouths.

The server takes the syringe from the bus person, of equally steady hand.

The syringe moves slowly towards Gladys' mouth, she only slightly disappointed because now Sirle gets the added time to contemplate mortality.

Gladys measures the size of the portion with her eyes and opens her mouth to just barely accommodate the portion. Too much, she looks desperate and will not be allowed back. Too little, and she's dead. 

(17 minutes)

The server moves the syringe forward.

The liquid glistens in time to the candles. 

Gladys' heart races as she thinks, "Did they skewer the meat before or after drawing the curare? If before, how did they get it into the vial without tainting the meat? If after, did any of the curare drip out on the meat?" The needle looks longer than she remembers from other inoculations so they could have placed the meat, then drew the poison, but what did she know? She's not a medical professional. She owns a bookstore. There is still the chance something came in contact with something.

The needle moves closer, fear making it seem too big for the space she has provided. The smell of the bacon, the sausage almost calms her but a slight odor brings her back to the immediate. Is it the curare? What the fuck does that smell like? Is it the server’s cologne? She feels the bacon first, then the sausage, then another piece of bacon, then sausage, then bacon, then sausage, then....how long is this needle? The server's hand appears steady, but the brow is furrowed, eyes squinting. Worry? Concentration? Vanity?

"Bite down. Gently. " says the server.

Gladys closes her jaw until she feels the needle between the spaces of her incisors. 

"Hold steady now." Then, "Extracting."

The server pulls the needle back, the pork products falling on her tongue. For a moment she feels nothing, tastes nothing. 

(15 minutes)

Then the flavor erupts. 

Adrenaline and fear have cleared her palette.  

There is only the meat.

The warmth. The salt. The history.

All senses working with a singular focus.

The flavor. It's all about the flavor. The real flavor. Her senses are freed from the mental prejudice, the walls people build from eating the same food the same way every time. They eat a food item with a name but with each bite, the disconnect between item and flavor widens, moves to the background, becomes rote. A cheeseburger becomes meatandchesseandbread, a thing to be consumed but no longer loved.

Most restaurants produce a product. People eat the product. They go home.

In a few places, "Yes, Chef. No, Chef. Immediately, Chef" is the standard language. The food is good there, people eat there, but are more concerned with the "there" than the food.

At "Restraints" the enjoyment of the food is of the highest order. 

Gladys knew this coming in.

Sirle also knew this. 

(14 minutes)

Gladys hopes he was able to appreciate, however briefly, the food before the curare kicked in, his attractive, heart-shaped mouth (his second-best feature) not able to accommodate the portion, causing the servers thumb to move the plunger forward. She barely noticed the light leave his eyes during her foodgasm. 

As they quietly remove his body, Gladys sees 4 other patrons (the prick Magnusson among them) being wheeled out, the extra space between tables easily accommodating the silent gurneys. Their tables are cleared, fresh patrons are seated, and the ritual begins again. Clocks are reset to 20 minutes.

(13 minutes)

Gladys waits for the next course.

No more wine, now. Only water. 

Water served in a custom blown water vessel, used just this one time, bits of broken glass resting on the bottom. Gladys sucks at a moderate pace, quenching her thirst but avoiding a shredded larynx. 

"So this what water truly tastes like".

One of the bus staff brings a bowl with a lid, a small hole allowing some steam to escape. The server uncovers it. 

Scrambled eggs, dusted with shallots, and...

"Is that saffron?", Gladys says.

"Yes", says the server in a tone that erects a wall against further talk.

From the cumberbund comes a silver spoon, the handle, bowl, and tip honed to a keen edge, finished off by the server on a leather strop, attached to the back of Gladys' chair, close by her left ear. 

She works in a bookstore. She's read a lot of books, read a lot of bad books, read a lot of cheesy metaphors, but, "I'll be damned, the metal is actually singing as it leaves the surface of the strop. 'Tzing'"

The server slides the spoon through the pile of eggs. He coughs. Not a black cancer cough, but definitely an allergy/smoker/dust-buffalo-in-the-back-of-the-throat cough. The eggs wobble in the spoon.

The server calms.

"Is this part of the show?", thinks Gladys, bi-watching the servers face and the spoon, both now within inches of her.

The server barely suppresses the next round of coughing.

Sliding into Gladys' periphery, another server whispers into her server’s ear.

("Why can't I hear what's being said? They're close enough to count their nose hairs. If this is theater, it's pretty fucking good.")

Her server’s eyes are watering, but not blinking, the gaze never wavering from hers.

"I have it under control. I don't need your help", to the other server, who slips away.

(10 minutes)

Gladys has two options: remove the eggs with her lips or her tongue. Risk a misplaced dueling scar about which she can never speak, or learning sign language because she can never speak again?

She opts for the lips because if she uses her tongue, the flavor will be diluted with the muscle exertion and the smell will be blocked.

She puckers her lips, indicating the method. The server's body shudders, but the spoon remains level.

(8 minutes)

She opens her mouth enough to fit the spoon (she hopes). The server places it 3/4 of the way in, leaving space for the lips to begin their journey. Gladys lowers her tongue to the floor of her mouth to avoid tasting the metal of the spoon bottom.

("Spoon bottom")

Gladys needs every bit of muscle control she has to not laugh. "Spoon bottom" is suddenly the funniest thing she has ever heard. Tears form. A snot bubble starts.

The only things preventing her curling up in laughter are the restraints and the spoon. 

(6 minutes)

She tries to shape her upper lip into some kind of triangle. She inhales softly to assist her lip with moving the eggs forward. As it moves along the spoon, the smell precedes it. Gladys' eyes begin a slow roll backward.

("No! Focus! Lips. Inhale. Lips. Inhale.")

For reasons unknown to Gladys, the server tips the spoon just enough to help the egg slide on to her tongue, but not down her throat. The server removes the spoon, to hand it to a waiting bus person, then stands back.

(4 minutes)

Gladys is not religious, spiritual, or a believer in anything she cannot see, hear, touch, smell, or taste. She saw the egg on the spoon. She smelled it as it moved toward her mouth. She felt it when it touched the tip of her triangulated lip ("Well done, Gladys", she thought). But then her tongue and ears became the one thing. She tasted the egg as her ears heard the sounds of the barnyard. The slight breeze. The warmth of the hen’s underside. The farmer gently removing the egg while listening to Justin Johnson on her music player, her hips moving in time to the delta river blues swamp boogie. The creak of the old barn plays side by side with the music. The breeze sneaks in the cracks to cool the sweat from the morning chores, the egg gathering always saved until the end. A slow stroll through the barn to end the morning.

This time the flavor doesn't erupt in Gladys' mouth so much as make everything else meaningless.

There is only the flavor.

She chews.

She thinks she feels a tear forming, but she fights it back into her eye.

She swallows. 

(3 minutes)

"Spoon bottom".

She can chuckle now, as the server daubs her lips. 

The bus staff removes the ribbons and other binds.

"The check, please", she says softly.

It was already on the table, a fountain pen next to it. She signs her name and adds "+30%" beneath the signature.

Her credit card is on file, so no further interaction is necessary.

(1 minute)

"Thank you", she says to the assembled staff, who are impatient to turn the table, but respectful.

The clock reads "00:00".

She will be welcomed back.

She rides home in the provided cab, the rain tapping on the roof, satisfied.