Moncks Corner's Revenge - Part 7c

So I walked into the diner...

The door was in the middle of the long glass wall of the diner. To my right, at the far end of the bar, an elderly couple sat in a booth, sharing some late afternoon chit chat over coffee. They both looked up when I entered and I received a double-barrel glare of "what the hell is this strange Mexican doing in our diner" before they returned to their conversation, now with an apparent new topic. Just to my left sat a pair of women in a booth against the bar, having an animated discussion, most likely the newest gossip about Billy Bob or Bobbie Sue, sitting facing one another. It was evident that at least one of them was a mother, if not both, as there were 3 young children sitting the next booth past them, the youngest, a small girl, perhaps 4 years of age, and the oldest, a boy, not likely more than 7 or 8.

As soon as I set foot through that diner door, that boys eyes locked onto me as if he were a roach and I was a D-Con Roach Motel. He had been animatedly talking until his eyes caught mine... as soon as they did, his mouth simply stopped moving, leaving it somewhat agape, and his eyes grew to the size of tea coasters. I took a quick inventory of myself to make sure nothing was entirely amiss with my outfit.

Pants - on. Check. Polo shirt - unbuttoned but unstained. Check. Shoes - untied but on. Check. Fly - closed. Check.

I had carried my backpack in with me to go over some notes from the job I had just completed and to work on a poem and I casually shifted its heavy weight higher up my shoulder with the standard "toss and shrug" maneuver.

The boys eyes never left me.

I walked calmly past the moms and past the children, my destination being a window booth towards the far end of the diner.

The boys eyes never left me. They blinked once as I walked past him. His head tilted up and he shifted his body and turned around as I continued past him. He turned completely around in the booth to stare at me, his eyes flicked over to look at my long, dark hair, and then back at my face as I proceeded down the aisleway.

His eyes blinked again in disbelief. His mouth was still open in the basic "oh my Gawd" expression.

I turned and tossed my heavy backpack into the booth seat facing the moms and the kids and "Stare" boy. He just kept on a-lookin'.

I then gave him what I will admit to have been an irritated glare at his unbroken staring. It didn't faze him in the least. Nope. He just kept on gawking at me.

And as I started to sidle in to sit down, the boy slowly raised his right hand up, as if to take the oath of office, palm facing me...

and he continued to stare...

and quite seriously, he uttered a single word to me.

"How"
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