Table 5

They were weird from the very beginning. The two of them walked in the door, the mom was crying and her son (about 25-ish) asked for a table very calmly and paid no attention to the crying woman standing next to him. I sat them and asked the woman if she needed water or a tissue, or if there was anything I could do for her. Her son answered me, "My mom's just had a really bad day. All she needs right now is some coffee. And I want a large chocolate milk. Can you put extra chocolate syrup in that for me?" Which is fine, I hadn't wanted to pry, I'm just the kind of person that gets concerned when people are crying around me...anyway.

It took 40 minutes for them to decide on something to eat. During that time, they didn't talk to each other at all. They just read the menu and drank their beverages.

When I brought their food, the mom was shaking. Not like from the cold, but like she was having some wicked DT tremors. I gave her more coffee and he had two more glasses of chocolate milk.

Neither of them touched their food. They didn't want boxes, but he got a slice of chocolate cake (with extra chocolate syrup on top) to go.

When I dropped off their cake and check, I said, "Thanks for coming in guys. I hope tomorrow's a better day. Have a happy holiday.", and started to walk away. I heard the mom behind me, "I hate that PC bullshit, 'happy holidays' just say 'merry fucking christmas'." I ignored her and kept walking. A couple of minutes later, I was putting in another order at the computer, and she came up behind me and asked, "Earlier, you said 'happy holidays', are you not a Christian?" I replied, "My religion has absolutely nothing to do with bringing you your food, I just hope you have a nice Christmas and New Year. That's two holidays, so I just abbreviate it, saves me time." I tried to make it sound light...I'm not terrible comfortable talking to strangers about religion.

She took my wrist in her hand, and was looking at me very searchingly...it was all too weird, so I told her that I was busy and had to go, again thanked her for coming in and wished her a good evening. This time, as I was walking away, she said, "Please God, have mercy on that lost little girls soul."

Fucking weird.