Nah foreal, happy moments never last on this mf. A girl could tweet a pic like “my bf bought me a Tesla” and then 2 days later “He was cheating on me I caught him and he beat my ass and threw my dog out a window” LIKE FAM WTF???
Inherently millennial phenomena:
• axe-throwing
• cards against humanity
• self-deprecating jokes
• drinking IPAs
• breweries instead of bars
• “we are young forever” slop music
• those burger joints (we all know)
• curse words on menus
• saying “adulting”
What else?
My ass ripped another cosplay. The zipper flew right the fuck off. And my thighs have internal bleeding marks from how tight this is around my thighs. THIS WAS CUSTOM MADE. why. WHYYYYYYY.
USA. A fast food counter. I ordered a sandwich. One sandwich. A simple request from a simple man.
"Want to make it a meal?"
Make it a meal. As if the sandwich were incomplete. As if I had asked for half a victory.
In my land, what you order is what you receive. Here, every item stands one promotion away from becoming a trilogy.
"What does the meal add?" I asked.
"Fries and a drink for like two bucks."
Two bucks. The price of transformation. My friend said everybody does it. The man behind me already had.
"Most people do," the cashier said, tapping the screen where the meal glowed.
Most people. The most dangerous phrase in American commerce.
I said yes. Of course I said yes. Refusing fries in America is like refusing armor on the eve of battle.
The tray arrived enormous. The sandwich looked smaller beside its new family. I had adopted potatoes and soda through a verbal contract that took four seconds.
I ate the fries first. Honor is complicated.
By the middle of the sandwich I understood I had not ordered food. I had ordered membership.
I was not deceived. I was not disciplined. I had been defeated by a question that cost two dollars.
A sandwich alone is an intention. A meal is a commitment.
Upgrade offered at the counter cannot be ignored. It can only be accepted with fries.
A man does not order a sandwich alone when the meal is only two dollars away. He only pretends he had a choice.
I know the rule now. Say meal before they ask. Skip the hesitation.
Who am I deceiving. I will order the sandwich again. I will hear the question again. I will say yes again, because in this country becoming more is always cheaper than staying exactly who you were, and I intend to become more at every counter I meet.
My nose tingled, a familiar warning. A sneeze escaped me, and before its echo faded, three voices offered a blessing.
"Bless you." From the left, a man comparing drills.
"Bless you." From the right, a woman with paint cans.
"Bless ya, big guy." From somewhere I could not even SEE.
In my land, a sneeze is a private failure. You suppress it, apologize to it, and carry on in shame. Here, a sneeze is a flare fired over the aisle, and the entire nation is on standby to answer it.
I asked the drill man if we knew each other.
"Nope."
"Yet you blessed me."
"You sneezed, man."
The logic was airtight and I had no response. You sneeze, you are blessed. Cause, effect. A spiritual reflex installed in three hundred million people, triggered faster than thought.
I tested it. Not on purpose. The dust of the lumber aisle tested it for me. Sneeze — "bless you" — sneeze — "bless you again" — sneeze — "you good?"
You good. The third sneeze downgrades you from blessed to monitored. There are rules, and nobody wrote them down.
I began carrying the duty myself. A woman sneezed by the fasteners. "BLESS YOU," I said, with the full weight of my lineage. Too loud. I startled her into a second sneeze. I blessed that one quieter. We found our peace.
A blessing here does not check your name. It is in the air before your sneeze has landed.
I practice my draw daily. Yesterday I blessed a man through a closed window. He could not hear me. The blessing counts. I have decided it counts.
Under the fluorescent glow of the gas station, the hot dogs turned, an endless, silent procession on their chrome altar.
Eight of them. Turning in place under the lights, golden and patient, like tiny monks in training.
I asked the clerk the question that mattered.
"How long have these turned?"
"Before my shift."
"And before that?"
He shrugged. The shrug of a man guarding a mystery he has chosen not to examine.
In Japan, food has a timestamp, and the timestamp has my full trust. Here was food whose origin no living witness could name. The roller does not count. The roller only turns.
I stood before it the way one stands before an old shrine. Travelers came and went. A man in a hoodie took one without hesitation — without even the COURTESY of fear — paid, and walked into the night, alive and unbothered.
"Are they safe?" I asked the clerk.
"People keep buying 'em."
That is not an answer. That is a theology.
I will be honest about what happened. I bought one. I stood in the parking lot holding it for some time. I am told the security footage is funny. I have not watched it.
The first bite was excellent. I want that on the record. Whatever the wheel has done to it, the wheel has done it well.
A man does not ask the roller when it began. He only decides whether tonight he is brave.
I return every Friday now. Same hour. The dogs are always turning. Perhaps the same ones. Perhaps their sons. I no longer ask.
Some wheels are older than the question. You eat, you nod at the clerk, you live.
I was a murder suspect cuz detectives noticed 7 ppl I argued wit on here died & da last one was da worst coincidence of all time cuz he got killed in da same spot I was in 8 hours after we argued on here. I was like why would I shoot up a place wit my name on da flyer.