Fries

“Honestly,” I huffed, “McDonald’s, you are supposed to be fast food!”

I was feeling a bit impatient. We were going to be late for a meeting. My youngest son and I, eager for dinner before we got to our destination, had pulled into the drive thru to grab a quick bite to eat.

But it wasn’t quick. We were sent into a pull-off area so they could clear us from their queue while still making their numbers look good. Even though our food was not ready.

My son sat in the passenger seat next to me. Nose in his homework, he was barely acknowledging my frustration. Late or not, it was all the same to him.

Eventually (and too many minutes later), a worker brought out our bag of food. I wanted to complain, but put on a smile instead and thanked him.

“Please pray,” I told my son. After he gave thanks, I eagerly opened the bag and started to drive out into the street. My fingers touched the top-most item. French fries!

They were hot. Wonderfully and deliciously hot!

“Oh, the fries are hot!” I exclaimed.

“Maybe that’s why it took so long to get our order,” my son replied. “They were making them fresh.”

He handed me a sleeve. The glorious, salty taste, the warmth struck me in such a delightful way.

The weather outside was cool as we drove towards our destination. I helped myself to a few more.

And I remembered. This warmth. This saltiness. This scrumptious aroma.

His van.

Him.

The smell of antifreeze blowing through the heater vents, mingling with that of the fries. They were hot. Wonderfully and deliciously hot!

The certain knowledge of what cruising around with him in that van meant. I didn’t realize it then, but the fries were part of the offering meal, the ritual that presaged the sordid encounter that always followed.

I was being fattened up for the slaughter. Lulled by comfort food into stupification. My conscience assuaged into expecting and allowing whatever. The fool on the other side of the bargaining table, where the winner takes all. And I do mean ALL.

He was the winner. Always.

I had thought I was. I scored the fries, after all. I was plied with treats into complicity. Into thinking I was special and was loved.

By him…

These things, these memories, flashed briefly across my mind as I ate my fries. My youngest son sat next to me eating his. Fourteen. He is the same age that I was when I finally told the last abuser no.

No more sex.

No more van rides.

No more fries.

How different is this boy’s life from that of my own? Worlds, galaxies, universes apart! He can eat fries with no stinging flashbacks, no olfactory connections to trauma that will haunt him for the rest of his life. He can enjoy fries for the fries’ sake without being transported back to places he wished he had never gone, regretting things he wished he never did.

How I wish I could be like that. How I wish that fries were innocuous culinary delicacies without a hurtful past. That, in eating them with my son, there was only joy for both of us.

I ate them, anyway. Conscience of the memory. Sad for younger me, but, oh, so glad for my son. God willing, he will never have to associate the simple joys of life with the greatest pain.

Isn’t that worth celebrating that the fries are hot? Wonderfully and deliciously hot?

Isn’t it worth enjoying fries for the fries’ sake?