And what would you like to order, ma'am?
Very good. And you, sir?
Thank you. I'll bring your dinners shortly. Can I get you anything else right now?
The restaurant is known for good, flavorful food well-prepared, nothing elegant or refined, but with friendly, casual service, relying on efficient turnover, but certainly very far from a fast-food joint. It's a favorite with the young crowd looking for something better, but also with older folks who would like a tasty meal that doesn't take half of forever to be served or cost half a fortune.
Like the two diners in the center of the dining room. Having just ordered, they again sit silently, staring past each other with the narrow peripheral vision of a busy waitress, seemingly not seeing each other.
Do they not want to risk even the chance of a simultaneous eye-locking glance that would demand that they say something to the other? How many years have they been together now? Could it be thirty, even forty?
Do they not remember that many, many years ago they surely had much to talk about, much to share, that they were always eager to bridge even the hint of the awkward quiet instant? Weren't the hours, the days and weeks, all too short when they were with the partner with whom they might want to share their future? Could they not recall that courting was not silence - there were words that spoke and asked, glances and touches, smiles and shared laughter that brought them closer?
Wasn't it all heartfelt and genuine then, no performance to win a prize, a prize that could tarnish with the years? Was it time as the great corrosive - a day, a week, a month, a year, then decades, of sameness: the same routine, the same thoughts, the same words, predictable words, predictable gestures, like a too-familiar melody played over and over and yet over again? Did even "I love you" become a robotic rasp on the once-responsive senses hardened by protective shells against the numbing sameness?
Can't they still remember that intimacy and love-making were once not euphenisms? Even if love decayed, have respect rotted and courtesy died as well?
Does the young couple at the nearby table even notice them - a klaxon warning of what their own future could become - or are they snugly enveloped in their own warm, sheltering world of youth and innocence? Or does the older pair take any note of them - their smiles, their laughter, their fond looks caressing each other at a distance, their animated, lively voices - wasn't that them once? Do their downturned faces mirror the sadness of decayed hope, burdened by monotony?
Or is he instead now thinking about his work and business, or the sports scene, or longing for the brusque banter and joking with his men friends? Or is she instead listening to conversations at the other tables, or planning what shops to visit, what antiques to look for, or wishing for gossip chatter with her women friends about who's doing what with whom?
Can either one still feel that gnawing silence growing louder every minute? Is it better to fill the black void with anything, idle chatter, the same old commonplaces, or are those even more dreadful than the ominous quiet? Have they perhaps realized that, like tennis with an overly familiar partner, each stroke anticipates the same counter-stroke, over and over again, so that there's no joy or sense in playing the game?
Are they disturbed by the contrast of flowing conversation, some lively, some intimate, some raucous, at every other table? Or is the warm bath of words and laughter a respite from the dull soundlessness of their meal at home?
Here you are ma'am. Sorry that it took a while.
Your dinner, sir.
Will there be anything else now?
Is the dinner as a focus for attention a welcome relief? Is there no longer a need for the sweeping glances that scan the room but stop just short of making the dreaded eye-contact? Is it more comfortable now to keep eyes on the plate: to cut the steak, to spear potatoes, to identify and maybe push aside the vegetables? Is the primal ritual of feeding, of satisfisfying hunger, of pleasing taste sensations, keeping them both gratefully busy? Is it just harder to talk with a full mouth, or would talking stretch out their dinner time together even longer? Will one think of asking the other how the meal is, of asking for or of offering a taste? Is even that level of contact gone, or does an offer risk yet more rejection?
Ma'am, sir, would you like some dessert?
One? very good, I'll bring that right away?
Again, will that one offer to share, or will the other think of asking how it is, and ask for a taste? Is another chance of contact gone, forever rejected?
Is it better now to finish and to quickly pay the bill (cash is faster than plastic), to go back, turn on the TV, chat on the phone, go their own ways unconstrained by place and time and by each other?
Is hell the silence when there's nothing left to say, and an eternity in which not to say it?
Peter E. Schmidt