It is dawn in Spokane, Washington, and the wheat fields are burning. The smell of charred chaff rides the sunrise into town alongside the pickup trucks.
A man comes into a caboose diner and orders two breakfast plates, one for his friend, “who’s on his way.” The food comes, and he eats rapidly, hunching through a waffle and the whole wheat toast. One cup of water in, he goes to the restroom. When he comes back, he furtively sits down on the other side of the booth and starts in on this plate.
The sun is unpacking its baggage in the parking lot, and the man can see the asphalt begin to wave. The urge to wave back is resisted. The oatmeal suffers a sudden plague of brown sugar, and succumbs. Half a cloud of eggs evaporate before he heads back to the bathroom. When the man returns, over-casually, it is to the original side. The caboose is just shy of busy, slowly shifting weight from the kitchen to the booths by way of baked grains and flexing tongues. Nobody reacts to the man’s switch, so he resumes eating, at a more measured pace. Now, as the window glass warms, an amiable glow has filled him. Now, quite often, his posture stirs, and he looks up expectantly toward the restroom.
This man, halfway through a morning meal with a good friend, is pleasantly awaiting his return from the toilet, so their conversation may go on. This man, puttering through the last of two syrup-showered waffles, is not alone. This man, awake before the first field began its controlled holocaust, is not himself burning.
