The evening is getting dark, the forty minutes long. We wait.

Four friends, half a dozen cans (not ours), and no plates.

We sit aside, the farthest table seats our families. Not one of them eats. A

Fast French friendly fidgety man flutters and mutters and brings other people pizza.

He always replies with merci beaucoup, then leaves. Does he thank himself so I can’t be rude?

I like his foreign grammar, his cluttered mind, – soon: his food.

To pass the time I decide I will listen and watch the people blessed with a culinary share.

I steal glances, I take chances and ignore that stone-sacred rule, “DON’T STARE.”

I assume from the start that they all are from Europe, my mind jumps to Britain.

I open ears and shut eyes, I take in the exciting sounds of language cluttered

The R’s are throaty, little dainty sounds, and vowels gutturall

French. I open eyes and see: a boy with a Tricolor sleeve and, verbatim, “nice nose.”

A woman, nothing but the messy classy tower of brown curls shows.

A tall man in a red shirt, balding. A woman in a zebra shirt and again – nose prominent

A fashionable lady, hair short, gestures and gesticulates with her glass, spill ominous.

The table of the French is complete. Spotlight stage right.

First impressions: bald and tall, thin and stretched, but yet a man I wouldn’t fight.

Tanned like a hide and tough as one too, that BeerLao shirt hangs around him like a shroud

He reviews the menu slowly, staring so hard he looks past it, baldness in the clouds.

I motion to the three, “Is it just me, or is monsieur missing an ear?”

Second looks, he does – the man is only half hear.

He sits with his family – PIZZA

(the observations disappear)