“…Eyeballs…” Book II: 12. Knight With Shining Flatware

Hey! You Got Eyeballs In There?

By Kate Chamberlin

As Grace grows up, some of her stories are happy, some trying, some enlightening, and a few themes are sad, but, they’re all the warp and woof of what goes into the tapestry of life we call Family. The daily living skills and techniques demonstrated by the fictional characters in these stories are valid, tried and true.

Book II:  The Teenagers

#10. Bad News

#11.  Grace’s Day One

#12 Knight With Shining Flatware

The same quiet baritone now asked her if he could carry her tray to a table.

“Thanks,” Grace said meekly. “I think that would be the safest thing to do under the circumstances. Do you see where Heather went?”

“Yes,” answered the low baritone, “but, there are no more chairs at that table. Would you sit with me at another table?”

“Ok, but no guarantees about not dumping gravy in your lap,” she ventured to say with a smile.

“It’s a deal. I’ll jump out of the way, if I see it coming. By the way, I’m Ken. Who are you?”

“Sloppy Grace,” she answered sourly and told Crackers to Track Ken to their table. Grace silently said a prayer for nothing more to happen during lunch.

She noticed it got quiet around the table he chose as she maneuvered Crackers to sit with her rump under the table and her head next to Grace’s chair. She felt for the seat and back to be sure she wouldn’t end up on the floor next to her dog and carefully sat down. She could hear some tittering nearby and some “Ooh, Ken.”  “What you got there, Ken?” “You going to feed her, too, Ken?”

Grace felt her face burn like a camp fire and  didn’t know what to say so she started to feel for her straw and flatware. To her rising horror, she could not find them and what was worse, she was pretty sure she hadn’t picked any up, because of all the confusion with the falling tray. She felt something brush her hand and heard a metal clink on her tray.

“I noticed that you didn’t take any of these, so I snatched an extra for you,” Ken said. “I’m not sure it will be worth the effort but I get so hungry, that I’ll even eat school food.”

“Thank you, Ken,” she said with obvious relief. “I’m not usually so klutzy.”

“No problem,” Ken said. “I have an aunt who says she is blind in one eye and can’t see out the other. She just happens to be my favorite aunt, so, I’m often filling in the gaps for her. By the way, what they call turkey is located at one o’clock, the little green balls are at six, and the stiff clouds are around nine. The whole thing is covered in brown mud. Bon Appetit.”

Grace didn’t know who this knight in shining armor was but she was very relieved to have at least one bright spot in her day. She started to relax and taste her food. She knew from eating peas at home that she’d have more success if she mixed them into the mashed potatoes. Grace sincerely hoped Ken was too busy eating his own lunch to notice what she was doing. She had a system of eating around on her plate from 12 o’clock to three o’clock and so on until she’d gotten back to the top of the plate. That way she did not have to ask if she had eaten everything. The turkey was dry in spite of the gravy, so she reached for her carton of milk.

Grace always put her beverage in the upper right hand corner of her tray. The straw’s paper wrapper was very tight and refused to budge without a struggle. She wondered why the school purchased such long straws when the carton of milk was so small. She managed to get the carton open with it blowing only a few bubbles of milk out. By now, she was really thirsty.

Grace quickly lifted the carton toward her mouth and immediately felt the result of her haste. The straw did not enter her opened mouth, but rather, her left nostril. The kids at the next table burst out into a roar of laughter. She wished she could climb down under the table with Crackers or run away. She had never been so embarrassed in all her life. Why did she have to come to this dumb school with all these dumb kids anyway?