Lonely Strand

A waitress waddles towards me. She is wearing a pink uniform,
liberally stained with God-knows-what. She has a few strands of grey
hair on her head, which is covered in a rash and flaking skin and she
scratches this head as she says:

"Can I take your order?"

and she is saying it in a way that is telling me, not asking me, and I
panic, because every eye is on me and every ear is tuned into our
conversation.

I see a sign for Soup of the Day over her shoulder and I order that,
although all I want to do is sit in a corner and sleep. The waitress
goes and everyone is still watching me. I look right at them and they
stare back, undaunted, like zombies.

... The waitress returns, dragging her feet, and she drops the bowl
down in front of me with a grisly, metal spoon. I look at the 'soup'.
It is brown, like the spoon, and there is something floating in it. She
is walking away and so I call her back and I laugh as I say: "Ha ha.
There's a hair ... in my soup ..."

It doesn't seem possible, but the silence in the diner deepens as the
waitress returns, picks up my spoon and dips it into the brown broth,
stirring.

"See?" she says. "It's what you ordered."

A bunch of sloppy, grey hairs is twirling around in the bowl like
flaccid tapeworms chasing each other.

I notice the lonely strands of stringy, grey hair on the waitress'
head. I notice the sign. Soup of the Day - Hair Soup.

She drops the spoon down, lank hairs still wrapped around it, and walks
away.

I can tell by the way the patrons are eyeing me that I have to eat the
soup, at least I do if I want to get out of here.

I scoop up a mound of hair and, with a trembling hand, I rush it into
my mouth. I immediately gag, much to the amusement of the crowd
watching me, and I spit the mouthful of hair back into the bowl, which
I push away from me as I call for the waitress. Eventually, she
comes.

"Hello? Miss?" I say. "This soup is cold."