Habit

         “Why do you do that?”
         The question shattered my daydream and I lost my thoughts entirely. “…huh?” For a few seconds I was confused about my location.
         “Why do you do that?” he asked again.
         I finally found the source of the question and everything came back into focus. Garret sat across from me at the table. We always had lunch at the diner after class. “Do what?” I asked him back.
         “That thing with your ear.” His eyes asked the question more earnestly than the tone in his voice.
         “Uh…” I realized what I was doing and quickly pulled my hand away from the side of my head. “What thing?”
         He gave me that ‘you-gotta-be-kidding-me’ look of his. “What do you mean ‘what thing’? That thing. Where you,” he spoke slower as he tried to describe the action, “caress your earlobe between your knuckles.”
         I knew what he meant, but I really didn’t know exactly why myself. So I lied instead. “I really don’t have the slightest clue what you’re talking about,” I claimed, probably a little too nonchalantly.
         He stared at me with a raised brow for a second or two; then he let out a big sigh and said, “Whatever.” He returned to his meal.
         I looked around me for a change of subject. The diner was decorated in the typical 50s-nostalgia style, with the shiny red seating and black-and-white tile floor. A jukebox in the center of the restaurant softly played 'Aquarius' and the all-female waiting staff served the few customers that were there on a Thursday afternoon. I was thinking to myself, Isn’t 'Aquarius' from the 60s? when our waitress passed in front of the jukebox and walked by our table. She flashed me a small smile as she passed, pink bubblegum between her teeth and a tray of fries and shakes balanced in her hand.
         Then my gaze fell on Garret’s plate of food. It consisted of a half-eaten hamburger with pickles, mustard, mayo, and relish, with a side of greasy onion rings. I then watched as he picked up the burger and pushed it into his mouth; relish oozed out the other end as he took a bite. I cringed a little at the sight. “I don’t see how you can order the same crap every frickin’ day.”
         “Ish nah crab,” he said with a mouth full of food.
         “Well it might as well be—and I’m not just talkin’ about your odd choice in condiments. Yesterday I noticed that Al didn’t wash his hands after a trip to the john.” The image of the cook walking past the EMPLOYEES: PLEASE WASH HANDS sign with a big smile on his face had been seared deep into my memory.
         Garret swallowed his enormous bite. “Is that why you didn’t order anything today?” he asked me, taking another bite of his burger soon after.
         I incredulously watched as he continued to eat the contaminated meat. I kiss that mouth, I said to myself. It took me awhile to finally get an answer through the layers of disgust that hindered my speech. “…yeah…”
         As he finished chewing he wiped the relish and mustard from the corner of his mouth. “If you’re not gettin’ anything to eat then you can leave the tip,” he said.
         “But I always leave the tip…”
         “Well, today you have good reason.”
         “What the hell good reason is that?” A cook with unclean hands serving crap-burgers isn’t good reason to tip.
         “I mean ’cause you didn’t spend any other money. Besides, you’re tippin’ the waitress, not Al.” He shifted his plate to feast on his onion rings.
         “…yeah, okay,” I grumbled; I reached into my back pocket and took three dollars out of my wallet. I put two of them on the table and proceeded to fold the third as usual. Garret looked up from his greasy rings and chuckled softly when he saw me at work. I stopped to look up at him; “What?”
         He smiled and shook his head, returning to his food. I continued my origami for another minute until I ended up with a neatly-creased dollar bill bow tie. I placed it on top of the others and leaned back in my chair, waiting for Garret to finish eating. I set my hands behind my head and started to daydream again, trying to remember what it was I had been thinking about before Garret interrupted my train of thought earlier. It had something to do with class that day… Oh, now I remember!—
         “You’re doin’ it again.”
         Crap! Not again! “Huh?”
         Garret sat with his arms folded over his chest and a smirk on his face. “That ear thing,” he said. “You’re doin’ it again.”
         I pulled my hand away from my ear and set it on the table. “Done eating? Good. Let’s go.” I pushed myself up away from the table and slid my chair underneath. Garret did the same and dropped five dollars on the table for his meal.
         As we walked out the door Garret pulled a pack of cigarettes from his back pocket. He tapped the bottom to dispense one and slid it between his lips. “You got a light?”
         I started searching my pockets for a match. “You really shouldn’t smoke so much,” I told him. “It ain’t healthy.”
         “And you shouldn’t daydream so much. You got a light or what?”
         “Uh…” All my pockets turned up empty. “No.”
         I stopped walking and looked back toward the diner; I remembered that there had been a bowl of matchbooks by the door. “But hold on a sec.” I ran back in to grab one.
         On my way out I noticed my bow-tie-dollar-bill tip still lying on our table. Under the spell of some strange compulsion I walked over to the table and unfolded the bow tie, trying my best to get all the creases out of the bill.
         When I was done I returned to my waiting boyfriend outside. I struck a match and lit his cigarette. “Thank you,” he said. I put the matchbook away and we walked back toward campus, hand-in-hand.
         “I really wish you wouldn’t smoke,” I said to Garret. “It leaves a bad taste in your mouth.”
         He remained silent and pulled me closer to him.
         A few seconds passed. “I guess maybe I could smoke too,” I suggested. “Then I’d only notice the taste of your crap-burger.”
         “It’s not crap,” he calmly defended. Then after awhile he said, “You’re not the smoking type. Besides, you might catch your hair on fire every time you do that ear thingy.”
         “There is no ear thingy!” I insisted.
         He laughed at my denial. He flicked his cigarette onto the sidewalk and put his arm around my waist, pulling me even closer. “Why not? It’s quirky. I like quirky guys.”
         I looked over at him and smiled. “Let’s eat at Quizno's tomorrow.”
 
         Back at the diner the waitress was cleaning up the table and collecting her pay. Disappointment crossed her face as she picked up the tip.
         “Aww, no bow-tie today?”