Kiese Laymon takes us back to 1984 and childhood Friday nights, where he, his grandmama, and her boyfriend Ofa D. went to Jr. Food Mart for takeout dinners Laymon remembers with great fondness.
I loved that we could get batteries and gizzards. I loved that we could get biscuits and Super Glue. I loved that we could get dishwashing soap, which was also bubble bath, which was also the soap we used to wash Grandmama’s Impala, and the good hot sauce in the same aisle. I was 8 years old. I never knew, or cared, that my favorite restaurant served gas. My Grandmama and Ofa D were deep into their 50s. They seemed to never know or care that our favorite restaurant served gas, either.
I suppose there were choices of where you’d eat out in Forest. There was a Pizza Inn. There was a McDonald’s. There was Penn’s Fishhouse. There was Kentucky Fried Chicken. But there were no choices in what we’d eat on Friday. Ofa D would order a box of dark meat, a Styrofoam container of fried fish, and a brown bag filled with ’tato logs. Grandmama would grab a box of a dozen donuts. Grandmama and Ofa D would let me pick my own cold drank. I picked the six-pack Nehi Peach or RC Cola every single time.
Maybe 35 minutes later, I’d eat myself into a lightweight coma while Grandmama and Ofa D lightly petted and pecked each other on the couch with the week’s greasiest lips. This was our practice.
This was their romance.
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