We meet at the Evergreen Diner because it’s equidistant from where we live, and it’s terrible. Cheese only covers seventy-five percent of the bread, can’t drink the coffee kind of terrible. The first time we went there, he choked on the first sip of his vanilla Coke because there was so much extract in it. We wiped our tears - mine from laughter, his from pain - and he asked me in a frayed voice, “Why are we here again?”
“Because it’s so bad,” I answered, dropping my voice as the waitress passed. “We can’t go to any of the good places between us, because we can’t ever agree on which ones are good, but we can agree that this place is - ”
“The worst,” he rasped, just as the waitress walked by again. He looked up, nervous, but she only shrugged. He winced with every sound but we couldn’t stop laughing anyway.
He slides into the booth next to me. He must have come around from behind me, because I hadn’t seen his car pull in as I gazed out the window. The fries on the table are hot and salty, the greasy, triple-fried kind that smell amazing and you can’t stop eating, even though you know you’ll wake up tasting them the next day. He stuffs four in his mouth and turns to me with a muffled, “Come here often?”
I dip my spoon into the ketchup on the plate and offer it to him. He raises his eyebrows appreciatively and takes the spoon, but thankfully he doesn’t eat the ketchup.
“Did you know,” he says, swallowing and clearing his throat of potato, “there’s a German word that means, like, deadly fire falling from the night sky? One word.”
His fingers trace the edge of the plate between us.
“So, I see DC was educational.” I’m happy staring at his hand, memorizing the lines of his knuckles, but I take a quiet breath and raise my head. He smiles.
“It was in a kids’ song during World War Two. It was, like, 25 letters. I tried to take a picture but there was no flash allowed.”
“Hmm, it’s a shame there isn’t a way to write stuff down when you want to remember it. In your smartphone. In the notebook.”
“That’s funny,” he nods, reaching for more fries. I feel a grin blooming across my face.
“Pretty poorly named app, the notebook,” I continue, chuckling a little. “Since apparently you can’t even take notes with it.”
He leans towards me, smiling wider. “I wish I had written it down.” His voice is low, conspiratorial. “So I could curse you with it.”
I laugh, my head dipping into the space between us for a moment. I pull back quickly, looking around the diner to cover my jumpiness. He mirrors me. The silence softens. I lose track of how many commercials have intercut the songs on the radio, how many fries we eat, how many times our waitress ignores us as she passes.
“I like words like that,” I say, without thinking.
He smiles. “Words about flaming death from above? Who doesn’t?”
“Well, those,” I nod. “And words that just don’t exist in other languages. No direct translation.”
“Do you know others?”
“There are more German ones. Schadenfreude. And there’s one, for the feeling of being embarrassed for someone else when they don’t even realize their own embarrassing moments. I can’t remember it.”
“Well, it’s a shame you can’t, like, write stuff down - “
I roll my eyes. “Yes, yes, I see what you did there.”
He shifts in his seat, moving closer. “So, the Germans are basically kicking our asses at long words for awkward feelings.”
“Basically. There are more in other languages. My favorite is in Portuguese.”
“Is it the word for the impulse to trip little old ladies as they walk down the stairs?”
“Up the stairs, actually.”
He laughs. The waitress finally stops at our table, smiling warmly as if we’ve just sat down. We order sodas and he asks for a grilled cheese. I stifle a laugh behind one hand. When I look up, the waitress winks knowingly and I nearly choke.
As she walks away, he asks, “So, what is it?”
“Somehow, despite how amazingly specific you are, I’m confused.” I put a hand on my chest, shaking my head apologetically. “It must be me.”
He rolls his eyes and takes another fry. “What’s the German word for wanting to strangle someone for being so annoyingly hilarious all the time?”
I tip my head to the side, flutter my eyelashes. “It’s so sweet when you profess your murderous intentions for me.”
“Seriously, where is your off switch?” He drops his head when he laughs, then turns to me suddenly. A finger extends from each hand. “Tell me your favorite word. Just one word, or I will poke you without mercy. Merciless poking.”
I squirm backward on the vinyl bench and he advances, brandishing a fingertip. “Saudade,” I say, hoping the pronunciation I’ve practiced in my head sounds close to correct.
“Saudade.” He lowers one finger. “You sure you’re saying that right?”
“No.”
“Saudade. I like the sound of it.” Both fingers are folded now, but still raised above the fists, trigger-ready.
I nod. “Yeah.”
The waitress sets down our drinks and drops paper-wrapped straws into the water rings the wet glasses have already left on the table. He ignores them. “I appreciate you taking this one word thing so seriously. Ten words. What does it mean?”
I reach for my damp straw and roll it between my fingers. Ten words. “Longing,” I begin, tapping the straw against the table once. “For something...lost.” Three taps. “Long ago. That’ll never…” I pause. Only two left. “Come back,” I finish, two taps.
He’s quiet. I look up from the table’s edge. He’s looking at me like those ten words are written on my face. “That’s sad,” he says at last.
I nod. I bounce the straw lightly against the table, not counting, not keeping time. Just bouncing. I look at the lines in his forehead, faint like shadows. “Sometimes.” The word comes out just above a whisper, when I hadn’t meant to say it all.
“Have you ever felt that way?” he asks. I look him in the eye. “Five words.”
I let the straw fall to the table and use my fingers to tally each word. “Yes. A whole fucking lot.” He watches each finger extend and I wiggle all five before I ask him. “Five words. You?”
He places his fist beside my hand. “More often than I’d like.” His hand unfurls all at once, resting flat on the table with all five points open.
I don’t tell him that I know a word for this, too - this moment when we sit gazing at our hands on the table, not touching but close. It is like the cells of the skin and bone and flesh of my hand are reaching out for him, and something like pain throbs down into my fingers, a pulse that begs m muscles to respond and move, graze his pinky with mine.
But I don’t, and he doesn’t, even as we pour heat and electricity into the scrap of space between us. I know a word for the stab of want when we look at each other, thinking about what it would feel like, what would happen, if we moved or touched or did anything, but instead we sit and do nothing and let it eat us up.
Mamihlapinatapei, in the language of Tierra del Fuego, and even though I’ve never heard anyone but merriamwebster.com say it out loud, I know I could tell him about it and he would be interested. He would ask me if I knew where Tierra del Fuego is, and I would say something smart and funny, like, ‘No, but I want to find out.’
I could tell him that I still dream about being an explorer, with a ship and compass and everything, and he wouldn’t tell me how impossible it was, or look at me like I was stupid. He would probably ask if he could come and we would wind up right back in mamihlapinatapei, which would be just fine. Just perfect.
“Because it’s so bad,” I answered, dropping my voice as the waitress passed. “We can’t go to any of the good places between us, because we can’t ever agree on which ones are good, but we can agree that this place is - ”
“The worst,” he rasped, just as the waitress walked by again. He looked up, nervous, but she only shrugged. He winced with every sound but we couldn’t stop laughing anyway.
He slides into the booth next to me. He must have come around from behind me, because I hadn’t seen his car pull in as I gazed out the window. The fries on the table are hot and salty, the greasy, triple-fried kind that smell amazing and you can’t stop eating, even though you know you’ll wake up tasting them the next day. He stuffs four in his mouth and turns to me with a muffled, “Come here often?”
I dip my spoon into the ketchup on the plate and offer it to him. He raises his eyebrows appreciatively and takes the spoon, but thankfully he doesn’t eat the ketchup.
“Did you know,” he says, swallowing and clearing his throat of potato, “there’s a German word that means, like, deadly fire falling from the night sky? One word.”
His fingers trace the edge of the plate between us.
“So, I see DC was educational.” I’m happy staring at his hand, memorizing the lines of his knuckles, but I take a quiet breath and raise my head. He smiles.
“It was in a kids’ song during World War Two. It was, like, 25 letters. I tried to take a picture but there was no flash allowed.”
“Hmm, it’s a shame there isn’t a way to write stuff down when you want to remember it. In your smartphone. In the notebook.”
“That’s funny,” he nods, reaching for more fries. I feel a grin blooming across my face.
“Pretty poorly named app, the notebook,” I continue, chuckling a little. “Since apparently you can’t even take notes with it.”
He leans towards me, smiling wider. “I wish I had written it down.” His voice is low, conspiratorial. “So I could curse you with it.”
I laugh, my head dipping into the space between us for a moment. I pull back quickly, looking around the diner to cover my jumpiness. He mirrors me. The silence softens. I lose track of how many commercials have intercut the songs on the radio, how many fries we eat, how many times our waitress ignores us as she passes.
“I like words like that,” I say, without thinking.
He smiles. “Words about flaming death from above? Who doesn’t?”
“Well, those,” I nod. “And words that just don’t exist in other languages. No direct translation.”
“Do you know others?”
“There are more German ones. Schadenfreude. And there’s one, for the feeling of being embarrassed for someone else when they don’t even realize their own embarrassing moments. I can’t remember it.”
“Well, it’s a shame you can’t, like, write stuff down - “
I roll my eyes. “Yes, yes, I see what you did there.”
He shifts in his seat, moving closer. “So, the Germans are basically kicking our asses at long words for awkward feelings.”
“Basically. There are more in other languages. My favorite is in Portuguese.”
“Is it the word for the impulse to trip little old ladies as they walk down the stairs?”
“Up the stairs, actually.”
He laughs. The waitress finally stops at our table, smiling warmly as if we’ve just sat down. We order sodas and he asks for a grilled cheese. I stifle a laugh behind one hand. When I look up, the waitress winks knowingly and I nearly choke.
As she walks away, he asks, “So, what is it?”
“Somehow, despite how amazingly specific you are, I’m confused.” I put a hand on my chest, shaking my head apologetically. “It must be me.”
He rolls his eyes and takes another fry. “What’s the German word for wanting to strangle someone for being so annoyingly hilarious all the time?”
I tip my head to the side, flutter my eyelashes. “It’s so sweet when you profess your murderous intentions for me.”
“Seriously, where is your off switch?” He drops his head when he laughs, then turns to me suddenly. A finger extends from each hand. “Tell me your favorite word. Just one word, or I will poke you without mercy. Merciless poking.”
I squirm backward on the vinyl bench and he advances, brandishing a fingertip. “Saudade,” I say, hoping the pronunciation I’ve practiced in my head sounds close to correct.
“Saudade.” He lowers one finger. “You sure you’re saying that right?”
“No.”
“Saudade. I like the sound of it.” Both fingers are folded now, but still raised above the fists, trigger-ready.
I nod. “Yeah.”
The waitress sets down our drinks and drops paper-wrapped straws into the water rings the wet glasses have already left on the table. He ignores them. “I appreciate you taking this one word thing so seriously. Ten words. What does it mean?”
I reach for my damp straw and roll it between my fingers. Ten words. “Longing,” I begin, tapping the straw against the table once. “For something...lost.” Three taps. “Long ago. That’ll never…” I pause. Only two left. “Come back,” I finish, two taps.
He’s quiet. I look up from the table’s edge. He’s looking at me like those ten words are written on my face. “That’s sad,” he says at last.
I nod. I bounce the straw lightly against the table, not counting, not keeping time. Just bouncing. I look at the lines in his forehead, faint like shadows. “Sometimes.” The word comes out just above a whisper, when I hadn’t meant to say it all.
“Have you ever felt that way?” he asks. I look him in the eye. “Five words.”
I let the straw fall to the table and use my fingers to tally each word. “Yes. A whole fucking lot.” He watches each finger extend and I wiggle all five before I ask him. “Five words. You?”
He places his fist beside my hand. “More often than I’d like.” His hand unfurls all at once, resting flat on the table with all five points open.
I don’t tell him that I know a word for this, too - this moment when we sit gazing at our hands on the table, not touching but close. It is like the cells of the skin and bone and flesh of my hand are reaching out for him, and something like pain throbs down into my fingers, a pulse that begs m muscles to respond and move, graze his pinky with mine.
But I don’t, and he doesn’t, even as we pour heat and electricity into the scrap of space between us. I know a word for the stab of want when we look at each other, thinking about what it would feel like, what would happen, if we moved or touched or did anything, but instead we sit and do nothing and let it eat us up.
Mamihlapinatapei, in the language of Tierra del Fuego, and even though I’ve never heard anyone but merriamwebster.com say it out loud, I know I could tell him about it and he would be interested. He would ask me if I knew where Tierra del Fuego is, and I would say something smart and funny, like, ‘No, but I want to find out.’
I could tell him that I still dream about being an explorer, with a ship and compass and everything, and he wouldn’t tell me how impossible it was, or look at me like I was stupid. He would probably ask if he could come and we would wind up right back in mamihlapinatapei, which would be just fine. Just perfect.