Bambrielle

“What can I get for you?” the fat man asks me. He sounds bored when he says it, and doesn’t even make eye contact. The pale brown hair on his head is thinning and the way his butt is leaking out of his metal folding chair cannot be comfortable. I guess I really can’t blame him for not loving what he does, it must be exhausting catering to the whims of cheerleaders and football players on their way to practice every day. I’m new to the team, and this is my first cheerleading practice, but eying the ingredients spread out across the fold-up table in front of him, I figure he could easily make my favorite breakfast treat.”
“Um, I’d like a bacon scramble, if that’s alright?” I look at him questioningly, just to be sure my request isn’t too outrageous.
“Sure,” He shakes his head and chuckles, then begins reaching for the plate of bacon that’s set out on the table, “I can make you a scramble, no problem.”
The way he says it, condescendingly and a tad bitter, has me worried and my worry quickly turns to apprehension when he proceeds to toss several pieces of bacon into the bright red blender sitting on the table before him. I don’t know why I didn’t see this coming. It’s the only piece of kitchenware amongst all the food items there on the plastic surface. I guess I just didn’t expect the blender to be applicable given my order. My mistake.
Cheddar cheese, egg, bell pepper, potato, green onion, salt, and pepper all follow the bacon into the blender. I’m relieved, at least, that he got all the right stuff in there, but then he hits the “blend” button and my relief turns quickly back to apprehension, then to horror as everything is slowly ground to a pale, pink mush. Thirty seconds later he stops the blender, pours the well-blended contents into a large cup, drops in a pink bendy straw, and offers me my drink with a satisfied smirk.
“Uh, thanks,” I say, gingerly taking the cup from his chubby hand and moving away from the table so the next girl can get her “drink.”
Peering into the cup I use the bendy straw to push the thick substance around and grimace at its paste-like texture. It looks terrible, but everything in it is delicious so maybe… I take a small sip, hoping it won’t taste as horrible as it looks and find myself somewhat surprised that it tastes only half as bad.
I must have been wearing my disappointment on my face because one of my teammates comes up and rubs my shoulder reassuringly.
“Do you not like your drink?” She asks gently.
I give the pink paste another push with my bendy straw, “I don’t know why he felt the need to ‘blend’ everything—all he had to do was push ‘pulse’ a few times and it would have been fine.”