Pickles

Two men around the age of forty sit at a bar. It’s October and late-afternoon sunrays shine through a big plate glass behind them, playing in the glass of their green beer bottles.

One of them takes a sip of beer and asks, “You wanna hear the funniest thing I ever heard anyone say?”

“Yes I do,” says the other. “That’s exactly what I want to hear.”

“Okay,” the man sets his bottle on the bar and begins. “This was when I was in college. Me and my friends Carter and Will and Matt went to D’angelo’s sub shop. We’d been watching football in Carter’s room and at the end of one of the games, it was getting to be dinner time, Carter said he was hungry for a sandwich. He liked the steak sandwiches at the D’angelo, so we went out to Cohen’s car, Matt’s car, and he drove us there. We were totally stoned.”

The bartender, a woman with red hair in a ponytail, looks up from where she’s standing at the other end of the bar, typing on her cellphone.

The man continued.

“So we get the place, and we go inside, and I’m standing there like a dipshit, staring at the menus, trying to remember how to read, when the lady walks in from the kitchen to the counter and asks us whether we were ready to order.

Carter says, ‘Yes, please. I’d like a number 14, grilled steak. Sans pickles, please.’

And the lady scrunches up her face, all quizzical-like and says, ‘Oh, I’m sorry. I don’t think we have those kind. We just have, like, normal sandwich pickles.’

I burst out a cough of a laugh before covering my mouth with my hands.

But Carter totally played it cool. Without missing a beat, he says, ‘Oh, you know what, then? I just won’t have any.’”

The man shakes his head, still in disbelief, and lets out a little chuckle.

The other man doesn’t respond at all. He takes a sip of beer and remains staring straight ahead. Then he says, “That’s not that funny.”