Everybody Knows

Vincent had a few hours left before he could check into a motel, so he pulled into the right lane of Route 10 to look for a place to eat. At five-thirty in the evening, he watched through his rearview mirror as, all over the highway, cars began turning off the road for food. He had been scared to eat in New Jersey, convinced that all of it would taste like the sewage he breathed in from the turnpike. Fortunately, there were lots of crummy places outside Boston to pick from: fast food joints where you could hear the sizzle of canola oil cooking fries, or large-scale pizza chains with stout delivery men running from the doors, or Chinese carry-outs exuding the stench of greasy sauce and cooked meat. Gyro stands lay scattered in between, as well as a few Indian restaurants with curry spice coming out of the bricks. None of these piqued his appetite.

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