RIP McDonald's

Hot, hot, Florida summer. The air is so thick you are basically swimming in it. The river is only a half mile away at most, the gulf a few miles further, but it's not the kind of water you jump into to cool down. It's a different kind altogether.

Back then you thought McDonald's McChicken sandwiches were something we convinced mom to get. You didn't realize that they were a treat for her too. A treat in the form of no dirty dishes to wash - and no decisions to make - packaged in yellow and handed to her in a bag. All for $.99 each.

You didn't realize that we all needed it, McDonald's. But the years had crept by and would continue creeping, and you would spend more time than you realize in the drive through. A habit that would stick, and continue sticking.

The feeling of hair sticking to the back of your neck and a drop of sweat, dripping down the side. You breathe in more moisture. The feeling of lifting the weight off your shoulders and throwing it into a sloppy bun. Such relief.

Sometimes mom would take the car out for a spin at night, and take you with her, to fetch the treat. Windows down, both hands on the wheel, her hair scattered in the wind.

The air was better at night. Somehow more breathable, and carrying the sound of cicada bugs and frogs, the song of the south. At night you felt awake. At night the sky was beautiful and the world was big and small at the same time. The night called to you, and so did the car, and together they formed a magical space.

The conversations that old car would hear, in time, and the joy and fear it would contain. The long night drives to a McDonald's in another town so that you could see the person you loved, all of them. In time.

But today it is probably 2007, and that time has not come yet. It is not night and the air is hard to breathe. You are throwing your hair into a sloppy bun while you wait for the teenager working the drive-through to take the order, and wait to hand a $10 bill to the cashier, and wait to see the bag appear out of the window.

Mom always noticed the man sitting on the sidewalk, and she always bought him a treat too.

"Hey, take it easy."

That feeling.

The man was out of place, because most of his kind - the kind that had nowhere else to go - stayed elsewhere, begging near other McDonalds. But somehow this one was his and his alone. He didn't beg, he sat there and waited patiently. He didn't say a word or move a muscle. Despite this he was a little scary anyway, and you didn't know why.

But mom wasn't afraid of him, and so you knew you didn't have to be either. As she drives away she says that his eyes were too red.

You don't think anything of it because you are a child, even though you think you aren't. She knows you won't think of it, but she will. His red eyes will linger in her mind and she will know that it means something.

The next time you wait in the drive-through she will notice that he's not there. And suddenly you will notice too. A few days later a story in the paper will confirm that his eyes were indeed too red, a reflection of a losing battle. You will never stop thinking about it. His red eyes will linger in your mind even though you never saw them.

For a while you will still want the McChicken. For a while the comfort is enough to dismiss the memory. For a while, nothing will seem to matter except who you are sitting in the car with as you wait.

But his eyes will still linger and they will continue lingering even after the price of no dishes to wash or decisions to make rises to a level you refuse to pay. The treat in yellow paper is not a treat anymore, just another addiction. Waiting in the drive through, with your mini-me at your side, even at night, even in the car that you love, will not be worth it anymore. Something you could have never even imagined before.

And every time you drive past the golden arches the craving will hit and you will miss your mom and want to taste that feeling. You will still think about him and the hot, hot, Florida summers, and keep driving.