Strip Clubs, Salvation and Sonic Drive-In
Hard lessons with a limeade and a side of onion rings
All of the Sonic carhops used to play Ro-Sham-Bo (rock-paper-scissors), best two out of three, to see who got to run the drive thru during the Sunday shift. This was a coveted position. You didn’t have to wear roller skates, you didn’t have to go outside (which, during the sweltering South Carolina summer, was a true blessing), and you still got tips.
Though you might not think it from the name, most Sonic Drive-In locations also have drive thru windows, and they are quite popular. I never understood why people would choose to wait in a line, 10 cars deep, instead of pulling into a stall. By taking advantage of the drive-in aspect of Sonic, you can get your food from a friendly carhop and be on your way home before those suckers in the drive thru even have time to place their orders.
The best time to work the Sonic drive thru, at least the branch that employed me as a carhop during the summer of 2004 in Anderson, South Carolina, was Sunday morning.
During this prime noshing time, people rolled through, thoroughly hungover, trying to consume as much grease as possible to soak up the alcohol in their systems — usually on their way to church. And there were always several bleary-eyed customers who had visited one of the local strip clubs the previous night. You could tell because those particular patrons paid for their breakfast burritos, tater tots and limeades with two-dollar bills. Apparently, this was the only available option when larger bills were changed at the clubs, because it forced spectators to tip the strippers more than if they had been provided with a stack of ones.
Late one Sunday afternoon, near the end of particular grueling shift, a coworker asked me to cover her on the drive thru while she went to the restroom. While I was a little stabby that she had thrown rock first that morning (when her usual pattern had always started with paper), I was thankful for the opportunity to stay inside for a few minutes to cool off. I had been on my feet for nearly eight hours in the blazing southern sun.
The monitor squawked. I flipped the switch to open the microphone so I could speak to the next customer. I still remember the order; our conversation went something like this:
Me: “Thanks for making my Sonic your Sonic today. How can I help you?”
Customer: “Hi, I want a number one burger combo no onions, Sonic-sized with fries and a diet cherry limeade and a chicken toaster combo, with onion rings and an Ocean Water” (Ocean Water is a cloying mixture of Sprite and blue coconut syrup — good for when you have a hangover, but not much else.)
Me: “I’ve got a Sonic-sized number one combo, no onions, with fries and a diet cherry limeade and a chicken toaster combo, with onion rings and an Ocean Water. Did you want to Sonic-size that second combo, sir.”
Customer: “No, thank you, ma’am.”
Me: “That will be ten dollars and eighty-eight cents. Please drive around.”
A few moments later, a white Jeep Wrangler pulled up to the window. The tan soft top was down, and a parking pass for a nearby local high school hung on the rearview mirror. A teenage boy with shaggy sun-bleached hair sat in the driver’s seat, a teenage girl with a long blond ponytail beside him. They both smiled at me, and I remember hearing Usher’s “Yeah” coming from the car speakers.
Me: “Hi there! Your total is ten eighty-eight.”
The boy handed me a twenty-dollar bill. I popped open the register to get his change, but there weren’t enough ones, and I didn’t see the manager on duty. So I decided to grab a couple of bucks from my carhop stash. I pulled a handful of bills out of my money belt, and on top was a two-dollar bill. I added it to the rest of the change, handed it out to my customer, who placed it on the dashboard.
I went to get their drinks — amused instead of horrified when he said, “Thank you, ma’am.” I was a 20 year-old college student, not much older than they were. But this type of politeness was usually second nature to those who grew up in Anderson. You always said “yes ma’am” or “no sir” to your elders, and technically, I qualified.
Still smiling when I got back to the window, I grabbed some straws and started to lean forward to hand them the drinks, but neither of the teenagers saw me.
The boy was punching the girl in the shoulder — closed fist, wailing on her as hard as he could. She cowered, hands raised to protect her face, as he shouted,
“You worthless bitch! How can you be so stupid?”
I stared. I still can’t imagine what might have happened in the 30 seconds that I was away from the drive thru window.
I had no idea what to do. But then, the boy turned to me, and it was like a switch had flipped. He gave me a huge smile, and reached up to grab the styrofoam cups that were dangling like dead weights from my hands.
“Thanks so much!” he said, still smiling. “I really appreciate it.”
I was shocked that he could treat me like his Sunday school teacher a split second after beating the fool out of the girl sitting next to him.
He took the drinks as though nothing out of the ordinary was happening. While his head was bowed, I looked over at the passenger seat.
There were bruises on her arm that I hadn’t noticed before. Surely, it was too soon for those to have come from the actions I had just witnessed. She looked up at me, haunted, tracks of tears running down her face. We had a silent conversation with just our eyes:
Me: Are you okay? Do you need help?
Her: I’m fine. Don’t worry about it.
Me: Are you sure? He’s hurting you.
Her: I’m fine.
I had just gotten a sweet Sanyo flip phone for my birthday. It was the first phone I had ever owned that had a camera. I thought about snapping a quick picture of this punk, in case I needed it. I even went so far as to take the phone out of my pocket. But, as I pulled it up, the girl caught my attention, her eyes wide.
Now, I have always loved books, and I was no stranger to the phrase “imperceptible head shake.” But, this was the first time I had ever seen that action in real life. I lowered the phone just in time, right as my new worst enemy lifted his head.
The whole exchange must have taken less than 15 seconds, but it felt like an hour.
Me: “Let me go get your food.”
Him: “Thank you, ma’am.”
I was no longer amused. My brain was racing. What should I do? Do I call the police? I grabbed the bag from under the heat lamps, opened the window, and literally threw the food at him.
Him: “Can we have some extra ketchup, please?”
In my mind I was screaming, “No, asshole. You don’t deserve any of my ketchup.” But what I actually said was,
“No problem. One second.”
I went and got a handful of ketchup packets. When I returned to the window, he was examining the change that I had given him a few moments earlier, staring at the two-dollar bill.
I apologized profusely and explained how there weren’t any ones in the register. I told him I could find the manager to get some change from the safe and swap out the two-dollar bill for a couple of singles.
“Nah,” he said, “it’s cool. I’ve just never seen one of these before. Here. You keep it. For your tip.”
He handed me back the two-dollar bill, and as he put the Wrangler in gear, I glanced at the girl. She gave me small smile and a little wave as the vehicle moved forward. As they began to pull away, I had the bright idea to write down the license plate number, in case I decided to call the police. I couldn’t find any paper, so I jotted the number down on the edge of my newly reacquired two-dollar bill. I folded it and put it in my back pocket.
As I finished up my shift, I realized I had witnessed my first instance of domestic abuse.
Maybe that makes me sheltered. I was fortunate that my parents rarely ever fought while they were married. Statistically, it’s likely that at least one of my childhood friends had seen or endured domestic violence by that time. But, it was never something I had personally experienced.
I didn’t know if those two blonde teenagers were related or if they were dating. I didn’t know anything else about what was happening in their lives.
But, even if I hadn’t done anything in that moment, I couldn’t just let it go. I decided to make a police report, even if it was to the anonymous tip line. But when I got home, my two-dollar bill was gone. I checked my pockets, purse, my car, even the registers when I got to work the next morning, but no luck.
It blows my mind that I remember everything about those few brief minutes — the make and model of the car, their exact orders, the song that was playing on the radio. I remember her white tank top, his blue polo shirt, and the way he twisted the paper off the end of the straw. But, I cannot, for the life of me, recall even one of the handful of characters that comprised his license plate number.
Every so often, I think back to the summer of 2004, of the girl with the bruises on her arm, who suffered in silence. Is she alive? Is she free? And every time she crosses my mind, I can’t help but feel as though I failed her.
I saw two-dollar bills every weekend that summer, but I don’t think I’ve seen a single one since.
