A father. A son. A gray SUV. Thirty minutes of hunger.
Total Time Spent Waiting
minutes that felt like hours
Gray SUV pulls into the lot. Spirits are high. Stomachs are empty. The order is placed with confidence. "Burrito and street tacos, please."
Dad and son chat about life. Maybe wrestle talk. Maybe school. The smell of grilling meat drifts through the cracked window. Any minute now.
"It's been ten minutes already?" Time perception begins to warp. Son starts fidgeting. Dad checks the phone like it holds answers.
Halfway mark. "Are they making the tortillas from scratch? Growing the cilantro?" Dad and son exchange a look that says everything.
"If we leave now, we could hit the drive-through and be eating in 5 minutes." But no. They've committed. Sunk cost fallacy kicks in hard.
This is life now. They live in this parking lot. The gray SUV is home. Son has memorized every crack in the dashboard.
The bag emerges. The weight of it — substantial. The warmth — radiating through the paper. Thirty minutes of suffering evaporate in an instant. It smells incredible.
"It hasn't been that long. They're probably just busy."
"Did they forget about us? I can see people who came after us eating."
"If the food comes in 2 minutes I won't complain. Maybe 5. Okay, 10."
"We're never getting tacos. This is how it ends."
"Worth. Every. Second."
Was it worth the 30-minute wait in a gray SUV on Valentine's Day? A dad and his son, hungry and patient, united by the shared suffering of an unreasonably long taco order?
Yes. Obviously. Always.