"Look what Miss Ida brung us," said the mechanic. "M's."
Immediately all the men in the vicinity of the table hummed inunison. "Mmmmm. Mmmmm."
"Not just M's, but peanut M's."
Again, only twice as loud: "MMMMMM! MMMMMM!"
Either M&Ms were part of the ritual, or they were making fun ofher. Suddenly Rainie felt unsure of herself. She held up the bag. "Isn't this OK?"
"Sure," said Douglas. "And I get the brown ones." He had alarge bowl in his hand; he took the back of M&Ms from her, pulled itopen, and poured it into the bowl.
"Dougie has a thing for brown M&Ms," said the mechanic.
"I eat them as a public service," said Douglas. "They're the uglyones, so when I eat them all the bowl is full of nothing but bright colorsfor everyone else."
"He eats the brown ones because they make up forty percent ofthe package," said Tom.
"Tom spends most of his weekends opening bags of M&Ms andcounting them, just to get the percentages," said an old man that hadn'tbeen at the cafe.
"Hi, Dad," said Douglas. He turned and offered the old man thebowl of M&Ms.
The old man took a green one and popped it in his mouth. Thenhe stuck out his right hand to Rainie. "Hi," he said. "I'm DouglasSpaulding. Since he and his son are also Douglas Spaulding,everybody calls me Grandpa. I'm old but I still have all my own teeth."
"Yeah, in an old baby-food jar on his dresser," said Tom.
"In fact, he has several of my teeth, too," said the mechanic.
Rainie shook Grandpa's hand. "Pleased to meet you. I'm ..." Rainie paused. For one crazy moment she had been about to say, I'mRainie Pinyon. "I'm Ida Johnson."
"You sure about that?" asked Grandpa. He didn't let go of herhand.
"Yes, I am," she said. Rather sharply.