Well, almost nobody. They’d left behind a waitress.

She was in no shape to play, though. The poor girl was collapsed like a rag doll on the floor next to the counter. Her burnt-out face reminded me of a kid’s toy you might have tried to run on a car battery rather than AAAs.

The name stitched on the pocket of her calico uniform was Judy Blue Eyes, and, you guessed it, her eyes were the kind of clear blue a guy could look into and see the promise of the whole world.

A human guy, I mean. For me, the promise of the whole world was usually a great deal darker.

“Hey, Judy. You okay?”

“Nnnn,” she said, consciousness slowly percolating back.

I helped her into a booth and gave her a glass of water.

“Wh-wh’appen?” she stuttered.

“Food fight,” I said, only it was far worse than that. Smashed china plates, syrup and salt caked on the walls, soda dripping from the tabletops, empty jelly packets stuck to the seats, ketchup and mayo on the jukeboxes, Promise spread splattered on the ceiling, slicks of alien slime pooled everywhere like a sticky mix of spilled honey and coffee.

“Oh gosh,” she said, struggling to sit up and take it all in. “I’m so-o fired.”

“Nah,” I said. “I can give you a hand.” And then, like somebody had pressed the ×8 button on my remote, I zipped around with a broom, a mop, a couple bottles of Windex, and a dozen dishrags and had the place spick-and-span in no time, literally.

“Man, I’m really out of it,” said Judy as I returned to her now-gleaming booth. “I mean, did you just clean all that up in, like, ten seconds?”

Man, was she cute. I was trying to think of something clever to say back, but I had this weird-though not totally unpleasant-tightness in my chest, and all I could manage was this really lame giggle.