Inside Writing: Soy Sauce Scene #2

Yesterday, I showed you one variation on the real soy sauce story. Here’s the other one.

Really, is it that much of a surprise to hear how much I love Mitchell?

Mitchell scratched his head as he contemplated the seven varieties of soy sauces. He hadn’t paid much attention when Ma had asked him to pick some up on his way over; he’d figured that just remembering it was the brand with the Chinese name would be good enough.

He could hear her reminder: “Good enough rarely is, Mitchell.” And his father, chiming in about how to find success, a person had to give 100%, all the time.

Clearly, he’d fucked this one up royally.

He was still standing there when a couple walked by. “Get the Ping’s,” the woman said. “It’s the best of the all-natural brands.”

“How can it be best?” the man asked.

“I don’t know,” the woman said. Mitchell smiled at her exasperated tone. “But it is. Maybe they use special soy for it or something. Make it in small batches. I don’t know. Call them and ask.”

Mitchell wondered if they would answer that sort of question if someone called and asked it.

Out of the corner of his eye, he caught the woman nudge the man and make a subtle gesture in his direction. With a sigh, he picked up a bottle of Ping’s soy sauce and tried to be casual as he walked away.

Just what he needed. To be spotted while making an indecisive ass of himself in front of something like soy sauce. It wouldn’t be surprising if, over the next few days, someone’s gossip column mentioned that he used Ping’s Soy Sauce and there’d be a run of it.

And that he’d spend the next six months autographing the stupid labels.

He looked at the label on the bottle he held. Thankfully, it was black. That’d make it hard to sign. No one ever carried Sharpies in colors other than black.

He was safe, at least from that.