“Madame, I am avoiding canine meat,” Gorfleeze buzzed. “Too chewy. But I thank you kindly.”

 

Judy’s right eye twitched. She brushed the sweat off her forehead with her right arm and smiled up at the 7-foot insect sitting in the booth. In her left hand, a basket of hush-puppies wobbled side-to-side.

 

Laughing nervously, Judy said, “Sorry about the confusion, Mister Gorfleeze. These are just fried cornmeal. Folks only call them hush-puppies because you toss ‘em at whining dogs to settle them down.”

 

Judy desperately tried to figure out which eye to focus on as she was speaking. Both of those yellow orbs were the size of basketballs, and they were plopped on either side of his head. Gorfleeze’s quarter-sized pupils zigzagged across the surface of his unmoving, moonlike eyes. They darted hungrily between her face and the basket of food. Sweet Jesus, Judy thought, I can’t tell which one he wants to eat.

 

A purple tongue swiped across his mandibles, as Gorfleeze said, “Scrumptious. I will have three more then.”

 

“S-S-Sure, sir.”

 

Judy turned around and headed for the kitchen. Dodging past broken plates and overturned chairs, she stopped mid-sprint when the alien coughed. It was a raspy cough - harsh as a jet engine. She nearly broke her neck looking back.

 

“More butter, please.”

 

The waitress nodded.

 

“Thank you,” Gorfleeze buzzed. “And another pitcher of lovely sugar water.”

 

Judy backed up so quickly, she crashed into the table behind her. Though she could feel a bruise welling up, she just smiled and bowed to the creature watching. As she slipped past the swinging door to the kitchen, she heard Gorfleeze applaud her by clapping his pinchers together. Clink Clink Clink.

 

Inside the kitchen, heat from the stovetops washed over her like exhaust from a rocket.

 

“Well?” her husband Johnny asked. He was hunched over the griddle. When he dabbed his forehead with his smock, it came away dripping with sweat. His other hand hovered over the handle of the fryer.

 

“Well, he liked it,” Judy replied.

 

“He liked it!” Johnny shouted, before realizing his mistake. Whispering now, he added, “I coated those hushpuppies in half a can of bug spray.”

 

“And he’d like three more of— ”

 

“Three more!” Johnny swore as a drop of grease landed on the back of his hand. “That bug’s going to ruin us before he kills us.”

 

“Hush your fuss.”

 

“But darlin’—”

 

Judy ran her hands through her silver hair. “We just have to put up with it.”

 

“All because your daddy made friends with a giant bug fifty years ago!”

 

Out of all the excuses and curses that followed, the only word she came back to was “hospitality.” That was the code they lived by at Raleigh Rockets. It might as well have been engraved in the chrome underbelly of the model rocket that stood atop the restaurant.

 

So Judy repeated the word hospitality over and over, turning it into a kind of mantra. Speaking of hospitality, she could hear Gorfleeze buzzing in the background.

 

Sighing, Johnny added another order of hushpuppies to the frier. Then he bent down to grab the rest of the bug spray. When the three orders were properly dusted and the spray can tossed into the trash, he poured the piping hot hushpuppies into one large pile on a nearby basket. Smacking his forehead, Johnny said, “Oh silly me, I almost forgot.” Johnny then went back to the fridge to grab a pitcher of unsweetened tea. Looking up at Judy, he asked, “Does the alien take his tea with one sugar or two?”

 

“The last one had ten.”

 

“Of course.”

 

“Actually,” Judy started, brushing her husband’s hand away from the tea. “Let’s give him Splenda.”

 

“Huh. Maybe that will do the trick.”

 

While Judy snagged breakfast for the creature, Gorfleeze was buzzing louder and louder. High-pitched notes rang through the eerily empty, overturned diner. Gorfleeze sang with the voice of a rusty chainsaw. As he reached a crescendo, Gorfleeze cried, “There is no place — nowhere in this whole stale, stagnant galaxy — as wonderful as this Raleigh Rockets.”

 

Not wanting to offend the monster after he just blessed them with a new jingle, Judy went to her happy place, which at this point was anywhere in the universe but there. “T-thank you, Mister Gorfleeze.”

 

Gorfleeze crisscrossed his pincers so that the right was over the left. Leaning toward the shaking human, he asked, “Do you think I could have some flip jacks?”

 

“What is... oh,” Judy said. Though she reflexively jotted notes on her notepad, it was little more than penning a cry for help. “Sure! A stack of our famous homemade flap... uh, flip jack — on the house, of course.” Judy made sure to add that Arm and Hammer detergent looks just like flour. She noted this in the toppings column in between chocolate chip and blueberry and circled it three times.

 

As she brought the note back to the kitchen, Judy tried to remember every small detail about Gorfleeze’s last visit. She was just seven at the time. Back then the milkshake machine still worked. Maybe her memory was a little faulty too. All she could recall was waiting in the maintenance closet while that bug ate through their whole pantry. It was a dark night, just like this one. But she remembered that Gorfleeze only left when he had a taste of something stronger than flip-flap jacks. At the time, it was Mr. Donnegal.

 

Suddenly, the door to the diner banged open. Jason “Doobie” McDougal burst in with his rocket cap falling off his slick black hair. He bent down to pick it up, completely ignoring the giant bug that had turned towards him.

 

Jason. Always sick. Always late. But for once, he was just in time.

 

“Huzzah,” Gorfleeze buzzed. “Dessert!”

 

Jason looked up at the famished praying mantis.

 

“Would you like a to-go bag?” Judy asked.