Krystal Clear

How a Simple Craving Turned Into a Two-Stop Failure

We were hungry. My wife and I sat on the couch, pining over the many options in our new town, but we couldn’t decide on what looked the most appetizing. Chicken? Had that a few days in a row. Chinese? Too expensive for dinner.

A thought suddenly flipped in my mind like a freshly cooked burger patty. I swiftly brought up my phone and looked up the one place I knew she hadn’t tried. A childhood favorite spawned from years of being slightly peckish. Instead of wolfing down pounds of greasy patties, I used to enjoy the simplicity of small, easily edible meat pucks between two lightly toasted buns.

If I lived on the west coast, you’d be forgiven for assuming I meant the joint made famous by Harold and Kumar. It wasn’t that restaurant that caught my fancy. We weren’t driving out west for a relaxing dinner to go. Instead, we were going to visit it’s eastern cousin, the wonderfully tasty Krystal Burger.

Krystal Burger specializes in tiny, delectable nuggets of beef tucked gently between two tiny buns. Perfectly seasoned, cooked, and juicy, without feeling overwhelmed by an inordinate amount of grease. Krystal is one of the best places to get a bite to eat without breaking the bank or the bowels. If you’ve eaten a lot of grease, you know what I’m referring to.

I pointed at the screen and told my lovely wife that we were only ten minutes from a Krystal, so we hurried to the car and started our pilgrimage to the petite burger bounty. There it was, in it’s magnificence.

“We aren’t there yet.” My wife whispered across the car.

Perfectly cooked burgers lined up, being handed out to salivating customers in their cars. I started to drift to the left as I saw the giant sign above and corresponding customer beneath. Soon, we’d be in that line, waiting for our chance.

“We aren’t there yet.” She repeated, pointing ahead. “Where are you going?”

Just a few more feet. We just have to turn into the parking lot and go around the building just one time. I already knew our order, and it was easy to make. Easy to make and even easier to go down the old gullet. It was going to be delicious. It was…

“Babe! This isn’t Krystal.” She said calmly.

I looked up and realized that the Krystal sign was above the Arby’s restaurant. What sacrilege! Advertising on top of such a low tier establishment. I huffed and kept driving. It was partially my fault for not reading the sign correctly, but mainly theirs for putting it there. Who places a giant billboard right next to their competitor?

Well, I guess everyone. Why pull into Arby’s if Krystal is right up the road? Good riddance, I nodded at the red hat as we continued our journey. Soon, the distaste of my mistake would be overridden by the sheer joy of our arrival. There it was!

We started to pull in when a sinking feeling began to override the slight burn of hunger that had developed. Well, it was bright outside, but it seemed really dark. Also, the signs advertised deals that expired months ago. Worse, there were no cars in the parking lot. Could it be?

“They look closed, babe.” My wife said, frowning a bit before hiding a slight smirk.

“How? We saw them online!” I said, growling under my breath. “Well, at least there’s another one!” I plugged it into my GPS. “And it’s only 12 minutes away! Let’s go!” I said, my fervor reignited with my fierce hunger and unfounded optimism.

We drove, cracking jokes along the way about how the one restaurant we chose that day was closed for good. Big deal. I knew Krystal was still opened. I saw one the other day. Where was it?

This was probably it, I said as we drove into a parking lot. I pulled in, hearing the gravel crunch under our tires as a sudden realization tore apart my foolish optimism. This had to be the wrong building. We slid alongside the derelict, dark building before we realized the truth.

Broken windows. Torn signs. Overturned tables. Completely abandoned. The Krystal sign hung crooked and dirty from the top of the building, with wires hanging around loosely holding the nests of birds who never even ate the burgers they once served. It was a disaster. A morale disruption I had never experienced from a culinary source.

I bowed my head in shame as the car slowly drifted away from the forgone memory of a once beautiful establishment. The crackling gravel seemed to echo into the building itself as we made our way back to the highway. My wife couldn’t stop laughing as I hung my head in shame.

“Two in a row! What’s the chances of running into two closed Krystal burgers!” She said. “Don’t worry, we will find something to eat!” She said, rubbing my shoulder gently.

I knew we would, but somehow, deep down I knew that Krystal might be going out of business. Maybe it was because of shrinkflation. Other restaurants had portions they could reduce for the sake of economic recession, but how could a Krystal burger get smaller? There was no room to wiggle for something that was already tiny in it’s prime. Maybe, Krystal had fully collapsed under the societal pressure of today’s financial circumstances.

Then again, I knew I saw a Krystal open. Maybe it was the last operating rampart against a wave of negative culinary change. A bastion to better times when burgers could be small and people loved it! It was the memoir of a munchies inspired evening. But, plans don’t always play out how you want them to.

Instead, life’s roadblocks can sometimes be Krystal clear.

Enjoyed the chaos? Help fuel future Adventures in Absurdity by buying me a coffee. Caffeine turns questionable life decisions into readable stories.