PART 3
Jordan crouched slightly, bringing himself eye level with Ethan, his tone shifting into something gentler, clearly practiced.
“Hey, bud. I need you to keep your feet down and your popcorn in your own space for the rest of the movie, okay? Can you do that for me?”
Ethan, suddenly much smaller under direct adult attention that wasn’t his own parents, nodded silently.
“Thank you,” Jordan said, standing back up, his tone shifting back to something considerably less gentle for the parents. “I’m not asking. The next complaint from this row results in removal without a refund, per the policy you both signed when you created that loyalty account. I’d rather not do that in front of your son, so let’s not get there.”
The father opened his mouth, then closed it, apparently recalculating whatever he’d been about to say once actual consequences entered the conversation.
“This is ridiculous,” the mother muttered, quiet enough now that it barely qualified as defiance.
Jordan didn’t respond to that, just gave Marcus a small nod and me an apologetic look before heading back up the aisle, tablet tucked under his arm.
For the rest of the movie, nothing hit my hair.
No shoes touched my seat.
Ethan sat unnervingly still, occasionally glancing toward the aisle as though Jordan might materialize again at any moment.
When the credits rolled, the family left quickly, without a word to us, the mother’s hand firm on Ethan’s shoulder in a way that looked considerably less patient than anything she’d shown him all evening.
Marcus and I sat in our seats a moment longer, the theater emptying around us.
“I didn’t know you knew someone who worked here,” I said.
“I didn’t either, until I saw his name on that board,” Marcus said. “I almost didn’t say anything. I stood in that lobby for probably two of those four minutes just deciding whether it was worth the awkwardness.”
“What changed your mind?”
“You had popcorn in your hair for the third time,” he said. “I realized I was more scared of an awkward conversation than I was upset about you being uncomfortable all night. That felt like the wrong thing to be scared of.”
