"We'll probably have to work doubles the day before and the day after too," he said, sighing, releasing the disappointment in his heart.
"Probably."
"What did we get ourselves into?"
"I don't know. If you're still here, then you can help me put up my tree and decorate it."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah."
We smoked some more as Mr. Whiskers sashayed around the living room, his eyes on the roaches, a couple with twitching legs still, rain drops pummeling the wood deck outside. A bright flash of light lit up the sliding doors followed by a loud clap of lightning, shaking the apartment building roughly, catching Mr. Whiskers off-guard. He dashed out of the living room into my bedroom, probably diving under my bed, to wait for the giant rain monster outside to go away.
The Dusty Dessert Tray and the Saddest Place in the Building
Paula the Assistant Manager discussed the reservations for the evening with Dan the General Manager at the podium in the front of the P.W. before every shift, both pointing to the table-diagram like lost explorers looking at a worn, ancient map, mentioning names of servers then huffing and puffing, some eye rolling then some nodding. The servers always stood around in a disorderly bunch--mumbling to each other about what they might do after work, a house party here, an apartment get-together there, cheap beer to drink, bags of Mexican shwag to smoke--the usual pre-shift chit-chat. Dan the G.M. was a hulking mess whose build suggested he may have played football in high school or college, but gave up physical tackling for corporate maneuvering while maintaining the same caloric intake of a young athlete. His short-sleeved, button-down, light blue shirt sagged out of the back of his dark blue trousers and it struggled to remain buttoned at the front, his stomach giving all the buttons and his belt a real test of endurance. Dan the G.M. didn't speak much to the servers, either. He left that job mostly to Paula the A.M.--her sweet demeanor better suited for persuading the mostly younger and unmotivated wait staff to accept their poor assignments with a smile and a promise for a better assignment the next shift. Paula seemed to be a dutiful assistant manager, her hopes of one day assuming the position of general manager were worn on her sleeves, as Dan would one day move on to another newly opened Pasta Warehouse in another bustling city like Baltimore or Detroit or St. Louis or Shitsville or New Craptown.
SALUD!
Dan and Paula always agreed on their plan of attack for the evening dinner rush with a nod, he patted her on the shoulder every time, and retreated to his office without fail. Dan really was an enigma to the rest of the staff. Paula would glance at us--a routinely wilted smile on her face, a red marker in her hand, a single silver barrette in her long, straight, light brown hair. It must have been hard always making promises she couldn't keep but this night seemed more promising to us than usual. There was an electric buzz in the air outside the restaurant when we walked up and the hunt for a parking space was even more difficult than the previous few night shifts. Something must have been happening in downtown Austin, though we weren't sure what it could be. It just felt different, the air, the atmosphere, the city life.
Me and Alfonso were assigned sections 12 and 14 (the good sections) and our hopes of a better evening were high. The hungry patrons flowed to our sections first and filled them up quickly. Sometimes, just sometimes, if the stars aligned properly and the mood of the wait staff ebbed and flowed in empathetic unison with the hunger of the patrons, then the inside of the restaurant could twirl and swirl like ballroom dancers drifting effortlessly in a paisley pattern of a dinner waltz. This particular evening, as luck would have it, we all danced the dance.
After a few hours of diligent work, me and Alfonso took a break at the tea station between our sections, our arms folded across our chests, big smiles on our faces, a good amount of tip money in our aprons, and the satisfaction of knowing that sometimes, just sometimes, the P.W. could provide a living wage (well, almost). Our sections were still bustling but our last customers were slowing down, their stomachs full from eating too much pasta and wine and complimentary bread. Alfonso nudged me with his elbow, patting the rectangular bulge in his shirt pocket where his cigarette pack was nestled, a wink of the eye suggesting that we should take a congratulatory smoke break.
"Do you think we should roll out the dessert cart before we step out back?" I said.
"Nah. My customers are full and I made enough tips anyway."
"You sure?"
"Yeah."
"I'm gonna roll it out anyway to my customers. It's been a great night so far!"
I walked around the partition behind the tea station where the dessert cart normally was parked but it wasn't there. I peeked around the partition at Alfonso.
"Hey! Where is it?" I said.
Alfonso shrugged. I took my place back next to my friend.
"Maybe Paula is vacuuming the dust off the desserts," Alfonso said. We both giggled. The desserts presented on the cart were plastic imitations--a frugal decision made by the corporate office to save some money and to keep the sample desserts from being consumed by hungry servers and bussers or from being prodded by the tiny fingers of curious children--and were susceptible to blankets of dust or spiders looking for a new home.
Alfonso motioned for me to follow him and I did. As we weaved our way around the perimeter of the dining room, good ol' obnoxious Warren noticed our quick exit, knowing exactly what that meant, and he abandoned his customers--some of which were waiting for refills of iced tea or water, some of which wanted a chance to glance at the dusty dessert tray--and he followed us on our way to a smoke break. Laura Ann saw us all as well, and even though she didn't smoke cigarettes, took the opportunity to enjoy a quick break from her busy night, envying the smokers moxy to just take a break whenever the need arose. The four of us escaped without Paula the A.M. or Dan the G.M. noticing.
Behind the restaurant in the alley, we perched on the edge of the landing area, our feet dangling side to side, while Warren and Laura Ann jumped down to the street. Alfonso set three smokes in his mouth and lit them in a dramatic fashion with his brass Zippo lighter, then handed one of the lit cigarettes to me and another one to that mooch Warren. He offered a smoke to Laura Ann but she refused demurely, a little shake of her head then a shy upturn of the corner of her mouth, even blushed a bit. Plumes of smoke suddenly reached for the sky.
"Thanks for the smoke," Warren said.
"Yeah, yeah," Alfonso said, taking a huge pull from his smoke then exhaling through his nose, his dragon-like appearance impressing the shit out of the rest of us. "You make another hundy, Mr. Mooch?"
"Yeah, as a matter of fact, I did. What a good night!"
"Good for you, money bags," Alfonso said, rolling his eyes. He turned to Laura Ann, standing there with her hands in her back pockets, looking cute as hell. "What about you? You do all right tonight?"
"Pretty good," she said, caught off guard, turning her attention to the night sky.
"What about you, buddy?" Alfonso said, nudging me with his elbow.
"I made a hundy."
"No shit!" Alfonso said, clapping his hands together, sending a thunderous echo through the alley. "That's great. I'm glad it was a fruitful night. The tips have been kinda sparse lately."
"Nah, things have been all right. I'm getting by pretty well," Warren said, a weasely smirk sliding across his greasy mug. Laura Ann rolled her eyes. Alfonso noticed.
"What about you, pretty girl?" Alfonso said. "Has the money been all right for you lately?"
"It could be better," she said, her eyes shifting from the sky to me then back to the sky. "I've been working a lot of doubles. It seems like more work than it's worth but I need the money."
"Oh yeah?" Alfonso said, nudging me with his elbow again, physically demanding I pay attention to Laura Ann. I smiled at her, setting my hot smoke down to my side, being more present.
"Student loans," she said. We all groaned. As we grumbled collectively, Laura Ann turned away, looking toward the end of the a
lley, leaning as if to get a better look at something. She turned back to us, perplexed. "Do you see that at the end of the alley?"
We all peered that way toward the end of the alley. Down there, past the dumpster, near the corner, standing in the shadows was a shabby figure wearing a burly coat, a sock cap, and rumpled boots. It was not uncommon to see people in the alleyway but it was a little ominous, nonetheless.
"Just a bum," Warren said, sucking the life out of his smoke then flicking the butt to the ground. Laura Ann rolled her eyes again. She was pretty good at rolling her eyes.
"You're a bum," she said, sarcastically. Warren stuck his tongue out at her.
The back door to the restaurant suddenly slammed against the brick wall hard, startling the four of us. Levonne, the humongously squat head cook at the P.W., pushed a squeaky plastic cart through the door, walked past us all, not saying a word. The cart was stacked high with aluminum trays. We watched him push the squeaky cart to the other end of the landing area, as close to the dumpster as possible. One by one, he tossed the aluminum trays into the dumpster, the bum across the alley watching closely, the loud boom of the trays hitting the metal sides of the dumpster, echoing thunderously throughout the alleyway. The loud ruckus destroyed the serenity of our break and Warren and Laura Ann ran back inside the restaurant, leaving me and Alfonso there to finish our cigarettes alone. I eyed the bum, then Levonne, then looked at Alfonso.
"It's weird watching an obviously hungry man watch Levonne throw away a lot of food."
"He'll probably go dumpster diving when Levonne goes back inside," Alfonso said, snuffing out the last of his smoke.
"You think?"
"Yeah."
I snuffed out my smoke too. We were ready to go back in, straightening our aprons and our starched shirts so we were more presentable to our customers, watching Levonne toss more food into the dumpster while the bum watched, motionless, his stomach probably grumbling with anticipation of the dumpster dive for the discarded feast. The grackles fluttered to the top of the adjacent buildings with each subsequent thunder clap from the dumpster, waiting for Levonne to leave along with the bum so they could dumpster dive themselves without humans around. When the cook was finished discarding the trays, he pushed the squeaky cart back toward us then stopped. He peered at us, his yellowed eyes weary and watery, red veins glowing, their course crisscrossing around his chocolate, brown iris.
"Why doesn't the restaurant give that food to a homeless shelter instead of throwing it away?" I said, curiously.
"Huh?" Levonne said, putting his hands on his hips.
"Or give it away to the bums back here?"
"We ain't givin' away no food to bums," Levonne said, definitively, like a boxer declaring he was going to kill his opponent.
"Oh," I said, sheepishly.
"The company gets a tax ride off on food we don't sell. You think they just gonna give it away without no ride off?" Levonne said, his voice booming louder than the sound of the trays hitting the dumpster, louder than Zeus barking down at the lowly humans of Earth, and louder than Chuck D demanding the suckers watch Channel Zero.
"No, I guess not," I said.
"It would be worffless if weez just gave it away. Why do you think I carry around this clipboard wit me?" he said, reaching to the plastic cart, picking up a clipboard with a ball point pen attached to it. "I'zz keep track of what I toss for the ride off."
Me and Alfonso looked at each other, a little confused. We were ready to get back to our tables to close them out. We began to make our way back into the building before Levonne stopped us, raising his hands in front of us. He glared at us.
"When you go back in, the boss man wants to see you," he said, looking at Alfonso.
"What?!" Alfonso said, confused, his hulking frame towering over Levonne's wide, tank-like body.
"The G.M. needs to see you, I sez!"
"OK."
"If ya niggas is bored, then you'z can help poor Levonne dump all this here leffovers and shit."
"That's OK," I said.
"That's what I thought! Ya punks," Levonne said, cackling to himself. He thought that was pretty goddamn funny.
***
Dan the G.M. kept his office as tidy as a junk man kept his junk yard. Piles of three-ring binders containing outdated training manuals and kitchen procedures and stacks of papers with sensitive employee data and employment applications and vendor invoices lined the perimeter of the office on the floor, precariously stacked in a way that could easily be destroyed by a gust of wind or an accidental nudge from an unsuspecting employee. The mass of the clutter seemed to weigh down on him, crushing his soul slowly and deliberately. He sat at his desk, hunched over--his face in his hands, a pencil perched on his right ear--and he appeared to be sobbing when we came in. But he wasn't sobbing; that's just how he was, almost always on the brink of a meltdown. It was kind of sad.
Me and Alfonso stood at the office door, peeking in, standing there quietly, watching Dan the G.M. run his fingers through his thin hair, exhaling loudly, sighs of heavy depression. Alfonso knocked gently on the door frame and the G.M. waved at us to come in. We sat down in front of the desk, looking at some framed pictures and documents on the wall: a photo of Stevie Ray Vaughn, a Bachelor's Degree in Business from the University of Texas at Austin, a photo of the 360 bridge stretching over Lake Austin, some Dilbert cartoons, a dry-erase board with grids of employee schedules, and other unrecognizable things. An array of small black and white security televisions, dusty and staticky, revealed the deepest, darkest corners, nooks, and crannies of the restaurant--including the storeroom, the alley, the side street, and the basement. The office was literally the saddest place in the building, depressing in its oppressive, cluster-fuck, messy state of affairs. We sat in tightly wound balls, making sure not to touch or disrupt anything, and waited to be spoken to.
"So," Dan the G.M. said, then exhaling a long, stinking breath that seemed to deflate him. His breath smelled like death. "I have a favor to ask one of you or both of you, either way." We looked at each other, surprised. Dan the G.M. did not look at us as he continued. He seemed to be staring through the top of his desk. "Here at the Pasta Warehouse, we pride ourselves in helping the community when asked, and we have some special customers that we go out of our way to help because we can. Do you boys think that you would be willing to help some of our special customers?"
We looked at each other again, surprised at the unexpected request from our very impersonal boss.
"Sure, what do you want us to do?" Alfonso said. I looked at him with stink eyes, annoyed that he said 'us' and not 'me.'
"We have some elderly customers who love our meals but have a difficult time coming to our restaurant, so we deliver meals to them. And since we've had quite a few employees suddenly quit, I've been in a bind finding some newer employees to perform this duty. I've been delivering the meals myself lately but as you can see--" He raised his hand and presented the piles of papers to me and Alfonso like a game show hostess, a thin smile on his face, the furrow in his brow digging deep into his skull. He really looked really, really stressed out. "I've been a little busy lately."
"I can see that," I said, Alfonso shoving me in the ribs with his elbow. I rubbed the tender spot in my side, my feelings hurt as well.
"One of you interested? Hell, the both of you can go if you want. The more that go, the better the service."
"Sure," we both said, in unison.
"Good to hear. All I need for you to do is, when you come in tomorrow for the lunch shift, clock in at regular wages instead of server wages, and Levonne will have the meals packaged for you, with the address and some instructions attached. It'll already be paid for and a tip will be given to you at the residence. Any questions?" We shook our heads. "Good. I appreciate your help. Now, one of you grab a mop. A toddler just barfed up her spaghetti in the ladies room."
The Delivery or How to Work but Not Actually Work
I parked my dusty, gold 1989 Honda
Civic in the alley behind the restaurant while Alfonso jumped out of the car, hopped up onto the landing area, then swung the rickety metal back door open--the crash into the brick wall almost sending it off the hinges--and disappeared inside the P.W. It seemed to me like a good time for a smoke break, so I too hopped out of my little piece-of-shit, Japanese car and leaned on its side, unsheathing a cigarette from my pocket and lighting it with deliberate coolness, knowing that there was a possibility someone may be watching me, even though nobody was around. The car continued to run, farting out wisps of exhaust and smoke, occasionally sputtering. I inhaled deeply, looking at the clear blue sky, watching some grackles flutter from building rooftop to rooftop. I looked around for the bum from the day before--curious if he came back to the same spot, wondered if he did some dumpster diving for food--but I didn't see him anywhere. I decided to pop the trunk to my car and be ready for Alfonso when he came back out.
The metal back door swung back open, the rattle from hitting the brick wall echoing throughout the alley, and Alfonso emerged, holding a few plastic bags filled with to-go trays of food, stacked tall and cinched at the top, dangling from his hands as he trotted out the door, a big smile on his face. He hopped down from the landing, winked at me, and placed the food in the trunk.
"Is that all?" I said.
"A few more things coming," Alfonso said.
Levonne emerged from the building soon after, a few more to-go bags in tow, and he handed them down to us.
"You got the directions?" he said.
"Yeppers," Alfonso said, tapping me on the shoulder, tilting his head toward the car, indicating it was time to jam.
"Later fools," Levonne said. "The Boss Man says to be back for the dinner shift." Then he hobbled back into the P.W. like some prehistoric monster retreating to its cold cave.
We hopped into my ride, turned up the radio, and were off to deliver the hot meals to our special customer. I barreled down the alley and weaved around a parking lot, turned a hard right onto Third Street, lifting the dusty car onto two wheels briefly before slamming back down onto the street, me and my homie whooping and hollering and rapping along with A Tribe Called Quest to the Scenario, weaving through traffic then turning left onto Guadalupe Street. We reveled in the change of routine from our usual day at work, watching the P.W. fade away behind us and Town Lake's body of water spread around us as we crossed over the South First Bridge, heading toward the south side of town. My apartment complex was close by and I thought about Mr. Whiskers and what mischief he was up to, sitting in the apartment by himself, cleaning himself or hunting for bugs or napping or spontaneously hallucinating, as cats are prone to do. 'What an exciting thing to happen without having to find a tab of LSD from a dealer in the wrong part of town at three in the morning,' I thought to himself.