The Waitress

by Melissa Nathan

  “All right?” nodded the Adonis to the room in general, grinning from evenly tanned ear to evenly tanned ear.

  “Ah! Nik!” called Paul. “Everyone! Meet the new chef!”

  The two men bear-hugged, thumping each other so much on the back it looked like part of a ritual slapping dance.

  “Sorry we’re late, guvnor,” said the new chef, slouching one muscle-bound shoulder higher than the other, hands in denim pockets, “but I had a nasty hangover. He had to wait till I got showered. He’s just parking the motor.” He gave Patsy, Sukie and Katie their own individual cheeky grin from under long eyelashes. A giggle escaped from Patsy.

  “No matter,” said Paul. “You’re here now.” He gave a little cough and then began the introductions. “This is Katie, your new manager.”

  “Respect!” exclaimed Nik and winked at her.

  “Thank you,” said Katie primly, “same to you too, hopefully.”

  “And this is Sukie,” said Paul. “Head waitress.”

  “Nice one,” nodded Nik, giving her a thorough once over. “Nice one.”

  “I’m an actress,” said Sukie. “This is just my part-time job.”

  He nodded again. “Nice one,” he repeated.

  “And this is Patsy,” said Paul. “New waitress.”

  “Hello gorgeous,” he said. Sukie went visibly rigid and Katie hoped very much that Nik was a good chef.

  “And this is Matt,” continued Paul. “Chief washer-upper.”

  “Nice one mate,” Nik smacked his hand into Matt’s and shook it firmly. “Nice one.”

  “Ow,” murmured Matt before explaining that he was doing his A-Levels and when he wasn’t here, they’d all just have to pitch in.

  “Where the hell is the man himself then?” Paul asked Nik. “Don’t tell me he’s done a runner and left the country.” He laughed nervously.

  Just then they heard the sound of the café door slamming shut and the cat being throttled once and for all. “We’ll get rid of that for a start!” shouted a male voice from the café.

  “We’re in here!” shouted Paul. “Move your arse!” He started pacing. “Right. You’re all about to meet Dan. You’ll love him, he’s—”

  “Pardon?” interrupted Katie. “What did you say his name was?”

  “Dan.”

  She swallowed.

  “It’s not going to be the same one,” tutted Sukie, examining her nails. “There are other Dans you know.”

  “Same one as what?” asked Paul.

  “Nothing!” squeaked Katie.

  “She had a hilarious date with someone called Dan,” explained Matt. “We’ll tell you about it some time. We’ve got a photo of him actually—”

  “He doesn’t need to see the photo—” said Katie, blocking the fridge.

  “You’re right,” said Sukie, staring at the man in the doorway. “Because he’s standing right here.”

  They all stared as their new boss stood on the threshold, beaming at them: chiselled cheekbones, blue eyes—one with a hazel fleck—and a face they all knew well from the fridge door. He was looking at Paul and hadn’t seen Katie yet.

  Then he came into the kitchen.

  He looked at Sukie and frowned slightly before stepping toward her and shaking her hand. He still hadn’t seen Katie. She stood, stuck to the floor in fright, as if she’d just been caught naked in someone’s living room, knowing that there were only seconds before they caught sight of her. He was saying something to Sukie and still had his back to her. Now he was shaking Matt’s hand and saying something to him. He was only inches away. She tried to think of something to do but her brain cells were too busy running round her head screaming. He turned slowly toward her and she watched as his face went from side view, still side view, nearly front view, nearly front—front view. He started to give her a polite grin. Then stopped. Then stared. Then blinked and tried to grin again. Then swallowed almost audibly. Then glanced away and then back again. Then started to speak. Then stopped. Then gave a little cough.

  “Hello,” she probably shouted.

  “Hello,” he said, his face frozen.

  She held out her hand. He looked at it as if it was a plate of live octopus.

  “Oh,” he said and eventually shook it. “Yes.”

  “Katie,” introduced Paul proudly, as if he’d made her himself, “Crichton Brown’s new manager.”

  “Oh!” Dan repeated. “I never…what was the surname again?”

  “I don’t remember,” said Paul. “What was the surname again?” he asked Katie.

  Katie turned deliberately to Paul. “The surname is Simmonds.”

  “It’s Simmonds,” Paul told Dan.

  “Oh,” said Dan. “Excellent.”

  Paul laughed nervously again. “Am I missing something here?”

  Katie decided now would be the perfect time to explain her behavior last time they’d seen each other.

  “I-I-I-it-you…” she explained.

  Dan turned to Paul. “Can we have a word outside?” They left the kitchen, closing the door behind them.

  Sukie looked at Katie. “Well done!” she said. “Pithy yet pathetic.”

  Chapter 11

  THE NIGHTCLUB’S LOW CEILINGS, UNEVEN WALLS AND INTERMINABLE bass made Katie feel like she was pot-holing in hell rather than out having fun with friends. She was scrunched up between Sukie and Matt, which would have been fun were Sukie not chatting up the new chef Nik, and Matt chatting up the new waitress Patsy. Dan and Paul hadn’t come. She hadn’t wanted to come either, she’d wanted to go home and write up her menu ideas or failing that, jump off a high building, but when she’d suggested getting an early night, Sukie had thrown her a look that said “manager” all over it.

  She decided to go back to the upstairs bar, where she could chat to Jon, eat bar nuts and feel her own heartbeat again. She shouted to Sukie that she was going up, making enough sign language for her to understand. She squeezed out and felt Sukie and Matt lean back into her space as she tried to step over legs and feet. She pushed her way through a mass of junkie-garbed teenagers with piercings and tattoos. She felt as if she was looking at the world through the wrong end of binoculars. As she climbed the stairs, she wondered when she’d got so old. What was the point of thinking like a parent if the nearest she got to having children was half a first date? And then, naturally, she thought of Dan and felt sick again. Was she living a hideous reality show? Was God switching the channel back from some worthy wildlife program in Africa to titter at the comedy that was her life?

  She was in shock, that was all. It was understandable. She’d been given wonderful news and received a bolt from the blue in the matter of one hour. Everything that was happening to the café was a dream come true. It had reminded her exactly why she’d wanted to go into the restaurant business in the first place. All the enthusiasm that she’d thought had died within her had in fact just been latent, like a volcano ready to explode. And today when she’d been made manager, it had exploded, red, hot steamy lava everywhere. Then she’d been told that her new role as manager was because she was the only one of the staff who had nothing else in their life. Then, after it had taken this long to finally forget Dan, he was suddenly very much back in her life, instantly turning her insides to compost. Not only that but he was angry, which turned her insides to rotting compost. And the final icing on today’s cake was the new, totally unexpected ugly in the form of Sukie. It was only now that Katie was able to appreciate fully how great their friendship had been when they’d both just been waitresses. Would it ever be the same again? Or was Sukie too angry with her and was she too hurt by Sukie’s stunning display of disloyalty? Ah yes, yesterday, she’d had no prospects, no boyfriend and a shit job. Today, she had an even shittier job, an angry ex as her boss and she felt like she’d lost her best friend. She should place bets on catching flu first thing tomorrow.

  Thankfully, by now she was approaching the bar. She wondered if the music in here was the newest craze to hit Londo
n or if it was her ears just ringing so loudly it was a sound in itself. It was much emptier up here. It was too posh for the teenagers and the after-work drinkers had started drifting away, having put off going home for as long as possible. She’d been here once at a weekend and watched in amazement as Jon rushed to and fro serving drinks to a queue that, like some mythological beast, just grew longer and longer until suddenly daylight robbed it of its powers. Tonight was different though and he and his colleagues were chatting easily together. He was the only bar staff without acne, and even though this was because he was the only bar staff in his mid-twenties, it was a fact Katie felt almost maternally proud of. She went and sat at her corner of the bar, picking up a bowl of nuts on the way. Jon raised his eyebrows in greeting, stopped chatting to his mates and met her there.

  “Having a good time?” he asked loudly.

  “Am I shite.”

  He grinned and nodded. “Have I told you my amazing news?”

  “You’re buying the café?”

  “Pardon?”

  “Is it me or is there a monster dancing under the floorboards?” asked Katie.

  “You get used to it after a while.”

  “I feel like I’m wearing a pacemaker.”

  He shook his head apologetically and pointed at his ears.

  “Get me a bloody Mary and tell me your news,” she shouted.

  “Two agents want to meet me,” he shouted.

  “That’s amazing!” she yelled. “Where’s my drink?”

  He nodded and grinned again. Katie mimed drinking and then took a pen from Jon’s pocket and wrote down her order on a napkin. He read it and then wrote something underneath it. She read “Coming right up madam.” She raised her eyes to heaven.

  Over the next half an hour, she managed to hear enough to glean that this time he wanted to meet them, and the only thing helping him contain his excitement was his blank utter terror. He’d never known two emotions battle so valiantly before and he felt both deserved to win.

  “Where’s Sukie?” he asked. “I need to tell her. I need advice.”

  “Downstairs trying to get the chef naked.”

  He frowned. “Jamie Oliver?”

  “I’m going home now,” shouted Katie, “to learn sign language.”

  Jon’s face lit up and just when she was about to congratulate him on hearing and getting the joke, she got jabbed in the waist from behind. She turned round to see a sweaty, grinning Sukie beside her. Sukie waved. She waved back.

  “What do you think of Dick?” asked Sukie.

  “Dick who?”

  “Nik!”

  “Fine.”

  “Vile?”

  “Fine.”

  Sukie nodded.

  The three of them didn’t talk properly until they were walking home an hour later.

  “Are your ears ringing?” began Katie.

  “Singing?” asked Sukie.

  “RINGING.”

  “Nope,” belched Sukie. “Pardon.”

  “I didn’t say anything,” said Jon.

  When they dropped Sukie off at her place, she offered to make them a cup of tea and they refused. Katie had to get up early tomorrow.

  “Ah yes,” said Sukie. “First day as manager.”

  “Fuck off,” Katie said, banging her ear with her palm.

  “Ooh,” said Sukie. “Get her.”

  “Gimme a break,” said Katie, her ears finally popping. “You don’t want to be manager and you know it. So don’t spoil it for me.”

  They stood for a moment in the cold, getting used to the silence slowly coming back.

  “Yeah,” said Sukie quietly. “You’re right. Sorry. And I will enjoy my lie-in tomorrow while you’re working through things with Dan.”

  Katie groaned at Dan’s name. “Oh my God, my life is shit.”

  “You can help me prepare for my interviews,” Jon told Sukie.

  “OK,” said Sukie. “Lunch is on you.” She waved as they sauntered away.

  They walked down the hill, up their road and to the front door. Katie grunted half-heartedly as they approached, so Jon found his key. They walked up the stairs to their flat door and she waited as he opened it. He dropped his jacket off his shoulders by the coat pegs and she picked it up and put it on the hook. He yawned. She yawned. They walked to their rooms and each slept as badly as the other.

  Chapter 12

  THE NEXT MORNING KATIE’S HANGOVER WAS BIGGER THAN HER BODY. As she shuffled down Asherman’s Hill, she was convinced it must be throbbing or pulsing or glowing. Possibly all three. How could this much pain be invisible? Her joints were competing for Most Pain Award. She had taken painkillers but they’d probably got lost working out where to go first.

  Maybe this wasn’t a hangover, maybe it was flu. Maybe, she thought slowly, just maybe, the hangover was masking some type of malarian killer flu that she’d caught at the nightclub from someone and they’d already died. When they did the docu-drama about it, after her tragic death, Sukie would play her and a Hollywood scout would spot her and she’d marry Tom Cruise. Maybe then Sukie would like her again.

  She really was in a kind of hell. There she was minding her own business despising her job and then wham! She loved it and didn’t want to lose it. Two minutes later, wham-bam! Boss from hell. If only she could explain to Dan what had happened to make her run out of that restaurant, but it wasn’t that simple and she didn’t have the money for therapy to work it out. She had no choice, she was going to have to be adult about this situation. Big poo. Because that meant she would have to apologize. Ever since her first apology at the age of three to her best friend Manda, for sucking her toy cowboy till he frayed, she’d found apologies difficult.

  It would hurt, but she’d have to say sorry to Dan for running out on their date. She decided she’d do it before Dan even said hello. She wouldn’t let that stupid male pride get a grip (hers, not his), she would humble herself endearingly, naturally and winningly. Suitably won over, he would then explain that he and Geraldine had been a hideous mistake—one of the worst nights of his life—and she would go on to prove to him that she was indispensable as a manager and had a very cute body. Then she’d start dating a self-made millionaire she’d met at the gym and he’d cry into his business strategy.

  Well, it was a plan.

  As she walked out of the newsagent’s, opening today’s much-needed sugar rush, she glanced at the café. She was early, thanks to only being able to sleep for four hours last night, and The Café was still unchanged. She crossed the road and stood in front of its doorway, watching her reflection as she finished her chocolate bar. She stepped forward and looked in. She leaned closer and shielded her eyes with her hands against the glass of the door, squinting to see inside. She tried imagining the faded décor with a new look, failed and stepped away again. Then she turned round and leaned heavily against the door. To her amazement, she fell in.

  She looked up to see Dan standing by her head.

  “I see you don’t need a key,” he said.

  “The door was open.”

  “Well spotted. You may find you’re too intelligent to be a manager.”

  She crawled up and watched him walk behind the counter. From there he explained how, now she was here, they could move the coffee machine and the cash-till to the front of the café before the builders arrived.

  “Right,” he said, taking off his jacket. “Ready?”

  Her eyes widened. “I’m not moving that thing.”

  “Why not?”

  “I’m five-foot tall and weigh eight stone.”

  He gave her a look. “I thought women wanted to be treated equally.”

  “Yeah pound for pound,” she retorted.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “It means find someone your own size to treat equally.”

  He gave a scornful laugh. “Haven’t you heard of feminism?”

  “It’s funny how men only say that when there’s something heavy to carry or one seat
left on the train. That’s where all male feminists are. In trains. Sitting down.”

  “We don’t have time to discuss this,” he said, approaching the coffee machine.

  “You don’t,” she muttered hotly, walking past him to the kitchen. “You’ve got a coffee machine to carry.”

  She slammed the door, went straight to the sink and ran the cold tap over her head. She wasn’t going to be able to do this. She was already close to tears and she’d only just got here. She came up from under the water. Right. Get a grip. Start again. She would apologize to Dan. She would humble herself endearingly, naturally and winningly. She would not cry or punch him in the face.

  When she came back into the café, pinny on, hair wet, she found him standing in exactly the same position he’d been in when she’d left him. Not a thing out of place. She felt a bit like Doctor Who coming out of the Tardis. The only difference she now noticed, on second glance, was that his face looked like thunder. A Constable thunder, all intensity and impending doom.

  She took a deep breath and prepared to humble herself endearingly, naturally and winningly when he suddenly spoke.

  “I can’t bloody move it on my own, can I?”

  She blinked. “How long have you been standing there?” she asked.

  “Look, who is the boss here?” he asked.

  She looked round the café and then back at him. “Did you move at all?”

  “I said, “Who is the boss here?’”

  “You didn’t, did you? Bloody hell, you just stood there.”

  “Right,” he broke in suddenly. “Remind me to put you forward for Employee of the Year.” He pushed his sleeves up further and approached the coffee machine as if he was about to kick-box it.

  She ran in front of it and blocked it. “Don’t move this coffee machine.”

  He stepped back in surprise. They stood like that for a moment. Then he spoke quietly. “Will you please get out of my way?”

  “What time are the builders getting here?” she asked.

  He thought for a moment. “Eight. Why?”