Betty called out to me the minute I walked out of the kitchen, waving her napkin as if I was hard of hearing.
“Good morning,” I beamed.
“Do you know how long we’ve been married, Priscilla?” asked Betty, for the millionth time.
“Fifty years?” I asked, hoping I sounded unsure.
Merle covered his mouth with his napkin and chuckled. It was a rumbly sound that no one under the age of eighty could replicate.
“No,” she said, confusing me. “We’ve been married fifty-one years today.”
I leaned down and gently hugged her frail, diminutive frame. “Congratulations to you both. I hope you’re doing something nice today.”
Merle answered, waving his shaky finger at me. “When you get to be our age, every day is nice.”
I agreed, smiling.
I wanted to do something special for the Swanstons. When I saw them standing to leave, I rushed to the counter near the door so I could be the one to take care of their bill. Rushing was unnecessary. It took them ages to walk across the room, arm in arm to steady each other.
Merle reached for his wallet. “Not today, Merle,” I told him, glancing around for any sign of Paolo. “Your breakfast today is on the house. Happy anniversary.”
A certain amount of guilt must have accompanied the gesture because when someone called my name – well, Priscilla’s name – I almost jumped out of my skin.
“Oh, it’s only you,” I said, spinning to see Elvis at the tiniest table we had, nestled near the door.
He smirked roguishly. “You could get fired for that, you know. Comping meals is considered stealing.”
I strolled toward his table. “Are you going to dob on me, Elvis?”
His dark laugh led me to think he was contemplating it. “If I knew what dob meant, I might.”
“What are you doing here, anyway? I haven’t seen you in a while.”
“What do most people do here, Priscilla?”
I cringed. Having a pseudonym bothered me only when he said it.
“They eat. Would you like to hear the specials?”
He laughed. “No. The specials are always the same.”
“Yeah, but today they’re really special.”
“Sit for a minute,” he ordered, pointing to the chair opposite him.
I glanced around the room to see Paolo standing at the podium near the front door, watching me like a short, fat hawk.
“I can’t.” I discreetly moved my head in an upward nod, gesturing toward Paolo.
Discretion wasn’t Elvis’s forte. He twisted in his seat and stared straight at him. Realising he’d been caught, Paolo started thumbing through the reservation book. “Pretend you’re reading me the specials,” said Elvis, giving me a wink.
I pulled out a chair and sat down.
I enjoyed stealing a few minutes with Elvis now and then. He was funny, smart and handsome. He also knew he was funny, smart and handsome so he was cocky too. In the few weeks since I’d first met him, he’d dined at Nellie’s with at least four different women, showering each one of them with enough attention to make them think they were the only one. Elvis was clearly trouble, but I took heart in the fact that I was at least clued up enough to realise it.
***
Waiting tables is not for the fainthearted. That morning I dealt with a screaming baby who threw her food around, two adult babies screaming at me because their orders were wrong… and Bryce and his pals.
“What’s a smash cake?” he asked, pointing to the item on the menu.
“It’s a favourite of all the little children who come in here,” I said acidly.
I wasn’t lying. The white cake piled high with sickly sweet frosting was a must-have for any toddler who dined at Nellie’s. Little ones who weren’t coordinated enough to eat it with a fork would pick it up and smash it against their mouths.
“We’ll take three of those.”
Something about Bryce made his friends think he was hilarious and witty. I’d tried to figure out what it was but come up blank each time. To me he was one of the most repugnant people I’d ever met.
“Would you like sprinkles on your smash cakes?” I spoke in the same slow tone that I used when asking two year olds that question.
“Sure, why not?”
I turned to walk away but Bryce grabbed my elbow. “Don’t touch me,” I snapped, shrugging free.
“You’re not very friendly today, beautiful.”
“I’m never friendly to you.”
His friends began to snigger, spurring him on to be even more offensive. But he didn’t get a chance to say anything else cringe-worthy.
Elvis walked in.
“Can I sit here?” he asked, pointing to the table next to Bryce’s.
“Yes, of course,” I replied.
The party of chubby investment bankers didn’t seem to appreciate company. The table fell silent.
I walked the short distance to Elvis’s table. “Good morning, Elvis,” I crooned.
He looked up at me and smiled. “Hey.”
“I haven’t seen you in a while.”
“Did you miss me?”
“Not one bit,” I quipped, handing him a menu.
He laughed. “I didn’t think so.”
It had been nearly a week since Elvis had been to the restaurant. I had missed him but would never admit it. Pathetically, besides Marvin, Elvis was the closest thing I had to a friend in New York.
Once I’d served the fat bankers their cake and coffee, I didn’t expect to have to deal with them again that day. When Bryce called me over to complain about his food, I was furious.
“Is there a problem?”
“There might be,” he hinted, turning the plate in a full circle. “I’m trying to figure out where the smash is. I see the cake and you remembered the sprinkles but there’s no smash.”
His horrid friends snickered into their closed fists. I was a hundred percent certain I was about to lose my job because of them, and at that moment I wasn’t concerned in the slightest.
“It’s just called a smash cake, moron.”
“I know that, honey. I’m just wondering what the smash looks like, just so I can keep an eye out for it. I wouldn’t want to break my teeth on a hard piece of smash.”
His friends chortled louder and I was totally at a loss why. Schoolboys wouldn’t have found him the slightest bit amusing.
“Are you planning to eat it or shall I take it back to the kitchen?” I asked, giving him one last chance to be a normal human being.
Bryce leaned so close to me that I was forced to take a step back. “Just show me the smash,” he whispered, making my skin crawl.
At the very end of my rope, I balled up my fist and thumped it down on the cupcake, sending chunks of cake and frosting splattering all over the three of them. “There. Your smash is served.”
I heard chuckling again but a quick glance around the table showed it wasn’t coming from the bankers. Their cake-spattered faces were all frozen in stunned silence. Elvis was the one chuckling.
I grabbed a napkin, wiped the cake off my hand and strolled back to the kitchen as if nothing had happened. As usual, no one in the kitchen took any notice of me, but Paolo wasn’t as oblivious. I knew he’d fire me the instant he heard about it. I spied through the window in the kitchen door, trying to see which part of the dining room he was lurking in. To my surprise, he was nowhere to be seen.
What I did see was Elvis standing beside the table of smash cake victims, talking to Bryce. I didn’t want him pleading my case. There wasn’t any point. Paolo was not a man renowned for his forgiving nature. As soon as Bryce demanded to see the manager to explain what I had done, I’d be cactus.
I went about the rest of my shift as if nothing had happened. The fat bankers were gone by the time I ventured back to the dining room, and so was Elvis. I crossed paths with Paolo a few times but he mentioned nothing to do with my cupcake assault that day, or the next… or the day after that.
For some reason, I’d got off scot-free. Not only had I escaped the wrath of Paolo but also no longer had to deal with Bryce and his goons either. They never set foot in Nellie’s again.
***
When I was growing up, we ate sandwiches for dinner for weeks on end. Alex was a woeful cook. As long as he was sure all major food groups were covered, he saw no problem with it.
Since I’d been in New York I’d reverted to old habits, living on cereal and sandwiches. The kitchen in Gabrielle’s apartment was beautiful. The off-white cabinets and glossy black granite bench top were a chef’s dream. But it was all for show. I’d moved into an apartment that hadn’t been lived in for nearly six years. It was a beautiful, stylish, empty shell.
The lack of furniture didn’t concern me in the slightest. I had a huge comfortable bed, and when I was in it I felt like the queen of everything. At first I thought Gabrielle had left it behind, naïvely thinking a king-size bed was too big to pack up and ship out with the rest of her belongings. Marvin let slip one day that it had been delivered just days before my arrival – along with a mass of very expensive bedding that I found in the linen closet in the hallway. I’d made a point of thanking her during one of my weekly check-in phone calls home.
“I couldn’t have you sleeping on the floor,” she’d told me. “Please don’t tell your father that there’s no other furniture there. He worries enough as it is.”
That was the beauty of Gabrielle. If there was a line between a hand up and a hand out, she never crossed it.
Living without furniture was bearable, but living without decent food was not. I craved home-cooked meals. After cereal for dinner the second night in a row, I decided that a home cooked meal would be my mission for the week. In order to do that, I was going to have to come up with a way of equipping the kitchen.
No one noticed the empty backpack I was carrying when I arrived at work that morning. The people I worked with barely noticed me at all half the time – except Paolo, who took great delight in berating me at the front door for being three minutes late for my shift.
Offloading my bag in the cloakroom, I headed into the dining room to start work, grabbing Phoebe’s egg white omelette off the servery on my way past.
I chatted to her for a short minute before heading to the Swanstons’ table to greet them. We were in the midst of the fifty-one-years-of-marriage conversation when from the corner of my eye I saw Elvis walk in.
I rushed over to him, steering him away from Paolo by linking my arm through his. “There’s a table for you near the window.”
I didn’t dare look back at Paolo. Stealing his moment of glory by denying him his meet-and-greet was huge no-no.
“You’re very keen this morning,” noted Elvis.
“I take my job very seriously.”
He chuckled darkly. “No, you don’t.”
Releasing my grip, I pointed to the table I’d reserved for him and handed him a menu. I couldn’t have cared less about his order that morning. I had a plan, and Elvis was my unwitting accomplice.
“I need your help.” I sounded desperate, like I was about to ask him for a kidney. I rushed through the plan I’d hatched on the short walk in to work. Elvis didn’t say anything for a long time, giving me a look I’d seen a million times before but never from him. He thought I was as unhinged as my plan.
“You’re going to steal pots and pans?”
“Not steal, borrow,” I clarified. “And I need you to keep Paolo distracted while I do it.”
“Priscilla, I’ll lend you some money. Go and buy some new pans.”
He reached for his wallet and I grabbed his arm to stop him. Elvis glanced across at Paolo, put his wallet back in his pocket and straightened up.
“No, I don’t want to buy them. I just want to borrow them and then I’ll return them when I’m done. Will you help me?”
“You’re never going to make employee of the month. You know that, right?”
I had more chance of winning a Nobel Prize than making employee of the month. My record was less than exemplary, and Elvis had been privy to every one of my indiscretions thus far.
“Please, Elvis?” I pouted a little.
“Who else have you mentioned this absurd scheme to?”
I shrugged. “Just Marvin, my door man.”
“Let me get this straight. You’re a poor, struggling waitress and yet you live in a building with a doorman?”
“Look, will you help me or not?”
He sighed. “Fine. Go, do your thing. I’ll keep your manager busy.”
He raised his hand, looked at Paolo and clicked his fingers. Paolo scuttled across the floor, weaving in and out of tables like a plump penguin.
“Go,” whispered Elvis.
I slipped away, confident that my partner in crime could buy me the time I needed. I’d gambled a lot by implicating Elvis. He could have thrown me to the wolves at any moment, but for some reason I trusted him.
I was like a ghost in the kitchen. No one raised an eyebrow when I retrieved my bag from the cloakroom and snuck into the adjacent storeroom.
It was a treasure-trove of goodies. I took a small skillet and the only saucepan small enough to fit into my bag. Glancing around the dimly lit, windowless room, I sighed wistfully. There was any amount of food in there. I could have made a hundred meals just from the groceries I could source from the storeroom. But I took nothing else. I wasn’t a thief. I had no intention of taking anything I couldn’t return later.
Back in the cloakroom, I hid my bag under my coat, hoping that nobody would discover my loot before I could escape with it later that morning.
I didn’t speak with Elvis again that day. Paolo had made it his personal mission to serve him himself. I glanced at him as I walked over to serve the table next to his, and he winked at me and smiled.
I mouthed two words. Thank you. And later that night, when I sat on the floor in the kitchen eating the meal I’d cooked myself, I silently thanked him again.
6. Devil’s Advocate
Arriving late to work was never a good idea. On days when Paolo was on the warpath, the only thing I could do was duck for cover.
“Where the hell have you been?” he bellowed, the second he laid eyes on me.
“I’m sorry I’m late.”
“Not as sorry as you’re going to be,” ribbed Taylor.
I’d met Taylor only once before. She was the girl standing at the podium near the door on the day I’d weaselled my way in to the job. And she looked just as frazzled and run off her feet as she had that day.
“Why?” I asked, following her through the kitchen door.
Paolo called after her. “Taylor, make sure she gets her costume.”
What costume? Surely the drab black pants and white blouse we wore were punishment enough.
I followed Taylor into the staff cloakroom and closed the door behind us. I said nothing as she rummaged through the large plastic bag hanging on one of the hooks. I still said nothing when she threw a stiff white tunic at me. But when she dumped a white fluffy marabou halo on my head, I couldn’t hold my tongue any longer.
“What is this about?” I asked.
“’Tis the season and all that junk,” she quipped. “Paolo makes us dress up every year at Christmas.”
I’m not sure what was more disturbing: the fact that Paolo wanted us in costume or that Taylor had worked at Nellie’s long enough to know it was an annual event.
“No way,” I protested, thrusting the musty-smelling dress at her. “Christmas is three weeks away.”
“You’re getting off lightly. You’re the angel this year. I’m one of Santa’s gnomes.” She dipped in to the bag again, dragging out a pair of red and white striped tights, making me laugh.
“An elf, Taylor. I don’t think Santa had gnomes.”
“Whatever.” She shrugged. “You’re the angel. Be happy.”
“Do I have a choice?”
“Nope.” She pulled open the door and breezed out as quickl
y as she’d come in, leaving me holding the angel dress and halo.
We managed to stay costume-free for most of the morning. Paolo started rushing around, ordering everybody to suit up before the lunchtime rush. I held out.
“Right now!” he ordered, clapping his hands as he approached me. “I want to see a Christmas angel, right now!”
“I’m allergic to taffeta,” I protested.
“And I’m allergic to insubordinates. Wear it or walk out the door.”
“I’ll make a deal with you, Paolo.”
Instantly he stopped walking and turned back to face me. I knew I’d piqued his curiosity.
“I’ll wear your dumb costume under one condition. You get me a new name badge… with my real name on it.”
Paolo deliberated for a moment before throwing his head back in a quick bray of laughter. “Fine. Whatever. It’s a deal.” He waved his hands in the air as he walked away.
“Do you even know my real name?” I asked, as he got to the door.
“Email it to me,” he replied, disappearing into the kitchen.
I couldn’t help laughing. Taylor the Christmas gnome jingled her way past me a few seconds later and I laughed even harder. It was going to be a long day.
I didn’t usually work the lunchtime shift. Working just a few hours in the morning suited me perfectly. It left the rest of the day free for exploring my adopted city.
Breakfast at Nellie’s was usually busy, but nothing compared to lunch. The build-up of people at the door was growing and tables were turning over much slower than usual.
Since my morning shift the day before, Nellie’s restaurant had undergone changes. Every spare surface had been decorated. A huge pine wreath hung from the balustrade; a herd of gold Papier Mache reindeers took pride of place near the foot of the stairs and pine garlands hung from the ceiling. The crisp white table linen had been replaced with bottle green tablecloths and red napkins.