Gabe let out a laugh that turned into a cough and I spoke over him. ‘And on that note! Ms Vaughn, I’m going to grab your lemons, and I will sendGabeback with your bread.’ I locked eyes with Al as I said Gabe’s name and he smiled and nodded.
‘Did …’ Gabe said when we were safely out of earshot and heading for the kitchen. ‘Did that woman’s husband just hit on me?’
‘Oh, he hit on you.’ I was eager to see how Gabe reacted to that. Maybe he would just freak out and run away and never come back. That would take care of all my stomach-soufflé issues. Plus one less distraction. I was a little uncomfortable about the easy way we had slipped into conversation. It was like there had been no lapse in our relationship and everything was exactly how it was when we were younger. Even thoughhestill didn’t remember that relationship. ‘That’s not his wife, though. I think she’s a lesbian, but I’m not sure. She might just be the only person here who can stand Al.’ Other than me.
I told him the first thing he needed to do with Ms Vaughn was run into the kitchen and grab lemons because she always asked for lemons with her water. If he did that, she’d be nice. Ms Vaughn was a terror to anyone who wasn’t me.
Hell, she had been a terror to me at first. Al was always pleasant, but Ms Vaughn was like the strictest teacher I’d ever had – on steroids. She corrected servers if they were serving incorrectly, then scolded them to speak up if they mumbled. If soup dripped onto a saucer on its journey from the kitchen, she would ask the server to take it away.
But without fail, the first thing she would say when approached was ‘Lemons for my water, please.’
So after I served her on my own four whole times, terrified each time, the next evening that I saw her and Al sit at my table, I walked right into the kitchen and grabbed four lemon slices and put them on a serving dish. I even went a roundabout way so she couldn’t see me approaching, then placed the lemons on the table – serving from the left because she had yelled at me about that twice – and said, ‘Here are your lemons, Ms Vaughn.’
She spun on me, her eyes wide, and I was afraid she was going to yell. To tell me I should never present something to a guest who hasn’t first asked for it. Instead, she took one quick glance at my name tag and said, ‘Thank you, Thomas. Well done.’
Across the table, Al beamed and waited for her to look down at her menu before giving me two enthusiastic thumbs up.
‘And don’t worry about Al,’ I said. ‘He’s harmless.’
‘Isn’t it a little creepy?’ Gabe asked. ‘An old man flirting with you every time he sees you?’
Al’s humor stemmed from trying to make people as uncomfortable as he could. He liked to test boundaries, see how far he could go before he finally backed off and became the Al I knew and loved. The one who dunks on Doris or goes out of his way to make Natalie as miserable as she likes to make us. The one who got into playful bitch-offs with our other manager, George.
George was always on his best behavior around other servers and residents. But when he found out I was on Al’s good side, he let his walls down. And watching the two of them throw shade at each other is performance art. Even Ms Vaughn almost smiles at it.
‘You’ll see what I mean,’ I said. ‘I’ll even let you take their orders.’
Gabe seemed nervous, but did pretty well, all things considered –Althings considered? The only joke Al made was when he asked about the chicken.
‘I’m not much of a chicken hawk,’ he said. ‘But I can always make an exception.’
‘Al!’
‘It’s okay, Ms Vaughn,’ I said. ‘Whatever that reference is, it’s so old we have no clue what it means.’
‘What an awful thing to say!’ Al scowled at me playfully, and I smiled right back.
We dropped off Al’s and Ms Vaughn’s soups and salads and went back to the service station. Natalie had made her way across the formal dining room and was now checking up on the residents in the casual dining room. She held two coffeepots in her hands, one regular, one decaf.
‘Coffee?’ she asked my five-top. ‘Sanka?’ Two people flipped their coffee cups and began talking as Natalie filled them.
‘Ah, shit,’ I muttered.
‘What?’ Gabe asked.
I nodded quickly to the table. ‘They accepted her coffee, so she’s going to think we didn’t ask if they wanted any. She’ll be over in a bit.’ I hoped that wasn’t a ding against my letter request.
I wiped the crumbs off the service station and checked that there was no evidence of Ava, Gabe or myself eating back there. Natalie rounded the corner.
‘Keep an eye on their coffee cups, Tommy,’ she said, placing the pots on the warmer. ‘Make sure they don’t go past the halfway point before you ask if they need a warm-up.’
They wouldn’t go past the halfway point because none of the residents at that table drink coffee this late. They flipped their cups over because they wanted to talk to Natalie or complain about something. And since all she said was make sure I watched their cups, it meant it wasn’t a complaint about me.
‘You got it,’ I said, acting like I was peering over her shoulder to look at the coffee cups. Of course, not one of the residents had touched the coffee.
Natalie turned her attention to Gabe, and her polite smile grew wide. ‘Gabriel, how is your third day going?’
‘Wonderful, thank you. Tom’s a really great teacher.’
