‘And remember, our jobs depend on it.’
Our jobs rely solely on me saying yes if Mrs Harrington asks for salmon when it’s not on the menu? Got it.
‘Absolutely. You’re right. And I will make sure it’s the first thing I tell new staff going forward. I’ll also ask A— Mr Turner to request something outlandish specifically as a test for Gabe.’
Natalie’s spine stiffened at that. ‘Maybe have Ms Vaughn do it instead.’
‘Good point.’
I moved to step around her when she stopped me again. ‘Oh, and I’ve started working on your letter of recommendation.’
Of course. Because I only asked her five days ago. Then, as if she thought I didn’t understand the subtext:
‘I’d hate to have to write that you’re a bit of a rebel when it comes to rule following. La Mère is very strict with their rules.’
I nodded and headed for the kitchen where Gabe was waiting for me.
He whispered, ‘You told me the other day that rule number one was don’t piss off the hosts!’
‘Sorry about that,’ I said.
‘You totally set me up.’ Gabe was acting indignant, but I could see the hint of dimples.
I shrugged as James called out Al’s table. ‘Everyone has different rule number ones.’ I grabbed the tray and turned to James. ‘James, what’s rule number one?’
‘Don’t touch Roni’s knives. She keeps them sharp as shit. I almost sliced a finger off once.’ He held up his hand and mimed cutting off his fingers and blood spewing everywhere.
Gabe’s smile grew and we walked back toward the dining room. As Ava came in I stopped in the exit doorway.
‘Ava, rule number one?’
She said without looking back, ‘Don’t stand on Mr Gilbert’s side of the table.’
‘I feel like I should be writing these down,’ Gabe said, grabbing a tray stand for me as one of the other servers, Bryce, entered the salad bar area.
‘Bryce, what’s your rule number one?’
Without stopping he said, ‘Don’t stand on Mrs Wells’s side of the table.’
Gabe shot me a questioning look.
‘Right … Mrs Wells is a butt grabber.’
At the end of the night, I had successfully managed not to get onto Natalie’s radar any more than I already was, and Gabe and I had fallen back into the natural rapport we’d had at summer camp. It felt so easy to talk to him. And none of it felt like small talk. It was all big talk. Even the small stuff ended up feeling bigger than the original question that led to it.
Like when we were resetting our section. After he told me more about his film classes at Murphy, I finally asked, ‘What’s your favorite movie?’
He looked like I had asked him to choose between cutting off his foot or cutting off a hand. ‘How can I pick one?’
‘Then … favorite director?’
‘Akira Kurosawa.’ He said it quickly, as if he knew the question was coming. I had never seen any of his movies. Don’t think I had even heard of him.
‘Was he the one who didParasite?’
Again, the hand or foot question. ‘I’m going to ignore the casual racism of that question for a second, but we’ll be circling back to that.’
Oh, shit. Note to self, don’t make assumptions about directors you know nothing about.
