Leigh barged through the door. How did she always find me?
I told Jay I’d call him back and climbed from the fire escape. Leigh paced the bottom of the stairwell, heaving into the phone.
“Are you all right?”
Shooting me a wild expression, she spat, “Get back to work.” But there was no conviction in her voice.
A party of two was seated in my section. I tied my apron around my waist and grabbed a water carafe.
It was Tristan and a guy I didn’t recognize. I palmed my flyaways, fighting back the strange torrent of excitement at the sight of Tristan’s head huddled over one of our dirty menus.
“Hey,” I said.
He looked up, a gold hoop shimmering in his ear. “Oh, hey. What’s up? How are you?”
“I’m good.” I pulled my notepad from my apron, which bulged with dried-out pens and crumpled receipts. I wished I’d cleaned it out. “What can I get you?”
Tristan glanced at his menu, smiling.
“What?”
He shook his head, twisting his bracelet. It was twine, like the kind kids braided at summer camp. “What’s good here?”
“Nothing.”
“Nothing’sgood here?”
“Nope.”
The corner of his mouth lifted. “Cool. I’ll take the wings, then. Flats only.”
“You’re one ofthosepeople.”
He threaded his fingers behind his head. “Flats, drums. There’s a big difference.”
I collected his menu. “It’s all from the same chicken getting its ass beat at a factory farm and force-fed antibiotics so it won’t die before it gets its head chopped off.”
He stared at me like he was trying to understand something. I could tell he was high. He grinned, suddenly, like he’d heard my comment on a radio delay. I thanked him for the article just to say something. He said, “No problem.” His friend cleared his throat, failing to cover up a laugh. When I walked away, my heart was a raft bobbing wildly in my chest.
While I was entering their orders into the computer, I heard Tristan say, “Remember my buddy Jay? Yeah, that’s his girl. Yeah, yeah. The one with the open relationship stuff.”
I didn’t hear what the guy said back, but he laughed. The optics of these men snickering about my love life shattered something delicate inside me.
I barreled toward their table. “What’s good?”
Tristan blinked, the fog clearing from his eyes. “What?”
“Why are you talking about me?”
“All I said was that you were in an open relationship, chill.”
I was shaking. “Fuck you, Tristan.”
Leigh came up and snatched my apron loose. “Shift’s over. Out. Now.”
I stomped downstairs for my bag. When I came back up, Tristan was at the top of the staircase. “Look, I don’t know what I did.”
I shouldered past him out the front door. I was so frazzled, I couldn’t remember which way the Metro was. Tristan followed me onto the sidewalk. “You’re really not gonna speak?”
