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“Can I Get You Anything Else, Sir?”

A Hopeful Anecdote for Your Next Shift

By Jahnney CantrellPublished 3 years ago 9 min read
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“Can I get you anything else, Sir?” Every night I ask the question and receive a similar answer, ‘Just the check’, or ‘No, that’s all’ accompanied with a falsely sincere smile and a bitingly pleasant tone. I’ll retreat to the kitchen and find a nook in back stock to check my grades, pray that my electricity bill is affordable this month, or listen to the overexaggerated stories of nightly bar crawls the line cooks loudly trade. While these moments of rest in nearly twelve hour shifts are partially for my own benefit, the couple on their anniversary dinner receive some solace in my absence as well. Apparently, the general duties of my job, such as checking in and “everything alright over here folks?”, can come off as pushy. Not to mention my stained apron and disheveled ponytail after chasing down salt shakers and appetizers may put a slight damper on their evening. I suppose when you’re only eating half of a 60$ filet, simply because you can afford to, the sight of a server’s fraying black notebook and slacks with tiny holes could cause discomfort.

I always throw myself into self pity during the weekend doubles. In my defense, it’s become increasingly difficult to stay positive. After five years of watching every well-to-do, white-collar customer come through the steakhouse and hardly glance at the prices before ordering. I, on the other hand, spend my down time debating whether or not I can leave my heat on this winter. Surprisingly enough, the posters my new manager designed with emojis that read, “SMILE!! THE CUSTOMERS ARE WATCHING!!” have not done anything to boost my morale. ‘Grin and bear it’ does, however, become a good mantra when the uncomfortably complimenting older gentleman slams down his platinum AmEx card for the bill and tips you less than 8%. I often find myself thinking during these shifts of my mother crying quietly in the kitchen over spilt milk, wondering how we’re going to afford groceries that week. I wonder when the last time the people dining in our banquet rooms, mulling over their choices between a Chateau Haut, Brion, or a Cakebread Cellars, had to choose which were the “must-have” items while grocery shopping, and the ones you’d ask the cashier, quietly and with cheeks stained red, to please put back.

“Rachel! We need runners, table 32, think you could handle that?” I slide my phone back into my apron, kicking myself for allowing bitter thoughts to distract me from my own table’s order. My manager hands me two sizzling pans, both topped with a filet that costs more than my non-slip work shoes, and causes just about as much pain. I make my way through a bustle of naive new hires, standing somehow perfectly in everyone’s way, and veteran servers, screaming at broken coffee machines, as if the nearly thirty years old appliance will listen and brew faster, all while ignoring the grease popping into my arms and the ever present fear of dropping the plates.

The couple at table 32 look close to my father’s age and are dressed for the occasion, with their greatest accessory being the stunning wedding bands on their interlocked hands. The woman, as blonde and tiny as my mother, is quietly telling her partner a story and he throws his head back laughing. I notice how free of worry-lines their faces are, giving them the kind of beauty only Jennifer Anniston has in anti-aging cream ads. I try my best to wait for the perfect moment to politely interrupt and set down the still sizzling (and wrist-bending) pans, but the man notices before I have to interject.

“Oh, dear, sweetheart, that looks heavy! Let me clear some space for you.” Usually, I dislike when men call me pet names, but this seemed less condescending somehow, perhaps because it wasn’t accompanied by a wink. He stacks their appetizer plates, and before I can let out a breath of relief from setting down what felt like piles of hot coal, I notice the wrong side is on the woman’s plate. My chest tightens.

“I am so sorry, looks like you’re missing vegetables. Let me-”

“Oh, this all looks wonderful. You don’t have to do a thing. I was eyeing the tomato pie, but decided against it, so maybe this was fate,” she beams up at me.

“Oh-” I have to take a moment before I’m able to respond, “Well, I’m glad. The tomato pie is phenomenal, I think you will enjoy it. Is there anything else I can get you two? Any refills?” The man smiles warmly at me and asks instead if he can tell me a story.

He tells me that he and his wife met thirty years ago at the very same restaurant while she was at dinner with her parents. He was a scruffy bartender, barely making ends meet, and she had her entire life mapped out and was going to nursing school. She told her parents she was going to the restroom and instead walked herself up to the bartender, batted her eyes, and tried her luck at getting a drink (a rite of passage for any 19 year old college girl, or so I’ve heard). He laughed in her face and asked where her parents were, but told her she was the most beautiful and bold woman he’d ever met. Thirty years and three kids later, they were sitting across from the very same bar.

“It’s amazing how your entire life can be changed so easily,” He looked at his wife, glowing, “I know my entire world was about to change the second I laid eyes on her.”

When they asked me about my name, my interests, and my story, I didn’t have nearly as interesting things to say. Nonetheless, they seemed just as enthralled by my ramblings as I was with their romance. I wanted to stay at that table for the rest of the night and tell them how even just for a few seconds, they made me think everything was going to work out. I wanted to ask them when I will be able to have dinner with someone who loves me unconditionally at an overpriced restaurant, as if they knew some secret about life and adulthood that I was missing. As quickly as positive thoughts appeared, they were drowned out by the sound of snapping at a nearby table.

“Waitress! Refill please!” I turn to see a pasty, unpleasant looking woman with a hummingbird brooch fastened to her eyesore of a sweater, shaking her glass vigorously at me.

“I’m sorry, you two, I’ll be back to check on you soon,” I apologized and stepped back into my reality of extra condiments with a side of complaints. I try to make it back to the couple’s table as much as I can, partly because my job requires it, but more so for my craving of their validation and the hope that their optimism and good fortune would rub off on me somehow. Their dinner seems to come to an end too soon, and before I know it, I'm dropping off the bill. When I return with their card, (and my favorite pen that I only hand out to nice tables) they thank me for listening to their “babblings”, as his wife calls them, and I assure them the pleasure is mine. As I make my way towards a server station to roll silverware, I think to myself about how that may be the first time I’ve ever meant it.

I roll up forks and spoons into perfect napkin triangles, trying to wait an appropriate amount of time before returning for the check, and I wonder about my own parent’s anniversary coming up, and how they will celebrate. I made a mental note to convince my manager to give me a coupon or a giftcard in exchange for working a double again tomorrow. While they couldn’t drop 100$ on a bottle of wine, I’m sure my parents, as youthful in spirit and in love as the couple I met, would manage to have a nice evening. I wonder if I could say their appetizer was cold and have my manager comp it.

When I make my way back to the table, they’ve disappeared with their plates stacked neatly as if a busboy had been by (and knowing Caleb’s tendency to disappear for smoke breaks, that was unlikely). I worried that the quick exit was due to the usual disappointing tip. I open the check presenter and see the tip line crossed out before I’m being called back over by Madame Brooch and her unfaltering snapping.

The rest of my shift was spent bitterly mumbling about being stiffed on a 198$ tab. Low tips never fail to humble me, or more so remind me exactly where I stand with upper class couples, no matter how polite or different they seem. In five years maybe they’ll come back, and I’ll still be here, assuring “my pleasure” through gritted teeth and burning myself on their dinner to barely make rent.

At the end of the night, I have to cash out. I go through all my disappointing tips from Daddy’s money college kids who send me through hoops for fun, the crumbs of change from local professors on tenure, who are as pretentious about their wine as they are their opinions on classical art, and finally I pull out the check presenter from my favorite couple who proved exactly how stupid I was to believe this shift would be different.

Somehow, I didn’t notice the slip peeking out from behind the receipt. I thought maybe I would unfold an apology note, or some explanation for not tipping. Instead, I found a check with tiny yellow flowers on it, made out to my name for 20,000 dollars. I had almost convinced myself that the beautiful cursive, the kind of elegant writing my mother used in Christmas cards, was some horrible, heart-wrenching joke, until I read further. The memo line simply said, “To start changing your life with”. It seemed too relevant to be a prank, but there’s no possible way I was tipped 20,000 dollars. I couldn’t be. I had no idea what to do, as I couldn’t very well scream that I was just given rent for nearly two and a half years with money left over for a few textbooks. I hardly believed it myself.

I try to stifle my reaction until I reach my “Gas for Clunkers” Chrysler, and after three failed attempts to start, I give up and start towards my place on foot. I must look insane as I trek through the overcrowded ‘Fort’ of the college town, the cheapest and sequentially, the worst neighborhood surrounding my university, but I do not care. In my hand, I have something to change my life forever. After five years of unforgiving shifts, trying desperately to balance work weeks with six classes a semester, not being able to afford birthday gifts for my loved ones, I have it all, quite literally, in the palm of my burned, scarred, tired hand.

After a long walk back to my apartment, I unclench my fist around the folded up check, and read over the zeros one more time, assuring myself that I didn’t imagine the whole thing. I toss my nametag on my bedside table, strip myself of anything tying my identity to a server, and sit on my twin bed. I opened up my tiny, black notebook, barely holding itself together at the spine, that I bought myself at fifteen to celebrate my first job, and used to record orders, to-do lists, and all my tips. I write down 20,055 dollars and allow myself to cry my heart out and, for the first time in a while, I’m not crying over spilt milk.

heroes and villains
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About the Creator

Jahnney Cantrell

Hello! My name is pronounced like 'Johnny' and I am a writer. This year I'm trying to write more and worry less, so I'll be posting here and keeping a positive attitude! Thanks for reading my writing!

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