Lower Strata
written by: Andrew Careaga
@andrewcareaga
I’ll be the first to admit what I did was wrong. There was no call for it. But the guy brought it on himself. I wasn’t supposed to hear his comment, but I have a pretty good sense of hearing, especially when business is slow.
Now I’ve overheard worse comments in this restaurant, and from men more arrogant than he. I’ve heard fag, queer, fairy, queen – the usual slurs, all uttered in hushed, derisive whispers not intended for my ears. Usually, I can keep my composure. But tonight it pushed me over the edge. And now Oswald, the manager, is on my case, more pissed than when he first saw the guy huddled under the table, gripping the center table post like a horny dog at a fire hydrant, and his girlfriend crying and leaning down from her chair, pleading with him and trying without success to pull the hem of her tight minidress over the tops of her thighs.
Well, what could I expect. It was a Sunday night. Weird things always seem to happen on Sunday nights at this place. That’s why I’d rather not work them.
This middle-aged guy walks in, a dead ringer for Rush Limbaugh. He’s tall and portly, in a blue blazer and khakis, tie knotted tightly on his neck, squeezing blood into his fat face so that it looks like a balloon with too much air in it. Black-rimmed bifocals. And incongruously on his arm is this elfin blonde, young enough to be his daughter. She’s poured into a lime sherbet minidress and set up on high heels that give her trouble as she walks. She’s looking bewildered as he leads her to the secluded corner table, where our hostess Mindy, as usual several steps ahead of the customers, like she’s trying to outrun them, the way an older sister tries to outpace a younger sibling, lay their menus.
I greet them, cheery as ever, and ask who’s having drinks before dinner. Without looking up from the menu he orders iced tea for them both.
That’s the first bad sign. Heavy drinkers are usually the best tippers. Tea drinkers are the opposite.
I return with the teas on a tray, thin wheels of lemon straddling the glasses. Rush studies me over his bifocals, then returns to his menu and points to the Kansas City strip. He wants it well done, he says. Another bad sign.
“And the lady will have shrimp scampi,” he adds, and he points it out on the menu for me, as though I might need help understanding.
I nod, feigning agreement, and tell him we don’t guarantee our well-done steaks. Our chef doesn’t like to cook steaks that way, I say. Truth be told, our chef refuses to prepare well-done beef. It’s a desecration, he says. But he never works on Sundays. Bob, who could give a shit less about how customers want their steak, works the grill on Sunday nights. But the-chef-won’t-guarantee-it line is standard fare with haughty cretins. Sometimes it works and they lower their sights to medium well, and when Bob’s on the grill it comes out burnt anyway, so everyone is happy.
Rush isn’t buying my line. He shoots me a sharp look over his glasses, half-annoyed, half-angry, so I shrug, ask “Anything else?” and after a moment of silence, I retrieve their menus, slide them under my left arm, and head toward the swinging doors, gateway to the line.
The line is where we give the cooks our orders. It’s a gleaming, stainless-steel counter beneath heat lamps, and next to it is the wheel and the microphone where Oswald barks out cooking commands when we get too busy to handle it ourselves. Working the wheel, we call it Below the counter are the reach-in coolers stocked with pre-made salads, salad dressings, and bus tubs full of parsley and cherry tomatoes for garnish. The speckled tile floor is dirty with footprints and slick with grease, water, and spilled drinks.
I slap the ticket on the wheel and say, “Burn one, Bob. To a crisp.” I give the wheel a spin. It twirls lopsidedly. “To a cinder,” I say.
“No problem,” Bob says. He removes a steak from a reach-in cooler and pitches it on the grill like he’s playing horseshoes. The meat screams and smokes at the touch of heat.
Bob’s wearing a wide white headband soiled by grill smoke and other kitchen things. On the front of it is the red-and-blue yin-and-yang symbol. It’s like a third eye on Bob’s forehead, red yin, blue yang, each with a heavy black dot, each dot itself an eye within an eye. Two fish fighting, or apostrophes coupling. The old sixty-nine. This is Bob’s emblem, telling us that all is well, that he is at peace with the world.
Sandy’s at the counter, dribbling poppy seed dressing on a salad. “Winners, huh?” she says.
“Typical Sunday,” I say.
She hip-checks through the swinging silver double doors that lead to the dining room. Those doors look like they belong in a diner; they don’t quite fit our motif, which is contemporary eclectic. Abstract wall art thrown about here and there, a few old brass horns and other instruments, photographs of famous and semi-famous patrons – John Grisham, the writer, once ate here, and he left us an autographed photo that is now framed and hanging above the hostess’s station, a sign to others that good and well-known people eat here. It’s right next to the autographed picture of Jack Buck, longtime announcer for the St. Louis Cardinals baseball team. In the photo, Buck wears his trademarked crooked smile and gleaming eyes under a full head of hair, white as a polar bear’s, and his trademark red blazer. More patrons recognize Jack Buck than John Grisham. A mix of other knick-knacks and artwork adorns walls and shelves. They’re meticulously placed to appear random, an inauthentic authenticity, along with the lush ferns, brass railings, walnut walls and tables, and dim, subdued lighting. And of course soft jazz music, very understated.
I peer through the doors’ portal windows, see that Rush has drained his tea, and so hurry a pitcher to the table. “More tea?” I ask. I get another indignant look as I pour. There’s a hostile, awkward air around this couple that tells me they don’t want me there, that I’m interrupting something. Their stares are hot on my back as I leave, and he snickers and says something I can’t help but overhear.
“Lower strata,” is all I hear. That and a snicker. But that is enough. The heat on my back intensifies. I head for the line.
I’m sure he has me pegged as I’m queer and a coke-head. And he’s partially correct. I’m not a coke-head, though. I do deal some coke, but most of my customers prefer acid. More bang for the buck.
He sees a faint blue streak in my hair and a nose ring, and so he categorizes me: lower strata. But what he doesn’t see is this: a master’s degree in sociology, strict Catholic background, political moderate, leaning toward Republican, at least on fiscal issues, pro-life, bilingual (English and Spanish). I also know the subtle differences between a Puligny-Montrachet and a Chassagne-Montrachet, can distinguish between the two blindfolded. I toss a terrific Caesar salad, carve an elegant chateaubriand, and prepare a lovely flaming bananas foster tableside. And I sure as hell know better than to order a well-done steak in an urbane restaurant.
So I’m thinking about this lower strata business, getting steamed, as I pull two dinner salads from the reach-in cooler. Each cold plate holds a mound of iceberg lettuce, nicely torn, one magenta onion ring placed at an angle, like a beret, a cucumber slice, and a bright, waxy-looking cherry tomato. I splash some dressing on them – ranch for the “gentleman,” vinaigrette for his girlfriend. Lower strata! I also pull a vial of purple microdots from my pocket and sprinkle a couple on the ranch dressing. It’s low-grade acid, but this guy doesn’t look like he’s had any in a while, so it ought to give him a pretty good jolt.
I balance the salads with one hand, grab a basket of crackers with the other, and return to my guests. “We’d like some more iced tea,” he says before I have a chance to set the salads before them. Beside his glass lies a pile of now-empty Sweet-n-Low packages, spotted with condensation from the adjacent water glass, which he hasn’t touched. “Certainly. Be right back,” I say.
Back at the line, Bob asks, “How burnt do you want this?” Beads of sweat form beneath that red-and-blue third eye on his forehead.
“Like I said, make it a cinder,” I say.
Bob throws me a grin, shakes his head, and returns to the task.
More customers arrive, and I greet and serve them with my usual elan. Oswald lopes in from the bar, where he’s been trying to flirt with the bored cocktail waitresses. Sundays are worse for them than for any of us; only the hard cases come in on Sundays, and they usually sit at the bar, so no need for the cocktail waitresses’ services. Oswald approaches the wheel, spins it to signal he is now in charge of the line, and says, “OK, let’s see what we’ve got here.”
Rush turns toward the silver double doors, as though he expects me to speed out with the pitcher of tea any moment. Finally, I meet his expectations.
“Oh, I almost forgot you all wanted more tea,” I say. I pour, then set the pitcher on the corner of their table and sweep Rush’s wasted Sweet-n-Lows into the empty salad plates. They ate everything, even the cherry tomatoes. I don’t see any evidence of microdot purple on Rush’s plate.
“I’ll be back with your dinner in a few minutes,” I tell them, and I’m off to the line. Oswald shouts orders in the sing-song deejay’s cadence that comes over him when we get busy.
“Here ‘tis,” Bob says, and he sets the two dishes on the metal counter. The steak looks better than I thought it would, less shriveled – almost salvageable. The scampi looks delectable, steaming in its buttery sauce in a boat-shaped dish.
“How about some butter on this,” I say, tapping the plate the steak is on.
“Coming up,” Bob says, and with one finger he pushes a blob of garlic butter from the edge of a cutting knife and onto the steak.
“How’re those lobsters coming, Bob?” Oswald asks. He’s pacing in front of the line now, clapping his hands like a football coach on the sidelines, trying to motivate his team. “Let’s go,” he says, “It’s picking up out there. Let’s go.”
But Bob and the rest of the team stick to their regular pace. It’s a Sunday night, and the busiest Sunday night is equal to a normal Tuesday. There’s no need to hurry, despite Oswald’s urgings.
There’s a new, nervous look on Rush’s face as I present the dishes. His mouth quivers, tight-lipped, like he can’t decide whether to smile or frown. His eyes, even behind bifocals, have a strange feral cast to them. He looks disoriented, like Latka, that Andy Kaufman character on “Taxi.”
“Everything okay?” I ask. He cackles and nods, says “Yeah, fine,” but his girlfriend doesn’t look so sure.
“I’ll be back with more iced tea,” I say. “Need anything else right now?”
Well of course he wants A-1 for his steak.
I return with the steak sauce and tea, and just as he sticks a piece of that charred meat into his mouth, I inquire as to the quality of their meals. The girl smiles sheepishly and nods, then casts her glance to the scampi still simmering in the boat-shaped dish.
I turn to Rush. “Sir, is your steak cooked to suit you?”
He nods, mouth full, grinding on the meat, which is stuck in one cheek like a clump of tobacco. “Excellent,” he says. Then he laughs and nearly spits the wad of meat at his date across the table. “Whoops,” he says.
“Very good! I’ll be back to check on you later.”
A minute later I return, and the guy is reared back in his chair, trying to balance on its hind legs, like a high school kid in the back row of a boring class. He’s chortling like a high schooler too. Other diners now turn toward him with furrowed brows. His girlfriend pales and folds and unfolds her napkin in her lap.
“Everything still okay?” I ask.
I look at him. He’s short of breath but still laughing. His face practically glows.
The girl is on the verge of tears.
He points at me and says, “You know what you look like?” He cackles, mouth twitching madly.
His date looks worried. “Barry,” she says. “Barry, don’t.”
“You look like – like a panda bear!”
“Oh, really,” I say, and move my hands around in front of his face, like a magician proving nothing’s up my sleeve. By now I’m sure he’s seeing big-time trails and shadows, courtesy of the microdot.
“And you,” he says, nodding toward his girlfriend, “look like a big bird. Like a big toucan!”
The girl’s elfin face cringes as Rush lets out more cackles of laughter.
“Like Toucan Sam!” he says.
At this his date reddens, furrows her brow. “Barry!” she says. “What’s the matter with you?”
“Toucan Sam,” he says, trying out a Humphrey Bogart imitation. “Toucan Sam.”
His girlfriend throws her napkin beside her plate and seethes.
“Everybody in this place looks like an animal, come to think of it,” he says. He smiles, then frowns, still undecided on which facial expression best suits the occasion.
He turns to me and says, “What the hell kind of place you running here, anyway? A zoo? It’s a jungle in here!”
He tries to laugh at his little pun, then stifles it as his mouth twitches wildly at the corners. “Get it? It’s a jungle in here. Not out there – in here! Ha!”
“Okay,” I say, and head to the kitchen.
Back at the line, Oswald has quit his deejay show. I’m leaning against a counter, taking a breather, the heat of the lamps on my neck. Oswald peers out the ocean liner windows, then he turns to me and says, “What’s with the guy at your two-top?”
“Strange one, isn’t he,” I say.
“He’s under the table.”
“He’s what?”
We both enter the dining room to see the blonde bent over in her chair, wringing her napkin and speaking in loud whispers to her date. The guy is hugging the center post of the table. He’s chuckling like a gerbil, drawing stares and hushed tones from other customers.
Oswald glares at me. “Get them the fuck out of here.”
“Oh, shit, Oswald,” I say. “I don’t know what’s going on with him, man. Honest, I don’t.”
“Yeah, right,” he says. “Just get them out of here.”
“Will do,” I say, and I head to their secluded table.
I guess the microdot was stronger than I thought. Maybe I should hike the price.
“Excuse me, folks,” I say, clearing their plates from the table. His steak lies brown and cold, barely eaten. Her uneaten shrimp float, tails up, in globs of congealed butter.
“Is something the matter? Perhaps I could seat you at another table.”
“What? No dessert?” asks the tremorous voice from below the table.
I nod toward his general locale and ask the girl, “Is he okay?”
She’s sobbing now, using her napkin to wipe tears from her mascara-streaked cheek. “No, he’s not. I don’t know what’s the matter with him.”
“Does he have any food allergies that you know of?”
“No, I don’t think so,” she says, her cheek streaked with tears. She bends down, legs akimbo, the vee of her underwear exposed. “Barry, you’re not allergic to anything, are you?”
Rush grunts, looks up with eyes furtive and feral.
The hot, enraged eyes of my other customers are upon us. “Listen,” I say to her. My voice is low, confidential, a near-whisper. “I’ve got other tables to tend to. Why don’t you just get him out of here and I’ll take care of your bill.”
She nods nervously and squats to the floor. “Come on, Barry,” she says, and she starts to pry him loose.
I speedwalk past other tables to the lobby, where Oswald waits. “They’re leaving,” I tell him. “I told them I’d buy their dinner. Can you help me out?”
“Not a chance,” he says.
“Come on,” I say. “This isn’t my fault.”
He shakes his head. “It’s all on you, hombre.”
I pass the couple on my way back to the dining room. She’s leading him away like a casualty of war. His face is clammy, hair disheveled, tie askew. But the bifocals rest firmly on the bridge of his nose.
“Sorry about this evening,” I tell them. I wave a big clown wave in front of Rush’s face. Wild-eyed, he stares at my hand motions.
“Happy trails,” I say grinning.
He turns and watches me as his date, wobbly in her high heels, leads him out the front door.
Lower strata, indeed.
Andrew Careaga is a former public relations and marketing executive who lives and writes from his home in Rolla, Missouri, USA. He is the author of three nonfiction books exploring the intersection of technology and spirituality. His fiction and poetry have appeared in Fan, Southwinds, Paragraph Planet, Red String, and Bulb Culture Collective. He has creative non-fiction scheduled for publication in July 2024 in Club Plum Literary Journal.
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Lower Strata
Lower Strata
written by: Andrew Careaga
@andrewcareaga
I’ll be the first to admit what I did was wrong. There was no call for it. But the guy brought it on himself. I wasn’t supposed to hear his comment, but I have a pretty good sense of hearing, especially when business is slow.
Now I’ve overheard worse comments in this restaurant, and from men more arrogant than he. I’ve heard fag, queer, fairy, queen – the usual slurs, all uttered in hushed, derisive whispers not intended for my ears. Usually, I can keep my composure. But tonight it pushed me over the edge. And now Oswald, the manager, is on my case, more pissed than when he first saw the guy huddled under the table, gripping the center table post like a horny dog at a fire hydrant, and his girlfriend crying and leaning down from her chair, pleading with him and trying without success to pull the hem of her tight minidress over the tops of her thighs.
Well, what could I expect. It was a Sunday night. Weird things always seem to happen on Sunday nights at this place. That’s why I’d rather not work them.
This middle-aged guy walks in, a dead ringer for Rush Limbaugh. He’s tall and portly, in a blue blazer and khakis, tie knotted tightly on his neck, squeezing blood into his fat face so that it looks like a balloon with too much air in it. Black-rimmed bifocals. And incongruously on his arm is this elfin blonde, young enough to be his daughter. She’s poured into a lime sherbet minidress and set up on high heels that give her trouble as she walks. She’s looking bewildered as he leads her to the secluded corner table, where our hostess Mindy, as usual several steps ahead of the customers, like she’s trying to outrun them, the way an older sister tries to outpace a younger sibling, lay their menus.
I greet them, cheery as ever, and ask who’s having drinks before dinner. Without looking up from the menu he orders iced tea for them both.
That’s the first bad sign. Heavy drinkers are usually the best tippers. Tea drinkers are the opposite.
I return with the teas on a tray, thin wheels of lemon straddling the glasses. Rush studies me over his bifocals, then returns to his menu and points to the Kansas City strip. He wants it well done, he says. Another bad sign.
“And the lady will have shrimp scampi,” he adds, and he points it out on the menu for me, as though I might need help understanding.
I nod, feigning agreement, and tell him we don’t guarantee our well-done steaks. Our chef doesn’t like to cook steaks that way, I say. Truth be told, our chef refuses to prepare well-done beef. It’s a desecration, he says. But he never works on Sundays. Bob, who could give a shit less about how customers want their steak, works the grill on Sunday nights. But the-chef-won’t-guarantee-it line is standard fare with haughty cretins. Sometimes it works and they lower their sights to medium well, and when Bob’s on the grill it comes out burnt anyway, so everyone is happy.
Rush isn’t buying my line. He shoots me a sharp look over his glasses, half-annoyed, half-angry, so I shrug, ask “Anything else?” and after a moment of silence, I retrieve their menus, slide them under my left arm, and head toward the swinging doors, gateway to the line.
The line is where we give the cooks our orders. It’s a gleaming, stainless-steel counter beneath heat lamps, and next to it is the wheel and the microphone where Oswald barks out cooking commands when we get too busy to handle it ourselves. Working the wheel, we call it Below the counter are the reach-in coolers stocked with pre-made salads, salad dressings, and bus tubs full of parsley and cherry tomatoes for garnish. The speckled tile floor is dirty with footprints and slick with grease, water, and spilled drinks.
I slap the ticket on the wheel and say, “Burn one, Bob. To a crisp.” I give the wheel a spin. It twirls lopsidedly. “To a cinder,” I say.
“No problem,” Bob says. He removes a steak from a reach-in cooler and pitches it on the grill like he’s playing horseshoes. The meat screams and smokes at the touch of heat.
Bob’s wearing a wide white headband soiled by grill smoke and other kitchen things. On the front of it is the red-and-blue yin-and-yang symbol. It’s like a third eye on Bob’s forehead, red yin, blue yang, each with a heavy black dot, each dot itself an eye within an eye. Two fish fighting, or apostrophes coupling. The old sixty-nine. This is Bob’s emblem, telling us that all is well, that he is at peace with the world.
Sandy’s at the counter, dribbling poppy seed dressing on a salad. “Winners, huh?” she says.
“Typical Sunday,” I say.
She hip-checks through the swinging silver double doors that lead to the dining room. Those doors look like they belong in a diner; they don’t quite fit our motif, which is contemporary eclectic. Abstract wall art thrown about here and there, a few old brass horns and other instruments, photographs of famous and semi-famous patrons – John Grisham, the writer, once ate here, and he left us an autographed photo that is now framed and hanging above the hostess’s station, a sign to others that good and well-known people eat here. It’s right next to the autographed picture of Jack Buck, longtime announcer for the St. Louis Cardinals baseball team. In the photo, Buck wears his trademarked crooked smile and gleaming eyes under a full head of hair, white as a polar bear’s, and his trademark red blazer. More patrons recognize Jack Buck than John Grisham. A mix of other knick-knacks and artwork adorns walls and shelves. They’re meticulously placed to appear random, an inauthentic authenticity, along with the lush ferns, brass railings, walnut walls and tables, and dim, subdued lighting. And of course soft jazz music, very understated.
I peer through the doors’ portal windows, see that Rush has drained his tea, and so hurry a pitcher to the table. “More tea?” I ask. I get another indignant look as I pour. There’s a hostile, awkward air around this couple that tells me they don’t want me there, that I’m interrupting something. Their stares are hot on my back as I leave, and he snickers and says something I can’t help but overhear.
“Lower strata,” is all I hear. That and a snicker. But that is enough. The heat on my back intensifies. I head for the line.
I’m sure he has me pegged as I’m queer and a coke-head. And he’s partially correct. I’m not a coke-head, though. I do deal some coke, but most of my customers prefer acid. More bang for the buck.
He sees a faint blue streak in my hair and a nose ring, and so he categorizes me: lower strata. But what he doesn’t see is this: a master’s degree in sociology, strict Catholic background, political moderate, leaning toward Republican, at least on fiscal issues, pro-life, bilingual (English and Spanish). I also know the subtle differences between a Puligny-Montrachet and a Chassagne-Montrachet, can distinguish between the two blindfolded. I toss a terrific Caesar salad, carve an elegant chateaubriand, and prepare a lovely flaming bananas foster tableside. And I sure as hell know better than to order a well-done steak in an urbane restaurant.
So I’m thinking about this lower strata business, getting steamed, as I pull two dinner salads from the reach-in cooler. Each cold plate holds a mound of iceberg lettuce, nicely torn, one magenta onion ring placed at an angle, like a beret, a cucumber slice, and a bright, waxy-looking cherry tomato. I splash some dressing on them – ranch for the “gentleman,” vinaigrette for his girlfriend. Lower strata! I also pull a vial of purple microdots from my pocket and sprinkle a couple on the ranch dressing. It’s low-grade acid, but this guy doesn’t look like he’s had any in a while, so it ought to give him a pretty good jolt.
I balance the salads with one hand, grab a basket of crackers with the other, and return to my guests. “We’d like some more iced tea,” he says before I have a chance to set the salads before them. Beside his glass lies a pile of now-empty Sweet-n-Low packages, spotted with condensation from the adjacent water glass, which he hasn’t touched. “Certainly. Be right back,” I say.
Back at the line, Bob asks, “How burnt do you want this?” Beads of sweat form beneath that red-and-blue third eye on his forehead.
“Like I said, make it a cinder,” I say.
Bob throws me a grin, shakes his head, and returns to the task.
More customers arrive, and I greet and serve them with my usual elan. Oswald lopes in from the bar, where he’s been trying to flirt with the bored cocktail waitresses. Sundays are worse for them than for any of us; only the hard cases come in on Sundays, and they usually sit at the bar, so no need for the cocktail waitresses’ services. Oswald approaches the wheel, spins it to signal he is now in charge of the line, and says, “OK, let’s see what we’ve got here.”
Rush turns toward the silver double doors, as though he expects me to speed out with the pitcher of tea any moment. Finally, I meet his expectations.
“Oh, I almost forgot you all wanted more tea,” I say. I pour, then set the pitcher on the corner of their table and sweep Rush’s wasted Sweet-n-Lows into the empty salad plates. They ate everything, even the cherry tomatoes. I don’t see any evidence of microdot purple on Rush’s plate.
“I’ll be back with your dinner in a few minutes,” I tell them, and I’m off to the line. Oswald shouts orders in the sing-song deejay’s cadence that comes over him when we get busy.
“Here ‘tis,” Bob says, and he sets the two dishes on the metal counter. The steak looks better than I thought it would, less shriveled – almost salvageable. The scampi looks delectable, steaming in its buttery sauce in a boat-shaped dish.
“How about some butter on this,” I say, tapping the plate the steak is on.
“Coming up,” Bob says, and with one finger he pushes a blob of garlic butter from the edge of a cutting knife and onto the steak.
“How’re those lobsters coming, Bob?” Oswald asks. He’s pacing in front of the line now, clapping his hands like a football coach on the sidelines, trying to motivate his team. “Let’s go,” he says, “It’s picking up out there. Let’s go.”
But Bob and the rest of the team stick to their regular pace. It’s a Sunday night, and the busiest Sunday night is equal to a normal Tuesday. There’s no need to hurry, despite Oswald’s urgings.
There’s a new, nervous look on Rush’s face as I present the dishes. His mouth quivers, tight-lipped, like he can’t decide whether to smile or frown. His eyes, even behind bifocals, have a strange feral cast to them. He looks disoriented, like Latka, that Andy Kaufman character on “Taxi.”
“Everything okay?” I ask. He cackles and nods, says “Yeah, fine,” but his girlfriend doesn’t look so sure.
“I’ll be back with more iced tea,” I say. “Need anything else right now?”
Well of course he wants A-1 for his steak.
I return with the steak sauce and tea, and just as he sticks a piece of that charred meat into his mouth, I inquire as to the quality of their meals. The girl smiles sheepishly and nods, then casts her glance to the scampi still simmering in the boat-shaped dish.
I turn to Rush. “Sir, is your steak cooked to suit you?”
He nods, mouth full, grinding on the meat, which is stuck in one cheek like a clump of tobacco. “Excellent,” he says. Then he laughs and nearly spits the wad of meat at his date across the table. “Whoops,” he says.
“Very good! I’ll be back to check on you later.”
A minute later I return, and the guy is reared back in his chair, trying to balance on its hind legs, like a high school kid in the back row of a boring class. He’s chortling like a high schooler too. Other diners now turn toward him with furrowed brows. His girlfriend pales and folds and unfolds her napkin in her lap.
“Everything still okay?” I ask.
I look at him. He’s short of breath but still laughing. His face practically glows.
The girl is on the verge of tears.
He points at me and says, “You know what you look like?” He cackles, mouth twitching madly.
His date looks worried. “Barry,” she says. “Barry, don’t.”
“You look like – like a panda bear!”
“Oh, really,” I say, and move my hands around in front of his face, like a magician proving nothing’s up my sleeve. By now I’m sure he’s seeing big-time trails and shadows, courtesy of the microdot.
“And you,” he says, nodding toward his girlfriend, “look like a big bird. Like a big toucan!”
The girl’s elfin face cringes as Rush lets out more cackles of laughter.
“Like Toucan Sam!” he says.
At this his date reddens, furrows her brow. “Barry!” she says. “What’s the matter with you?”
“Toucan Sam,” he says, trying out a Humphrey Bogart imitation. “Toucan Sam.”
His girlfriend throws her napkin beside her plate and seethes.
“Everybody in this place looks like an animal, come to think of it,” he says. He smiles, then frowns, still undecided on which facial expression best suits the occasion.
He turns to me and says, “What the hell kind of place you running here, anyway? A zoo? It’s a jungle in here!”
He tries to laugh at his little pun, then stifles it as his mouth twitches wildly at the corners. “Get it? It’s a jungle in here. Not out there – in here! Ha!”
“Okay,” I say, and head to the kitchen.
Back at the line, Oswald has quit his deejay show. I’m leaning against a counter, taking a breather, the heat of the lamps on my neck. Oswald peers out the ocean liner windows, then he turns to me and says, “What’s with the guy at your two-top?”
“Strange one, isn’t he,” I say.
“He’s under the table.”
“He’s what?”
We both enter the dining room to see the blonde bent over in her chair, wringing her napkin and speaking in loud whispers to her date. The guy is hugging the center post of the table. He’s chuckling like a gerbil, drawing stares and hushed tones from other customers.
Oswald glares at me. “Get them the fuck out of here.”
“Oh, shit, Oswald,” I say. “I don’t know what’s going on with him, man. Honest, I don’t.”
“Yeah, right,” he says. “Just get them out of here.”
“Will do,” I say, and I head to their secluded table.
I guess the microdot was stronger than I thought. Maybe I should hike the price.
“Excuse me, folks,” I say, clearing their plates from the table. His steak lies brown and cold, barely eaten. Her uneaten shrimp float, tails up, in globs of congealed butter.
“Is something the matter? Perhaps I could seat you at another table.”
“What? No dessert?” asks the tremorous voice from below the table.
I nod toward his general locale and ask the girl, “Is he okay?”
She’s sobbing now, using her napkin to wipe tears from her mascara-streaked cheek. “No, he’s not. I don’t know what’s the matter with him.”
“Does he have any food allergies that you know of?”
“No, I don’t think so,” she says, her cheek streaked with tears. She bends down, legs akimbo, the vee of her underwear exposed. “Barry, you’re not allergic to anything, are you?”
Rush grunts, looks up with eyes furtive and feral.
The hot, enraged eyes of my other customers are upon us. “Listen,” I say to her. My voice is low, confidential, a near-whisper. “I’ve got other tables to tend to. Why don’t you just get him out of here and I’ll take care of your bill.”
She nods nervously and squats to the floor. “Come on, Barry,” she says, and she starts to pry him loose.
I speedwalk past other tables to the lobby, where Oswald waits. “They’re leaving,” I tell him. “I told them I’d buy their dinner. Can you help me out?”
“Not a chance,” he says.
“Come on,” I say. “This isn’t my fault.”
He shakes his head. “It’s all on you, hombre.”
I pass the couple on my way back to the dining room. She’s leading him away like a casualty of war. His face is clammy, hair disheveled, tie askew. But the bifocals rest firmly on the bridge of his nose.
“Sorry about this evening,” I tell them. I wave a big clown wave in front of Rush’s face. Wild-eyed, he stares at my hand motions.
“Happy trails,” I say grinning.
He turns and watches me as his date, wobbly in her high heels, leads him out the front door.
Lower strata, indeed.