Fifteen

Leviticus 11:21

1991

“Do you like cupcakes?” Alan asked Patrick, as the two stood on the dining room stairs, waiting for the setting sun to bring Checker’s Saturday night rush.  Patrick raised an eyebrow –

“Am I talking to Alan, or am I talking to the Phantom?”

The Phantom smiled, passing him a small plastic container that once housed fifty, multi-colored cupcake wrappers, but now contained – once Patrick opened its lid – twelve pair of bright red eyes, twenty-four moving antennas and wings, and seventy-two tiny brown legs that wanted up and out.  Patrick gasped –

“Are these…cicadas?”  

“Straight from Guinevere’s back yard,” Alan told him, grinning.  “We met at her folks, and it took about fifteen minutes to gather close to thirty.  I’ve got a container, myself” – he showed Patrick his own cup of glowing red eyes – “Gwen’s got cicadas, and now you have cicadas.  I think you know what to do.”

“Actually, I don’t,” Patrick laughed, cringing.  The large, golden-winged arthropods were desperate to escape confinement, and one of them crawled onto his hand – which he quickly flicked back into the container.  Its forelegs pinched his skin.  He was both disgusted and laughing when he spoke –

“What…do you want me to do…with this?”

“Disbursement,” Alan said proudly.  “Let’s disperse the cicadas throughout the dining room plants, and then see what happens.”

“Alan, I can’t” –

“Yes, you can!” Alan insisted.  “It’s easy.  Just pop the lid, stick your fingers into the container, and they crawl right up, onto your arm.  Then you let them loose.  All you need to do is brush against the plants like this.” 

As Patrick watched in nervous horror, Alan opened his own container and allowed three bugs to scurry up his forearm.  The Phantom then nonchalantly strolled through the restaurant’s upper thirties, straightening the plants above customer tables, grinning when he returned. 

Guinevere was doing the same in the lower sixties, adjusting the hanging philodendrons above vacant tables – while servers checked their own sections before the rush.  Patrick watched her help Ty push tables together for a twelve-top reservation, at five; Gwen was careful to move the leafy plants out of the way, so Ty’s party could best enjoy their meal, and its aftermath.

“Twenty down,” Guinevere said, as she joined the two on the stairs, her shirt a little snug in the middle.  She looked at Patrick’s white face, and then to Alan’s red one –

“Is my Schnookums’ friend getting cold pincers?”

“He’s grossed out,” Alan admitted, snatching Patrick’s container of insects.  “If you want a job done right,” Alan told them, heading for the lower forties.  The two watched him scatter critters throughout the remainder of the dining room, returning with an empty cupcake-container – with a stray trochanter & veined wing left behind.  He gave it to Mia as she passed.

“This should be a fun shift,” Alan said.

Sharon – in puce – passed the three with a frown, and gathered Alan, Patrick, Guinevere, Jackie, Marty, Rob Vain, Derek, Ty, Cheryl Bennish, Laurie, the miscellaneous Bradley Boys, and all other servers into the kitchen for a pre-shift alley-rally.  An unseen camera followed everyone around the corner –

But then it’s point-of-view changed completely, now seen through the eyes of the kitchen staff.

*  *  *  *  *

The long, hot, stainless-steel passover window stretched from left to right, beneath the orange glow of heat lamps.  The window was clear for the most part, but stacks of white plates, platters, saucers, and serving bowls looked down from a second, upper passover – where dishes were kept warm for hot food. 

Big Tim stood in front of all of this, checking temps on sauces, gravies, and a vat of garlic mashed potatoes.  He marked items off one at a time on a clipboard, then initialed on the line marked “Kitchen Manager” – a position Sharon had offered him months ago, but he had only just accepted.

“Are you gentlemen ready for the evening?” Tim asked eloquently, looking down the cook’s line, at his motley crew.  Zevon raised his “Sprite” from the fry station, then dropped a bin of fresh-cut French fries into a nearby ice bath.  Tim noticed that Zevon’s hands were shaking slightly, which likely meant he was dehydrated – He’ll be fine in ten minutes.

At the sauté station to the left of the fryers, Duncan, the sauté-guy, a puffy Irishman with red hair, prison tattoos, and a cigarette behind his ear, gave Tim a nod before opening the refrigerated drawers below the stove – where he checked his stock of uncooked chicken, most cut into pieces for stir fry’s. 

Cochise stood next to Duncan, just behind Big Tim’s shoulder.  Cochise was a solid black man with darker skin than Tim, dressed all in white, and with a pack of Kools rolled in his sleeve.  His head was shaved, his eyes were shiny, and he looked like he could kick the shit out of an elephant – assuming, of course, that elephant was only packing a knife. Cochise was the grill-guy, the most important station on the line.  He rubbed his spatulas together like a swordsman sharpening a blade, throwing Tim a nod – Yes SIR.  

“And how about you, Roger?” Tim asked carefully, to his right. 

At the far end of the cook’s line opposite the fry station, a tall, skeletal, cellophane-colored man stood silently at the broiler.  The orange flames below reflected in his aviator-style glasses, and “Roger” was short for “Mr. Rogers,” as the cook resembled the popular kid’s show host, albeit in a coffin – ready for a jump scare. 

Roger had an unsettling talent for grilling raw meat over open fire, and his steaks & ribs were always cooked right the first time, with flesh that literally fell off the bone, no matter how thick the sinews.  Roger scared the shit out of everyone on the staff, and even Big Tim kept a kitchen knife close whenever the two worked in close proximity. 

“I’m ready,” Roger whispered, never looking up from his fire.

Tim shuddered in the expo window, as Men at Work sang Down Under from above.

*  *  *  *  *

“LISTEN UP, PEOPLE…THIS IS GOING TO BE SHORT AND SWEET!”

The cooks looked up in unison as the passover window filled with hair and faces, while the back of Sharon’s head pushed Bill aside.

“I don’t know WHO…the FUCK…is pulling all these pranks, but it STOPS…RIGHT …NOW!” Sharon’s head shouted.  “Whoever is doing this, you’re fucking with my customers – and if I catch you, I’ll fire you on the spot and kick you to the curb, myself!  DO I make myself CLEAR?”

“But, it’s the Phantom, Sharon!” Jackie’s head protested.  “The restaurant has a ghost!”

“THERE ARE NO SUCH THINGS AS GHOSTS!” Sharon screamed, slamming her fist onto a nearby tray and jack.  Her action sent several empty oval trays spilling to the floor.  “And I don’t want to hear the word Phantom from any of you people!  Do I make myself clear on THAT!?”

Tim watched the servers’ heads nod together, in silence.

“We’re also getting sloppy on our sidework,” Sharon’s head went on.  “So, as of tonight, all sidework will be checked – and double-checked – by a manager.  Does everyone understand that?”

Nods.

“And also starting tonight, in addition to sidework, every server is to roll a Lexan of silverware – seventy-five rolls apiece.  You will NOT be allowed to leave until you show me or another manager that you have rolled seventy-five rolls of silverware!”

Rob’s head did mental math.  “But Sharon, that’s one-thousand fifty rolls – not counting what’s being used on the tables, and what might be in the dishwasher.  Do we even have enough silverware in the building for a thousand rolls?”

Sharon’s hair shot towards Rob’s.  “Did I STUTTER?”

“No, Ma’am.”

“We just sat eight tables!” Rodney’s head popped into the window. “And the lobby’s full.  Cheryl – I need you up front!”  Tim watched Rodney’s head disappear through the saloon doors with Cheryl’s.

“WALKING IN…TWO FRIES, ONE KID TENDER!” Natalie shouted from the server’s alley corner.  “Sharon – we need some help out here!”

Sharon’s eyes narrowed.  “Have a good shift,” her head hissed at everyone.

The servers’ heads scattered.

“Order in the bowl!” Bill’s head called to Tim, picking up trays and taking its place at expo.  Fry baskets hit the grease with fire and sizzle –

The Saturday rush had begun.

*  *  *  *  *

“Out where the river broke, the bloodwood and the desert oak…holden wrecks and boiling diesels, steam in forty-five degrees…”

Midnight Oil blasted from above while the cook’s line boiled with smoke, fire, steam, and hot, crackling meat.  Flames rose in unison from both Zevon at the fry station and Roger at the broiler, while Cochise – sweat rolling off his face – threw six plated burgers into the window, like a dealer throwing cards.  A wet rag now rolled around his neck, Big Tim stood calmly in the epicenter, separating the completed orders as he’d done for years at Denny’s.  The window before him was filled with the heads of shouting servers, and the fast-moving hands of Bill in the expo window –

“I need food runners!”

“Got it!” Patrick’s head said, lifting a steaming tray into the air.  The tray was replaced with an empty one, and Bill’s hands started pulling the next order from the window.

“Orders in the bowl!”

“COMING IN,” Big Tim called to his staff, “THREE COW PATTIES, ONE SLAB, ONE CFS!”  He turned to Duncan while adding the new tickets to the line.  “On deck – two chick stir-fry’s, one jizz on the side!”

“Got it!” the sauté cook called back.

“What’s the ETA on forty-two?” Laurie’s head asked Tim.

“Please talk to the Expo!” Bill’s head reminded her, garnishing a tray.  He looked at Tim.  “Forty-two?”

“On deck, ready in two,” Tim told him.

“WALKING IN…THREE KID TENDERS, ONE SHROOM!” a server yelled.

Whoosh! – the fry station went orange.

            “Cochise, I need two Deluxe for table five as soon as you” – the shiny black cook threw the order in the window, before Big Tim could finish his sentence.

“Two stir fry’s,” Duncan called out, adding more items to the passover. Tim pushed them aside, tapping the ticket to a different order so Bill could tray that one first.  “This one’s on twenty-two, Bill.”

“Got it,” Bill said from his finished tray, as Alan hoisted it upwards.  Replacing the tray, Bill trayed the overdue order.  Laurie’s head appeared at his side.  She saw her food was up in the window.  She reached for it –

“Run this one, Laurie.”

“But that’s my order!”  She pointed at the new burgers.

“This one’s on twenty-two,” Bill told her.  “It needs to go out now, and then these two” – he pointed to two additional orders, waiting in the heat lamps – “go out next.  I’ll tray yours after that.”

“Order in the bowl!” Guinevere’s head yelled.

“Can you run this, Gwen?” Bill asked.

“Sure.”  She lifted the tray, and he replaced it with an empty one.  Laurie’s head looked pissed.

“What?” Bill asked.

“Just let me run my own damn food, Bill.”

“Laurie, you’re a trainer, you know the rules.  Run this ticket, and I’ll have the next server – JESUS!”

Bill jumped backward, dropping a ladle full of ranch in the process.

“WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT?” someone yelled from the Coke machine.

Big Tim looked up as a large black insect flew through the server’s alley like a crop duster, bumping against the fluorescent lights, then flying into the bar.  The cooks heard customers scream.  The saloon doors burst open, and Cheryl’s head shouted, “There’s a flying roach in the bar!”

“You sure it wasn’t a wasp?” Derek’s head asked, coming into the alley behind her.  “It sounds like a wasp.  And it’s way too big to be a roach.”  He grinned at the cooks.  “That’s fuckin’ funny!”

“What’s going on?” Cochise asked Tim, adding a grilled halibut to the window.  Big Tim looked down the line.  All of the cooks had heard the commotion.

“Calm down, gentlemen.  It’s just a wasp that came through the front doors.”

“THERE’S ANOTHER ONE!” Cheryl’s head yelled.  Big Tim watched her shield her face with an empty beverage tray, as a second flying bug catapulted into the kitchen, hitting the wall with a thump.  It fell behind the soup tureen.  

“There’s more in the dining room!” Rob Vain shouted from the corner.  “I saw like…three.  And one landed in a customer’s food!”

“It’s the Phantom!” Jackie yelled from the coffee machine.

“Fuck the Phantom,” Cheryl Bennish screamed.  “It’s a goddamn plague!”

“The roach is dead!” Marty called from the bar.  “It got caught in one of the ceiling fans!”

“INCOMING!” Zevon shouted from the fry station, as an insect entered the cook’s line, buzzing like a remote-control plane.  The smoky air filled with waving spatulas and tongs, as Zevon, Duncan, and Cochise all attempted to knock the winged beast from the sky.  Big Tim ducked when the bug clipped his ear, then ricocheted – with a sizzle – onto the broiler, next to a slab of ribs.  A bone-chilling grin washed over Roger’s face, as he used tongs to push the insect through the grate into the fire, where he watched it burn –

The horsemen are coming with locusts!

“SHARON!” Guinevere cried, laughing so hard she could barely speak.  Tim watched her stagger into the kitchen, an empty tray and jack under her arm.  Her cheeks were crimson.  She fell against the Bobcat while Patrick came up behind, to comfort her.  Gwen’s words could be heard in short gasps –

“I was serving…table twelve…and a roach…flew down a customer’s cleavage!  She wants…to talk to Sharon…NOW!”

“Hey, boss?” Cochise tapped Tim’s shoulder, nodding towards the full window of food.

“Not now,” Big Tim said, straining to see what was happening.  More bugs had entered the kitchen.  From behind the cook’s line, they looked as big as birds.

Sharon burst through the saloon doors.  She pushed Bill aside and slammed an empty plate onto the window.  Tim watched her fist appear, dropping a dead cicada onto the white circle.  She had crushed it in rage, and its eyes had popped – its vertex expelling a blob of yellow juice. 

Her head glared at Bill’s.  “It’s not…a fucking roach!”

“Sharon, we need you in the dining room.” Laurie’s head said, her cheeks the color of water.  “Rodney’s talking to tables in smoking, so he needs you to take nonsmoking.”  Sharon shot Big Tim daggers, then pivoted on her unseen heel – crunch. 

Tim watched her look down, towards her shoe.

“No, that’s definitely not a roach,” Bill’s head said, looking down as well.  Sharon snatched his expo towel and wiped bug guts from her heel.  She threw the used rag in the window before following Laurie into the dining room.

Alan’s head appeared.  He looked across the overflowing passover window, where food was starting to die beneath the heat lamps.  He grinned at Tim –  It’s Denny’s all over again!

“Want me to run some food?” Alan asked.  The question was enough to snap everyone back into the moment.  Bill nodded, then franticly trayed overdue orders with Alan’s help.  “We should probably get some free Kookie Monsters started.”

Sighing audibly, Big Tim squashed a nearby cicada with his knife before wiping it on his apron, then pulling dead food from the window.

It would still be hours before his shift was over.

*  *  *  *  *

Hours later, after the restaurant had closed, Big Tim watched Zevon finish the last of his Sprite before climbing into the waiting van, joining Roger, Cochise, and Duncan in the back.  The driver rolled the door closed – slam – then handed Tim a clipboard, for the Kitchen Manager’s signature.  Tim signed, passed it back, and watched the black and white vehicle pull away; he could see the stenciled lettering – Peoria County Department of Corrections – above an official state seal, between its waning taillights.  He lit a menthol as the Work Release van squeaked out of the parking lot.

            “Hey – I know it was a rough night, so I did the inventory for you,” Bill said as he came out of the restaurant’s propped back door.  “You’ll have to do it tomorrow, though.  Rodney closes, so he can help if you have any questions.”

            “Thanks,” Tim said, offering him a drag.  Bill passed –

“Trying to quit.”

“So am I,” Tim admitted.

“Yeah, tonight wasn’t the best night for quitting anything,” Bill said.

“Did you find out where the cicadas came from?” Tim asked.

“Sharon thinks they came from the plants.  The service comes tomorrow, so we’ll ask them, then.  Cicadas stay in the ground, for what?  Seven years?  Maybe they were already in the dirt.”

“You mean, in the potting soil?”

“Well, soil, dirt – it’s all the same stuff, right?  We think we got all of them, though.  Sharon and Rodney had to comp a lot of food tonight.”  Bill sighed loudly.  “You know what?  Maybe I will take a” –

Tim passed his cigarette before Bill finished his sentence.  He watched the young manager take a long, deep drag before exhaling a lungful of white, into the quiet night air.  Bill passed it back.  “Thanks.”

“Want your own?” Tim asked.

“No, I’m fine.  But I’m definitely hitting Happy Valley when I leave.  Want to come?  Everyone’s going to be there.”

Tim shook his head.

“I’ll see you on Monday, then.”  Bill gave Big Tim a nod.  “Good luck tomorrow and Sunday.  I promise – not every shift is like this.”

“Good night, Bill.”

“Night, Tim.”

Bill vanished into the kitchen while Big Tim finished his cigarette.  In the silence of the night, a flash of movement caught his attention near the dumpsters – which were just outside the kitchen’s back door.  A tiny pair of red eyes appeared, as the night’s first rat came out of hiding to feast.  Tim watched as more rats followed from the sewer, and scurried around the trash containers, devouring bits of fallen food.

Flicking his cigarette, Tim returned inside.

He came out a moment later, holding the baseball bat that Sharon kept in the office.

*  *  *  *  *

“Crazy in the Night” – in Spanish – blasted from the open kitchen door, as Big Tim arrived to work the following morning, parking his 79’ Bill Blass Continental behind the building.  Clean and well-rested, the new Kitchen Manager climbed out of his car, and walked towards the unopen restaurant – where several prep cooks were standing outside, smoking.  One of them was leaning on the bat, and as Tim entered the back kitchen, he noticed a pile of gray fur & blood by the wall, from a dumpster diner who’d clearly stayed past the establishment’s closing time.

Nodding to the ladies, Tim took off his sunglasses when he stepped into the manager’s office.  He found that Sharon was already there, her aqua-colored blazer draped over the back of her office chair – a cigarette burning in an ashtray, next to coffee. 

The desk was covered in open binders.  She was transcribing numbers from the office computer to a printed spreadsheet, with a fresh inventory sheet on a clipboard, nearby.  She heard Tim enter, but didn’t look up.

“Our food costs are too high,” she said from the desk.  “And all the comps we had to do last night did not help at all.  It looks like yesterday cost us” – she adjusted her glasses to see the computer screen, where the Bobcat’s Lotus-based program provided data in black and white columns – “almost four hundred and seventy-five dollars, give or take what we lost in the bar with free drinks.”

“That ain’t good,” Tim said.

Sharon looked up.  “No…it’s not.”

Leaving her blazer behind, Sharon stood with the clipboard.  She brought her cigarette along as she led Tim through the prep kitchen, where four Hispanic women hacked at potatoes and raw fish.  She opened the walk-in refrigerator and held the plastic strips aside so the tall black man could enter first.  She followed him in, propping the outer door open for more light.  Cigarette in hand, she gestured towards the clipboard, and then to its corresponding items on the metro shelves.

“See that?” – she pointed towards the case packs of ribs.  “And those?” – she gestured towards the blue cheese wheels and containers of iced shrimp.  “Those items are extremely expensive, and if we don’t use them carefully, we lose a lot of money.”

She paused so Tim could take this in.

“And the same holds true for many non-refrigerated items, like olive oil, barbeque sauce, and chocolate.”  She puffed into the cold, fanned air.  “You follow so far?”

“This isn’t my first restaurant, Ms. Donovan.” Tim said calmly, trying not to be insulted.  “I do understand how food costs work.”

“Well, somebody clearly doesn’t,” Sharon informed him, peering into a Lexan of raw chicken portions.  It had been stored above the lettuce, ripe for cross-contamination.  She frowned, gave Tim the clipboard, and shoved the cigarette between her teeth.  “And I’m guessing it’s the same idiots who don’t even know basic health department rules.”

Tim watched her swap the items, putting veggies above the chicken, then kick the meat into place with her heel – as ashes fell to the floor.  Once finished, she looked for other violations.  He helped her move a few more improperly-shelved items, before following her out the door, and into the long prep kitchen. 

“On Monday, I’ll be sitting down with you, Rodney, and Bill,” she continued.  “I want to see exactly how you three are doing your inventory counts, and I want all of us to figure out why our food costs have been so high.  Something’s not right, here.  And it’s either sloppy management or theft.”

She extinguished her cigarette in cold running water, before washing her hands – and drying them with a dirty towel.

A car horn honked outside.

Tim followed Sharon’s heels as she backtracked through the kitchen, and out the open back door.  The Work Release van was back.  The driver passed his own clipboard through the window, and Sharon counted the inmates as they filed out of the vehicle, heading inside like a chain gang.  She signed her name, then returned the paperwork to the driver – who immediately pulled away.  Her eyes narrowed at the felons.  It’s either sloppy management –

Or theft.

Big Tim lingered behind the restaurant for a moment, while Sharon glanced at the trash before going inside.  He was still tired from yesterday, and today had the looming feel of another painful shift.  His eyes looked up towards the beautiful late-summer sky, before settling on the server’s lot – where Patrick and Guinevere had just arrived together and were chatting happily before their opening shift. 

He noticed the waiter had a different Cadillac today – that’s a sharp-looking 1980! – a near-mint condition, stock Eldorado coupe that looked as though it was kept in the garage, and only driven on nice days like today.

Nice weekend ride, buddy.

Turning back to the door, Tim gasped on seeing Sharon coming at him with the bat.  A fresh cigarette now dangled from her lips, and the aqua blazer was in place and buttoned – its big, gold buttons twinkling in the sunlight.

Bitch, what the fuck!?

The woman pushed him aside and stormed for the rear of the dumpster, raising the bat as though clubbing a seal.  She disappeared behind the filth.  Tim heard the bat come down hard onto muscle – Thwack! – followed by an ugly squeal – Eee! Eee! Eee!

The cook had no idea exactly what she was killing, but from the sound of the screams – and the arc of flying arterial spray – it sure as fuck was not a rat. 

Thwack!

Thwack!

Thwack!

The squealing stopped dead.

Silence.

Sharon returned with a spotless blazer, though the bat now looked as if it had stirred red paint.  Flicking her cigarette, she passed the bat to Tim on her way into the kitchen – “Could you rinse that off, please?”

Bloody bat in hand, Tim stood frozen for a moment.

I wonder if Denny’s would take me back?

Patrick and Guinevere came up from the parking lot but slowed as they neared the cook holding a murder weapon.  “Err, is everything okay, Tim?” Patrick asked, cautiously.

Guinevere, however, was completely unphased.

“That happened to me once, but the bat was bigger.  That’s why I’m careful whenever I date a black guy” – she paused for effect –

“Their cocks are huge!”

Next Chapter: Red Eyes