I tap my fingers on the fake granite countertop. Rhythmic and continuous, it gets my mind off the hot, stale air I’m inhaling. Nobody has been in here since noon. It’s four o’clock, five hours until closing. I can never understand why this place stays open until nine. Hardly anyone ever comes in here as it is, let alone at nine at night. No cars even pass outside on the dead “highway” as Sam, the owner, loves to describe it.
“What a great location!” he brags to me on the few occasions he’s ever actually here. “Not every restaurant gets to be on a highway, you know?”
He couldn’t be more wrong. That small patch of cement can hardly classified as a road let alone a highway.
Five minutes later, a single car speeds down the road where cops don’t even fancy. To no surprise the car doesn’t even slow down to read the sign that says, “Hot Food!”
A few more minutes in, a small family enters the restaurant. Finally.
“Hey folks, table for three?” I ask with a small, fake smile.
The man, dressed unusually fancy, grunts a hardly audible response that I take as a “yes.”
The young boy with them has his nose practically touching up against his iPhone. The woman, wearing high heels and a short dress, is looking with disgust at the old records hanging on the yellowing wallpaper in this “vintage” diner. When her mouth isn’t curled up in repulsion, its in pouty, snide frown.
I sit them down at a small table, give them their menus, and recite my mandatory line of, “I’ll be right back with you folks in a few. Go ahead and look over our menu,” as if I have to go help the other customers in this empty restaurant.
I go back to my place behind the counter and I hear the woman whisper fiercely at the man, “Are you sure we should be eating here? They probably don’t even properly clean their utensils let alone properly prepare their food. I can’t stand places like this. Why did we even stop here? I mean there are probably so many health code violations. The waitress is probably a health code violation too.”
I would love to say that I couldn’t believe what I was hearing from this woman, but I could. More than often our costumers here were rich, snotty, snide families on their way to some fancy hotel up north who were looking for some quick food along the way. But for some reason this lady just irked me. The sweat dripping the makeup off her face revealed imperfect skin, speckled with dark spots and creased with wrinkles. The small, hardly noticeable scars told me she had a nose job, but not a very good one. Her hair started to frizz with the humidity caused by our broken air conditioner.
“Miss!” The man’s holler broke me out of my world of thoughts. “We’re ready to order. We’ll have two burgers and two fries, a milk shake, two waters, and a salad.” “Coming up,” I say as I turn to give the order to the cook.
Once again I return to my spot at the counter, practically glaring at the small family. Then something hits me.
“Order up,” the cook bellows. I pick up the salad first and bring it over to the woman.
“Here you go ma’am,” I say with my sweetest voice I could possibly bring myself to use for this woman. “I noticed you were not pleased with the cleanliness of our utensils, so I took it upon myself to bring you a new one that I personally washed twice. I know it can be hard coming from where you come from and coming here where we obviously like everything dirty. I know I love eating with a dirty utensil when I eat my food, but I wanted to give you exactly what you wanted. Something clean. Don’t worry I don’t mind. You just wanted something nice. I can totally understand because being callous and cruel you need to fill your world with nice things. So I hope now you can better enjoy your food.” I finish my speech with a smile and I turn around to grab the two burgers and fries, the milkshake and the waters. The woman is simply staring at her salad, saying nothing. Neither does the man. The boy, still consumed by his iPhone, probably didn’t even hear my rant.
As I yet again return to my spot behind the counter, I find myself filled with gratification. I know I won’t be getting a tip from these people, but I don’t mind; money has the ability to make people petty.