the floor, tell Mai and Anna: eighty-five on the meat loaf.”
“One mo?”
“Right.”
“Dimitri,” said James. “These burgers gonna be up in a minute. You can call out your colds.”
“Thanks, James. All right, Maria. I need a cold cut, everything, no onions. A tuna on rye, plain. And a Maria’s salad.”
Maria laughed. “Jame, the salad moving!”
“I know it, senorita. Good thing you put your name on that one, because it is your masterpiece.”
Anna Wang walked in, put a ticket in front of Karras. “Food’s coming out great, everybody.”
“Thanks, baby,” said James. “But I know you didn’t come in here to shower us with compliments.”
“Well, I was wondering about the order for my eight-top.”
“You can just get your hot little self back on out there, too.”
“All right, I’m gone.” Anna buzzed out of the kitchen.
“Hit me, Dimitri,” said James. “I’m all caught up.”
Karras gave James the new hots, repeated the order, studied his tickets, rearranged them according to cooking times. James crowded the grill with meat, then went to the radio and turned it up.
“Luther Vandross,” said James. “Sing it, my brother.” James sang the chorus of the song in baritone. Maria looked at him and cracked up. The two of them laughed, hugged each other briefly, then split apart and went back to their stations.
“Jame likes Luther,” explained Maria to Karras with a smile. There was a blue mark under her right eye.
“Luther is serious, ” said James, transferring the burger order onto plates. “I remember listenin’ to him when he sang for that group Change, didn’t even have his name on the cover of the album, and I can remember thinkin’, who the fuck is this? ”
“You ready, Maria?” said Karras.
“Go ahe, Mitri.”
He recited her colds. He didn’t repeat the order because by now he knew that you never had to tell Maria twice.
Darnell turned his head halfway around, watched Karras work. Karras was doing a good job, and for a moment Darnell thought he’d tell him. But the moment passed, and Darnell went back to his dishes and the sink.
Karras sat at the bar, eating the last of the meat loaf with a side mound of garlic mashed potatoes with gravy pooled in its center. Darnell made a nice meat loaf, not too dry, with just enough onion in it to give it taste.
Karras liked this time of the afternoon. He had done a good job at lunch today, and that was something in itself. He’d prepared his own food after the rush while Maria listened to her half hour on the Spanish station, wrapping her salads away for the night. Then he’d brought his food out to the bar and eaten it quietly, his personal reward. This had been a good day.
A beefy guy in a tweed jacket sat two stools down to Karras’s right, nursing a shot of something along with a beer. Karras only knew him as the Irish homicide cop who frequented the Spot. Down the bar sat Happy, staring straight ahead, and beyond Happy sat a couple of GS-10s, arguing over sports trivia while splitting their second pitcher of draft. Mai was behind the stick, her arms folded, a cigarette in one of her thick hands, listening intently to the Carpenters mix she had going on the box.
Karras considered today’s lunch. It had gone well. His first few days on the job had been pretty rough; there were a couple of times, when he was in way over his head and the tickets were flowing into the kitchen in bunches, that he thought of just bolting. He’d heard restaurant people talk about being “in the weeds,” and that’s how it felt. You couldn’t see your way out, and the next step was panic.
But it had worked out. And every day he grew more confident and got better at his job. He had begun to figure it out: the rhythm, the personalities, the way James and Maria interacted, knowing when James could take a hot call, watching his body language signal overload and knowing when to pull back and wait. Working the kitchen was a kind of challenge, and he was beginning to beat it. And there was the other thing, too. During the lunch rush he could only think of the task at hand. For two hours every day, he could forget.
“You mind?” said the Irish cop.
Karras looked over. The cop was putting a match to a cigarette. “No, go ahead.”
Darnell came from the kitchen and had a seat next to Karras at the bar. He removed his leather kufi and wiped his face with a bar napkin. Mai drifted over and Darnell said, “Mix me up one of your specials, Mai.”
“You got it,” said Mai.
“So, Dimitri,” said Darnell, “how’s that meat loaf?”
“Beautiful,” said Karras. “I was afraid I wasn’t gonna get it, the way it was moving.”
“The heel’s the best part anyway, you ask me.”
Mai served Darnell a mixture of pineapple and orange juice. He thanked her and had a long sip.
“How long have you been cooking?” said Karras.
“I started back when I was doin’ this little stretch at Lorton. I guess Nick’s already told you about that. I got a job in the kitchen as a dishwasher. This guy that had been cooking for years there kind of took me under his wing.”
“You’re good at it.”
“Yeah, I can put a meal together, I guess. Thing is, Phil doesn’t let me stretch out too much here. Wants to keep this a meat-and-potatoes, middle-of-the-road, bar-food kind of place. I’d like to do a whole lot more.”
Karras pushed his empty plate to the side. “Listen, Darnell…”
“You don’t have to say nothin’, man. You’re doin’ a good job. Things have been running smoother since you got here, and I’m happy about that. I just wasn’t suited for that position, that’s all.”
“You were trying to do too much, is what it was. I can’t take too much credit, either. I’ve had a lot of help. James and Maria have been great.”
“Yes, those two sure can do it. ’Specially Maria. She can sense when that food’s coming off the grill, like she’s seein’ behind her back.”
Karras drummed his fingers on the bar. “Let me ask you something about Maria.”
“Go ahead.”
“I’ve noticed marks on her face -”
“Her husband. He drinks at night and sometimes he drinks too much. When he does, he beats her.”
“Can’t we do anything?”
“Nick asked her if she wanted us to report the guy. She said no. I think she’s afraid. Afraid for herself but mainly for that beautiful girl of hers. So there it is. Everybody’s got their own little world of problems they got to deal with, man. We’re all out here just doin’ the best we can.”
Darnell swallowed the rest of his juice and got up off the stool.
“Thanks, Darnell.”
“Let me get on out of here and back to those dishes.”
Darnell headed toward the kitchen.
“What’s up, Darnell?” said the cop.
“Officer Boyle.” Darnell didn’t stop or turn his head.
When Darnell had entered the kitchen, the cop leaned over, extended his hand, and said, “Dan Boyle.”
“Dimitri Karras.”
They shook hands.
“Yeah, Nick told me your name. I said to him, Now we got two Greeks in this joint.”
“Uh-huh.”
Karras hoped that would end the conversation. There were certain kinds of drinkers who had a sleepy kind of cruelty in their eyes. Boyle had that look – and he was a detective in the bad bargain. Along with everything else, Karras had lost his faith in cops.
Boyle said, “You know, when I asked Nick who the new guy was and he told me your name, it rang a bell. It wasn’t just that your name had been in the papers a few times these last couple of years.”
“Yeah?” So this Boyle character knew about the murder of his son.
“Yeah, it was something else.”
