“Well,” he said, leaning closer. She could smell cigarettes on his breath. “You should tell your man that his fists aren’t doing the trick. You still haven’t got no respect.”
She felt her face grow hot, and the eyes of the men on her, waiting for a reaction. They said not a word, forks held close to their mouths, still loaded with food as they absorbed what had just occurred. A line had been crossed they would never have crossed themselves it seemed, but perhaps out of fear, they weren’t about to point that out to their boss, who showed not the slightest sign that he regretted what he’d said. Louise straightened slowly and brushed absently at some imaginary wrinkles in her skirt. She looked from Ty, and the satisfied smile on his thick rubbery lips, to the cutlery she’d just set down before him, the tips of the knife and fork catching the fluorescent light, and she knew she was going to kill him. The awareness came without fear, or anxiety, or concern for the future she would be denying herself by plunging that knife into his throat. There was no future to squander. There was only now.
“Now get me some A1 sauce for my meat, okay?” Ty said sweetly around his victorious sneer.
She saw herself doing it. Though the fantasy seemed to last forever, she knew the moment itself would not. It would be quick.
“You hear me?”
There had been many men in Louise’s life. Too many, she sometimes thought, and yet still not enough to balance out the investment she had put into them. From Louisiana to Alabama to West Virginia and now Michigan, the path to her present could be found by following the trail of shattered dreams, empty promises, buckled pride and heartache. She’d been the sole burlesque performer in a theater filled with dead-eyed men.
And though she had never unlocked her most secret desires for the hulk sitting before her now, his eyes were just as lifeless, reflecting only inward, studying the desires and dreams of the self, incapable of recognizing those of others.
Her hand found the knife. Ty glanced down.
“What do you think you’re going to do with that?”
“Is there a problem here?” a voice said, and Louise jerked, her hand splaying, releasing the knife. She felt her muscles relax, even as some other part of her tensed in disappointment. The invisible strings that had been tugging at her heart, her mind, and her arms, encouraging her to cut loose from them in the same swoop that would see the knifepoint piercing the sagging black flesh beneath Ty’s double chin, released her. She had to struggle not to collapse from the recession of that furious impulse.
“I said is there a problem here?”
Louise glanced to her right, into the face of Robbie Way, her manager. He was at least ten years her junior and seemed condemned to use his authority to compensate for his lack of good looks, charm, and physique. His skin was pale and supple, slack around the dull gray eyes, and speckled with angry red pimples around the chin and nose. Now those eyes were narrowed, and fixed on Louise.
“There ain’t no trouble.”
“What?”
“I said there ain’t no trouble here.”
Robbie turned his attention to the men at the table. All but Ty had resumed eating. The manager watched them for a moment, then sidled up to the big man. “Everything all right, sir?”
Louise felt her guts coil.
Ty, armed with his most winning smile, nodded once and held up a flaccid cheeseburger seething with grease. “Sure is,” he said, beaming. “We were just asking Miss Daltry here if she could get us some A1 sauce. Not sure she heard me properly though. It’s what I get for eating with my mouth full, I guess.” He chuckled, and Robbie smiled. Nobody seemed compelled to point out that the burger was untouched, and that there was no food in Ty’s mouth.
“I’ll take care of that for you right away,” Robbie said, and turned, his thin fingers squeezing Louise’s arm as he led her away from the table toward the counter. “What’s going on?”
“Nothin’,” she replied, sourly.
“Didn’t look like nothing.” They reached the counter and he plucked a bottle of A-1 from beside the cash register, then looked squarely at her. “This can’t keep happening, you know.”
“I know.”
“No… I don’t think you do. This isn’t some sleazy bar where you get to back-talk the customers for ogling you, or get up in their faces because they were staring at your tits. This is a
Louise felt like a child, but couldn’t summon the will to raise her head and look the manager in the eye, opting instead to just stare at the floor, and the still-wet boot prints from whomever had come in last.
“Problem is,” Robbie went on, “Half the guys we get in here only come to look at you anyway. We all know the food is crap, and Elmo’s Pizza is only two blocks from here, but have you seen the waitresses over there?” He shuddered. “They’ve got some kind of faux Italian thing going on, which would be fine if their ancestors didn’t all hail from Montreal.”
She smiled at that, and nodded. Robbie chose to take it as an encouraging sign. “You’re a good looking woman, Louise. You gotta expect to have to take some shit from these guys, and learn to let it go right over your head. It’s the only way you’re going to last in this business.”
Louise sighed and offered him the smile of understanding she knew he was waiting for. Unfortunately, Robbie was another dreamless wonder. He assumed anyone who worked under him entertained the same grand notions of one day opening up a restaurant of their very own as he did. Somewhere along the crooked road of his life, the young man before her had considered his options and found but a single route still open to him. He’d hurried down that road, his mind fixated on the one thing that would allow him to retain his pride, and had done so with such veracity that it had brainwashed him, consumed him, and now anything beyond that single well-trodden path seemed incomprehensible, perhaps even threatening to him because it was a facet of life of which he would never get a taste. Louise imagined his apartment dark, damp and empty, with Robbie in the bathroom, still dressed in his trademark white shirt, red tie and black pants with the razor sharp creases, practicing the many expressions of authority and stern speeches he needed to excel at his job.
It was this summation of his character in Louise’s mind that negated his words to her now. Everything he told her was trite, pulled straight from
“Thank you,” she said, and exhaled heavily.
“You’re welcome,” Robbie replied, obviously pleased with himself. “Now bring this bottle down to that gentleman’s table.” He slid the A-1 into her palm and watched her carefully.
“Okay.” She started to turn, then paused and looked back into his expectant face. “Can I take a five minute smoke break after that?”
Robbie frowned, shirked back his shirtsleeve and checked his watch, then sighed. “Five minutes. But do it around back. I don’t need smoke blasting in on people while they’re eating every time someone opens those doors.”
Louise nodded and headed away. As she approached Ty’s table, the large man looked up, mouth stuffed with cheeseburger, a smear of cheese on his lower lip.
“About time, sugar tits,” he mumbled around his food and reached out a hand for the bottle.
Breathing hard with anticipation, she grabbed his wrist with her left hand and quickly yanked it aside.
The men froze.
Ty’s eyes bugged. “The hell you think you’re d—?”
“Hey!” Robbie called, and she heard his perfectly polished shoes slapping the tiles.
“Sorry,” she said, aware it would not be clear to whom she’d been speaking as she swung the sauce bottle into the side of Ty’s head.
