2. The Injection Alien

I got to work a little late the next day, and Mario was giving me an earful of his usual crap.

“All these waitresses runnin’ around the city, dyin’ for some steady work, and I got you, comin’ in when you feel like it, right? Tell me how that makes any goddamn sense?”

I just kept my mouth shut and hauled ass to the kitchen to punch in. It was best to keep a low profile with Mario. He got mad all the time, but he hardly ever stayed mad. Unless you talked back. Then he'd stay mad for good and long, and make your life a living hell while he was at it. Not worth the trouble. I learned that the hard way.

After I clocked in I went straight to table five, which was crammed with old ladies. I groaned knowing I was in for a thirty-five cent tip. Maybe I'd luck out and get sixty cents, a nice shiny dime from each of them. But I didn’t want to get my hopes up.  As soon as I got to the table, they started interrogating me about the menu.

One old woman with a very pronounced old-lady perm went first. "Now is the bacon crispy, dear? Or would you say it's more chewy?"

Before I could answer, another one piped up. She had penciled in eyebrows that were a totally different color than her hair, which was bright orange and fried. It was crispier than any bacon we made. "Is it butter you use? Or margarine? I can't digest dairy like I used to."

A bigger lady with a sensible haircut and normal eyebrows chuckled. "Please miss, if you have it, give her margarine. I don't want to have to listen to her tooting all day. We're going to bingo in a little while."

They all tittered and giggled.

"Jackie!" Mario bellowed. I turned around and he was standing behind the counter tugging on his earlobe, which was the signal for rushing the customers along, pressuring them to hurry up and order already. He did the ear tug a lot with old lady tables, but never when important looking business guys came in once in a while to have their power lunches. He let them take up as much of my time as they wanted, and he let me refill their coffee cups for free too, which was really weird. Mario didn’t even like serving water for free.

"All right ladies. Have we decided yet?" I felt like a car salesman.

I dug a pen out of my apron.

"Oh my God!" said one of the old ladies. "What in heaven's name are you doing with that?"

I was really confused for a few seconds until I actually looked at the pen and realized it wasn't a pen at all, but one of John's hypodermic needles. "I—uh—I—."

The old ladies were staring and gasping and shaking their heads. I had to think quick if I didn't want to get canned on the spot. Mario had serious issues about everything, but one thing he absolutely did not tolerate was drugs. He had fired a waitress a couple of weeks ago because someone said he saw her smoking a joint at a party.

I shoved the hypo back into my apron and tried to stay calm and composed even though I felt like I was going to wet my pants. "I'm sorry," I said. "It's my grandma's. She's diabetic. I help her with her insulin sometimes."

"Oh. Oh dear." They all changed their attitudes right away, and I was back on their team in a matter of seconds. "We understand," the one closest to me said. "You run and get yourself a pen. We'll wait here." She nodded and smiled and gave me a little nudge on my side.

"I'm really sorry about that," I said, walking away. "I know it's not the best thing to see right before lunch. They waved their hands at me. "Pish posh," said the one with bright orange hair. "We talk about our medical conditions over lunch all the time."

I grabbed a pen off the counter and tried not to think about how much I wanted to punch John in his face. Did he think he was funny? Did he think jobs grew on trees? I couldn't figure out what would posses him to do something so idiotic. Maybe it was the next verse in "The Pancake Phantom" song—The Injection Alien.

After the whole incident was forgotten, and the old ladies were done eating and off to bingo, I started clearing their table because the bus boy was completely backlogged. I looked around for my big shiny quarter, but I didn't see one. I wasn't really mad because of the whole hypo-scare I had given them. It was too much to ask from the waitressing gods to keep my job and get tipped too, I guess. But then I saw the tip and I realized why it had taken me so long to find it. I had been looking for silver or bronze, but this tip was green. A ten-dollar bill was folded in half under the ketchup bottle. I looked out the window, hoping the old ladies were still out there so I could wave to them. But they were gone.

"Hey Jackie," called Mario from the kitchen. He must have been watching me from the service window. "What's up? You on another day dreamin' break?"

No comment. I shoved the money in my apron and went back to clearing, which was much more fun when I imagined John's face at the bottom of the brown dishpan.