splat chapter thirteen

Time passed. If you look at each day as a continuum, it doesn't seem like much was going on. Suzie got up, lazed around at home during the early part of the day, went off to her hideout sometimes, went out on vigilante runs sometimes, went down to Nelson's sometimes, always achieving exactly nothing. She worked all the time at a job she was learning to hate, and fell asleep on the couch in the middle of some TV show. Nothing changed.

Except that the idea that nothing changes is a particular fantasy of the young. Only young and inexperienced people think that life goes on one way, forever, and that there's no hope for change, and that nothing new will ever happen. Well, actually, depressed people think like that too. But the young don't want stability, they don't like sameness, they don't want to think that this is it and they'd better get used to it.

Suzie was young. And probably depressed. In fact, she was sleeping later and later in the mornings, and waking up tired. And she started to get vague stomach pains when it came time to get ready for work every afternoon.

Suzie got in a little bit late for her shift one day in late June, and walked in on a staff meeting. The service staff clumped nervously together beside the stairs, looking like penguins. The Latino porters lurked in the shadows back by the sinks. The black cooks loitered near the long table. The professional chefs clustered in front of the office. Chef stood addressing the troops.

She had to walk right past him when she came in, punching in noisily at his back during his speech. He broke off and turned his head to glare at her as she edged back to stand with the cooks. There was another man up front with him, dressed in the same whites as the rest of the professional staff. The guy watched her closely as she passed.

'Harrumph.' Chef cleared his throat and continued. 'Chef Henri is a graduate of Le Cordon Bleu in Paris. He comes to us from the Four Seasons Hotel in Washington, DC. Before that he spent four years in the Caracas Hilton, in Venezuela. And he also served as assistant to former White House Chef, Walter Scheib.'

The Latinos glanced at each other. The professional chefs applauded, the cooks nodded politely. The waiters looked for scuffs on their pants and shoes. The new guy smiled and nodded at the attention. He was shorter than Chef, and many pounds lighter. He was in his thirties, with red, thinning hair, worn short and curling up all over his head.. He seemed much more relaxed and easy-going than Chef Ricardo. Suzie thought he fit right in with the rest of the white male professional cooking staff.

'And now, I present to you Chef Henri,' Chef said, bowing a stiff, formal, pseudo-European bow. Then he stepped back slightly, and pulled his toque off his head, turning to give respect to the new guy as he stepped forward.

Chef Henri stood with his hands clasped behind his back, and spoke in a low voice. The Sous-chefs strained to hear him, the cooks and waiters pretended deaf interest, and the Latino porters grew a little more shadowy.

'I am not difficult to get along with,' he said in a pleasant French accent. 'I simply ask that you follow the procedures and do it the right way. If we function as a team, then we will all be happy.'

Except for his accent, he sounded like any other chef. Gradually it dawned on Suzie that he wasn't just going to be another Sous-chef, but that this guy was going to be the new Executive Chef, and Chef Ricardo was out the door. The cooks were listening with one ear, because he was saying the same things they'd come to expect. The brigade way, do it by the book, order, discipline, rules. They breathed a few words softly to each other while he went on about how if the workers were happy, he'd be happy; any concerns come see him; Open Door; Make A Difference.

He asked for questions. The Sous-chefs were too awed, the cooks were bored, the waiters thought he was kind of cute, and the Latinos never asked questions anyway. So he and Chef Ricardo went into the office, and the rest of them moved out of their line of sight to discuss the change.

Suzie noticed the waiters melting upstairs, while the cooks gathered by the coolers to settle up with each other over Chef Ricardo, and to place bets on how long this new Chef Henri would last.

She stood around enjoying the action for a moment. Most of the money was on his early departure, but some thought he might last six months or more. Nobody bet on him staying a whole year. When Joseph the butcher had written everything down in a little pocket notebook and put it away in his pocket, everyone went back to what they were doing, and Suzie went upstairs to see what her shift assignment would be. And then a few minutes later trooped back down with the waiters to hear the menu.

The new Chef announced the menu in rapid French. And didn't translate. The waiters stood there in shock, their heads tilted, their eyes glazed over. A few shrugged. Let the diners figure it out, they mumbled as they staggered back upstairs.

The schedule in the pantry had her working tables in the Jasmine Room, and entertaining a party of three in the Honeysuckle Room. Member 1278, Elwood Dwayne Collier, eight o'clock.

She took care of three tables for the first part of her shift. Her first cover was a member, his wife and their two young kids. Suzie had notice of them from downstairs, hearing the screams and footfalls of the kids running through the halls while their parents were in the bar. They were as well behaved in Casual Dining as they had been downstairs, and Suzie was kept busy escorting the kids back to their seats, and bringing out fresh napkins and silver to replace the articles dropped, with great glee, just so they could see her dashing back and forth with new ones.

The other two tables were occupied by regular, normal types. A young member and his mistress, catching an early dinner before going home late to their respective spice. And an older member, dining alone, reading the paper while he ate his fish and potatoes with a bottle of wine. None of these gave her any trouble, and by quarter to eight, they were gone and Suzie was ready for her Eight o'clock and whoever showed up in the Jasmine Room.

She fixed a cup of coffee and took into the lounge in the servants' quarters. Most of the waiters were women, but the few men took their breaks there as well. The women were mostly black or Latina, the men were mostly gay. She knew Yolanda pretty well, and she was slowly getting to know the others: Frankie was a musician on the side, Martha was a painter, Estelle acted, and Sabine was a hand and hair model. Sally had three kids to raise, Julia was putting her husband through Morehouse College.

They were all talking about the new chef downstairs. They discussed how he might behave when presented with a last-minute order. Would he act like a prima donna, resentfully ordering a cook to get already wrapped stuff out of the cooler? Or would he be proactively kiss-ass and install a night staff so the members could have food all night? Nobody had a clue, but they all had opinions.

Elwood Dwayne was that guy with the glasses who'd given her trouble the first night she worked upstairs. He remembered her, too, and broke into song at the sight of her, 'Oh Suzie Q, Baby I Love You, Suzie Q.' The other two joined in for the next verse: 'I like the way you walk...' They couldn't agree on a pitch or a key.

She walked around the table, avoiding them, watching warily as they established their pecking order and took their seats. Elwood Dwayne beamed and grinned at her as he sat down. The dark, brooding one immediately lit a cigarette. Suzie frowned. Smoking wasn't allowed in the Casual Dining rooms.

'Darling!' Elwood Dwayne said. His face was all lit up with excitement. 'It's wonderful to see you again.' He probably did this with all the girls. 'You're looking very nice,' he said looking at her breasts as Suzie's smile plasticized. 'Come sit on my lap and tell me what you been doing.'

Suzie was still a brand new waitress. She did not yet have the skills to fend off the unwanted advances of paying customers. It's a big conflict. In the food service and entertainment industry, you've got to make nice, or you don't get the tips. But a girl's got to have a limit.

She was having trouble with his greeting. He was being friendly, jovial, using a particularly intimate style of banter that guys tended to indulge in when their wives weren't present. But he could also be conveying a serious subtext about a lap dance.

Suzie had run into truckers who asked if she wanted a date, but she'd just turn them over to her dad or Uncle Daddy, and it was never any problem. Usually she stuck with her dad and his buddies, and didn't talk to strangers. Everybody knew her all up and down the coast anyway, so nobody ever lifted a finger against her. All the truckers and truck stop waitresses loved her, and used to go out of their way to watch out for her and give her little presents, ever since she was the size of a flea.

She knew how to handle Elwood Dwayne, but her way was the highway, rough and ready, and she didn't think it advisable to start off on the offensive in this environment. Actually, Suzie found the guy a bit shocking. He fluffed his balls at her, grinning. He was probably drunk; no, he was certainly drunk, but he looked like he'd had practice and built up his drunk muscles.

She had to put up with it. Yolanda had told her that they should never complain to the Service Manager about the members no matter how rude they got. It was lethal to your job prospects to take complaints to the management. That's just how places like these were run. What you did was you developed your sense of style and put on no-nonsense armor, that frosty touch, an air of professionalism, and you managed the fuckers into line.

The guy was unfolding his napkin and laying it out on his knees. Adjusting himself under the table. He caught her eye. 'Hey, Missy.' He saw the look she gave him. 'Just joking, just joking,' he said, spreading his hands in a calm down motion. 'I'll behave....' He leered. 'Suzie Q.'

And the boys roared, and started up another chorus.

Suzie slapped their menus down in front of them as they serenaded her, sliding away from the reach of Asshole, who was turning not just his head but his body to follow her around the table.

'Honey, bring me another one of these, willya?' He lifted the highball glass in his palm and rattled the ice cubes.

She stopped and faced the table like Mom addressing the kids. 'Who wants more?' They almost raised their hands and bounced in their seats: 'I do, I do.'

Elwood Dwayne motioned with a finger. 'We're getting champagne with dinner. We're doing a little celebrating tonight. So we're going to get the Dom '90. And keep it coming.

The moment she was out of the room, they turned their attention to the scheme of the century. They called the big redneck E.D. or Ed, or sometimes Uga. Nobody called him Elwood Dwayne but his nanny. He was the head of Resurgens, a hot Atlanta development company. He'd been a member of the White Magnolia Club since 1988, a graduation present from his daddy. He was at dinner that night with his good friend Sam Burns, who had an architecture and urban design firm in Atlanta called Slaughter, Strangle, Slash and Burns, and his business partner Jerry Sweat, also a member of the Club, who was a managing partner at a respectable Midtown law firm. They all grew up in Atlanta; attended tony Pace Academy in Buckhead more or less together; went to the University of Georgia as legacy students, lived up Georgia 400 in Sandy Springs, Roswell, and Cumming; were conveniently married, and knew the names of each others' kids. They were about as connected as good ol' boys can possibly be.

Yes, they were there celebrating. Because these fine gentlemen were about to make history in the city of Atlanta. They were going to change the face of Intown, and while there were a few other hot developers in this town, say 70 or 80 , you could safely say these were the men with the guns. They had the genius, the really broad picture, the vision of the future, and the political backing to ensure success. Because it's who you know in this town. It's all about connections.

Of course, these fellows were too well-bred to go crowing their business successes all over town, or even downstairs in the bar. The mere fact that they were making millions developing Atlanta meant less than dirt to quite a few influential members of the Club who made many times that quarterly. They didn't want to risk looking gauche, and besides, the projects were all in the early stages where too many things could go wrong.

'Let's toast to the beauty of our kind hostess, here,' Ed started off, staring at her as she poured, and lifting his champagne glass courteously. 'And to the glory of our fair city. May they both improve with time.' Suzie pretended not to notice the complement or the innuendo.

They were busy toasting themselves, and it looked like it was going to be awhile before they were ready to order, so Suzie bustled in and out for a few minutes, handing out bread and pouring more champagne. Then she went to see to her other tables.

The Jasmine Room was fairly busy after the lull. Set up like a regular family restaurant, it had earth-toned wall-to-wall carpeting and acoustical tile ceilings, round wooden tables for six on two levels, separated by a wooden railing and plastic vines. The decor was Bachelor Modern - dark green and brown, inventive sprays of gathered up fishing poles, horse whips, rifles and baseball bats mounted on the walls, maroon drapes framing the windows.

The door of the Jasmine Room led directly to the top of the stairs above the breezeway, where dark wood paneling displayed hundreds of autographed photos of athletes and sportsmen. The men's lounge featured train engines and watchful horses and a clean pine scent, and the women's lounge had posies of pink and yellow flowers tied in ribbons of baby blue, and smelled of roses.

Suzie learned this because she was sent off to investigate the lounges by her third table, a female member of which had wandered off a bit unsteadily about ten minutes before.

'Oh where have you been,' cried the other wife when Suzie appeared at their table. 'We've been frantic to find her. We're so worried.' She looked around at the men and sipped her drink.

The woman wasn't in the women's lounge. She wasn't in the men's lounge either. She wasn't in any of the little dining rooms, which were kept locked, sometimes. Suzie tried a few of the ones closer to the Jasmine Room, and then went to the top of the stairs to see if maybe she'd gotten herself down to the main floor. She finally found her in the servants' quarters, crumpled onto the couch with her head on the arm rest, passed out.

Suzie helped her up. 'Yes m'am, just a little too much food, I'm sorry to hear that. We'll get you right in a moment.' A short spell inside a stall, a quick wash of the face, water on the back of the neck, and Suzie escorted the diner back to her table. Her husband gave the woman a pat on the back of the hand, and ordered her another drink. She sat, mostly recovered, and pushed the rest of her meal around while conversation resumed on topics of golf scores and vacation house plans.

Suzie put in the orders for the alcohol, and ducked back in to the Honeysuckle Room to see how the men were getting along. They were talking about their development, but interrupted to sing another chorus at her, so she shut the door on them and went back to see about dessert at table two.

Table three was ready for desert, so Suzie cleared the dishes and gave them the menus, recommended the white chocolate mousse, cleared away plates at her second table, tweaked the fanned napkins on the first table, and came back to take orders at the third table. Coffee and brandy all around; they'd decide on the dessert in a couple of minutes.

She filled a pot of coffee and took it in, loitered around listening to dessert deliberations at table two, punched up their order (mousse, homemade peach ice cream, two crème brulée), and went back to see about the world conquerors.

More drinks. They were getting pretty raucous, and Ed kept turning his attention to her and making subtle jokes the boys would chortle and guffaw over, and then they'd order more drinks. But when she was gone, the boisterous energy faded, and they went back to business, leaning toward each other and uttering numbers and buzzwords.

Going in and out, she heard words like 'Conservation Zoning,' 'LEED ratings,' 'Greenspace Oriented Pedestrian Friendly Nature Preserve'. Eco-this and Eco-that. Eco attached to words she hadn't thought of before, like Eco-streetscaping and Eco-retail.

They were ready to order around nine-thirty. By then Suzie had gotten a new set of members and their parties at both tables one and two in the Jasmine Room. The two tables were friends, up from the bar and talking between tables while they waited for their drinks. The folks at table three had just gone downstairs, half supporting the woman who'd mostly passed out. She took care of the drinks at one and two and bussed table three, and headed back to the Honeysuckle Room.

She heard the boys from outside in the hall. They sounded like teammates in a huddle. But they broke up into a halftime cheer when she came in to take their orders. 'Well, say that you'll be true and never leave me blue, Susie Q. Another round, Honey.'

Have they been practicing? she wondered. 'Do they play this a lot on your oldies station?' She had to let them finish the verse. 'Guys, guys, slow down. Let's get some food into you before they shut down the kitchen.' She darted around them to fill their champagne glasses, and answered all the technical questions about all the possible choices. Ed wanted a steak, Sam asked for the fish, and Jerry wanted chicken. Potatoes in various forms all around, green beans and mixed vegetables, no matter what they were called on the menu. More bread. More $200 a bottle champagne.

'Don't forget my extra gravy.'

'Honey, I need another napkin.'

'I gotta pee.'

She pointed out the men's lounge and went off to the pantry to key in her order on the computer. The she went to see about the two covers in the Jasmine Room, who were getting on fine. They'd ordered the moment they came in, skipped the salad, and didn't waste much time over the wine order, so their food was just about coming up the dumbwaiter as she got there. She was beginning to feel like she was catching on. Maybe waitressing was a matter of timing and presence. Acting. She could do this, and might like it, if it weren't for assholes like the men in the Honeysuckle Room.

As the night went on they started to grow on her, and she started to accept the situation, as long as they didn't touch her. No longer did her insides turn to acid when Ed spouted some broad innuendo the others found funny, nor her blood boil when they started singing at her. She was beginning to get an attitude. When it came to annoying her, they were no better than the guys she lived with.

She served the Jasmine Room their food and made them happy, and then slipped back into the Honeysuckle Room. 'Get your feet off the table.' She scolded Jerry like his grandma would, coming in with the salads and catching him with his chair way back and the heels of his Bally loafers on the table. She couldn't do that with the guys at home. There she was entirely mousy. Here she was queen of the room. Or could be. When she could pull it off.

Jerry came down with a whump, careening forward toward the centerpiece, smirking. She said, 'Thank you,' calmly, and continued to pass out the salads.

He pouted his mouth and said, 'Sorry, Ma'm.' While the other boys sat roaring. What do they find so funny? she wondered.

Ed reached over and slapped her on the ass. 'You know, Honey, we like you. You've got spunk. We're going get you to serve us every time we get together, from now on.'

She immediately regretted her attempt at making nice. 'Oh please don't. I couldn't take it.' She said in a desperate voice. They laughed and elbowed each other around the table. Like being stuck in a room with a bunch of Hee-Haw videos and a bottle of Jack Daniels.

'Ha. You know you love us.' He reached for her waist, but she skittered backwards.

'Tell me about your celebration,' she said, to change the subject. To poke them for a while.

'Well, Sugar, we just hit a milestone. We're still in the early phase of this little project of ours, and we're starting small, but we're fixing to create the next big thing right here in Atlanta.'

'What kind of big thing?'

'A gigantic live-work-play corridor. Phase One of the biggest commercial development in Atlanta, way bigger than Atlantic Station.'

Sam the architect explained. 'It's going to have all the features of the hottest products in the industry today. Gated neighborhoods. Surveillance cameras. Infrared. Bike paths. You'll be able to walk around at night. We're not going to clear cut all the trees, and we're doing all those environmental things that're so popular right now. Great tax breaks doing that.' The others agreed. 'We're planning more retail, and more restaurant space, and more office space. We're going to build a city within the city, but way bigger than the shrimpy 140 acres over at Atlantic Station. When we're done, we'll have three new zipcodes, a post office, a hospital, and a charter school, all of them brand spanking new. We're planning for fifty thousand new residents.

Jerry illustrated the concept with buzzwords. 'Pedestrian friendly, energy efficient. Green architecture. Preserve mature trees. Period style design with decor-friendly features. Sustainable, natural materials. Urban design principles promoting safety and community. A real hometown atmosphere where families can feel safe and enjoy all the benefits of living in an intown community.'

'And this is where there's already a neighborhood, right? Suzie thought to ask.

'Oh, sure' Ed said. 'The place has been a slum since the 60s. That area's always been poor black. But the neighborhood finally stabilized and the demographics are changing. Ever since the new construction started on that shopping center, prices have been rising. We've got to move fast.'

Suzie was trying to picture what part of town they were discussing. Traditionally black. That meant on the other side of the tracks from where the white folks lived, back when it was possible to zone that kind of thing. Maybe they were buying up some section of South Dekalb County along I-20 East. Maybe way down Memorial halfway to Stone Mountain. 'Where will the people that live there go?' she asked.

'Well, for a lucky few Section Eights, the law says we got to replace some of the neighborhood's existing public housing. But only ten percent , and anybody's got any kind of police record is automatically disqualified from the lottery. As for the owners, we're buying them out, so they'll have enough money to set themselves up wherever they want.'

'What about the ones that rent? They'll move to where?' Lots of the people they were talking about were undoubtedly old grandmas, people living in the same houses they'd been in for fifty years. They'd be lost anywhere else. Children and orphans and feeble old people.

'Oh, Jonesboro. Marietta. Someplace with public transportation.' He looked evenly at her with his pudgy eyelids and cheeks squinched up. His white shirt covered a barrel chest the size of a weather balloon. Suzie thought, The man's going to grow a Georgia Bulldog face if he doesn't undo that collar button.

'I don't care where they go,' he continued. 'They don't deserve what they've got. They've let the whole area slide into ruin. It's a goddamn slime pit. Crime. Murders, robbings, carjackings. Crack, unemployment, prostitutes, daylight shootings. Unwed mothers. Tenth grade educations.' He stopped to wipe his forehead with a napkin and take a drink.

'Now, I'm not against these people. They are living in a truly blighted area. I want to help them. What they need is a new start, a new place to learn how to be autominous. Lest you might think I was a racist, Young Lady' he said after another long slug, adjusting his belt like he was getting ready for a tussle, or like he had to take a leak.

'Hell, we're bending over backwards to give them a new start. We're giving them vouchers to get replacement housing somewheres else. We're giving them moving allowances, we're forgiving back rents in a bunch of cases. I'll have you know,' he said righteously, wagging his head in a lecture. 'We've partnered with local and national service providers to bring an end to chronic poverty in our city through a series of inter...uh...arrangements.' He stopped. 'Jerry?'

''Intermodal solutions that offer clients an engineered disconnect from the issues that contribute to their...'

'Their sorry ass jobless, crack-addicted selves,' he broke back in, remembering how it went. 'We're going to give them what they need, and push them out into the big world.'

'The program engages them on a journey that leads them into hope and self-sufficiency,' Jerry explained piously. 'Local-initiative and state and federal agencies are connecting underprivileged clients with targeted services. They're focusing on core choices that keep them from achieving autonomy, and offer them the opportunity to enjoy a new self enhancing lifestyle.'

What the hell are they talking about? Suzie wondered. Jerry sounded like an ad. Is that how lawyers talk? She went to check on the dumbwaiter, shaking her head. She didn't know whether to like Ed and Jerry or loathe them.

She'd never seen a developer up close. They talked large. Their numbers were all in the millions. The complexity of things that had to get done must be enormous. It sounded like more fun than Monopoly, and every bit as cutthroat as when she played her dad, back when they went on marathon trips, when they'd play for 18 hours straight sometimes. Monopoly, Trivial Pursuit, Risk. Atlanta to Boston.

She didn't know anything about developing. You buy some land, and you improve it. And then you sell it. But a million little things go into that simple process, starting with permits and testing. Developing a major property, you'd need to have the organization of an army. More complicated than being Executive Chef at a private club, that's for sure.

Architects, engineers, lawyers, consultants, bankers, contractors, suppliers, insurance - it must be like producing a movie. It sounded kind of exciting, as a career. Suzie briefly wondered if she would like to build houses and skyscrapers. She could take her personal vision of the way things should be, knock down an old neighborhood or tear down an old factory, and just build it the way she wanted it, like a permanent sand castle.

She passed out dinner, got a bunch of things they needed, and sat down in the lounge for a moment before going in to the Jasmine Room to check on things.

Tables one and two were almost through with their meals. The men had sped right through them and were drinking up the wine, the women were still picking at their plates. One couple at each table was talking, the rest were looking kind of tired. So they just had coffee and brandy, and looked like they were going right home when they left.

Suzie took a longer break, and sat with her shoes off and her feet up in the servants' quarters. It wasn't labeled servants' quarters. It actually had a little brass plate that said Employee Lounge and had to be polished every two weeks.

She sat rubbing her feet and trying to figure out her customers in the Honeysuckle Room. What a bunch of interesting, puzzling, annoying men. There were two ways to look at Ed's interest in her. Either he was kidding, or he was not. And if he was kidding, then she could tolerate it, barely. And if he was serious, then she'd find some way short of kneeing him to make him stop.

As for their development project, she was trying to look at it their way. Back in the '60s they bulldozed whole sections of the oldest parts of Atlanta to put in the interstates. They were doing something similar now, for the improvement of the city as a whole.

When a city is falling apart, sometimes you just have to bring it all down and groove on the rubble, as her dad used to say. And then build something new out of it, rising like the phoenix, like the noise of hammering and sawing after Sherman left.

They were just out to make some money and change the face of Atlanta. So what if there were people displaced and thrown into deeper poverty than before? It was the luck of the draw, and those kinds of people couldn't afford to live in the place once it got built, anyway, so they didn't matter.

She went back in to see what they were doing in the Honeysuckle Room. The men were still talking about their project. Financing. Lots of jargon that went in Suzie's ear and hit a big wall of ignorance. Mortgage-Backed and Floating Point and Blue Sky stuck in her head, because she got interesting images when she heard them. But everything else was lost immediately. So she gathered up the plates and waited to offer dessert. As long as they got their dinner orders in before stuff was put up in the kitchen, they could laze around as long as they wanted with the after dinner drinks, and she would be there to tend to them until they went downstairs. This night they didn't want to go downstairs. So she brought them brandies. And coffees. And desserts.

And the talk turned to love and a young man's fancy. 'You sure are a pretty little thing,' Ed started.

She rolled her eyes.

'Got a boyfriend?'

'Yes, I do,' she replied, refilling his coffee cup. 'So you can stop now.'

'Girl, I'm just getting started. On you. Suzie Q,'

Sam started to giggle. They were like a bunch of middle-aged eight year olds. She left the room when the next verse occurred to them: 'Well, Say That You'll Be Mine.'

They were drunk now. Well and truly. She left them alone, and set tables in the Jasmine Room for tomorrow's lunch. Then she went into the pantry and spot-polished glasses for awhile. Then she went back in to see how they were holding up.

Sam was holding his head up with his elbow. Ed and Jerry were talking business. Jerry was scribbling notes on his cloth napkin with a ballpoint. They broke off their conversation at her entrance, and Jerry got up and went to the men's room. Sam roused himself and followed. Ed turned to Suzie. She drew herself up, ready for anything, loosening her leg muscles in case she had to knee the guy, putting a kindly smile on her face in case she didn't.

'You sure you got a boyfriend?' He asked, approaching pretty skilfully for a drunk.

'Yes, I'm sure,' she said, going around the table collecting plates and silver. She made sure the points of all the silverware stuck out of the side of her fist where she could make use of them.

'Cuz I'm in the market for something cute as you are.' He followed, catching up.

'I don't think I want to be alone with you,' she said, edging to the door .

'Hell, I'm only as dangerous as you want me to be,' he whined.

She groaned. 'I meant I don't want to be alone with you because you smell,' she said, pushing him away with her shoulder.

He took that as a challenge, and came forward, but she was out the door. Then the other two returned and they stood around talking business for a few long moments. Suzie brought the ticket and Ed signed it. Then he leaned forward with the ticket in one hand and a twenty in the other hand, and slipped the money into her cummerbund as she was taking the bill. 'We'll be seeing more of you, Darling.' He winked, tugging at her waist.

'Just please stop saying things like that. It makes me very uncomfortable.' She was already rehearsing how she was going to fill out the harassment forms. Yes, she had made her feelings and intentions clear to the perpetrator.

'Aw, honey, I was just joking.' He sounded disappointed; she must have misunderstood him. Suzie wondered if maybe he was just like that and everyone just let him get away with it. The others came back in. 'Want to get your thing wet?' he whispered in her ear.

'This is sexual harassment.'

The boys broke up laughing and filed out of the room. Suzie followed, wishing she could help them down the stairs with her foot. She banged through the pantry door with the glasses.

It was late. The Service Manager had gone home and left them to close the dining room. Suzie ran into Yolanda downstairs at the time clock. She had a cigarette ready to light, and was heading out the door, but she waited, and Suzie gave her a lift to the Marta station to catch her train.

'I just don't think I can take it,' Suzie insisted, while Yolanda tried to calm her down. She was feeling near hysterics; that trapped, desperate feeling when something bad is happening that you can do nothing about. Not even a Krispy Kreme would help.

'It's not so bad.' Yolanda repeated. 'I've dealt with him plenty of times. That's just the way he is. He acts like that with everyone, and you just get used to it. He means no harm by it.'

Suzie felt anger bubble up inside. 'Well, I don't care if he thinks he's saying a prayer. I find it threatening, insulting, demeaning, definitely unwelcome, and harassing, and I want it stopped.' She was still rehearsing. 'I'm going to talk to the Service Manager tomorrow.'

Yolanda shook her head and took another puff of her cigarette, aiming the smoke out the open window as they drove slowly down Peachtree toward the Arts Center station. 'Like I told you before, you can't go to the manager about this. You'll just get in trouble.'

Suzie turned right to go around behind the High Museum, cruising by the giant Calder mobile sitting in the front yard. The paint's fading on the blades of that thing, she thought. How long has it been there? To Yolanda she whined, 'Why can't I take my complaint to him? I'm supposed to report sexual harassment to Management.'

Yolanda sighed. 'Because if you complain about it, they'll fire you.'

Suzie pounded the steering wheel. 'That's ridiculous. There are laws in this ountry to prevent things like that from happening.' She turned left again on Peachtree Walk and pulled up at the subway entrance. It was dark and spooky, deserted, echoey. Not how I'd want to get home late at night, she thought. 'Hey, where do you live? Maybe I could give you a ride home. I don't like the looks of this place.'

Yolanda shrugged. 'It's perfectly safe. Besides, I live way out Buford Highway. My husband meets me at my stop. I'll be fine.'

Suzie turned in her seat to look at Yolanda. 'So tell me how come they can fire me when I complain that my legal rights are being violated? That would be a violation of my legal rights.'

Yolanda shook her head. 'Silly. You work at a private club. They can fire you if your hair isn't right. And there's nothing you can do about it.'

Georgia is a right-to-work state. In typical euphemistic fashion, what 'right to work' means is right to be fired. Employers don't have to show cause to fire employees. They can just call you in, tell you to clean out your things, and walk you to the door without giving any reason at all. Of course, this means they have to pay unemployment, so what most employers do is either lay you off, or eliminate your position. They tell you that there is no longer any work for you to do in the company, and then turn around and give your workload to whoever is left in your department.

Your only recourse is to sue for unfair dismissal, and the burden is on you, as well as the legal expense. In a private club, there are even fewer employee safeguards. In a private club, the employers can do what they like, make conditions as hard as they want, treat employees like slaves. And there's nothing for the employees to do about it except walk.

If Suzie were to go to the Service Manager, he would listen to her complaint, watching the air above her head and avoiding her eyes. He would nod his head sympathetically. He would let her finish. And then he would look at it this way: the members pay his salary; he works for the members; his job is to make a pleasant dining experience for the members; his loyalty is to the members. If there's trouble in the pantry, then his job is to see that it gets fixed. In a private club, the squeaky wheel gets replaced.

It made her feel like a victim. And she hated feeling that way. But, although it made her very angry to have to put up with being treated like a hooker on Ponce, she could see how it might be wise to go along with it until she could get herself back into the kitchen, where she was safe from members with Don Juan complexes.

But she was still mad. So she drove home with her paintgun in her lap, and took potshots at a mailbox, three stop signs, a crossing signal, a stray dog (she missed that shot - it was moving), and the red light at the corner of Seaboard and Monroe, pumping the last three shots into the back of a Marta bus cruising slowly up Seaboard on its way to the station.

 

* * *

next, the guys don't give a fuck