Better for You

It was now only a couple of weeks left until winter break and while I was more than excited to spend the holidays with my friends and Harry, my anxiety was beginning to steadily increase. This would be my first Christmas without my father and our tradition of my father and I going on a Christmas trek while my mother cooked our roast dinner. This was going to be a hard holiday I knew but I was hoping that with Harry and my friends by my side, I would feel less alone.

The air had cooled into a constant frost which was too often combined with a biting wind that made me simply want to hurl up in my bed all day and watch a Friends marathon with a scented candle alight also. However, my work had other plans and caused me to sigh as I changed into my shirt and skirt, preparing for my horrible shift. It was a Friday night shift which meant that I would be at the restaurant until midnight and I was already feeling tired despite the fact that it was only 5 o’clock.

“Fudge me, I have got the moodiest pig ever in table number 9.” Amy moaned at me, the moment I walked into the kitchen as I grabbed a notepad and pen.

“Oh really? What happened?” I asked her, my hands quickly tying my hair up in a messy bun as I faced Amy’s frustrated face.

“He sent the food back because there weren’t enough fries in his bowl! I was like, that is the serving size, but if you like I can get you some extra if you like – I mean I was being super nice and he then had a fat go at me for being rude to him and complained that the menu was overpriced! Argh, just talking about him is angering me off!” Amy ranted, using her arms to emphasize her anger, which I did empathise with due to my own previous experiences with rude customers.

“Ok, well I can take him if you really like? I’m really sorry but I’ve got to go to a table 13, I’ve been warned that they’re a big table.” I told Amy and she nodded her head in response.

“Ok, thank you for the offer but I want to be overly polite to him and shove it right up his arse.” Amy told her and I smiled at her in approval. Amy was the sweetest, kindest girl going and I did feel a protective urge to have a go at the rude customer for being so cruel to a person who had the biggest heart going, but then I also didn’t fancy losing my job just before Christmas.

I walked to table 13, the table that was reserved for large parties of eight or more when I saw a familiar face amongst the crowd of guys. The ocean eyes that belonged to the kind boy from my law class looked into mine and filled with an emotion that I couldn’t decipher. “Izzy,” He greeted with a small smile that didn’t seem to meet his eyes.

“Adam.” I returned with a smile also when a friend of Adam’s coughed just to make the atmosphere awkward.

“Oh, so Adam is the girl that pied you off then?” One of the boys who had messy light brown curly hair that covered his eyes hollered at Adam causing my cheeks to redden as my eyes widened.
“Hum, yes, well my name is Izzy and I’ll be your waitress tonight. Are you ready to order any drinks?”

After a gruelling two hours of waiting on Adam and his friends, I was more than ready to hand them their check. Adam himself hadn’t done anything wrong, he’d just been silent throughout the whole evening, but his friends had decided that it was funny to make inappropriate remarks about me to Adam.

For example, after I had handed them their food, Adam’s friend with the brown curly hair commented that he could see why Adam was attracted to me, seeing as I was well trained at serving men food. Suffice to say that my hands were balled into fists, my jaw was clenched, my blood was boiling and I was fuming.

Reluctantly, I had returned to the table to hand them their bill. “There you go, will any of you need to be paying by card?” I asked the table and two of them raised their hands and so I left the table to get the card machine when I saw Amy who looked incredibly flustered as she tried to work the cash register.

“You alright there Amy?” I asked Amy as I picked up the card machine and switched it on.

“No – I can’t seem to get the cash register to open.” Amy replied with furrowed brows as she prodded the buttons of the machine relentlessly, probably causing more harm than good to her quest in opening the cash register.

“Let me have a go.” I told Amy, placing a soft, comforting hand on her arm as I led her away from the cash register. I frowned as I looked at the cash register, flickering my eyes to Amy’s agitated form, when I noticed the tears forming in her eyes and I knew that something wasn’t right.

“Um, remember all that you have to do is press this button here saying ‘options’, then click on the button saying cash register and the select the open cash register tab.” I explained to Amy, although I knew that she already knew this and so there was another reason as to why she couldn’t work the machine.

“Oh, right, of course yeah.” Amy nodded, scratching the back of her neck. I eyed her rattled form for a couple of seconds.

“Amy, I’ve got to quickly finish off with my large table but I want you to take a break and go to the locker room and I’ll meet you there in a couple of seconds, ok?” I told Amy and she nodded her head to show that she understood what I meant before walking off in the direction of the locker room.

I inhaled a deep breath, preparing myself to see Adam and his friends, before walking in the direction of their table. “Hi, so who would like to pay by card?” I asked as I reached the table, serving the group.

After everyone had paid they all started getting up from the table and putting on their coats as they prepared to leave. “Thank you all for dining with us tonight.” I told them with a smile, readying myself to walk away and find Amy, when the curly haired brunette spoke up again.

“No, thank you for providing us the most pleasant view when you were both walking towards and away from us, it takes a special type of talent to be able to do both I’ll tell you.” He told me and I had to physically bite my lip to restrain myself from firing back a comment which I knew would get me fired.

“You would know given how many girls you’ve had to watch walk away from you.” This comment surprisingly did not come from my lips but in fact came from the lips of Adam who had been incredibly quiet up until now.

“Oh, so you do have a voice? I was so sure that it had run away along with your pride.” The other guy fought back, and I internally rolled my eyes, wanting to be anywhere else but here.

“Oh please, I lost my pride many years ago when I became friends with you.” Adam retorted and I almost chuckled.

“Touché.” Adam’s friend responded, clearly not having a response to Adam’s remark. The rest of the table disintegrated and left the restaurant but Adam hung around for a few seconds later.

When the whole table had left, Adam then chose to speak to me. “Izzy, I’m so sorry about Brian, he’s a twat and he shouldn’t have done anything that he did.”

“You don’t need to apologise for Adam, but if you don’t like what he’s saying then why don’t you say anything?” I asked Adam, trying to not show anger at Adam but still feeling slightly frustrated with people who had an issue with something but never spoke out about the issue.

“I don’t know, he’s my friend and stuff and so I just didn’t want to make it awkward.” Adam tried to explain, although it was evident that he himself didn’t really believe in what he was saying.

“Ok, well it was nice to see you, take care.” I replied to Adam, forcing a smile at him which he returned before leaving. I then took my small break in waiting as an opportunity to find Amy in the locker room.

When I reached the lockers, I heard heavy breathing and found Amy with both of her arms extended and leaning on the lockers with her head bowed to the floor. “Amy?” I asked softly and I heard her inhale a deep breath before she lifted her face to look at me, the light in the locker room reflecting off of the tears that were falling down her cheeks.

“Hey, what’s going on?” I asked Amy gently, approaching her slowly and taking her into my arms so that I could direct her in the direction of the bench where we both took a seat on.

“That customer, that bloody customer!” Amy spoke in a raised voice, shaking her head in frustration.

“Ok, what did he do?” I questioned softly.

“He, he told me that I was useless. He said that he had no clue - as to why I was even working here - and that this was the best job that I’d ever get.” Amy recalled, speaking through hiccups as she wiped her tears with the back of her hand.

“Amy that’s not true, you know that. You are a very intelligent 17-year-old who is going to Stanford University next year! He doesn’t know you, he is just a bitter man who clearly has nothing better to do with his time than shout at waitresses.” I explained to Amy, shocked at how rude the customer had been to Amy, that was just way out of line and unacceptable.

“But what if I lose my job because of this? I can’t afford to lose my job, Izzy, I need all the money I can get to get me through college and pay off my dad’s medical bills!” Amy stressed, her body shaking in worry. My heart ached for Amy, I didn’t know the details of her situation but I knew that her dad was very sick and her mum’s job didn’t pay well so Amy had a lot of pressure to earn money for her family.

“Amy, calm down, breathe.” I instructed Amy calmly, taking her hands in mine and mimicking breathing patterns for her to copy to try and calm her down. “It’s going to be ok, Amy, he’s one customer, he can’t do anything to you I promise.” I told Amy gently, running a soothing hand up and down her back as I spoke.

“But you don’t know that though, Dave can be a difficult if he wants to be and what if he’s in a bad mood and just has enough of me and fires me?” Amy rambled and I shook my head at her words.

“You haven’t done anything that is punishable by dismissal so he can’t fire you Amy, the worst that Dave can do is give you a warning which would be harsh even then.” I told Amy and she went to interrupt me however I put my hand up to her and continued, “but, if you do for some ridiculous reason then I will do everything in my power to get Dave to rehire you or help you get an even better job, Amy; you’re not alone in this, ok?”

Amy was quiet for a second, her eyes cast down towards her hands before she raised her face to look at me and nodded her head. “Thank you, Izzy.”

“You don’t need to thank me, Amy, I’m happy to help.” I told Amy with a small smile before giving her a comforting hug.

A few hours later, the restaurant was closing as I was handing the check to the final table. “Thank you for dining with us, have a lovely evening.” I told the final customers as they left, before letting out a sigh as closing the registers. I checked my phone to see the time when I saw a text from Harry asking if I was nearly finished.

I furrowed my brows, unsure as to why he was asking me this, but replied nonetheless saying that I would be 5 minutes.

I checked the tables one last time and then Amy, Fred (the chef) and Dave and I all grabbed our stuff from the lockers and then exited the restaurant, and into the bitter cold outside air. “Are you going to be ok?” I asked Amy quietly outside of the restaurant, and she nodded her head and gave me a small smile.

“Yeah, I talked it through with Dave and he was really understanding and said that he would support me if the customer did write a complaint.” Amy replied and I smiled, happy that the situation had turned out alright. Amy then gave me a quick hug goodbye before getting into her car and driving off.

Then as I looked around the parking lot, I noticed Harry sitting in his car, the light on his phone illuminating his face. A smile warmed its way onto my face and I walked towards his car, then tapping on his window. Harry’s face whipped towards me, and he leant over to open the door to let me inside and out of the freezing cold air outside.

“Hey, what are you doing here?” I asked Harry with a big grin on my face that he seemed to mirror.

“I thought you might wanna come to mine tonight?” Harry asked me and I bit my lip and nodded at him.

“I would love to – only problem is that I brought my car here.” I told Harry but he shrugged in response.

“That’s fine, we can pick it up tomorrow morning.” Harry answered, before taking my hand in his and started up the engine, causing my stomach to perform Olympic standard flips and somersaults at the simple action.

I inhaled a deep breath, feeling completely content in this moment and wanting to capture it in my mind and engrave it into my memory for eternity.