At midnight, while Bill and Marie were busy cleaning up after the long and hectic dinner rush, the loud noises of noisemakers, balloons popping and loud cheers came from the dining room. The dishwashers had already left. Bill was busy scrubbing down the line. Marie was busy doing the same thing on her station. Almost simultaneously they stopped work and looked at each other.
“Happy fucking new year,” Marie said to Bill.
Bill dropped his scrubber into his soap pail and walked over to Marie. He took her up in his arms and gave her a full kiss on the lips. Marie kissed back and held Bill tight. “I hope it’s a better year for you,” Bill said. “I hope you don’t get hit anymore.”
“I wish it would be like that,” Marie said. “But I ain’t got no hopes.”
Bill went back to work as did Marie. A moment later the kitchen door opened and Lorraine walked in carrying a beer. She walked around the counter and onto the line and gave Bill both the beer and a big kiss.
“You staying over tonight?” she asked.
“Yeah, why not?” Bill said. “I be done in about a half an hour.”
“Be longer for us,” Lorraine said.
As Lorraine was leaving the kitchen, Victoria came through the doors with a tray full of dirty dishes on her shoulder. She dropped the tray down by the dishwasher machine and went onto the line and gave Bill a big kiss. “Happy new year sweetie,” she said. Bill smiled at her and pinched her cheek.
“Same to you,” he said.
The rest of the night was unremarkable. While Suburban did not have a New Year’s Eve party per se, the bar was open and Bebe kept replenishing pretzels, potato chips and beer nuts. The bar was packed but the dining room was starting to empty out, more so after the new year had turned and the people at the tables were starting to go home. Since the waitresses had eaten, there was nothing much to be done except for cleaning up and setting up for the morning. The restaurant would be open on New Year’s Day, but only for the dinner meal and not until noon. Bill could actually sleep in, somewhat, because he had to be in at nine to help start setting up. Henry Lee would also be in, and he had a full day’s work ahead of him to cut meat for both stores.
When Bill finished his work, first thing he did was go into Tommy’s office and call his fiancé. Unfortunately, what happened was he woke up her parents, which was not a happiness. However, they went on and got her so he spoke for several moments to his fiancé and told her he missed her and looked forward to seeing her. This was actually true. He did miss her and he missed her presence.
From there he went down the front stairs and into the back where he started to change clothes. Unbeknownst to him, Marie was lying in ambush. She found him in the clothes room. Quickly and happily, she locked the door from the inside. This was only one of a few doors in the place that actually had an inside lock.
“Boy,” she said, “I just love jumping your bones.”
“Girl,” Bill said, “sometimes I like having my bones jumped. But don’t you have somewhere to be?”
“My kids are asleep. He’s out probably. He’s doing whatever it is he’s doing. He could’ve come here you know. You see him anywhere around? About the only thing I know is that maybe he’ll be home when I get there. Maybe he won’t. Maybe he’s doing the babysitter for all I know.”
“Goddamn,” Bill said.
“Yeah,” Marie said. “Goddamn.”
Coming Right After Mother’s Day
