suppressed frustration, nervous energy, caffeine and alcohol. The night
garde-manger man, Angel, who looks like he's twelve but sports a tattoo
of a skull impaled with a dagger on his chest (future wife-beater, I think)
is falling behind; he's got three raviolis, two duck confits, five green
salads, two escargots, two Belgian endive and Stilton salads, two
cockles, a smoked salmon and blini, two foie gras and a pâté working
—and the sauté and grill stations are calling for urgent vegetable sides
and mashed potatoes. I swing the pastry commis over to Angel's station
to help out, but there's so little room, they just bump into each, getting in
each other's way.
Tim, a veteran waiter, is dry-humping Cachundo—to Cachundo's
apparent displeasure. He's blocking the lane and impeding traffic in the
narrow kitchen with his thrusting. I have to ask Tim nicely not to
sexually harass my runners during service . . . after work, please. An
order comes back for refire and Isidoro is not happy about it; it's cooked
perfectly. I peer out into the dark dining room and see nothing except the
dark silhouettes of customers waiting for tables at the bar, hear, even
over the noise in the kitchen, the ambient chatter, the constant roar of
diners as they shout over the music, the waiters describing specials over
that noise, then fighting each other to get at the limited number of
computer terminals to place orders, print out checks. "Fire table
fourteen! Catorsayy! . . . That's six, seven, fourteen and one on fire!" I
shout "Isidoro! You time it!" "I ready fourteen," says Isidoro, the grill
man, as he slaps the refire back on a plate. Cachundo reaches around me
and loads up with food, picking out plates seemingly at random, as if
he's plucking daisies. I dry-swallow some more aspirins, and duck back
into the stairwell for a few puffs of a cigarette.
A whole roasted fish comes back. "The customer wants it deboned," says
an apologetic waiter. "I told them it comes on the bone," he whines,
anticipating decapitation himself. Isidoro growls and works on the
returned fish, slipping off the fillets by hand and then replating it. The
printer is going non-stop now. My left hand grabs tickets, separates out