I frowned, not that it did much good. Max couldn't see it, being 30 miles away as he was.
"Why, exactly?" I seethed.
"Look at the budget," he urged.
Although supposedly good at my job (or good enough to be promoted to the lofty station of 'supervisor', at least...) there were more than a few things that I wasn't actually sure how to do. Checking the staff budget was one of them. I gave the till a contemptuous look and thought about making a conscious effort to actually work it out, but instead decided on keeping up with the pretense that had seen me that far already.
"Oh yeah," I said in my most convincing tone. "Isn't that something?"
"I know!" Max said worriedly. "Ellen would have our arses if it got much higher. It's best I don't come in."
I frowned again before remembering he couldn't see me. "You didn't think of bringing this up yesterday?"
There was a long pause. "Actually, it just came to me a few minutes ago."
"Surprising..." I muttered. Then louder. "You realise that means I have to work open - close, just like last Sunday, by the way, don't you?"
"Oh yeah," Max said. "I hadn't thought about that."
I growled, forgetting myself.
"Look," he said. "I can come in, but you need to let me know in the next five minutes otherwise I'm not going to be able to catch the train."
"Yes I want you to bloody come in!" I shouted. "You know I want you to come in! I'm suppose to finish at 2 and you want me to finish at 6. I do have a life outside of work, you know; hard as it may be to believe."
"You've got plans then?"
As far as I was concerned, I did have plans. Going home and nursing my hangover, to me, was a plan and a much better plan than staying at work and nursing my hangover.
"I had an afternoon off at the weekend (something of a rarity, in case you hadn't noticed); of course I had plans."
"Ah," Max said, knowingly. "Asprin and a nice warm blanket, before starting the cycle again tonight?"
I snorted, a little in anger and a little in amusement, but mainly because it seemed in keeping with my general demeanor.
"My reputation precedes me," I said. "Look, can't you just come in? I feel like crap."
"You've got a day off tomorrow," Max yawned.
"I do at the moment," I laughed. "You'll probably decide you're not going to come in and Maddy'll call me up and say I have to work."
"That won't happen!" Max said. "Look, I'm going to phone Maddy and let her know what's going on."
"What that you're coming in so I can leave at 2?"
"Very funny."
I sighed, trying to calm myself. Then the anger burst out of me again.
"You're a peach, Max," I said, enunciating almost every second syllable, like some over-trained actor. "A real peach. You know that? I hope you know that, buddy."
"Calm down," he said. "It's not so bad a job."
I didn't say anything.
The dialtone started.
I slammed the phone back into the cradle, imagining it was a particularly sensitive part of Max's body.
"Motherfucker," I muttered.
The cafe was typically empty. The wooden floor (which only I seemed too bothered about sweeping and mopping, Max opting to save such ceremonies for "special occasions"), was spotless, owing mainly to the fact that I closed the night before and I hadn't had a customer yet. The few tables were pristine, except for one that was at slightly less of a right-angle than I would have liked. I sighed and walked over, adjusting it accordingly before looking out of the window (which encompassed the entire northern wall) at the empty street. The sun hit the stone in a way I thought would have been quite artistic if I wasn't in a town I regarded (and still do) and the most mundane place on the planet.
I ambled over to the coffee machine and made myself a cappuccino which, after working in coffee shops for longer than I had ever intended, was second nature to me.
Put coffee in holder.
Lock holder in machine.
Put cup under holder.
Press the button.
Put milk in jug.
Put steamer arm in milk.
Turn lever.
Wait for milk to heat and thicken.
Turn lever the other way.
Pour milk into cup.
Repeat depending on the amount of orders you have.
I thought about all of the training the company had paid for me to have and how all that training had really encompassed was heating milk. My manager, Maddy, readily admitted that I didn't really need the training but "It wouldn't hurt". Annoyed at the condescending tone of the "expert" I lost my concentration and burned my forearm on the milk steamer. Maddy had been wrong. It did hurt.
The phone rang and I grabbed it.
"Hello, Maddy," I sighed.
"How did you know it was me?" she laughed.
"Well, it was either you or the president of Penguin Books phoning to tell me that they'd read 'Endless Tides' and wanted to publish my next book and give me a ridiculous sum of money for it, but, then I remembered that he was going to get back to me sometime next week. Thusly, by process of elimination (elimination, in your case, probably not being the worst thing in the world) I deducted that it was you."
There was a pause.
"I didn't get any of that," Maddy said in that voice that had an aversion to saying "T"s.
"Don't worry about it," I sighed at the thought of wasting quite a good rant. "How can I help?"
"You've spoken to Max?" she asked.
"I spoke," I said. "Judging by the outcome of the conversation he either wasn't listening or didn't hear. But I suppose we could be said to have spoken."
"Uh... okay. So you know he's not coming in?"
"I am all too aware."
"It's a good idea the two of you had," she said. "That's the sort of thinking Ellen likes to see."
"Indeed," I said in a voice that transformed the actual meaning of the word into 'Of course she does. Who wouldn't like me to work on my own so that they could line their own pockets with money that has been earned exclusively down to my hard work.'
"Well," Maddy said. "As long as you're okay with it."
I didn't say anything.
The dialtone started.
I slammed the phone back into the cradle imagining it was something that Maddy really cared about. You know, like a vase handed down her family through generations or one of her kids' faces.
"Motherfucker..." I muttered.
I'd been open almost an hour and I still hadn't had a customer. Now, I'm what has always been referred to as a 'hard worker' but it's pretty hard to live up to that when there's no work to be done. I'd already done the weekly cleaning (which in my case was more like the daily cleaning) and I'd just spent half an hour organising the CVs that people had handed in into alphabetical order, gender and age, photocopying each one so there three copies in order for me to see which order I liked the most.
"The next person who hands a CV in can have my job," I muttered, placing all three filing systems next to the till.
Although a hard worker, I always made it a point of honour never to take work too seriously, if only for the fact that I have better things to do with my time. As such, I like to keep my mobile phone on me just in case, and this is really a shot in the dark, someone vaguely interesting wants to get in touch with me. What can I say? I'm all about making the day go quicker.
It just so happened, at that moment, I got a phone call from someone I deemed (and, to this day, deem) one of the most interesting people on the planet.
"Hello, Lilly," I said with a smile.
"Hello, stranger," she said in that voice that was half-way between cutesey and sarcastic. "What are you up to?"
"I'm at work, or in Hell. It's hard to tell the difference. Which is the one with the red guy who carries the pitchfork?"
She laughed. "That would be Hell. I believe his name's Satan."
I smiled. "Satan? No, this guy's Stan. I think he has high blood pressure. As for the pitchfork, I can only assume he's one of my more rural customers."
She laughed again, then we shared a silence that only the best of friends can comfortably share.
"It's dead here," I eventually said. "Come for a coffee."
"I can't," she sighed. "I have work in half an hour."
"Better be quick then," I joked. "How is work?"
"Don't try and be funny with me, stranger," she growled, but I knew she wasn't angry at me. "You know perfectly well how work is."
"Do I now, brother?" I laughed, partly at the way she was trying to butt heads with me and partly at amount of inflections I'd put in the sentence.. 'Brother' was just one of the myriad in-jokes we had. "What's so bad about it over there?"
Judging by the strange noise she made I guess she was trying not to laugh.
"You know what's wrong with it," she said. "I hate it. I just hate it. Spending all my day waiting for customers to walk in. I hate it."
"Tell me what that's like," I laughed. "Sorry, Lilly, but I didn't quite catch the sentiment in that sentence. I get the feeling that you hate it, but you didn't say outright..."
"Do you have to antagonise every situation?"
I shrugged, before remembering she couldn't see me.
"How is Aunt Agonise, these days?" I asked in the accent I always imagined Holden Caulfield as speaking in.
She laughed, then she sighed. "I have to go."
"Okay," I said. "Chin up though, yeah?"
"Yeah," she said. "I'll see you next week."
I smiled. "That's what you said last week and the one before that, if my memory serves me correctly."
"I'm working all the time in a job I hate," she said. "It's not easy."
"You're not the only person who hates their job," I said suggestively.
"Really now, brother? Well, I mean it this week. I want to see you."
"We'll see," I said. "You'll feel differently when you actually see me, I'm sure."
"Oh, definitely," she laughed.
We said "bye" and we both hung up.
It's at this point that I'd like the reader to remember that I opened at 10am. It was now 13:30 and my first customer came in. They were the upper end middle-aged and the upper end of middle-class and the type of customer I tended to get in our 'artisan' coffee shop. He gave me a look I was used to (the kind of look that told me he didn't approve of the length of my hair...) and walked over to the till.
"I'll have a Flat White," he said.
Having been a barista for over a year by that point, it was my professional opinion (and still is, I hasten to add) that anyone who ordered a Flat White was, for the very act of ordering a Flat White, an arsehole. Add into the mix that he didn't even say 'hello', 'please' or, when I gave him his change, ' thank you' and you have something a little stronger than my usual disdain for the customers.
I made it for him and took it to his table. He didn't thank me for that either. When I got back to the coffee machine I muttered, under my breath, "Motherfucker..."
It was just about that time when my anger reached it's high point and I wrote this note for Max:
'Dear Max,
Thank you so much for deciding to let me work today, you absolute
I hope staying at home wasn't to straining!!!! You didn't pull a muscle putting your feet up on the sofa, did you? I hope not. Because you're going all of your leg muscles to run from me and the axe I'm going to be holding the very next time I see you.
Incidently, when are you moving back in with your parents? Soon isn't it? And why did you have to move back in? Was it because you couldn't pay the rent on your old place by any chance? Have you considered working more hours as opposed to less? For some reason, and I can't quite work it out, but when I work more hours my pay cheque is bigger. Now, I'm not saying that the two are related, but maybe you could try it one month and maybe we'll have more evidence? Just a thought.
I have to go now because somebody (read: me/myself/I) has to sweep and mop the floor which, despite it being part of your job, you seem incapable of doing.
Enjoy breathing while you still have a body to keep up the habit.
All my murderous, vengeance-filled hatred,
Sam
"Excuse me," a quiet voice said from the direction of the till.
"Motherfucker," I growled under my breath and continued to sign off my note.
"Excuse me," it said again.
"What?" I growled, spinning around to face them.
It was a guy a little younger than me with hope in his eyes and a love of life yet to be extinguished by working in catering or hospitality.
"I just came to hand my CV in," he said.
I smiled, thinking of how perfect he was. How he could do with a good soul-crushing and how this job was the perfect catalyst for it.
"You're hired," I said. "I'm leaving."
I looked at the clock. It was almost 2pm.
