Ricky grabbed the pizza peel, spun around and dropped two pies into the first oven. He spun back around tossed some corn meal on the peel and grabbed another dough ball. It was Friday night at Pepi's, the most popular pizza place in town, and the place was packed. All the tables were full and there was a line spilling outside waiting. On top of that there were many customers waiting for take out.
Steve pulled more tickets off the wheel and yelled out " We got a rack and a stack!"
Ricky just shook his head.
" 4 oven night for sure." He quipped over to Steve.
" Well then you better hump it brother." was his reply.
A rack and a stack meant that there were more than 60 orders waiting. The rack above the cutting table where the pizzas were sliced and put on trays for serving or into boxes for take out held 60 tickets, a stack meant that the rack was full and a pile of tickets were waiting to be put on the rack.
Pepi's kitchen held two side by side double stack pizza ovens. Ricky was the pizza maker and Steve the pizza puller. They had been a team for over 2 years now and had had many nights like this. Both men had sweat pouring off their faces and their uniform shirts were splotched with wet spots Standing in front of the ovens with the doors being opened constantly was hot enough. But when you added the frantic pace they were working at, it became a full on sweatfest.
Each oven could hold 6 pizzas. Ricky made the pizzas and tossed them into the upper right hand oven which was directly behind him.
Steve would then turn the pizzas to help them cook evenly and then drop them into the second and then the third oven to make room for more. Each pizza took between 15 and 20 minutes to cook depending on how many toppings they had. In order to get into the fourth oven the maker had to be making pizzas at a rate of better than one pizza per minute.
There were two other cooks in the kitchen, Jeff the kitchen manager and pasta maker did all the pasta orders on a stove next to the ovens, and Timmy, the salad boy who handled all the salads and garlic bread and sandwiches. Every cook in there had started as salad boy, which was low man on the totem pole and got most of the shit jobs.
Ricky spun around and dropped two more pies and then threw more corn meal on the peel. The corn meal kept the dough from sticking to the double sized wooden peel. Then he grabbed a large dough ball, flopped it into the flour bin to coat it and keep it from sticking to his hands and started kneading it.
First he pinched about a one inch strip around the out side of the ball, this made the crust part of the pizza. Then he put the pinched ball on the peel and pushed his palm into the middle of it and pressed and spread the dough at the same time. Once he had it flattened he picked it up and spreading his fingers out in a fanned twisting motion tossed it in the air three or four times. This spread the dough out until it was the right size. All of this was done at lightning speed.
He then dropped the spread dough onto the peel and grabbed another dough ball and repeated the process. Once he had both of them prepped he ladled sauce onto the pies. Starting in the middle he spun the bottom of the ladle around and out till the sauce completely covered the dough to the edge of the crust. Then came whatever toppings were ordered and on top of that the cheese.
Now lots of makers could get into four ovens if they were only making cheese pizzas, but Pepi's was famous for it's "Works" which had Pepperoni, Canadian bacon, salami, sausage, olives, onions, mushrooms and bell peppers . All of these having to be spread over 18 inches of dough. Very few people could do all this in under two minutes. Ricky could. He tossed the two pies into the oven then grabbed the next two tickets.
As soon as he looked at the first ticket he yelled over at Steve to call waitress number 7. Steve reached over to the pager system and pressed #7. This made a pager stuck to the waitresses apron vibrate and was how the cooks let the waitresses know when their food was ready.
Ricky had dropped #7's order and picked up the next one and started making two more pizzas while he waited for #7 to show up. He knew this had to be a new waitress because he knew all of them and this number used to belong to Kathy who had quit last week.
When he heard the girls voice kind of timidly ask if her order was ready Ricky slapped her ticket down on the counter in front of her and said, " I know you are new, but I also know they told you not to take special orders during the rush." " I don't have time to make a pizza with one slice cheese and two slices just pepperoni, and the rest whatever; got it?"
A very dejected and kind of scared little, " I'm sorry; I forgot." squeaked out of the girl and for the first time Ricky actually stopped and looked at her.
She looked like she was 12 years old. She was tiny, her head barely making it over the counter. Beautiful sun blonde hair pulled into a ponytail. One of the cutest faces he had ever seen, and these diamond blue eyes that actually sparkled. Ricky had heard of sparkling eyes before but this was the first time he had seen eyes like this. Every time she moved her head the light flashed out of her eyes like one of those disco balls.
For a second he was mesmerized. Then he shook his head, sweat flying off of it when he did, and said," It's O.K., I'll make this one just no more during rush alright?"
At this she smiled up at him and that was it, Ricky fell in love right there and then. Well at least he would later admit to himself that he fell in lust.
She mumbled a "Thanks" and walked back into the dining room.
It took Ricky a second or two to bring his focus back to the pizza orders, but he was so busy he didn't even see this #7 again for the rest of the night.
The Friday night rush usually lasted about 5 hours. Non stop craziness from around 4:30 to 9:30. After that it slowed to a mere trickle and everyone started restocking their stations and cleaning up. Ricky had all this down to a science and quickly finished his station.
He told Jeff he was out of there and clocked out. Because of his talents in making pizza he held a little status in the kitchen and was able to leave before anyone else. Steve would take over making any late orders and the salad boy would be responsible for cleaning the counters and floors.
Ricky walked through the now nearly empty dining room and then into the men's room. He stripped off his sweat soaked uniform and splashed water on his face and upper torso at the sink. He gave himself a quick glance in the mirror as he toweled himself off.
He knew he was no great shakes, only 5' 8" tall with dirty blonde wispy hair. He was deceptively strong for a little guy, but body builder was not the first thing to come to any ones mind the first time they saw him. But he had a pretty good tan from hanging out at the beach during the days before work. Blue/green eyes and a slightly too big almost hawkish nose. A decent smile. When looked at from certain angles he understood he was pretty good looking, but from the wrong angle he could look kind of goofy.
He had once overheard a friend of an ex-girlfriend of his say she thought he looked like a lizard. But there was also the time he had been told by a girl that he was a "stone fox". So he didn't really dwell on it one way or the other.
He finished cleaning up, put on the clean shirt he had brought along to work, combed his wet hair and headed out the front door. Sitting on the bench in front of the restaurant was #7.
At first glance he thought she looked even younger out of her uniform. He knew she had to be at least 18 because Pepi's served alcohol and the waitresses had to be at least 18 to work there. But she really looked like she was still in Junior high. She was very thin and her T-shirt left no doubt that she had tiny almost non-existent breasts. But the smile she gave him when she saw him come out the door just exuded sex appeal and took his breath away.