No, but I'm hopeful
I'm Jason McKenzie, 32 years old, graduated from high school when I was 18, had my first piece of ass when I was... well, never mind, that doesn't matter, and I never went to college. Why? I started bussing tables in a restaurant when I was 16 and I'm still at that same restaurant; only now I'm the manager. It's the only job I've ever had.
It's a nice restaurant and the owner, Benjamin (Benjy) Wright, lets me do pretty much what I please; that's partly because he's rarely here. He spends a lot of time bouncing between this restaurant and his other three and traveling. He travels, he says, to sample wines from all over the world so he can serve them in his restaurants. My restaurant is the smallest and in the smallest city.
I'd been the manager for almost three years. I had an assistant manager who had been here the same. In fact, he was hired to replace me when I replaced the last manager. As manager, I don't work nights... okay, that isn't true; I don't generally work late nights. I usually get to the restaurant around 10 in the morning and leave around eight in the evening. The assistant manager, Gabe Paulus, gets to work at six in the evening and works until the place is empty, cleaned, and ready for the next day. That's usually around one or two in the morning.
We don't have any Michelin Stars, but we serve a good meal at a fair price and the owner prides himself on his wine selection. Our wine prices range from $24 to $268 a bottle. We sell very few of the latter.
We also have a piano player on Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday evenings. We include Wednesday's because it's our slowest night of the week and it seems to help bring in diners.
We are open for lunch and dinner and have lots of repeat customers who generally seem to have favorite times to come. We had one couple who came every Wednesday. They came to eat and dance. The gentleman never had more than two cocktails or two glasses of wine during the course of the evening, and his wife never more than one. "She's a cheap date," he said more than once. "It's not that I'm a cheap date," she would counter, "it's just that I have a very low tolerance for alcohol and more than one drink makes me totally and uncontrollably, drunk".
Their names were Louise and Sidney Thompson. They were a couple of years older than I, and taught at our local university. He taught History and she taught English Literature; not that it matters.
I knew this about them because every evening before I leave for home, I walk through the restaurant doing my 'meet and greet'. The Thompsons had been regulars for almost four years and, as both assistant manager and manager, I would usually take a little time to chat with them and others. They always left good tips for their servers and I would occasionally 'comp' their meals. On those occasions, they were particularly generous with their tips.
Another thing I sensed about them was that one, or both, had money.
Louise and Sidney had an aura of quality about them. To my knowledge, I didn't know any other college professors and if everything I'd heard about how underpaid they were was true, the Thompsons weren't living on professorial incomes. I would occasionally hear them talk about vacations they had taken or wanted to take. Hers invariably involved ocean voyages. Apparently, she and her whole family loved them and cruised as often as they could.
Another thing I noticed about Louise was she didn't like being teased. I witnessed it on a couple of occasions when Sid would tease her about some small thing.
"If you know she hates it, why do you do it?" I asked him once.
"I can't help it," he laughed. "I know she's going to be pissed, but it's like a moth being drawn to a flame. I know it's potentially fatal, but I can't resist it."
I laughed and went on about my business.
I really like my job, but it has a major disadvantage: working until eight or later every evening except Sunday and Monday has eliminated any meaningful social life for me. I've had dates and managed to get laid occasionally, but it has not been nearly as often as I would like. I've thought about changing jobs, but I don't know how to do anything else. As I've already mentioned, this is the only job I've ever had.
I do get four weeks of annual vacation and I use them to attain my principal goal for vacations and that is to get laid as often as I can and I'm not necessarily particular about the age, ethnicity, social status, or wealth of my partner. The only requirements are that she be available, willing, and a happy, joyful participant in the activity and absolutely NOT an employee or customer.
Needless to say, I mostly live a life of celibacy.
Then they stopped coming and it was It was three months before I saw one of the Thompson's again and it was on a Thursday, not the regular Wednesday, and it was Louise, alone. I am careful when I approach a customer to chat. I try to do it after they've ordered their meal or just after they've finished eating and are just sitting, relaxed, and enjoying an after-dinner drink or music on those evenings we have it. But that evening, Louise was just picking at her food and seemed off in 'lala land', so I stopped.
"Good evening," I started, "we've missed you."
She smiled. "Good evening, Jason."
"You've barely touched your food. Is something wrong with it."
"Oh, no, it's great as usual. I'm just a bit off tonight."
"Where's Sid?"
"I don't know. We're separated."
"Really?" I hesitated. "Would you like to talk about it?" I had no reason to think she did. After all, I worked in a restaurant she occasionally frequented; I didn't even consider myself a friend, much less someone she would bare her soul to.
"It's okay, but thank you. I'll be fine."
With that, I finished my meet and greet, said good night to Gabe, and went home.
Over the next several weeks, Louise came in more and more often and our chats got longer and longer. So long and frequent that Gabe told me that the staff was beginning to talk about it. "Not in a bad way, Jase." He and most others called me Jase instead of Jason. "They think it's cute." And he laughed.
"Cute? What do you mean cute?"
"They just think maybe you and she should date... or something..."
"Something? What kind of something?" I wasn't sure I liked the idea of the staff talking about me like that.
"Come on, Jase. Everyone likes you and thinks you deserve......"
I didn't let him finish. "Stop. Let them know that I am perfectly content. Now, good night. I'm going home."
I didn't hear any more about what the staff thought, but every time Louise came in, someone came to my office to make sure I knew it. After several weeks of that, she asked if she could talk. I sat at her table and she told me that she and Sid were getting a divorce. He apparently had a gambling addiction and it reached a point that he couldn't, or wouldn't stop. So, she gave him a choice; stop or get out. She came home one day and he and his stuff were gone. She told me the only thing he left was his collection of wine. "He liked wine, only I was never sure if it was actually the wine or its' cost," she said. They had a relatively large collection and she had no idea why he left it. "He could sell it and have more money for gambling."
One Wednesday evening, she came in relatively early. The piano player had just started. She and I chatted for a few minutes and I went to my office. It was just after eight and I put on my suitcoat. I started to find Gabe to tell him I was leaving. I was met by one of the servers who told me Louise was drunk and couldn't stand, so she was sitting with her head on her table. Just then Gabe came up.
