Summer 2009
âShut your fucking cock-hole, bitch,â laughed Nikki as she sprayed vinegar over the hot tray of cutlery, and picked up a soup spoon. Christineâs hands froze in the middle of polishing a handful of forks with a napkin, as her eyes went wide with shock and amusement. She looked around the kitchen, scandalized. It was the universal teenage girl code for âOMG, I canât believe you just said that!â
Nikki was having none of it. âWhat, youâre worried these cocksuckers will get offended?â she said to Chris before raising her voice so it cut through the sounds of the kitchen activity. âYOU COCKSUCKERS DONâT MIND MY FUCKING LANGUAGE, RIGHT?â
A few waiters and waitresses shook their heads, but theyâd long since gotten used to Nikkiâs profanity. The sous-chef, cooks and dish-pigs couldnât resist the challenge, though, and a chorus of fuck-yous were volleyed back from across the serving line.
The wait staff were mostly kids like me, trying to earn money over the summer for college in the fall. Probably half were going into their last year of high-school, and the rest of us were already finished our first-year at university. The kitchen staff were a more varied bunch. Most of them were somewhere on a work continuum that progressed from dishes, to prep cook, to line cook. Carl the sous-chef was a grizzled old bugger who leered at all the girls and seemed to have a shard of ice where his conscience was supposed to be. Heâd been working in a kitchen long enough to know that sous-chef at a suburban golf club was as high as he was going to rise on the career ladder.
Nikki was the only one who didnât fit neatly into either group. She was my age, but we couldnât have been more different. Where I was a good student, just finished my first year of Commerce at U of T, she had dropped out of school at sixteen. In high-school, Iâd been on the varsity soccer and swim teams. Nikki smoked close to a pack a day. I came from a middle-class family with two younger brothers, and sheâd apparently bounced around foster homes until she was old enough to tell Child Services to go fuck themselves. I was a little shy and socially awkward, but Nikki could say anything to anyone.
She was short -- maybe 5â2â in the flats she and the other girls had to wear at work. She was skinny as well, like sheâd never quite had enough to eat her whole life, and didnât care to start now. The only thing that wasnât tiny on her were her boobs. The girl had a chest on her that looked completely out of place. Shoulder length jet-black hair framed a pale face that could have been pretty if she wasnât wearing too much eye makeup and snarling profanities at people all the time. Sheâd just had red streaks put in her hair the other day, and sheâd caught shit from our supervisor over that. Ms. Sullivan wanted wait staff in the clubhouse to present a certain image, and she made Nikki remove all her piercings (other than the tongue stud) at the beginning of each shift. Nikki even tried to cover a tattoo on her wrist with a tensor bandage at Sullivanâs urging, but so many people asked her how she could carry trays of food with a sprained wrist, she quickly ditched that idea and silently dared our supervisor to call her on it. I donât know why Sullivan hired Nikki in the first place.
Okay, maybe I did know: Nikki worked crazy hard every shift, and she worked all the hours Sullivan would give her. Split shifts, opening the coffee shop in the morning before the first tee-time, closing after a wedding or banquet at 2am, whatever. And the members seemed to like her. At least, the older guys did, the ones old enough to be her dad or grandpa. I would watch them look right down her uniform blouse when she was topping up their coffee or serving them lunch, and Iâm pretty sure she knew it. She would flirt with them, laugh at a dirty joke and tell them another even filthier to get the table roaring with laughter. Gratuities were âincludedâ on every chit the members signed, but Nikki got more cash at the table on top of that than anyone else on staff. She was certainly rough around the edges, but she was a good waitress.
We were different in one more way, one that made me a bit embarrassed and uncomfortable. While I was decent enough looking to have dated a bit -- and even fooled around with some of the girls who would do that in high-school -- I was still technically a virgin. To hear Nikki talk, she was getting as much dick as she wanted, whenever she wanted, no strings attached. She was more of a swordsman than any guy Iâd ever known. It was intimidating and fascinating at the same time. Although I often pretended I was absorbed in stocking creamers, or cleaning the soup station, or some other crappy task in the kitchen, Iâd use that as an excuse to hover around the edges of her bawdy conversations with the kitchen guys, listening intently to her stories of conquest.
âCocksucker is it?â Carl asked with a sneer, peering through the serving line. âTakes one to know one, you skank,â he continued with a malicious grin.
Nikki looked back at him with an expression of exaggerated boredom plastered across her face. âLick my dick-ditch, you fat old perv,â she replied. âOn second thought, donât,â she continued. âThe last place you stuck that tongue was in Billyâs asshole, and I donât need an infection down there.â The whole room let out a theatrical âooooohhhhâ at the comeback, and even Billy grinned shyly over at the dishwasher as he loaded another tray.
Before Carl could return fire, Ms. Sullivan burst through the swinging doors from the banquet hall.
âOkay, the last of the reception is clearing out now, so most of you can punch out. Nikki and...â Sullivan glanced around at the collected wait staff until her eyes fell on me. â...Jeff, you two will stay and clear tables, restock for the morning. Tracy will finish up at the bar and lock up.â She turned to the sous-chef. âCarl, you remember the payroll discussion with Tim this month: get as many of your guys out of here as quickly as possible.â He nodded and turned to direct his guys to finish their cleanup. She glanced at her watch. âI have to be back early tomorrow for that tournament, so Iâm going to take off too. Donât stay late,â she admonished me and Nikki, and then turned on her heel and walked out.
Within fifteen minutes, the only people left in the building were Tracy chatting with a couple of drunk wedding guests as she tried vainly to close up the bar in the main lobby, and me and Nikki clearing the aftermath of a wedding reception off tables in a dim banquet hall.
âYou gonna keep looking down my top, dickwad?â Nikki asked calmly as she bent further over the table across from me to retrieve a half-full plate of dessert and put it on her tray. I started to stammer some excuse, but she stood up straight and cut me off. âOr do you just want me to pull the girls out and you can stand here and jack your little cock off while you get a good look?â
The truth was, I had been sneaking looks as we worked, but I was mortified that sheâd noticed. That embarrassment quickly morphed to angry protest, which was piqued even further when I looked up from her cleavage and saw the self-satisfied smirk on her face.
âYeah, I figured I was the only guy in town who hadnât seen them already, so I wanted to catch up,â I retorted with a rare edge to my voice.
Nikkiâs jaw dropped at the unexpected comeback. I donât think weâd said five words to each other per shift over the last month, and she obviously didnât think I had it in me to trash talk with her.
âFuck you, pindick,â she said.
I got flustered, my mouth opening and closing abortively as I tried to come up with something clever and cutting. Nikkiâs face broke into a grin again as she watched me struggle.
âAnd then you say âJust because youâve been fucked so much I could stuff a telephone pole up your cunt without you feeling it doesnât mean I have a pindick, bitch,ââ Nikki continued as I gawped at her. âAnd then I say âFuck you at both ends, pindick.ââ Her grin widened. âPin. Dick.â She drew the insult out.
Then she did something I never would have expected. She reached down and with her bare hand, she picked up the half-eaten lemon meringue pie piece off the dessert plate in front of her and threw it at my face. It hit me on the left cheek with a wet splat. I looked at her in shock. I couldnât believe she did that. Mischief and excitement danced in her bright eyes, and she turned heel and ran towards the kitchen with a bark of laughter.
Her sudden flight unfroze me and spurred me to chase like a dog after a squirrel. I burst through the kitchen doors a couple of seconds behind her, looked around frantically, and found her digging in one of the condiments fridges under a prep counter. She turned and faced me with a can of whipped cream in each hand. I felt my face split in maniacal grin to match her own, and charged her. She shrieked and started to spray me with whipped cream. I wrestled one of the cans away from her and returned fire. Soon both of us were covered and slipping on the tile floor, laughing hysterically.
One moment we were wrestling and spraying each other. The next, our eyes locked, and then she leapt at me, grabbing my head in both hands as she plastered her mouth to mine. The cans clattered to the floor, and we pawed at each other, licking the sweet, slippery cream from each otherâs lips, chin and cheeks. Then I was at her neck, sucking and licking it sloppily. Her back arched, and I felt her quiver a moment before she wrenched my mouth back to hers so our tongues could duel wetly.