The Waiter Chronicles: Last Day (redux)

By 1:00 the dining room was dead, so I took off my tie and apron and printed my batch report. Fifteen dollars on three tables: bad. Really bad. So bad that I take a moment to feel some sympathy for Grandpa, Pepe, and Junior. This is what I'm leaving them.

A couple parties of two wandered in a little after 1:00. Grandpa could handle them with his eyes closed, but something sentimental inside made me re-don my apron and take "one last table." Easy stuff. A pizza, a ravioli, coke, iced tea. The women linger over their lunch, and as they do I'm thinking ahead to the rest of the afternoon. I texted Pepe earlier to come up and see me, but he never responded. Oh well.

The rear doorbell rings, and around the back corner comes Junior and What (as we've come to call one of the bussers). Pepe follows soon after, and it becomes clear that they're here for a reason. Finally, the other Owner arrives, windblown from a motorcycle ride from the city, and places are set around table 43. Wine glasses are set and appetizers are ordered.

It's a lunch. The Owners, the waiters, the bussers, and me. I'm choking on the realization.

Pepe asks me what I want to eat, and I tell him, "Whatever you think I should have."

"You ever had the lamb shank?" he asks.

"No." He turns resolutely to the computer and taps in the order, grinning and eagerly pulling at the few hairs that protrude from his chin.

I clock out and ceremoniously return my card to The Owner, who receives it with a broad smile. We all sit and enjoy a fabulous lunch. The Owners have a gift for "la bambina": a pair of baby booties and a Target gift card. I'm touched.

The Owner mandates that I will say a blessing over the capasante, gamberi con fagioli, and calamari that Nando (the other busser) is placing on the table. This is a dear thing about him that I have loved from the beginning. A man of deep skepticism and loud objections to institutional religions, he has a fixed insistence upon the celestial order of things and our part in petitioning the heavens. His pleas for me to pray for him stopped seeming like jokes months ago.

I return thanks for good friends and good gifts, and I ask God's blessings on all of us in the days ahead. At the "Amen," Pepe feigns emotion, placing a clenched fist to his chest and moaning through pursed lips. I pat his shoulder and laugh. All that's left to do is to enjoy the table. Tell funny stories, laugh over-zealously, and pour more wine. It's beautiful, and I don't deserve it.

It's a living tableau of grace, given to the clumsy by the Hell-bent, and shared among people who, months ago, had no reason to care about the existence of one another. When the wife unexpectedly arrives to join in, it can't get any better.

And so it doesn't.