Total pages in book: 67
Estimated words: 60864 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 304(@200wpm)___ 243(@250wpm)___ 203(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 60864 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 304(@200wpm)___ 243(@250wpm)___ 203(@300wpm)
“You are doing an amazing job,” she said. “I can’t thank you enough. You know, maybe I should just have ‘thank you, Jodi’ printed up on a T-shirt and I can wear it anytime I see you. It would save me a lot of time.”
I laughed. “No problem.”
“I should be thanking you too,” another voice said. I looked over toward it and saw Derek. He at least had the decency to look humble and maybe even a little sheepish. “I saw you working out there, and you were really good.”
“Thank you,” I said.
Ally looked at him, her eyebrows lifting expectantly, and he drew in a slight breath.
“I also want to actually apologize for the way I spoke to you the other day. It was presumptuous of me, and I was a jerk about it,” he said. “And if you are willing to stay for the dinner service, we would be happy to have you.”
I gave a single affirmative nod, and he glanced at Ally before walking away again.
“See, I told you he would eat crow,” she said with a laugh. “But I guess we do have to give him at least a little bit of a break about the whole thing. He is one of the last two single King brothers. The three of us women and his brothers have all been trying to set him up. I should probably apologize about that.”
“Don’t you dare,” I said. “Like I told you before, you aren’t responsible for his behavior. But maybe you shouldn’t be trying to set him up.”
We laughed together, and she told me to go to the kitchen to grab something to eat and catch a few minutes of rest before the dinner service started.
“So, does this mean I have the job? Should I still fill out an application?” I asked.
Ally slung an arm around my shoulders and walked with me into the kitchen to get food.
“You definitely don’t need an application,” she said. “At the rate you were working, you might just run some of the other servers off the vineyard.”
“Don’t say that,” I said. “I don’t think we could handle any fewer hands.”
We laughed again and accepted the plates the cook was holding out to us.
In an afternoon I had gone from slinging breakfast and burgers at the diner to having a job at a high-end restaurant serving froufrou food and expensive wine. It was a completely different experience even if many of the skills were the same. It definitely wasn’t bad. I had Ally there and was getting along with the other waitstaff as much as I could in the brief time we got to interact. The clientele wasn’t as loud or crass either, which could sometimes be fun but also lost its charm quickly.
Above all, the tips were more than worth it. I was pocketing far more pouring wine and serving up elegant dishes of food I barely recognized than I did with eggs and endless mugs of black coffee. I had to admit it reminded me a bit of the way I’d grown up and the life I left behind, but I could live with that if it helped me reach my goal.
The break to eat and relax a little turned out to be even more important than I expected it to be. Every reservation was booked that night, and we even got a few walk-ins desperate for a table who ended up sitting at the bar or waiting for hours to get wedged in when the reserved tables emptied.
By the end of the night, my feet hurt, but I was feeling flush with cash. There was more in my pockets to add to the duffle bag in my room than I would usually squirrel away in a few weeks. It was a good feeling.
The hard work also left me ravenous, and when Ally cornered me to make sure I was staying for a family meal, there was no way I was going to turn it down. I was ready to shove anything I could find into my mouth.
The kitchen staff brought out pans of pasta salad and the leftover ends of loaves of bread cut off before the neater slices were brought to tables. We loaded up our plates, poured glasses of wine and soft drinks, and spread out at the tables in the front of the house.
There was a sense of accomplishment and pride that came with settling down at the tables that were recently occupied by the customers we served. They came dressed up, ready to be on their best behavior in the beautiful restaurant and have an elegant meal. We got to slouch, sprawl, and relax, feeling at ease when we ate.
I would imagine it was kind of like the feeling of having people over to your home for a dinner party and then those first moments after you close the door behind them. I’d never had a dinner party of my own, obviously, but I remembered what the stuffy gatherings were like when my parents had them when I was young.