Needle Too (13 page)

Since there was no furniture in the apartment of any kind, as soon as we arrived we’d begin to assemble around the breakfast bar and within seconds, a blunt was being passed around and some beers were cracked open. And then at last, the daily decompression would begin as the tension drained away from the head, heart and extremities that absorbed so much of the abuse and I felt a sense of peace and serenity enveloping me:

“I just wanna
KILL
that ugly motherfucker.”

“What are
you
talking about, Craig?” said Rick who was gay and one of the few staff members older than Perry and me. “You and Kirk look exactly alike. You’re just a slightly younger, curlier-haired version of him.”

“We look nothing alike,” I said even though I knew he was just kidding. “And besides, my hair isn’t orange and my freckles faded away
years
ago.”

“Not the ones on your shoulders,” Perry chimed in.

“Did you notice those when you were kissing his neck?” asked Kristen who was my favorite waitress.

“Craig, you’re not the
only
server Kirk picks on,” said Donna—my
least
favorite waitress and one that actually looked a lot more like Kirk than
I
did.

“What the fuck did you just call me?!”

“Craig’s a WAITER—
not
a server,” explained Pete as I already read him the riot act about this a little earlier in the week.

“How’s that any different?” Donna asked.

“BECAUSE IF YOU SIT IN HIS STATION YOUR ASS IS GONNA BE WAITING!” Pete blurted out like he’d been waiting to say that for
years
.

All joking aside, however, I think I was actually considered to be a bit of a prima donna throughout the restaurant and I’m not exactly sure why:

“Hey!” I barked on the very next day at Annie, who was Bistro 41’s 17-year-old hostess. “This is a list of customer criteria or better yet—things I better never-the-fuck find in my station.”

“Oh,
wow—
how unbelievably cool,” she said as she eagerly attempted to snatch the important document from my hand.

“Not so fast,” I snapped as I slapped her filthy little fingers away. “Just to make sure you know the score and there’s no confusion about ANYTHING, I’m gonna stand here and recite it to you so listen the fuck up!”

“Okay.”

“There will be no nurses, no personal attendants, no medical personnel of any kind in any official capacity at ANY of my tables!”

“No problem.”

“I’m not finished yet!”

“Oh, sorry.”

“NO walkers, NO oxygen tanks and NO FUCKING WHEELCHAIRS. Got it?”

“Yeah, alright already!” she suddenly snapped at me with an appalling degree of disrespect for her elders.

“In fact, now that I think about it—NOTHING on wheels. NO strollers, NO baby carriages, NO FUCKING BIG WHEELS! You see anything on wheels you better just roll it the fuck over to the other side of the restaurant. Catch my drift,
buttercup
? Huh? DO YOU? Alright—stop laughing. I’m fucking
SERIOUS
!”

“OKAY! Now go over there and bother Kristen or something.”

By the middle of March, as winter weather battered much of the country, the brunt of the busy-season came bearing down upon Southwest Florida and it seemed as though Bistro 41 was the only restaurant in town. There was constantly a line out the door, and though the wait staff handled the throngs of hungry guests with grace and dignity under fire, occasional difficulties would erupt that were clearly beyond our control. And for some reason these difficulties always seemed to come quickly and in bunches, whether they were rolling around on wheels or not.

“I’m gonna need a void,” I told Kirk as I showed him the check, while at least temporarily distracting him from busting Kristen’s balls for something stupid as I could see appreciation in her eyes and a wave of relief wash over her face. “The redneck at table six doesn’t think he should have to pay for the fish special.”

“Which one?”

“The one with the greasy jeans and disgusting bandanna.”

“No, which FISH special?” he said with a sneer as he rolled his eyes.

“Oh…God, I forgot what it’s called—the one that’s cooked in a bag.”

“The
lemon-baked branzino?”
he asked in a nasty, rhetorical way.

“The
what?”

“The bass…
the one that’s cooked in a bag
,” he explained as he was now mimicking me in mocking mode. “What was wrong with it? Why didn’t he like it?”

“Oh, no—he
loved
it,” I told him. “He ate every bit of it.”

“Then why doesn’t he wanna pay for it?”

“Because he also ate the bag.”

“Well maybe if you were a little more prepared to offer some details about the dish he wouldn’t have.”

“Oh, no—I’m pretty sure he would’ve anyway.”

“Hey, Craig—you need to get over to table twelve,” Perry suddenly told me on his way to the kitchen.

“What now?!?”

“The lady at position three said there’s something wrong with the fish special.”

“Again? Which one?”

“The stuffed tuna.”

I headed over to table twelve to check on position three.

“How can I help you, miss?” I asked an entirely dissatisfied customer.

She said nothing, and only held out a fork with a hunk of tuna attached to it.

I took the utensil and after holding it up to the light, realized there must have
indeed
been something wrong with the tuna because it was wearing a bloody Band-Aid.

“That is just so disgusting I don’t even know what to say.”

After apologizing profusely I removed the injured tuna from the table for evidentiary purposes and found Kirk.

“Kirk, I need you to void another special.” I said as I showed him the plate.

“First of all, you don’t need shit unless I say you do,” he informed me while ignoring the plate I was holding. “You just need to tell me where the problem is, what the problem is, and the name of the special if you think you can manage it.”

“No problem. Position three at table twelve is unhappy with the Band-Aid she found in the stuffed tuna.”

“What?!”

“And I think we should forget about reciting fish specials for the evening.”

“Thanks, but I’m not paying you to think.”

“Yeah, you couldn’t afford to. But that’s beside the point—you should take my advice anyway.”

“Now why in the world should I do that, Craig?”

“Because there are some pretty clever quips going around the restaurant right now and you might wanna start making them a memory,” I said just before he left me standing there with the ouchless tuna as he headed over to table twelve and the customer offended by it.

“I’m
so
sorry about the tuna ma’am. Please, please, PLEASE let me get you something else—
anything
you want—on me,” said Kirk as he played the groveller like a natural.

“You know, I can’t believe I’m actually saying this, but I really think I’d still like to have the tuna,” answered position #3. “Do you think you can rustle one up without a Curad?”

“Absolutely,” he responded before heading over to the kitchen which operated at the front of the restaurant and only a few feet away from front row guests including table twelve, as a long line of cooks stretched from one side of the dining room to the other.

“What’s wrong with these guys tonight?” Kirk asked rhetorically and quietly while addressing the expediter as he shook his head in disbelief. “Can I get another fish special for table twelve?”

“Sure thing—boss!” responded the expeditor with much more enthusiasm and volume than necessary or even appropriate given the awkwardness of the moment. “Fire up another boo-boo tuna!” he barked at the grill man.

“Hey! Stop that
right
now!” a horrified Kirk growled at the expeditor as he was apparently unimpressed with the witticism.

“Oh, sorry boss,” he said. “Hold the boo-boo! Do you mean a bass
in a body bag, boss?”

“What!?!”
screamed Kirk. “No, I don’t mean a bass in a fucking body bag!”

“Hey, I wanna bass in a body bag!” shouted position three at table twelve who was well within earshot of the exchange. “My server never mentioned anything about bass and had I known there was one in a body bag I NEVER would’ve gotten a boo-boo to begin with!”

“Ah, yes indeed, madam—the
lemon-baked branzino!”
I interjected triumphantly while flashing an exaggerated grin at Kirk. “It must have slipped my mind for a moment and I’m sorry about that—but you’ve nonetheless stumbled upon a magnificent item, my lady. The bass is a truly remarkable dish and one so exquisitely prepared with just a hint of citrus to counterbalance the robust flavor and aroma of the fish. And it’s not at all fishy-tasting, mind you, but
oh
so moist and tender—
so very moist and tender
. In fact, I daresay it’s the perfect plate and beautifully presented—
just try not to eat the fucking bag
…and don’t call me your server.”

16

At the beginning of April, when I mentioned Montauk and the Hamptons to Rick, I was really just running my mouth. It was just a lot of talk from a loud mouth New Yorker who thinks he knows everything. I certainly had no
real
intention of heading back up there even if it
was
for just the summer. That’s the truth, the whole truth and nothing but. Rick, however, was a little older than the rest of us with responsibilities and a mortgage to pay, so when I mentioned that between June and September he could clear over
$500 a day on Eastern Long Island he was all about it.

“I can’t spend another summer down here,” he told me once at the Compound. “It’s hot and humid and disgusting and there’s no money to be made anywhere. Each winter things are good for three or four months and then by July I’m completely broke again.”

Unfortunately, that week when he actually started getting the ball rolling by making arrangements with a seasonal restaurant in Southampton, my drug monkey finally opened its eyes, yawned and had a good stretch for the first time in four months. And when I realized Perry and I would indeed be heading up north for the summer I knew at the very bottom and most desolate, far-flung corner of my heart that somehow, someway I’d be doing dope again. Of course, I absolutely refused to acknowledge it in any way, shape, or form but it was still vaguely there for the taking. It was kind of like carrying around a deep, dark, mostly repressed childhood memory that was too self-destructive to consciously consider. Or, perhaps, it was more like desperately wishing and waiting for something
fantastic
to happen but refusing to mention it or even think about for fear of jinxing it away. But regardless, and to confuse things even
further
, on some equally obscure level I absolutely knew that dope was something I truly
didn’t
want in my life, something I knew I
couldn’t
want. However, I can assure you I
never
considered the absurdity of it all—finally fleeing New York to get clean and enduring that arduous and grueling bus ride to Florida only to turn around and head back for a few months before returning to Florida once again. Of course, I also refused to consider the obvious pitfalls of going back to the belly of the beast because of course—
that
would be a waste of time.

My own mental gymnastics aside, our new Floridian friends knew little to nothing about our drug history or inclinations. As far as they were concerned, the decision—both mine and Perry’s—to spend the summer in Montauk was at worst motivated by personal greed, and at best inspired by compassion for some cash-strapped coworkers.

In a matter of days, Rick had secured summer jobs for a group of us at a restaurant in Southampton along with housing in Montauk, and by the end of April the sun and the ever increasing humidity started heating things up and I was looking forward to getting away from Florida for a while. Besides, Kirk was absolutely pissing me the fuck off, and the endgame would finally play itself out one morning when Kristen arrived a few minutes late to pick me up at the Compound before heading in to work.

“Sorry,” she said as I took the passenger seat. “I already called Kirk and told him we’d be a few minutes late so don’t worry.”

However, as soon as we stepped into the restaurant Kirk called me into the office and flipped the fuck out in a way that was not only totally over-the-top, but partially incoherent and completely irrational. He knew precisely why I was late, which was the same reason Kristen was late and while he said not a word to her, he was literally foaming at the mouth at me. I’d never seen anything like it. His fury seemed pent up, like he’d been waiting for the perfect opportunity to let it combust before unleashing it all. And as he ranted and raved incoherently about everything he never liked about me and chunks of spittle came flying out of his mouth in all directions—I thought he might’ve been a little out of his head. Of course, this was purely speculation as I never saw any evidence other than a few periods of extraordinarily absurd behavior but then again—that might’ve been enough. So anyway, toward the end of April in 1997 Kirk fired me because Kristen was late, and for some reason I was totally cool with that. Besides, immediately afterwards I was able to secure work for the month of May at Jalapenos. In fact, from what I understood, the job was practically waiting there for me from the moment the last chunk of spittle landed thanks to recommendations from the staff at Bistro 41—but not so much the management.

Jalapenos was a Mexican restaurant, and though like Bistro 41 it was also located on Route 41 near the Bell Tower, it was much
closer in caliber and proximity to Taco Bell and Crime Manor. Nonetheless, the month I spent at Jalapenos is notable only because it was there where I met Amy—Savannah’s mother—and because I developed something of a friendship with Rob Moore and Jamie Sharkey, two members of the wait staff who were also something of a couple. Both were 22-years old and Jamie, coincidentally, harbored very serious ambitions to become an actress. Hence, predictably enough, within a week the New Yorker Who Knows Everything started running his mouth about the city and before I knew it—I’d extended both of them invitations to join us in Long Island for the summer. Unfortunately, unbeknownst to me, Rick had already secured housing for the group that would be insufficient to accommodate any additional members.