There's Not Enough Money in the World

Being a busboy has its quirks: I was pretty much invisible; the cooks tended to like me the most because I was on par with their level in the heirachy (and taking a quick swig off half-empty Long Island Iced Teas meant cleaning off tables wasn't as demeaning a job I thought).

But, despite those silver linings, being a busboy was pretty much the worst apron-wearing job I have ever had.

The restaurant I spent many a month wiping barbecue sauce and ranch dressing off cheap dining booths was more eye-opening than a week in an orphanage camp. The orphanage camp, you must understand, is a dire circumstance that goes without saying: it's very sad and an awful fact of life. Bussing, on the other hand, made me realize that people have less scruples than a Jackie Collins novel. Customers, in the restaurant world, expect you to not only bend over backwards, but they want you to bring them a cup of water in one hand and your soul in the other.

Bussing was hard work. I was the waitress's bitch. I did everything they weren't willing to do (eventhough they happily dirtied their knees kissing the ass of every tip-worthy customer who walked through the front door). I cleared tables, set them up again, folded napkins, cleaned up spilled drinks and barf, and even delivered food. Working in a restaurant where the busboys delivered the food could do nothing but confuse customers and, even worse, create a disaster that only I could start.

One evening (a busy night of elderly couples sipping Manhattans and demanding a discount because of their advanced age), I dutifully brought out a trayful of fried mozarella and badly grilled hamburgers to a table with four women sucking down Kamikazes faster than a water-deprived dog at a toilet. Clearly they were hammered. Three of them looked about my age -- mid-twenties -- and the fourth had a neck on her like a turkey. I was guessing she was pushing fifty.

"Whoo-hoo!" Turkey-neck shouted, popping a Kamikaze shot like a pill-addict. "This is some good shit!"

I imagine it was; I'd had three thanks to the bartender who liked me because I knew how to stock his bar fast and without flaw.

"Here you go ladies," I said, placing their plates carefully on the cup-strewn table. "If you need anything else, your server will be with you in a..."

"You're cute," one of the younger gals said. "What're you doing working in a dump like this?" The gal, rather pretty in a young-but-I-worship-Courtney-Love kind of way, slurred her words and kept pushing back a chunk of bangs that did not exist.

"Just making a living," I said, getting ready to leave.

"I'll give you twenty bucks to get on this table and dance for me!" she wailed. The older patrons, deeply involved in their own Metamucil troubles, barely blinked an eye. I worked, after all, in the "downstairs" portion of the restaurant where, in less than hour, a disc jockey named Jake would take the reins of the musical library and turn the pool-sized dance floor into a place where 80s bloomers pretended Paula Abdul was still the pinnacle of musical godliness.

"I don't think so," I said curtly and started to make my getaway.

"Come on!" Turkey-neck shouted. "Shake that cute ass for us! We'll make it forty!" she said, as if this were enough for me to demean myself (they forget that the apron was enough).

"I have work to do," I said.

I could tell that the four of them were growing agitated and I felt it was my duty to book it out of there as fast as I could. Drunk women, I had come to learn, were worse than coyotes flocking around a wounded poodle.

"You fucking fag," one of them said. "What kind of guy passes up forty bucks for a teeny, tiny little dance?" I don't remember which girl it was, but she kept fingering her nipple. If anything, this made me not want to dance, no matter the payment.

"The kind with work to do," I answered back. After eyeing my surroundings to make sure my higher-ups were not hovering around this particular conversation, I said, "Besides, none of you has a penis, which would be more incentive for me to dance on your table than your measly forty bucks."

If the sound of jaws dropping could be documented, this would have been the one to put on record.

"A hundred!" a young one said, teetering back and forth like a boat in the ocean. Had she the choice of taking another shot or falling asleep, I think she would have opted for la-la land.

Wow, maybe I was cuter than I thought. "Thank you, ladies, but I don't think my boss would appreciate me getting on your table and doing a little a dance."

With a serious scowl, Turkey-neck said, "But we're paying customers."

"And I'm a man with work to do. I'm really sorry."

A moment passed. I waited to see if anything else had to be said. I could sense the tables around me waiting for the next course of dialogue, as if this were a really good movie they were watching; I don't blame them, this was an interesting exchange.

"Fine," Turkey-neck said, throwing a ten dollar bill at the edge of the table, far enough for it to hang on the edge of the table and fall at my feet. "Go get me a pack of cigarettes then." She proceeded to have a conversation with the girls at her table.

I stood there, relatively dumbfounded (I like to think that, at that point, I'd seen it all...I was wrong).

Turkey-neck looked at me with a bitchy yet quizzical gaze and said, "Are you lost? The cigarette machine is over there." She pointed over my shoulder where, in fact, the cigarette machine was.

I took a deep breath. Being the nice, pleasant, generous person I am, I bent down and picked up the money. I tossed it back on the table. "I'm sorry," I said, "but I think you have me mistaken for either your husband or the guy you leave money for on the side of the night table in your hotel room after an hour of mediocre hooker sex." I wish I could tell you I made this up, but I did not -- the words came out as fluid as a water tap.

Had Turkey-neck or her friends had anything else to say, I couldn't tell you -- my shift was over not five minutes later and I had turned on heel more quickly than a ballerina in The Nutcracker. I must admit, despite the belittling set of circumstances involving me girating my ass on their table, had they upped their ante to at least a hundred bucks, I might have actually considered it.

But, unfortunately, this is what happens when you deal with an embittered apron-wearer.