Running on Empty

by Don Aker

  Suddenly, the music across the hall stopped, and a moment later the door opened. Raye entered, crossing the room and flopping into the chair beside his desk.

  “Surfing porn?” she asked as he closed his laptop.

  “Ever heard of knocking?”

  “Knocking’s for losers,” she replied and, recognizing the comment he’d made about public transit, Ethan had to chuckle. Raye lolled back in the chair so her head was nearly upside down.

  “Pen explode under your chin?” he asked, nodding at the ink marks on his sister’s neck.

  “Jazz.”

  Ethan figured as much. Raye’s friend Jasmine had decided she wanted to be a tattoo artist, and she liked to practise new designs on whoever would let her—which meant that Raye had been coming home a lot lately with strange symbols drawn on her skin. Their father had freaked the first time until Raye had shown him they scrubbed off, but he still didn’t like the idea of his daughter being, as he put it, “covered in cartoons,” to which Raye had responded, “One day when Jazz is famous, you’ll wish she hadn’t used washable ink.” This dogged support of her friend was just one more thing that Ethan loved about his sister—although he’d never tell her that, of course.

  “What’s this one supposed to be?” he asked.

  Raye got up and stood by the bed, raising her chin so Ethan could better view the design. “A dragon. See how it’s clutching a woman in its claws?”

  “That’s a woman? Looks more like a squirrel.”

  “I’m ticklish. I squirmed when Jazz was doing that part.”

  “Who’s the woman?”

  “It’s all women.”

  “I don’t get it.”

  She sighed. “The dragon’s a symbol of misogynistic societal attitudes.”

  “Deep.”

  Raye cuffed him, her open palm connecting with the side of his head, which was still tender from his encounter with the Cobra’s door frame.

  “Hey! What was that for?” he demanded.

  “I know sarcasm when I hear it,” said Raye, returning to the chair.

  He grinned in spite of himself. The fact that Raye took crap from nobody, including himself, was yet another of the things he admired about her—and, of course, another of the things he’d never tell her. “So,” he asked, “who came up with the dragon?”

  “Jazz says it represents male hatred toward women. See how all those pointy parts look menacing?”

  “Not to mention phallic,” observed Ethan, grinning again.

  “Yeah, that too,” smiled Raye. “Hey, speaking of phallic symbols, what’s happening with the Mustang?”

  His grin faded. “It’s not happening.” He told her about Kyle’s decision to sell the car to Filthy LaFarge.

  “Bummer,” said Raye, and he could tell she really meant it. “What’ll you do now?”

  Ethan pointed to his laptop. “I found another one in the north end that’s in pretty rough shape, but I could do a lot of the work on it myself.”

  “With Pete’s help,” she said. It was no secret that Raye once had a crush on Ethan’s best friend, and one of his many attributes that Raye used to gush about—despite Ethan’s efforts to ignore her—was Pete’s extraordinary mechanical ability. She was right, though. The guy barely passed math each year, but he could dismantle anything from a toaster to a transfer truck and put it back together so it worked better than ever. He was a good guy, too, always taking the time to answer Raye’s questions even when he had his head under a car hood.

  “Yeah, with Pete’s help,” Ethan agreed. He was glad Raye’s crush on Pete had passed. Lately, he’d begun feeling protective of her, although she’d split a gut—and probably his lip—if she heard him say it. “The problem,” he continued, “is coming up with the cash. My bank account just took a shit-kicking, remember?”

  “Every action has a consequence,” she said, completely deadpan, and Ethan threw a pillow at her. She ducked it easily.

  They sat in a comfortable silence for a moment. Then, “I’ve got some money you can borrow,” she said.

  This surprised him. “How much?”

  “Over four hundred bucks.”

  Ethan whistled. “All that from babysitting?”

  She nodded. “Been saving for my guitar. Winnipeg says he’s got a second-hand bass coming in soon that’s perfect for me, but I don’t really need it. He’ll let me use his loaner as long as I want.”

  Ethan was touched by her offer. “Thanks, Raye, but it’s not nearly enough.” He told her what had happened to his job at the pool. “So I guess my car plans are officially on hold,” he finished.

  “Ever think about working somewhere else?”

  “You expanding your babysitting syndicate?”

  She grinned. “Don’t knock it. Money’s good. The Croziers and the Sturks usually stay out the latest, but the Applegates tip the best.”

  “They’d have to, to make up for those monsters.” The Applegate twins, boys who’d just turned eight, were known throughout Cathedral Estates for terrorizing sitters and had gone through half a dozen before their parents began hiring Raye. There were even rumours they’d tried to set one poor girl on fire, but Ethan suspected the boys started that story themselves. They’d met their match in Raye, though. No pun intended.

  “Seriously,” she said, “have you thought about getting another job?”

  “None of the other pools are hiring. I already checked.”

  “What about waiting tables?”

  “What about it?”

  “Remember me talking about Jazz’s sister, Sapphire?”

  “The drama student at Dalhousie?”

  “Yeah. She works part-time as a server downtown. Makes a ton in tips.”

  “A ton, huh?” He didn’t try to hide his skepticism.

  “No, really. Jazz says on some nights she makes over four hundred bucks.”

  Ethan’s eyes widened. “Where’s she work?”

  “Carruthers.”

  “Yeah, but Carruthers is really upscale. And they serve liquor, which I can’t.”

  “There’s lots of restaurants in the city. Must be a few that need servers. Something to think about, anyway.” She got up. “Big French assignment due on Monday. Have to go conjugate me some verbs.”

  “Jeez, it’s Friday night. You’ve got all weekend.” But he knew it was pointless to remind her. She was the polar opposite of Ethan—she took school seriously and put a hundred per cent into every assignment. And never at the last moment.

  Moving to the doorway, she said, “Wouldn’t hurt you to crack a book now and then, Ethan Palmer.”

  He laughed at her near-perfect impression of their father, who had made that very comment to him many times. Ethan flipped her the finger and she grinned at him, then went out and closed the door behind her.

  He opened his laptop and slid his finger across the touchpad to wake up the processor. Watching the car ads fill the screen again, he thought about Jazz’s sister. She makes a ton in tips.

  Ethan stared at the screen a moment longer, then clicked on his browser’s search bar, typed serving jobs in halifax, and hit Enter.

  Chapter 5

  “You gotta be kidding me.” The owner slash manager slash head server at Kenny’s Café—who, weirdly, was not named Kenny—slid the resumé back across the table.

  Ethan knew what the problem was. He’d already had four other conversations like this at four other restaurants. “Yeah, I know I haven’t done any actual serving, but—”

  “Look, kid, you’re probably a great lifeguard and all, but I need someone who knows how to operate our computer system, can handle a dozen different orders at once, and won’t drop the ball when things get crazy. I don’t have the time to train you.” He waved his hand around the room where people sat at all but one of the café’s tables enjoying a Saturday snack. “We’re not big, but we’re busy. And up to now we haven’t needed somebody with Red Cross lifesaver training.”

  Ethan looked down at the sin
gle sheet of paper that summed up his work history in four words: lifeguard and swimming instructor. Pathetic.

  The man who wasn’t Kenny stood up. “Sorry, kid. Come back when you’ve got some experience, okay?”

  Ethan stood, too. “Thanks anyway,” he said, but the man had already moved off to seat two more people who’d just walked in. Sighing, Ethan reached for his resumé and slid it back into its folder. He wasn’t sure why, though. It wasn’t like it was doing him any good.

  But he still had one last place to try.

  “A friend ‘a Selena’s, huh?” said the thin woman in the pink uniform and white running shoes as she gestured toward a table. She looked to be in her forties and wore a name tag that said “Lil” and an apron around her tiny waist that was splattered with a bunch of faded stains, one of them either ketchup or blood.

  Sitting down, Ethan found himself wishing her apron was a little longer because her bony kneecaps looked eerily like doorknobs. For a moment, he couldn’t help thinking how this woman and Beaker, his physics teacher, were made for each other. Not only were they both maybe ninety-eight pounds soaking wet, they even had the same sharp nose and close-set eyes. In a sudden weird leap of imagination, Ethan pictured the two of them naked in a heated, horizontal frenzy, and it was like picturing two sticks being rubbed together to start a fire. Struggling to erase that mental image, he said, “I’ve known her for a couple years. Her boyfriend, Kyle, is the brother of a buddy of mine.”

  Lil nodded, then set a glass of water on the table before sliding into the seat across from him. “Welcome to The Chow Down,” she said.

  Looking around the diner, Ethan counted more than a dozen tables arranged on worn red and white tiles. Several booths lined two walls, one of which had a plate-glass window overlooking the harbour two blocks below them. A couple of the booths and four of the tables were occupied by solitary customers, every one of them several times Ethan’s age. The tables were made of wood and stained a diarrhea brown, and lying on their scratched surfaces were vinyl placemats with faded pictures of Nova Scotia tourist sites like Peggy’s Cove and the Cabot Trail.

  “You wanna order?” the waitress asked him.

  “No, thanks.” Glancing at the menu, he’d been surprised by how long it was, but most of the people eating there now seemed to be going for the All Day Breakfast. The smell of bacon hung heavy and cloying in the air, and behind him he could hear someone spreading something on toast as crisp as cardboard.

  “So you’re lookin’ for a job,” said Lil.

  Ethan nodded. “Who do I—”

  “—see about applyin’? You’re lookin’ at her. The owner, Mr. Anwar, drops in maybe once a month. He’s got places all over the city. The Chow Down ain’t at the top ‘a his priority list, if you know what I mean.”

  Ethan wasn’t sure how to respond so he just nodded.

  “Me ‘n’ Ike pretty much run the place,” she continued, nodding toward the kitchen behind her. “Ike’s the cook.”

  Ethan handed her his resumé. He felt bad now about asking Allie to help him with it last night; they’d spent over an hour trying to find ways to make him sound more hirable, time she could have spent doing something far more worthwhile. Like staring at a wall.

  He was surprised when she gave it only a passing glance. “A recommendation means a lot more to me than a piece ‘a paper,” she said. “If Selena sent you, that carries a lot ‘a weight.”

  Selena hadn’t sent him. In fact, Selena didn’t even know he was there. Last night while he was online copying names of Halifax restaurants that were hiring, he’d suddenly remembered Pete talking about Selena giving up her job at The Chow Down. But if Lil thought Selena had sent Ethan to the diner, he wasn’t about to change her mind.

  Just then, a bell rang at the diner’s entrance. Lil shot a look over her shoulder as a balding, heavy-set guy came in. He gave the waitress a wave.

  “Take a load off, Clarence,” she told him. “Be with you in a minute.”

  Clarence nodded and moved toward one of the booths beside the window, the door of the diner shrieking shut on a hinge that clearly hadn’t seen oil for a while.

  The waitress turned back to Ethan. “You got any servin’ experience?”

  Ethan’s heart sank. He shook his head.

  “Ever done any cookin’?”

  “For myself. Not in a restaurant, though.”

  “Dishwashin’?”

  He thought about their dishwasher at home, a state-of-the-art stainless-steel tall-tub that did everything but load itself. He shook his head again.

  “And I should hire you because …”

  Ethan took a deep breath. Riding the bus over here, he’d tried thinking of ways to offset his lack of experience, but only one thing had come to mind. It was dumb, he knew, but what did he have to lose? “I’m a blank canvas,” he said. “You get to train me exactly the way you want.” It sounded even lamer than he’d imagined it would.

  Lil threw her head back and laughed, the sound much deeper than Ethan would have expected from such a scrawny woman. With her mouth wide open, he could see lipstick lining the edges of her front teeth and, beyond them, dark fillings in her molars. He took a swallow of his water as an excuse to look away.

  “Blank canvas, huh? So now I’m an artiste?” She used the French pronunciation, and Ethan couldn’t imagine anything more bizarre in that greasy-spoon diner. Except maybe the image of Beaker and the waitress doing the nasty. Yeah, definitely that.

  Her laughter subsiding, she scanned his resumé. “Still in high school, huh?” she asked after a moment. When Ethan nodded, she continued, “If you’re lookin’ for somethin’ part-time, why not try Costco or The Brick? Or even that jeezly Bed Bath & Beyond?”

  “I need to make a lot of cash fast.”

  She raised her eyebrows, which were little more than pencilled lines on her narrow forehead. “You musta seen my Mercedes in the parkin’ lot, huh?”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “Probably ‘cause it looks a lot like a Ford Focus with bald tires and a trunk that’s tied closed with a coat hanger.” She grinned. “What makes you think The Chow Down’s the place to make a lot ‘a money?”

  Embarrassed, Ethan shared something Kyle had once told him: “I heard Selena cleaned up in tips.”

  “That’s because she had a couple assets you’re sorely lackin’.”

  “Experience and regular customers?” he asked.

  “Great tits.” Lil shrugged. “Maybe you’re right about that blank canvas.” She looked across at the heavy-set man by the window. “Clarence,” she said, “just be another minute, okay?”

  “No hurry, Lil,” he told her. “My meetin’ with the lieutenant-governor can wait a bit.”

  She shot him a grin—”Thanks, sweetie”—then turned toward the kitchen. “Hey, Ike!” she called. “Stick your ugly mug out here.”

  Ethan heard something from the kitchen behind her that sounded like a blend of grunt and snarl, and a second later a guy nearly as wide as he was tall pushed through the batwing doors rubbing a wad of paper towels between his hands.

  “Ethan,” said the waitress, “Ike Turner. Ike, this here is Ethan Palmer. He’s interested in the job.”

  Ike Turner looked like he’d been a cage fighter in another lifetime. An undefeated cage fighter. He had huge shoulders and a massive chest, and his arms were nearly as thick as Ethan’s thighs. Even under his apron and baggy workpants, his legs looked sturdy enough to support a truck. He wore a baseball cap and T-shirt that looked the colour of grease, and tattoos covered most of his exposed skin. Ethan wondered what Raye and Jazz would think of the tat on his right forearm, a green dragon with glowing red eyes being ridden by a voluptuous blonde. As the guy got closer, Ethan could see the blonde was having a pretty good time given her lack of clothing and the way she was gripping the dragon’s tail. Nothing phallic there, he thought as he stood up. “Nice to meet you,” he said, extending his hand.

  Ike ignored
it. “You waited tables before?”

  Ethan let his hand drop. “Not really.”

  “You either have or you haven’t. Which is it?”

  “Haven’t,” Ethan admitted.

  “Don’t let the door hit your ass on the way out,” Ike said, turning back toward the kitchen.

  “Selena sent him,” said Lil.

  Ike hesitated and looked back. “You know Selena?”

  “Her guy, Kyle, is my best friend’s brother.”

  “And she sent you?”

  “That’s why I’m here,” Ethan lied.

  The cook looked at Lil. “Up to you,” he said. “You’re the one’s gotta work with him.” He pushed through the batwing doors and disappeared.

  Lil turned to Ethan. “Say I give you the job. When can you start?”

  “When do you need me?”

  “I could really use someone this afternoon. My other part-timer’s in Cape Breton visitin’ family, ‘n’ there’s an American destroyer and two cruise ships in the harbour. With the city full ‘a sightseers, we’ll be packed to the rafters when the gawkers get hungry.”

  “Sure,” said Ethan. “Why not?”

  Lil grinned at him, unveiling the lipstick on her teeth again. “You got chutzpah, kid. I’ll give you that.” She pushed back and got up. “Come meet your first customer.”

  Ethan slid out of his chair and followed her over to the man in the booth by the window. “Sorry to keep you waitin’, Clarence,” she said. “Meet the new Selena. Name’s Ethan. Mind if he busts his cherry on you?”

  The guy grinned, his double chin doing a little dance. “Anything for you, Lil.”

  “Thanks, sweetie. Be right back.” She walked over to the cash register and rummaged in a drawer beneath it.