Can I Get You Anything Else
I say 'anything else?' hundreds of times a shift. Tonight it slipped out in bed, and he answered like a customer.
i've said it so many times tonight my mouth doesn't need me for it anymore. can i get you anything else. table four, table nine, the guy who tips in exact change. i say it warm even when my feet stopped being feet an hour ago.
closed out at 1:40, drove home on autopilot, and now it's almost three and neither of us is asleep. he's on his side of the bed scrolling something. i've been lying here rehearsing the actual question, the one i drove home to ask him. are we still doing this. do you still want to.
what came out instead was can i get you anything else.
he laughed, thought i was doing a bit. said no, i'm good, in the exact flat voice customers use back at me. i laughed too, like it was a bit.
i lie here running the diner math on us now without meaning to. how many tables i've saved by being pleasant instead of honest. how the script is just faster, and nobody sends it back.
i could still say the real thing. he's right there. i open my mouth and out comes something about tomorrow's shift instead, and he says okay, sounds good, and rolls over, and i let him.