Philippe Djian - Betty Blue

“Make me another one with mushrooms, and one plain!” I called out.

Though he never answered, you knew he heard you. It was something engraved in his brain. I leaned in a little farther to get one of those tiny bottles of San Pellegrino and downed it in one swallow. I’d taken to doing that lately. I put away about thirty or forty a night-it made me feel just a little bloated by closing time. Eddie looked the other way.

Eddie manned the register. Betty and I worked the dining room. If you ask me, you needed at least four waiters for that dining room, but there were just the two of us. We ran like chickens with our heads cut off, carrying trays where our heads should have been. By eleven o’clock I was dead on my feet, but the San Pellegrino was free and we were getting good money, so I couldn’t complain.

I grabbed my steaming pizzas and headed for the two little blondes who’d ordered them. They weren’t too bad, but I wasn’t up to making snappy chatter-I wasn’t there to have fun. People were shouting at me from all sides. It hadn’t been that long ago that I had to strain my ears to pierce through the silence of the night-walked out on the porch and felt myself surrounded by space. It seemed only natural. Now here I was squeezing my ass to steer through the noise of clattering plates and bursting voices.

Betty took it better than I did-she knew how to deal with it. Sometimes we’d cross paths, and she’d give me a wink. It gave me my strength back. I tried not to notice her bangs soaked in sweat-I didn’t let myself look. Every once in a while I’d light a cigarette for her and leave it in the ashtray by the kitchen window, hoping that she’d find the time to take a few drags and think of me. I don’t suppose she always did.

We’d been working there about three weeks, and they’d never been busier. We didn’t know which way to turn. I’d been out of it for a while. We were all sort of numb. The only thing I saw clearly were my tips. What really got me was to see all the people standing outside waiting. It was getting on toward midnight, and we apparently wouldn’t be closing for a while. The smell of anchovies was starting to make my stomach tum. I was sticking biscuits in a peach melba when Betty came up to me. In spite of the brouhaha and the circus going on all around us, she managed to whisper a few words in my ear.

“Shit,” she said. “You better take over number five or I’m going to wind up pushing that cunt right through the window.”

“What’s her problem?”

“She’s got it in for me,” she said.

l went to check it out. There were two at the table – this old guy, sort of hunched over, and this woman. She was about forty but already on the edge of the abyss-just out of the beauty shop. The perfect bitch, out on the town with some poor jerk, dry as a saltine.

“Oh, there you are!” she said. “That girl is retarded! I ordered a pizza with anchovies, and she brings me one with ham. Take this away right now…”

“Don’t you like ham?” I said.

She didn’t answer. She gave me a dirty look and lit a cigarette, exhaling through her nose. I took the pizza with a smile and headed for the kitchen. I passed Betty on the way. I wanted to drop everything and hug her-help her forget the old bag-but I left that for later.

“See what I mean?” she asked.

“Exactly.”

“Before all that, she made me bring her new silverware. There was a drop of water on her fork.”

“It’s because you’re prettier than she is,” I said.

I got a smile out of her, and made my way back to the kitchen.

Mario was scowling, his hands on his hips. Things were sizzling in the oven, and greasy steam was hovering in the air. Every little thing seemed covered with a glowing cloud.

“You back here for a breather?” he asked.

“A little correction,” I said.

I went back to where they kept the garbage, three huge cans with handles-repulsive. I got a fork out of a stack of dirty silverware, then scraped the top of the pizza, getting rid of all the ham. Then I took two or three tomatoes that were lying around and started putting the pizza back together again. It was easy to find the tomatoes-that’s what people leave behind most-but it took quite an effort to locate four anchovies, not to mention the glistening lacework of grated cheese that I had to run under the faucet because of a cigarette butt. Mario watched me, his eyes wide, pushing back the oily hair that kept falling over his fore head.

“I don’t understand what the fuck you’re doing there,” he said.

I smashed all the ingredients together and held the little jewel out for him to see.

“Stick this in the oven a minute,” I said.

“Shit…” he said, shaking his head.

He opened the oven door and we stood there, squinting.

“Some people deserve to eat this sort of thing,” I said.

“Yeah, you’re right. Boy, it’s enough to give you a heart attack tonight…”

“I think we still got at least an hour to go, man.”

I got my pizza back and took it to the lady. I set it on the table delicately. It was just like new-piping hot and crispy. The lady made like I wasn’t even there. I waited until she’d swallowed the first bite, then went away, avenged.

It kept up like a runaway train for another hour or so-even Eddie had to lend a hand-and then the place started clearing out slowly and we could breathe a little-we could light the first cigarette of the evening.

“Shit, that’s good,” said Betty.

She was leaning against the wall with her eyes closed and her head bent slightly forward. She held the smoke in as long as possible. We stood in this little alcove where no one could see us from the dining room. All at once she seemed totally done in. Fatigue sometimes makes life painful and sad, there’s no way around it. I looked up at the ceiling and smiled wanly. In a way it was a victory just to end up on our feet. Every job I’ve ever had has only served to demonstrate that man has supernatural powers of resistance. It’s tough to get him down. I took the cigarette that Betty was holding. It wasn’t good-it was divine.

All that was left to do was serve a few desserts-two or three banana flambé-type concoctions-and the game would be won. Then we could go sit in the booth in back and let Eddie take over. I could already see her slipping her shoes off, her head in my lap, my forehead against the windowpane, watching the empty streets, looking for the first sentence of my new novel.

Among the last customers to leave were the lady and her old boyfriend. The guy had hardly touched his food but the lady had eaten-and drunk-enough for two. Her eyes were glazed. She was on her third coffee.

What happened next was entirely my fault. The day seemed to be over, and I had stopped paying attention. I let Betty take care of the dining room-clean out the last stragglers. I was a fool. I felt a chill down my back a fraction of a second before the storm hit. Then there was an incredible sound of things being smashed.

When I turned around Betty was standing nose to nose with the lady. The table was overturned. She was white as death and the lady was red as a poppy, blazing in the sun.

“Bitch…” said the one in red. “I want to see the manager immediately, you hear me?”

Eddie went over, frowning, not knowing what to do with his hands. No one else moved. The few customers left in the dining room were happy to get their money’s worth. It’s always a delicate situation for an owner when one of his employees is getting ready to tangle with a customer. Eddie was uneasy.

“Okay, let’s calm down,” he moaned. “Now what’s going on here?”

The lady was half choked with rage.

“What’s going on is that the service has been abominable all evening long, and if that wasn’t enough, this little twit refuses to bring me my coat! What kind of place is this, anyway?”