Jodi Picoult - Small Great Things

I am sure that the caseworker can see the steam rising from my hair. My fingers are clenched so tightly into fists that I can feel myself drawing blood. I’m not quite sure what precipitated this transformation into full-on gangsta, but I’m going to kill my sister.

Hell, I’ve already been indicted for homicide.

The caseworker glances from Adisa to me and then down at the paperwork. She clears her throat. “Well,” she says, all too happy to get rid of us, “you qualify for medical, SNAP, and cash assistance. You’ll be hearing from us.”

Adisa hooks her arm through mine and pulls me up from my chair. “Thank you,” I murmur, as my sister drags me from the cubicle.

“Now, that wasn’t so bad, was it?” she says, when we are out of earshot, standing next to a potted plant near the elevator bank. She is suddenly back to her normal self.

I round on her. “What the hell was that? You were a total asshole.”

“An asshole who got you the money you need,” Adisa points out. “You can thank me later.”

–

MY TRAINER IS a girl named Nahndi, and I am old enough to be her mother. “So basically there are five stations,” she tells me. “Cashier, headset, coffee headset, presenter, and runner. I mean, there are people on table too, of course, they’re the ones who are making the food…”

I trail her, tugging at my uniform, which has an itchy tag at the neck. I am working an eight-hour shift, which means I get a thirty-minute break and a free meal and minimum wage. After exhausting all the temp agency office job positions, I’d applied to McDonald’s. I said I’d taken time off from work to be a mom. I didn’t even mention the word nurse . I just wanted to be hired, so that I could give up some of the benefits I’d received at the unemployment office. For my own sanity I needed to believe that I could still, at least in part, take care of myself and my son.

When the manager called to offer me the job, he asked if I could start immediately, since they were short-staffed. So I left a note for Edison on the kitchen counter saying I had a surprise for him, and caught a bus downtown.

“The fry hopper is where the fries are loaded. There are three basket sizes to use, depending on how busy we are,” Nahndi says. “There’s a timer here you push when you drop the basket. But at two-forty, you need to shake it so the fries don’t just become one giant blob, okay?”

I nod, watching the line worker-a college student named Mike-do everything she is saying. “Once the timer goes off, you hold the basket over the vat and let the oil drain for about ten seconds. And then dump them into the fry station-watch out, that’s hot-and salt them.”

“Unless it’s a no-salt fry order,” Mike says.

“We’ll worry about that later,” Nahndi replies. “The salt dispenser puts the same amount on every batch. Then you toss with the fry scoop and press a timer. All those fries need to be sold in five minutes, and if they’re not, they get dumped out.”

I nod. It’s a lot to process. I had a thousand things to remember as a nurse, but after twenty years, that was muscle memory. This is all new.

Mike lets me try the fry station. I am surprised at how heavy the basket is when it’s dripping. My hands are slippery in their plastic gloves. I can feel the oil settling through my hairnet. “That’s great!” Nahndi says.

I learn how to bag properly, how many minutes each food item can sit in a warming basket before being discarded, which cleaners are used on which surfaces, how to tell the manager you need more quarters, how to push the medium-size button on the register before you push the button for Number 1 meal, or else the customer won’t get fries with his order. Nahndi has the patience of a saint when I forget ranch dipping sauce or grab a McDouble instead of a double cheeseburger (they’re identical, except for one extra slice of cheese). She feels confident enough, after an hour, to put me on table, assembling the food.

I have never been one to shy away from scut work. God knows, in nursing you have your share of holding emesis basins and changing soiled sheets. What I always would tell myself was that after an episode like that, the patient was even more uncomfortable-physically, or emotionally, or both-than I was. My job was to make things better as professionally as possible.

So getting a job as a fast-food worker really doesn’t bother me. I’m not here for the glory. I’m here for the paycheck, as meager as it might be.

I take a deep breath and grab the three-part bun and set the pieces in their spots in the toaster. Meanwhile, I open a Big Mac box. This is easier said than done while wearing plastic gloves. The top part of the bun is sesame-seed down in the top of the box; the middle piece sits balanced on top of that; the bottom part is bottom-side down in the bottom half of the box. Two squirts of Big Mac sauce from the giant metal sauce gun go on each side; shredded lettuce and minced onions are sprinkled on top of that. The middle piece gets two strategically located pickles (they should be “dating, not mating,” said Nahndi). The bottom gets a slice of American cheese. Then I reach into the warmer for two 10:1 patties, and place one on the top and one on the bottom. Lift the middle piece and place on the bottom part, place the top of the bun on that, and the box is closed and given to a runner for bagging or counter service.

It’s not delivering a baby, but I feel the same flush of a job well done.

Six hours into my shift, my feet hurt and I reek of oil. I’ve cleaned the bathrooms twice-including once after a four-year-old got sick all over the floor. I have just started working as a runner to Nahndi’s cashier when a woman orders a twenty-piece McNuggets. I check the box myself before putting it on a tray, and like I’ve been taught, I call her order number and tell her to have a nice day as I am handing it over. She sits down ten feet away from me and eats every last piece of chicken. Then suddenly, she is back at the counter. “This box was empty,” she tells Nahndi. “I paid for nothing .”

“I’m so sorry,” Nahndi says. “We’ll get you a new one.”

I sidle closer, lowering my voice. “I checked that box myself. I watched her eat all twenty of those nuggets.”

“I know,” Nahndi whispers back. “She does this all the time.”

The manager on duty, a cadaverous man with a soul patch, approaches. “Everything all right here?”

“Just fine,” Nahndi says. She takes the new box of nuggets out of my hand and passes it to the customer, who carries it out to the parking lot. The manager goes back to the presenter position, handing out food at the drive-through.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I mutter.

“If you let it get under your skin, you won’t make it through a single shift.” Nahndi turns her attention toward a high-spirited group of kids who surf through the door on the wave of their own laughter. “After-school rush,” she warns. “Get your game face on.”

I turn back to the screen, waiting for the next order to magically appear.

“Welcome to McDonald’s,” Nahndi says. “Can I take your order?”

I hope it’s not a shake. That’s the one machine I don’t feel confident running yet, and Nahndi already told me a story about how, her first week, she forgot to put in the pins and the milk exploded all over her and onto the floor.

“Um, I’ll take a Big Mac meal,” I hear. “Dude, what do you want?”

“I left my wallet at home…”

I spin around, because I know that voice. Standing in front of the counter is Edison’s friend Bryce, and beside him, hands jammed into the pockets of his jacket, is my son.

I can see the absolute horror in Edison’s eyes as he scans my hairnet, my uniform, my new life. So instead of smiling at him, or saying hello, I turn my back again before Bryce can recognize me, too. Before I have to hear Edison make yet another excuse for the situation I’ve put him in.