[An excerpt from unfinished novel Island Of Sanity.]
Emmett was delightful. A crowd favorite, should there be a crowd available to offer its well-earned approbation. He was also a guy with an edge, though safely backgrounded and surfaced only as needed, and even then ever so briefly. Should circumstances dictate, he could be a man of action. Like that period of time serving up beverages as a local barista.
"Emmett, what of that job-related rascally behavior you once hinted at," Walt probed.
"Que," stalling for time, was Emmett, weighing if, in fact, it was time to drop this load.
"You know, you told me about it that one time, speaking of your coffee shop gig. You pulled me aside during yo momma's annual Christmas party. The annual event where she showed off her Santa collection. Those one hundred plus Santas, some of which were quite spooky, dude."
"Oh yes, the Santas. Also, the de-caffeinated coffee served up to jackasses," slow rolled Emmett.
"Dude, that's not cool. You were a professional," Walt with mock derision.
"I wasn't a professional, I was a barista," Emmett scoffed.
"Tell me again," Walt liked a good story, and Emmett webbed stories nicely, like a snake oil salesman spinning one final yarn before blowing town.
"You remember. Under those special circumstances, what's a guy to do," Emmett's vague and unsatisfactory plea for a pardon.
Walt offered this nudge to grease the skids, "A customer orders coffee, caffeinated, like any normal person would order, but you and your colleagues took it upon yourselves to serve de-caf. I'm pretty sure that's the work of the devil. Devil maybe sounds rough, at least the work of someone as dastardly as who believes in the baseball pitch clock."
"The devil's work? Easy with the escalation, dude. That would be, and has been, for one example, more accurately displayed by one of Lucifer's minions outside a coffee shop door at 6:28 a.m. Shop opens at 6:30. Hours of operation clearly posted right there, on the very door the prospective patron was pounding on for two minutes, then angrily saying that we opened late. The doors were unlocked on time at 6:30. That person, the minion, is already amply pumped to tackle their day. That kind of behavior earns decaf, every time, because it's safer for the rest of humanity that person is not caffeinated," explained Emmett, totally believing his own words.
"What else? What other behavior could possibly be deserving of such decaffeinated ire," encouraged Walt, hiding a smile having lubed Emmett just enough to flow the stories.
"Well, let's see, there could be a scenario where a customer places their order, face to face at the counter, eye contacting the barista, then closing with 'And I'm in a hurry. Fucking hurry up.' Which you civilians might be surprised at the frequency of such rude outbursts. That person's getting decaf. Nobody deserves to endure such indignity. And besides, what kind of idiot talks like that to someone who will be handling their food," Emmett soundly expounded, one eyebrow arched high on his forehead for effect.
"How about the regulars? Always treat them well, do you," Walt knowingly asked.
"Almost always."
"Could you please address the almost," Walt prompted.
"One example. The community condiments," Em.
"A particular favorite topic of mine," said Walt, Emmett pointing at Walt acknowledging his pet peeve. Walt fastidiously abstained from publicly shared condiments. Sharing of such things, the too oft handled shakers and sauces, such widely and alarmingly varied degrees of sanitized, and unsanitized, public hands, was too intrusive for his delicate constitution, so he went without, even if it meant ordering pancakes and taking them down dry to avoid the community syrup beaker.
"This one person, a regular, like every time, would order their beverage, receive their beverage, then make their way to the condiment quadrant, where they would proceed to take off the top of the nutmeg shaker, spooned it into their drink, like, actually unscrewed the top of the shaker, stuck a spoon up in there, as if shaking the shaker would take too frustratingly long, so this person went spoon. And then, then, left the top off the shaker, spoon and nutmeg debris scattered in the community condiments area needing to be cleaned up and no other customers could use it. That person gets decaf."
"What, after the fact you switch them to decaf," Walt questioned.
"No, this happened every Monday at the busy morning rush, same person, every week. All my barista colleagues and I were busy behind the counter at that time, and now we had other customers clamoring for usable nutmeg. Nutmeg of all things," rolling his eyes. "One of us had to stop what we were doing to address this unnecessarily manufactured mess, fix this problem while other customers are waiting and now there's one less of us moving out product. That mess maker received decaf every Monday as a preemptive blast in anticipation of their forthcoming destructive behavior. They earned a decaf beverage," Emmett concluded.
"Does this happen at other coffee shops, do you know."
"Probably, jerks get served decaf. It's a universal blowback consequence," Em.
So went such conversations with Walt and his pals, when not otherwise watching or talking baseball. Their lives were filled mostly with such nonsensical travails as this. Well, at least, that would certainly be the impression of anyone who overheard their silly dialogue.
[The barista anecdotes are real life scenarios experienced by my sister, a former barista, and relayed to me with some mild prodding.]
Posts
