So long, Bathtub Mary. I'm fifteen and roundly embarrassed by the garden shrine my cranky, skinflint landlord has planted right next to our apartment. The blessed Virgin stands sheltered in an upended bathtub, her paint chipped concrete feet lost in a blanket of crimson petunias in the summer, buried up to her knees in snow come winter. Cranky landlord tends her with more respect that he can muster for his family, much less his tenants, plus the rent is about to go up past what mom, hardworking and educated as she is, can swing. We need to move.
At the time, I'm working at a diner on Chicago Ave. It's a little Greek place, same menu as the little Greek place up on Sherman, or out on Main. The kind of place where you should order breakfast no matter what time of day it is, because if you think you're actually going to get something edible when you ask for the whitefish or the spaghetti, guess again sister. It's my first waitressing job and I need it badly. Mom has nothing extra to spare, and if I want new clothes, music, books, it's up to me to earn the money. I like walking out of each shift with a soft pile of sweaty bills faced and folded neatly in my cream soup stained apron. What I don't like is that I seem to screw up the easy efficiency of a mostly tolerant staff that has worked together for what appears to be forever.
One girl at this place does not like me. At all. When I screw up an order or worse, take hers by accident, don't do my prep or closing right she rolls her eyes, mockingly informs the other staff, doesn't give me a break. My head spins with panic every time she throws a sidelong, demeaning glance. Her tobacco stained, plodding presence isn't so much intimidating as it is humiliating. Each shift, I set the goal of not messing one thing up, or maybe just one thing, but no more. She doesn't have to like me, but I'm exhausted by her disgust.
One hot Saturday afternoon I have a rare afternoon off. Mom and I have an apartment to look at. The neighborhood is decent, a step down from our current place, but decent. The street is lined with old, mostly dilapidated houses that have been converted into two flats. The lawns are scratchy and brown, little kids in too-tight t-shirts fumble down the broken sidewalks on roller skates or screech around on bikes. We walk up to the hulking grey building at our appointed time to meet the landlady, a shapeless blue haired woman whose rote tone tells us that she's had to show the place over and over.
We push through the heavy wooden outer door, thick red paint flaking off in long, sharp shards, into the cramped vestibule that stinks like old grease and cigarettes. This doesn't bode well, you can tell a lot by the smell of a vestibule. The lady opens the door to the apartment and we see that the place has good bones - wood floors, tall arched windows with wide sills and large front rooms. But it's a godawful mess. Food scattered on the coffee table, piles of newspapers and toys litter the floor and towers of dirty dishes totter on the dining room table. Stale air hangs heavy and thick, like breathing in murky water. The kitchen is as grimy as the rest of the place. Hard food dried onto the filthy stove burners and a sink full of crusty dishes. We murmur optimistic appreciation for the muted sunlight that streams in despite the sheen of grease that coats the windows, try to be complimentary about the generously sized rooms. The landlady mumbles assent and says we can look at the bedrooms.
We follow her into a room off of a short, dark hall. She opens a door and we're met with a blast of cold air, even more stale than in the rest of the apartment. A huge AC window unit is pumping out an icy breeze. This seems to be where everyone sleeps by the look of the waist high piles of clothes that dominate the room. I see a clearing in the piles and look down onto the floor. There's a mattress without sheets, along with a dirty blue pilly blanket and another tangle of unfolded clothes. I hate this place. The landlady flicks on the light so I can see better. My eyes adjust in a second and when I look back down I see curly brown hair poking out from the disheveled heap. I try to absorb the reality that this is a person, a person sleeping and I'm here deciding that I could never ever live here like this, but that we could be one signature and enough desperation away from this being our next home. The blanketed form shifts a little and I see now. I see that it's her.
The waitress who hates me.
Jenny Hay lives in Belgium where she runs, writes and raises three children alongside her incredibly patient husband. She holds a BA in Written Communication from Blackburn College.