Seeking Target
Part Eleven
I wasn't there, but I watched it all happen.
There are phone calls you don't want to get. There are phone calls you wish you had never received.
I told Paddy and Nagi I wanted them to go shop for things for Paddy's tattoo studio, since I wanted Paddy to go full-time before the end of the month. I made sure Paddy knew to stop by the welder's, too, to see about getting his new chair designs brought to reality. Dutch sent along Radical, for the hell of it, and Billy sent Bonzai and Bird as well.
Bird had been charming everyone to no end, downstairs, and Billy felt it best if that charm was absent for a while.
Darren picked them all up at 1:45 pm, and he did indeed look like hell. But he seemed to perk up when the boys piled into his pickup truck.
About ten minutes later, a young, disheveled Little Person walked up to the bar, where Rut was putting drinks on a tray for Terrell, one of our waiters.
"Are you the manager?" the short redhead asked plaintively.
Rut stared at him in consternation. I can only imagine what he was sensing from the young guy.
"I'm not, no," Rut said slowly. "What seems to be the problem?"
"I was hoping you guys were hiring," the young man replied listlessly. "I don't suppose the manager is here, huh?"
"We don't have a manager, exactly," Rut replied. "What kind of job are you looking for?"
"Anything?" he begged. "I'll wash dishes, I'll sweep floors, really, anything. Please, who do I need to talk to?"
"We can't bother Dad today," Dagger whispered to Rut. "But... Let's run it past Billy and Dutch, that's kind of the way things are supposed to go now, right?"
Rut looked surprised, and then nodded hard enough to make his goatee a dangerous weapon.
Within a couple minutes, Billy and Dutch had the young man seated at one of the tables in the bar area.
Billy and Dutch had looked the young man over, and exchanged glances.
While his curly, pale red hair was passably neat, it still looked like it needed a good shampoo. His short beard was combed. The button down shirt he wore was relatively clean. His blue slacks weren't too wrinkled.
In short, he looked like a homeless person had hurriedly gotten ready to look for work. His neck had a suspicious ring of dirt and sweat around it, and his liquid green eyes were bloodshot. His breath was a tad on the rank side. There was a certain rancid odor coming from his body. There were a hundred tiny signs of a problem.
From what Billy said later, there was plenty of silent conversation going on, asking "What would Red do", and some heavy speculating as to what I really would do.
"So, you're looking for a job here?" Billy asked politely. "What kind of job have you done in the past?"
"Janitorial," the redhead replied. "Are you the manager?"
"I'm the director of quality assurance for the company," Billy replied. "Basically, I work with the owner and Dutch, who owns his own franchise, to make sure everything runs smoothly."
"What's your name?" Dutch asked.
"Daryl, Daryl MacCailin," the redhead answered.
"Daryl, where do you live?" Dutch asked.
"I don't live anywhere," Daryl admitted. "I'm on the street. Please, I just need a job."
"How long have you been on the street?" Billy asked him gently.
"About eight months," Daryl sighed. "The company I worked for got shut down by that raid by ICE. They employed too many illegals. So I lost my job too."
"Wait here," Dutch told him. He got up and went to talk to Rut and the other guys, all of whom were watching the "interview" with all the subtlety they could muster.
It took some discussion, but Dutch came back, with a menu in one hand. He handed it to Daryl.
"First thing you do is order yourself something to eat," he told Daryl.
"I don't need a handout-" Daryl objected, close to tears.
"You're not getting one," Billy told him. "You're getting a meal. You're then getting a bath and shower. Then you are getting a uniform, and you are going to do your job. But Billy and I have a responsibility to our customers and our employees. We're not putting you out there to pass out on your feet. We're not putting you out there to get ridiculed or sneered at. So figure out what you want to eat, before Jackson gets over here to take your order."
"Once you have ordered we will have a talk," Dutch said pointedly.
"You know this is a gay-owned restaurant and bar?" Billy asked Daryl, once he'd finished eating.
"Yeah," Daryl nodded. "I figured, who else would hire me? You have other Little People here. I'm not hideous, or anything. I'm not that bad. And, well, maybe I'm gay too."
"Fine," Dutch shrugged.
"What we're offering you is a job bussing tables and stocking," Billy told him. "To start. You'll also be getting trained in prep work, bartending, cooking, and dealing with the customers. In fact, you'll be getting trained in every area we have, until we figure out where you do the best and where you are happiest. Is that good enough, or did you want something else?"
The young man stared at him.
"You'll get the same benefits as all other employees," Billy continued. "Lucky is on his way over."
Lucky slid onto the seat next to Daryl, spreading open a folder. "We have paperwork to do, but we'll do it later. Right now, here's letter offering you a job, with your wages, job duties, etc., on it." He slid the letter over. "And these are the employee benefits you will get, and here are the additional benefits we offer to those who want them." He slid over several more sheets of paper. "I need your signature on that letter, stating you are accepting or turning down the job, by the way." He held a pen out to Daryl.
I was in my office upstairs, furiously trying to pretend to be working on my next novel, while a number of midgets scampered back and forth.
I believe that Piggy went so far as to muffle the door of the room they were in with extra blankets, so I wouldn't hear them start up the sewing machine.
At one point, Mosh was carrying a large blank canvas back and forth in the hallway, so I wouldn't see them smuggling Daryl into the bathroom and later out of our apartment.
I didn't get a damned thing done that day, other than the obvious.
Darren and his passengers didn't get back until about 6. I paid Darren an extra $300 for the flat tire, and went back into my office. I couldn't look at him for very long without getting angry at myself.
Darren had elected, as usual, to eat his dinner at the bar, joking with the guys.
"Excuse me sir, if you're done with your salad, I can take that for you," a low, cheerful voice said.
Darren turned around, and looked down. Into a pair of sparkling green eyes.
Daryl looked up at him and froze.
Darren's a tall, wiry guy. His straw-blonde hair looks like it was cut and combed with a weed-whacker. His hazel eyes usually look mischievous, and his wide, wicked grin emphasizes that.
Rut says the entire restaurant went quiet, at what was going on between the two men.
Darren silently handed over the empty salad plate, and Daryl put it in the bus-tub. Daryl turned away slowly, still with that stunned look on his face, and tripped. The bus-tub went flying, with a long trail of broken glass and plates pointing straight at Daryl.
Our customers are, I have to say, a rowdy lot. They are also some of the best people I've ever worked with.
But we had some strangers in for dinner that night, and somebody started laughing.
If not for Mosh, Darren probably would have destroyed the restaurant that night. Not only did Mosh deliberately get in the way, he held Darren back. Cain managed to squelch the noise before much got out of Daryl.
What silenced the restaurant then was Daryl, though.
"But I need this job!" he cried out.
Emily, our "head" dishwasher, came out then, and ordered the offending party out of the restaurant. When they threatened to not pay, she laughed in their faces.
"We don't need that kind of money anyway," she told them.
Meanwhile, the other little guys were quietly cleaning up the mess.
Paddy and Dagger helped Daryl up off the floor, and hustled him into the break room. Suzie, Julie, Anton, and Jarrod all went back to reassure him and try to cheer him up.
Finally, Lucky threatened to fire him if he didn't get back out there to do his job.
"Who was that guy?" Daryl demanded.
"Which one?" Lucky asked, bewildered.
"The guy at the bar," Daryl told him. "The really good looking one."It took more explaining before Lucky could pin down which guy at the bar Daryl was talking about, and Daryl couldn't understand why Lucky was acting so clueless.
"How fucking humiliating," Daryl moaned. "I don't know who his boyfriend is, but I hate his fucking guts already."
"Darren's single," Lucky told him as he turned away. "And he's waiting at the bar to see if you are okay, he wants to talk to you."
It took Paddy and Dagger both to drag Daryl out of the employee restroom.
"Are you alright?" Darren asked him urgently.
"Uh, yeah, sorry about the scene," Daryl shrugged, not looking at him. "I don't know how I still have a job after that."
"Red would never fire somebody for something like that, it was an accident," Darren told him.
"No, but I might fire somebody for taking an hour break," I remarked dryly. Darren spun to look at me, and Daryl looked at me like the Devil incarnate. "If his shift hadn't been over for a half hour by then anyway." I looked at Daryl. "You better put your time down for the entire time you worked. I don't let employees work off the clock."
"Please don't fire me," Daryl begged.
"What part of 'employee' are you unfamiliar with?" I asked him suspiciously.
"But-"
"You need to get cleaned up, order yourself some dinner, and check back with me before running off anywhere," I interrupted the little guy. "I still need to find you a place to stay. I'm not having any employee of mine sleeping on the street."
Darren looked at me and then at Daryl. "I've got extra room, he can stay with me."
I looked at Darren, considering. "I don't know if that's a good idea, Darren. He's going on the night shift for the rest of the weekend. You wouldn't get any rest at all, with him coming and going."
"No, that's great," Darren assured me. "You know me, I'm a night owl anyway. We can work it out. I'll even guarantee he gets here on time."
"Well, that's up to him, I guess," I sighed, giving up. I turned to Yazzie and Lucky. "We're clear, Darren doesn't pay for any drinks tonight. He can't buy rounds on the house, but if he buys a friend a drink, that's fine."
"Perfectly clear," Lucky said, deadpan.
"Can I buy you a drink?" Darren asked Daryl. "Once you clock out, I mean? Or did you have other plans?"
"I don't have plans," Daryl said slowly. "But sure. I- I have to go get cleaned up."
Arkansas's concert went off without a hitch, and our Friday night regulars were very supportive. He ended with a slow song he had written, about destiny.
Darren asked Daryl to dance with him for that song, and Daryl found enough wits to say yes. Darren danced the whole song on his knees.
I went upstairs after the concert, and erased the twelve messages on the answering machine, from Darren, drunkenly crying about being so alone.
