When the restaurant finally cleared out for the night, I was stuck cleaning up the entire place. That fucked up perk was thanks to the landlord, who’d told the wait staff and kitchen staff not to help turn the place down while I was on the job. Part of paying off my debt to him was handling one hundred percent of the job.
“That’ll teach you some responsibility, kid,” the bastard would tell me every chance he got. There was no use trying to reason with that guy then, and after I started working at his restaurant, I realized it was just a character flaw. No one challenged him. Ever.
Tonight, after I delivered the last load of dishes to the dishwasher, wiped down every table, placed every chair up on the tables and mopped the floors, I stretched and let out a ragged sigh.
“It’s not easy, is it Clark?”
Crap, he’d probably made it his personal mission to never let me live it down.
“No sir. Not after being at practice all afternoon.”
I walked off as the exertion of the day hit me. My feet were hurting. My legs were sore. I even felt the burn in my arms and shoulders. I was hurting in places that hadn’t hurt since the first time I’d stepped into football practice. It reallywaslike going to a second practice every day. I just couldn’t let it affect my game or show at practice.