Kept Cunts and the Self Medicating Wine Steward

The Martini Chronicles

I had only been on the job for a month when Brian Banks was transferred down to Miami.  Brian was a slight little dark haired guy with Tourette’s Syndrome from a well to do family in Florida.  He had a real passion for wine and, as a floor manager, did great double duty as a Sommelier.  The people at the tables loved him when he was straight.

The problem was he was never straight.  He used coke as a form of self-medication.  Not a Sunday night passed without the guy calling his dealer to deliver an eighth at least three or four times.  Then again the same thing happened every shift.

This particular Sunday, he was up in the Customers bathroom, getting himself correct, as he put it, for a special VIP Table – Deborah Cowan, the trophy wife of the owner Eric Cowan, and three of her friends, and they came in specifically to sample the better wines on the List.

Their reservation was for 7:00pm and they showed up half an hour early for drinks at the bar.  I tried to keep them with me as long as possible as no one could seem to pry Mike’s nose from the back of the toilet.  They went to the table after ten or fifteen minutes.  Carleton, the suave server from Columbia, had the table and took to charming the women right away.  He artfully deflected their wine questions and had me pounding on the door to see where Basso was.

Mike came out of the bathroom and straightened his tie.  He whacked me in the arm twice and in the stomach once.  “What table are they on Zola bola?”

Fuck.  I thought.  He may need the Coke to keep himself awake for these shifts but if he didn’t have ten minutes to collect himself, the Tourette’s overcame the drugs.

“33,” I finally said.

I ran over to get Carleton and let him know to look after Mark when he approached the table.

“Hello ladiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii………………….,” was all he got out as he sneezed Cocaine all over Deborah Cowan.  Carleton closed his eyes and grabbed my arm.  I bit my tongue to keep from laughing.

The Tourette’s was out in alitterative force, he kept slapping the red head to the left of Deborah in the arm and I think I saw him cop a cheap feel on Donna at least once, as well as calling the ladies “Kept Cunts” several times each trip to the table.

My next shift with Banks was to be on the following Saturday night.  When I got to work, I had found that Ben had replaced him in the Manager rotation as our Sommelier.  Banks had been moved to the Florida store.

I’m thinking if killed one of the regulars during service I could be the new CEO the day after.