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~oOo~
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“Where’s Parker?”
Vanessa, one of the other waitresses on shift, glanced quickly around the Andante. “I guess he’s not back from dealing with that asshole who put his hand up Jamie’s uniform.” She gave Siena a once-over. “You changed out of yours. You never do that at work.” With a grin, she asked, “Holy shit, do you have adate? I didn’t think you did that.”
Siena looked down at her clothes: jeans, boots, a sweater. She’d washed the makeup from her face and brushed most of the mousse and spray from her hair and put it up in a ponytail. She’d been out of the dating scene for a while, but unless things had changed dramatically, this wasn’t really first-date attire.
“I don’t. I have a meeting at Geneva’s school.”
The new therapists had made a list of recommendations for how to support Geneva in light of her new diagnoses, and the school had made a ‘cohort’ of her teachers and Dr. Granger to work out how and whether to implement said recommendations. Tonight, hours after the end of the school day, they wanted her to come in and hear their plan.
Considering that Geneva’s grades were excellent and most of the recommendations had to do with her social and emotional experience of high school, Siena wasn’t optimistic that the school would end up doing much for her.
She intended to advocateenergeticallyfor them to do everything Geneva needed.
The meeting was at six. It was now five-forty. The high school was ten minutes away, and Siena wanted to be there early.
“I’m sure he’ll be right back,” Vanessa assured her. “Just a few minutes.”
“I can’t. I don’t want to be late.”
Now Vanessa’s expression changed from ‘sunny southern girl’ to ‘bossy southern granny.’ “Honey, don’t you be thinkin’ of goin’ out on your own. Especially not after the other night.”
Two nights ago, another night that Siena worked a double, she and Kyrie, another waitress, had some bad trouble with a bachelor party in one of the bar’s private party rooms. The kind of bad trouble that had the sheriff’s department in the lobby and had probably destroyed some poor bride’s special day, what with her groom and his groomsmen in jail for what had been assault and, but for the timely assistance of Parker and his brawny bouncers, would probably have been rape. But the bachelors had been dropping big dollars and were obviously loaded, so their arrests had probably gone on the books as ‘public disturbance.’
Whatever. Siena was a casino cocktail waitress. Assholes like that came with the gig. Knowing it, and knowing she had good men like Parker to deal with the assholes in ways they’d remember, she could deal with it. Within the context of her job, she could deal.
Outside of her job, however, was a different story. Having to deal with handsy drunks all day probably made her dislike most men and distrust all men all the more. She felt constantly under siege, just being in the world where so many dangerous men were.
One of the most dangerous places for a casino cocktail waitress to be was right outside the casino: its parking lot. Drunks who got bounced from the bar or even got booted from the casino for bad behavior not infrequently lurked around outside.
The Andante had a firm policy that waitresses went off the clock in groups—at least in a pair—so they could go to their cars together. And after dark, the policy was that they’d be escorted to their cars by one of the security staff. Parker and his bouncer team.
Siena wanted to wait for Parker. She didn’t like walking to her car alone around here, day or night. But she really needed to get to Geneva’s school. They’d be looking for any reason to discount her, she knew it. Already she had lots of strikes against her: She was not Geneva’s mother. She was uneducated. She was a cocktail waitress who wore a tiny uniform, which plenty of parents and teachers had seen when they’d come to the Andante; Geneva got teased for that, too. She was poor. She drove a shitty car. She lived in Desert Lanes, a ‘working class’ neighborhood which had a reputation for ‘gang activity.’
She would not,couldnot, add ‘habitually tardy’ to the list.
Her uniform was stuffed in her bag. It was only five-forty; on the cursed clock of February, that was twilight, but it wasn’t truly dark yet.
“I have to go now. I can’t be late to this meeting. It’s just sunset, not dark. I’ll be out of the lot before dark.” She had to guess that, of course; workers in casinos did not often get to see the outdoors while they were on the clock. Windows to the outside world, where sun and moon traveled through the sky, were antithetical to the casino business plan. Gamblers who lost track of time gambled more, lost more, and made the bigwigs richer.
Vanessa shoved her hands on her hips. “Well, hurry up, then. I’ll send Parker after you if he gets back quick.”
“Thanks, Ness.” Siena grabbed her bag and headed straight for the kitchen and the employee exit.
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~oOo~
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She got to her carwithout difficulty. Parker caught up with her about halfway across the lot and then grumbled at her the rest of the way for not waiting for him. But then her stupid car did its drama-queen routine and took about five minutes to decide to start, with Parker standing there all the while, telling her how she needed to get her alternator looked at, and maybe the timing belt, too. Car stuff was gobbledygook to Siena, and Parker wasn’t all that much more knowledgeable, so she nodded and kept doing what she always did when the car acted up: multiple attempts to start it, interrupted by occasional sessions of screaming abuse at the dashboard.
But it eventually started, as it, so far, always did. Parker returned to work, and at about ten minutes to six, Siena finally pulled onto South Casino Drive and headed to Laughlin High School.
The traffic lights were in her favor for the most part, and she arrived at the school at one minute to six. By then, the abuse she’d screamed at the car had been applied liberally to everybody on the road who even looked like they might slow her down. She was jittery with rage and anxiety. She was even sweating.
