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“God, I hate this job.”
Eve snorts, puffing out a cloud of cigarette smoke in the process. “Really? I had no idea.”
Elena glances at her before rolling her eyes, smiling. “You know you love listening to me bitch.”
Eve nods soberly as she drops her cigarette to the pavement, grinding it out under her heel. “Highlight of my day.”
“Damn straight. Don’t think I’ve missed that you always take one of your smoke breaks — the ones you’re definitely not supposed to be taking, by the way — as I’m heading out.” Elena hefts her bag onto her shoulder. “And on that note, I’m off. How much longer are you here for?”
Eve grimaces, looking back at the building they stand outside of. “Don’t ask. This might be hell and we just haven’t realized it yet.”
Elena tilts her head, considering this. “It would explain the service industry as a whole. And people, just generally. Also, Frank, who, yes, I classify as distinct from people.”
She grins at the dark look that crosses Eve’s face at the mention of their shift manager. “Oh, don’t worry, Eve — I think that new line cook will take him out if you don’t first. You know, the one with the knives and the hots for you.”
“She doesn’t have the hots for—” Eve stops mid-sentence at the delight on Elena’s face. “Oh, shut up.”
“I absolutely will not, not after you basically admitted you know exactly who I’m talking ab—”
Elena’s victory speech is cut off by a third, very unwelcome voice. “Eve, there you are!”
They both turn to see Elena’s proof of eternal damnation emerging from the restaurant. “Kill me,” Elena mutters. “Actually, kill him.”
“Can we kill him if we’re already in hell?” Eve mutters back.
“Well, not with that attitude.”
Frank scowls at them both as he nears. “Eve, we’ve spoken about your breaks. Namely, that you’re taking too many.” He sniffs around them in a rather off putting display before zeroing in on the cigarette butt by Eve’s foot. “And has someone been smoking ?”
Eve doesn’t bother saying anything, looking at him evenly, and the silence stretches; after a moment, he stammers before finally settling on, “It’s getting busy. Honestly, Eve, more and more I question your dedication to this establishment.”
Elena lets out a hastily smothered laugh at that, before sputtering into a series of rather poorly forced coughs, and Eve just sighs. “Take it up with Carolyn if you have an issue, Frank.”
He puffs up at this, but something in Eve’s gaze seems to forestall any further retorts, and he simply says, “Come in, please. Now, if you would.”
Eve holds his gaze for a moment more — Elena looking more and more amused by the interaction, glancing between them — before finally nodding once. Frank looks like he wants to say something more, but mercifully just blows out an aggrieved breath and turns without another word, heading back into the restaurant.
They watch him go. “God, he’s the worst.”
“Truly.”
“Nice to have Carolyn on your side, though.”
Eve shrugs. “I think she just likes a certain amount of controlled chaos, to be honest. You can never really tell with her.”
Elena sighs happily at that. “And that’s why she’s the best.” She turns to leave, waving a hand. “Have fun. Don’t kill anyone.”
Eve snorts and makes to leave herself, straightening her half apron.
“Oh, and Eve?”
Eve pauses, half turning, brows raised expectantly.
Elena grins. “Say hi to that cook for me. What was her name…?”
Eve is answering before she could think better of it. “Villanelle.”
“HA!” Elena points a finger at her. “Knew you knew it.”
Eve just rolls her eyes, and heads back inside.
**
Geraldine’s is not an especially notable restaurant. Not quite greasy spoon, but a far cry from fine dining, it sits somewhere uncomfortably in the middle, in the liminal space that seems to attract middle class couples and their irritating children but also rowdy college kids pooling together to eat out and seniors eating dinner at 5pm. The menu is nothing to write home about, and the food perfectly normal; not exactly life-changing, but decent enough to placate the patrons without too many tantrums (from either children or fully-grown adults), overturning of tables (also children or fully-grown adults), demands for comped meals (mostly fully-grown adults, but Eve is just waiting for the day), or whatever other fresh hell they come up with that day.
So it’s all very middle of the road.
(It also may or may not be a front for something else entirely, but that’s a whole nother story.)
If Geraldine’s is a, perhaps, average dining establishment, Eve is a decidedly below -average waiter, no doubt about it.
(This is a nice way of saying she sucks at it.)
As Frank would not hesitate to tell you: Eve has a way of staring, unblinking, at diners as they place their orders that unnerves them a little; she fails to hide her irritation when a child is having a meltdown, or her flat unamusement when yet another middle-aged dad cracks a terrible joke. She is impatient, overly to the point, perhaps even brusque.
In short, she is simply not very well suited to the service industry. (And this is where Frank would love to tell you that he is, therefore, kicking her out on her ass, but, alas. She manages to stay on, no matter how many enraged texts he sends to Carolyn — the oblique, say-nothing replies he receives don’t really soothe his ire.)
And as Eve would tell you: being in the service industry entails dealing with people. Live people. Live people are, of course, dicks, more often than not. So, as far as she’s concerned, it’s a wash.
Anyway, it’s a job. It pays the bills. Elena’s wisecracks even make it amusing, at times, as does the gallows humor employed by the back of house crew; they, in turn, seem to like her and her cutting jokes, or at least respect her — as indicated by the better-than-usual team shift meals they make whenever she’s on shift — perhaps sensing a fellow not-fit-for-polite-society misfit who managed to slip to the front of house and then stay there.
And, yes. There’s Villanelle. The newest addition to the kitchen staff, who, if Frank has his way, will be kept so back of house she’ll probably be falling out of it; if Eve is not very well suited to the service industry, well, Villanelle does not appear to have the faintest grasp on the concepts of “service” or “industry” themselves whatsoever.
Frankly, Eve is still a bit unclear as to how or why Villanelle was hired; she knows they were looking for a new line cook, but were having trouble finding one who could do the job and not be completely undependable, as is often an issue in the restaurant industry given the shitty hours and poor job security. This raises the obvious question, then, of why Villanelle of all people was considered the suitable solution; she just appeared in the kitchen one day, looking far too at home for her first day on the job in her white chef’s coat and baggy checked pants...and she’s been here since. That is, when she is actually here, far from a sure thing.
It’s not that she’s entirely without ability. Far from it, in fact; she, as Elena alluded to, is somewhat worryingly adept at anything knife-related — Eve has spied her, through the kitchen pass-through window, showing off some neat tricks with a chef’s knife to a visibly alarmed Bear. She is also actually, from what Eve hears, a pretty damn good line cook — when she can be bothered to show up.
The fact that an apoplectic Frank hasn’t been able to fire her, either, indicates yet more of Carolyn’s odd sense of humor, or whatever else that absolutely impenetrable, often baffling woman is thinking. (Eve’s current theory is that, to Carolyn, Geraldine’s and all its staff is something of a vaguely interesting experiment, a side hobby not unlike a vastly advanced civilization running a simulated reality just to see what happens, for laughs. Or, you know, the front theory, which Eve is equally unfazed by.)
Also not helping Frank’s case is that on the days and nights when Villanelle does show up for work, looking like she’s greatly enjoying her own personal joke while somehow also making her decidedly unglamorous chef clogs look freshly off the runway, the general quality of the food noticeably improves, to the diners’ audible appreciation and Frank’s incandescent rage.
It’s worth noting that Eve has not spoken much to her directly. When Eve is at work she is usually far too busy to pause for little more than her unauthorized smoke breaks or the team meal at the end of a shift, and though she’s cool with the guys in the kitchen (as any seasoned server knows it’s important to be), she is, after all, a server, and thus spends more time in the dining room then shooting the shit behind the swinging doors.
(You may reasonably wonder, then, how Eve has arrived at her many observations regarding Geraldine’s latest kitchen addition. Eve would probably murder you with her eyes and potentially her hands were you to bring it up, but Elena would gleefully chime in here to let you know that, on that first day, Eve and Villanelle did meet. That, as Elena can attest, Eve walked into the kitchen with Elena as Villanelle was loudly cracking a joke to a somewhat nervous looking Kenny, and then, as Eve passed her, just— stopped midsentence. Eyes following Eve, Kenny’s entire existence completely forgotten. Eve, for her part, didn’t seem to really notice, apart from a parting glance as they left, and a passing “So I guess they found a line cook, huh,” comment as they headed back to their respective tables.
But Elena didn’t miss the way Eve turned her head to look back into the kitchen through the pass-through window, back at Villanelle.)
So they are not, perhaps, complete strangers. There are the team shift meals, of course, where the team eats communally and decompresses after hellish shifts and nightmare customers (and Frank, a common enemy to all), and where Villanelle — if she’s shown up to work that day — has quickly established a reputation for telling increasingly outlandish, obviously fake stories about various aspects of her life, eyes flitting over to Eve now and again to catch her reaction (and sometimes getting rewarded with the tail-end of a smirk).
But, again. Eve is there to work and then get the hell out of there before she loses her mind and possibly her freedom as a nonincarcerated member of society, regardless of whatever her thoughts on the new line cook may or may not be. And Villanelle clearly has her own thing going on, given her spotty at best attendance at the restaurant.
And if Elena is adamant that Villanelle is into Eve — and that Eve, at the very least, is clearly not opposed to this development — that’s fine. Elena is adamant about a lot of things, it’s an entertainment of sorts to her.
As for the shift meal notes situation, well — look, it’s not a big deal. (It isn’t, Elena, stop waggling your eyebrows, you look insane.)
**
The first time it happened, Eve had just finished having it out with Frank for maybe the millionth time; he was attempting to chew her out, she was waiting for him to finish so that she could move on with her life, this was pissing him off even more, and so on. This happy little discussion was taking place in hissed whispers in front of the pass-through window, and when Frank finally stormed off, Eve continued standing there, arms tightly crossed, anger bubbling in her gut and more than a few dark thoughts crossing her mind. God, what a dickswab.
And then there was the sound of a cleared throat, not too far away, and the sound of paper sliding against metal. Eve looked over to the pass-through to see a little paper basket of fries sitting there on the shelf, and a retreating arm. She frowned and peered through the narrow window to see Villanelle’s back as the other woman walked back to her station, and then, after a pause, picked up the basket and shoved a fry in her mouth, keeping her back to the dining room — daring to eat where customers could see her was a big enough of a no-no as it was, but she was pissed, and being pissed always made her hungry.
A few fries in, she paused suddenly as some black scrawl suddenly peeked out between the remaining fries. Eve stared at it, really hoping she wasn’t about to read something that would make her instantly regret going down the fry-path, before tentatively pushing the rest of the fries out of the way to see, scribbled in pen on the bottom of the basket:
Want me to kill him?? :D
Eve stared at this grease-stained message for a full five seconds before slowly raising her head to peer back through the pass-through window. She saw Villanelle staring back at her, as if she’d been watching her, and when she realized Eve was looking her way broke out into a bright grin, holding up a sharp chef’s knife in one hand and giving a thumbs up with the other.
Eve watched this display for a long moment, utterly bemused and more than a little torn on what she should be feeling in response to this. Villanelle nodded encouragingly, stabbing the air with her knife in what was clearly meant to be a demonstrative manner.
And that did it. Eve, almost despite herself, felt herself laugh. Villanelle’s grin renewed, and Eve turned away — but not before popping the last few fries into her mouth.
So that was the first time.
**
Obviously, once Elena caught wind of this interaction — Kenny, his station next to Villanelle’s as it is, awkwardly watched the whole thing unfold, no doubt wishing very much he could be anywhere else, and if he knows Elena knows — there’s been no letting it go.
And that was before all the other times.
Eve is not dumb. Nor is she naive; this is not her first time around the block, thank you. Villanelle could not be more transparent were she actually a sheet of glass. And she doesn’t strike Eve as someone who typically tries to draw things out…but yet, here she is, playing some sort of long game. Not particularly subtly, either; something tells Eve subtlety is not one of Villanelle’s strong suits.
(And Eve is not finding it endearing. Nor amusing. Absolutely not.)
Take the second incident, for instance.
It was towards the end of an absolutely insane shift, the Saturday night dinner crowd pushing Eve to the edges of her (limited) patience.
Finally, once the crowd started to dwindle and the kitchen was near closing, Eve’s section of the dining area finally emptied and she was able to catch a breather. In the employee bathroom, she stared at herself in the mirror for a moment, exhausted, before reaching up and loosing her hair from its bun and running her hands through it to shake free the curls, trying to alleviate her burgeoning headache.
Without warning, one of the stall doors swung open, and Villanelle emerged.
Their eyes met in the mirror, and Villanelle froze in the doorway of the stall. Only at Eve’s arched brow did she seem to regain her senses, lurching towards the sinks and turning a faucet on.
Eve kept her eyes trained on her own reflection, feeling Villanelle continue to look at her, in true Villanelle fashion not even trying to hide her stare. The water continued to run from the faucet, the only noise in the small room.
Eve took her time tying her hair back up, very specifically not acknowledging Villanelle. Finally, she made to leave. Only at the doorway did she turn to look at Villanelle, whose gaze snapped up to meet hers.
“Don’t forget to wash your hands.”
Villanelle followed her stare to the sink, where the water uselessly continued to run; by the time she looked back at the exit, Eve was gone.
Later that night, as the staff finished off the uncommonly good pasta prepared by the kitchen for the shift meal, scraping clean the paper plates the dishwashers insisted they use, Eve stabbed one of her few remaining ravioli — and paused.
More of that now familiar black scrawl peeked out along the bottom of the plate.
She looked to the other end of the table, where Villanelle sat with the rest of the kitchen crew, laughing loudly. She didn’t look at Eve.
Eve looked back at her plate, staring at the smudged writing — best not to think about the interaction of ink and pasta sauce — and pushed a ravioli to the side. The message stared back at her:
You should wear it down more.
Eve looked at this for a moment, and then back at the other end of the table, at Villanelle.
This time, Villanelle looked back.
They held gazes for a second. Villanelle raised her eyebrows just a bit, challenging.
Eve reached up to her hair, never looking away, watching Villanelle track the motion…
And tightened her bun.
And then she returned to the rest of the ravioli; it really was quite good.
Out of the corner of her eye, she could see Villanelle smiling.
**
So it’s sort of becoming a thing, maybe.
Elena has accused Eve of having lost her mind, or at least of wearing her hair down to work much more often (“Don’t even try to deny it, Eve, I was sitting right next to you at dinner while you were eye-fucking the line cook, right over my ravioli!”).
Villanelle, for her part, mysteriously starts to appear at work noticeably more than she once did; Frank is deeply suspicious.
And Eve? Eve is just fine. Really, it’s just business as usual. She’s always in the kitchen this much.
But things are about to boil over, perhaps.
They’ve been dancing around each other for weeks. The entire staff is sick of them. Even Frank, notoriously uninterested in the personal lives of his team, has taken notice.
And then Villanelle stops coming to work.
At first, it’s not terribly noticeable. Her recent uptick in appearances aside, she does, after all, have a terrible track record that would get her fired on the spot at any restaurant that is not Geraldine’s.
But the days stretch on, with the station next to Kenny’s occupied by some stand-in who is very much not Villanelle.
It doesn’t bother Eve, obviously. What does she care if one of the countless blink-and-you-miss-them kitchen crew has apparently left or quit or gone missing? So what if there’s no more illicit orders of fries diverted her way, or suspiciously delicious shift meals, or absolutely ridiculous stories told at those meals?
(And so what if she corners Frank after work one day to hear from him that Villanelle hasn’t quit; she’s just MIA.)
She even texts Carolyn, something she is usually loath to do, only to be even more annoyed by the all too typically cryptic, mysterious reply confirming that Villanelle will surely come back eventually, whatever that means.
The days turn into weeks. The shifts are endless and unbearably dull. Eve’s vague not- worry turns into anger, and then back into not vague at all worry. She’s an idiot for feeling any of this, of course; people quit all the time, simply stop reporting to work and are replaced. It’s the restaurant industry, for god’s sake. And Eve is an idiot.
Then, two weeks after her last shift, Villanelle comes back.
And Eve’s irritation is sparked afresh.
She hears Villanelle before she sees her. There’s been little reason to go into the kitchen, Eve limiting her interaction to whoever is sliding dishes across the pass-through window.
It’s as she’s doing this, picking up three orders at the beginning of a shift, that she hears a familiar voice — and almost drops the burger she’s about to balance.
(She doesn’t, of course. She’s a professional.)
But she does duck her head to peer properly through the narrow window, and stops short. Villanelle is at her station next to Kenny, currently in the process of teasing him mercilessly if his blush is anything to go by.
She looks worse for the wear. Tired, and a fading bruise visible on her left eyebrow ridge.
Eve stares at her, anger and worry warring inside of her, before a hissed utterance of her name — Frank, obviously — reminds her she is in fact balancing three heavy plates in her arms, ready to be delivered to a table.
At the sound, Villanelle looks over to the window, and sees Eve. Her eyes widen.
Eve turns away, and heads for her tables.
Villanelle tries to catch her eye several more times that night, but Eve refuses to engage, staying in the dining area and focusing on her tables. When a paper basket of fries appears on the pass-through shelf, she ignores it. She can feel Villanelle’s rising frustration, which, great . That makes two of them.
It’s towards the end of the shift that Villanelle finally corners her. In the bathroom, predictably.
“Hi, Eve.”
Eve doesn’t look away from where she’s fixing her hair. “Hi.”
Villanelle takes a cautious step into the room, the door swinging shut behind her. “I’ve been looking for you.”
“Congrats. You found me.”
Villanelle pauses. “Are you…okay?”
Eve finally drops her hands, looking at her. “Are you?”
Villanelle has the gall to look taken aback. “What?”
“Your face. What happened to you? Where have you been?”
She instantly wishes she could take back the revealing questions, and their even more revealing tone, but it’s too late. Villanelle’s face goes through several expressions before she settles on a smile, looking pleased, her voice dropping. “I was helping Carolyn with something. I’m fine.”
“Does ‘helping Carolyn’ always end with bruises?”
Villanelle just smirks. “No. Only sometimes.”
“Thanks for leaving without a trace, by the way. Not even a note — isn’t that supposed to be your thing?”
Villanelle pauses, and then actually looks a bit remorseful — and for once, Eve doesn’t think she’s putting on an act. “Sorry. I’m not very good at, uh, all that. Or goodbyes. Or, people, I guess.”
“Didn’t stop you earlier.”
“You’re clearly the exception.”
And this should not have an effect on Eve, it really shouldn’t, but well, that’s been her mantra for the last two months with little to no impact, so. “And you’re an idiot.”
Villanelle just laughs. “You bring it out of me.”
“I’m not sure that’s a good thing,” Eve deadpans, and Villanelle just raises a shoulder in a half shrug.
They look at each other for a moment.
“So…it doesn’t hurt?” Eve gestures at the bruise.
Villanelle blinks at her before seeming to remember the injury. “Oh. No. I’m good at taking a hit. You should see the other guy.”
She gives Eve an exaggerated look as she says this, but somehow, Eve gets the feeling she isn’t joking. Even worse, Eve finds that she doesn’t mind.
“Well, that’s good to know, for future reference.”
Villanelle laughs. “Let this one heal before testing the theory, okay?”
“No promises.”
They stare at each other, the air in the small room more charged than it was a moment previous. Villanelle clears her throat. “So, I was thinking—“
Her sentence is interrupted by a sudden pounding on the door, and then the incredibly unwelcome sound of Frank yelling through the door that “The employee bathroom is not meant for hiding from your duties, Eve, and just because this is the ladies’ room doesn’t mean I don’t know you’re in there!”
Villanelle gives the door a deathly look. “Just say the word. My offer still stands.”
Eve chuckles as she heads for the door. “I’ll let you know.”
**
At the shift meal that night — easily the best they’ve had in weeks, the common denominator in these meals finally becoming clear — Eve takes her time eating. This time, she is not at all surprised by the message greeting her on the bottom of the plate.
I can’t stop thinking about you.
Eve looks at this for a moment, then to where Villanelle again sits with the kitchen crew.
And then she rises to her feet, taking the plate with her, walking down the length of the table to stand across from Villanelle.
Villanelle is engrossed in telling a long, winding story to a deeply pained Bear — until Kenny elbows her in her side. She breaks off, looking annoyed, until she sees Eve standing there, and suddenly just looks nervous.
Eve holds up the plate, so that the writing is clearly visible. “So do something about it.”
Villanelle stares at her for a long moment in complete surprise — as do Bear, and Kenny, and pretty much most of the staff. Eve doesn’t care.
Then, Villanelle grins.
Eve would probably not be the best person to ask about what happens after that. Nor, god help you, Villanelle. But Elena would definitely — after waiting for Eve to walk away — lean in and tell you that she may or may not have seen them leaving together that night. And that Villanelle shows up to work much more often these days, sometimes arriving with Eve. She joins Eve for almost every one of her smoke breaks while simultaneously cajoling her to stop smoking, and, even crazier, Eve seems to be listening.
She still looks at Eve from the kitchen, and Eve looks back. (It’s all a little voyeuristic, to be honest with you.) She sneaks Eve fries, and, once she learned Elena is Eve’s pal, slips them to her too. (Also, that time Elena caught them making out in the alleyway.) But never mind that — get this — Elena once saw Eve, in the kitchen at the tail-end of a shift, reach out and squeeze Villanelle’s hand, just once. You should’ve seen the looks on their faces, so soft it was actually kind of terrible. Oh, and she still makes the best shift meals Elena’s ever had.
And she never stops writing Eve messages.