The Botel was a seasonal job. May through August. The day after Labor Day I was out of work, and out of money. My co-workers had amassed small fortunes. Not me. Naïveté in full bloom, I was unaware that one could sublet one’s apartment. I paid rent, electricity, and phone even though I wasn’t living in the place. By the end of the summer I had a grand total of thirty bucks. With memories of the fabulous Roberta Flack and dozens and dozens of half-naked tea-dancing fools, I skedaddled back to Manhattan, and went to bed. I woke up early with the intention of finding a job. I took a shower, brushed my teeth, got dressed…and called Francois.

PS: “Google Translate” is free I hear.

CHEZ PASCAL

Mid 1980s – 5:15pm

Chez Pascal – a French restaurant with three-stars from Mimi Sheraton – occupies the lower level of a brownstone on East 83^rd Street on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. Highlights are exposed brick walls, gray suede banquets, salmon-colored tablecloths, and snooty waiters. I’m sitting at a table in the rear of the dining room, just off the hallway to the bathrooms, eating family meal with the staff. In French restaurants everyone partakes of family meal, no exceptions. Tonight, it’s the chef (Bernard), sous-chef (Machismo), waiters (Francois, Miguelito and Jorge), busboy (Goh-Goh), porter/dishwasher (Nestor), owner (Robey), and maître d’ hotel (M. Vachon). They chat, chew, argue, guffaw, drink, and spit food in French and Spanish. Cigarette smoke swirls above their heads, wafting to the push-pull of flying hand gestures. Every few moments they stop and harrumph at me, the new guy. It’s the French method of waiter training: torment the new guy until he quits or falls into place. I endured the ritual at Le Provençale.

I’m on to them.

I nod. I smile. I shove a forkful of their food into my mouth. It’s my third helping, white meat, possibly veal, in a light butter and garlic sauce, sprinkled with chopped chives. No adjective can aptly describe its deliciousness. I am overcome and can’t stop eating.

“Où l’as-tu trouvé? Le zoo?” says Robey.

Robey, tall but refusing his height, is constantly lowering his head into his neck, a continental turtle. He’s little-boy turned big-boy handsome with sweet demi glace eyes, thick eyelashes, gigolo hair. A lit Gauloises smolders nearby at all times. A throat-cancer survivor, when he speaks he sounds like he’s gargling with wet gravel.

“We worked together at Le Provençale,” Francois says to Robey.

I heard Le Provençale, and say, “Francois told me if I ever needed a job, to look him up.”

“This morning he looked me up,” says Francois.

Vachon grunts. He sports a sexy two-day beard and a gorgeous suit, but his visage is that of a deranged Marcel Marceau. He holds a lit cigarette to his mouth with tight white fingers. He isn’t smoking; his lips are clenched too tight to get a cigarette past them. Rocking back-and-forth he stares at me with such disgust, I shudder. I am determined to show him that I know what to expect and say: “I understand there is to be no formal training. I am to watch everything Francois does, and do the same, just as I did at Le Provençale. It’s the French way, I guess. Toss the new guy into the deep end of the pool. If he doesn’t drown, he can come back to work tomorrow.”

“Je n’aime pas ce cochon,” says Vachon.

“Laisse-lui le temps,” says Francois.

I know they’re talking about me — in French, no less. Then again, Francois isn’t really French, he’s Spanish, but he sounds French, particularly when he speaks it. People who speak French sound, well…French. The French and people who speak French aren’t easy to impress; I try by stabbing the last morsel of white meat on my plate, dragging it through the sauce, and shoving it in my mouth.

“What is this?” I say, chewing with enthusiasm.

“Il mâche la bouche ouverte,” says Vachon, pretending to spit.

“Je vais lui parler.”

“It’s just delicious,” I say, thrilled to be included in an international conversation. “What is it called, again?”

“Sautéed cerveaux de veau sur le pain grillé,” says Vachon.

“What is that? Let me guess. Something French?”

Vachon to Bernard: “Nommez-moi cette célèbre vache Américaine.”

“Elsie,” says Bernard.

Vachon turns on me with eyes full of hate, “You are eating the fried brain of Elsie the Cow’s daughter. On toast.”

“Moo,” says Goh-Goh, and I excuse himself to the bathroom.

HOW GREENE WAS MY VALLEY

One month later — 8:30pm

First letter of the reservation is “B.” The rest is indecipherable, one of Vachon’s scribbles. It’s a party of four. Had Vachon realized that “B Indecipherable” was Gael Greene, food critic for New York Magazine, he would have reserved her a spot in the VIP section. But that section is already packed with real VIPS, so “B Indecipherable” and party are exiled to No Man’s Land, AKA my section. As low man on this French totem pole, I get to wait on all the indecipherables.

Ms. Greene’s most vocal companion – a tall, once-handsome galoot, surrounded by an air of masculine prissiness, a real Mister Mary – loudly declares that he is not happy with the table, but Ms. Greene taps his forearm and says, “Leave it.”

By now Vachon has recognized Ms. Greene – that damned flapitudinal hat fools no one. He grabs my elbow and gets in real close. I can feel his whiskers on my ear. “That is Gael Greene,” he whispers coarsely. “She writes on food. Do not fuck her up.”

After cocktails and a couple of slices of Saucisson en Croûte (the house amuse-bouche), Ms. Greene and Mr. Mary order appetizers for the table: the Confit de Canard and the Salade de Haricots Verts et Truffes. Eight minutes later, I serve the appetizers. Mr. Mary finger-pokes the haricots, and says, “There’s hardly a truffle here. Is this the usual amount?”

I’m convinced that Ms. Greene is going to write that I, Ted the waiter, ate one of the truffles on the way to the table, so I panic, and sputter, “Um, I’m sorry, um, maybe?”

“Take it back to the kitchen and add more truffles,” Mr. Mary orders. “The correct amount this time.”

I know for a fact that I did not eat one of the truffles and regain some confidence. “Actually that is the correct amount,” I say, because it is, in fact, the correct amount. Truffles are expensive little buggers.

“You weren’t sure a second ago.”

“Now, I’m saying it is.”

Mr. Mary points to Ms. Greene. “This is Gael Greene. She is the food critic for New York Magazine. So listen up–”

Ms. Greene stops him with a hand on his forearm. Her cover blown, she looks at at me, “Just go to the kitchen and get us more truffles, please.”

I take the salad back to the kitchen, and beg Machismo for more truffles, because it’s Gael Greene, and if she complains, Vachon will shove his bazooka of hate up my ass. Machismo is a good guy, always on my side. He places the tin holding the truffles next to the salad, reaches in his pants and scratches his testicles. With newly scented fingers he lifts three pieces of truffles and gingerly places them atop the salad. “Tell them, Bon Apetit,” he says.

I re-serve the salad. I say, “Bon Apetit.” I try to escape.

“Wait,” says Mr. Mary, “Pepper? Doesn’t Robey allow pepper mills in here?”

Fuck. I forgot to offer pepper. I will not allow Mr. Mary to win this round, so I take a dramatic pause wherein I look heavenward for guidance, and say, “Pepper? On truffles?” like it’s wildly known to be akin to putting salt on a slug. There are those who despise being informed of something they should have already known (even if that “something” wasn’t entirely correct). Ms. Greene says, “Never mind the pepper.”

I toddle off.

Later, while Ms. Greene and Mr. Mary discuss the height of their raspberry souffles, I bring two haricot vert salads to the adjoining table. I serve the salads with a great elan. Holding high a pepper mill like it’s a drum major’s baton, I say, quite loudly, “Would you care for pepper?”

Mr. Mary hears, and opens his mouth to squawk, but Ms. Greene intercedes, and says, “Leave it.” On her way out, she pulls Vachon aside and I’m sure complains about me. Vachon looks at me, then says something to Ms. Greene. She takes one long scurrilous look at me, and leaves. I await Vachon’s bazooka, but he says nothing. I feel as if I have just passed a test.

(Note: Ms. Greene did not write a review.)