Chez Pascal

1983

Vachon has moved on. I believe he resigned to run a friend’s restaurant in Hackensack. François is now the maître d’hôtel. He has my back and with Vachon off my back, I’m blossoming into a four-star waiter.

Tonight, François tells me I will be taking care of a private party in the upstairs dining room. It’s a posh fête to celebrate the inauguration of E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial video game. Ten guests. Mr. Atari himself will host.

Apéritifs at seven-thirty.

Dinner at eight.

François hands me the menu:

Saucisson en Croût

Veuve Clicquot

Escargots à la Bourguignonne

Domaine Raveneau’s Blanchot Grand Cru

Carré d’agneau, pommes de terre rôties, légumes de printemps

Chateau Lafite Rothschild ‘77

Salade Verte

Soufflé aux Framboise

Château d’Yquem ‘75

Café Expresso

Digestifs

François says, “You know what to do, Tedee.”

I do, indeed. I head upstairs to put into play all that I’ve learned from François.

• Long table. Four seats per side. Two at either end.
• Crisp linen table cloth, wrinkles steamed flat.

• Presentation plates set two inches up from edge of table; twenty-one inches from its neighbor.
• An embossed copy of the menu on each plate.
• Forks on the left. Knives on the right, blades facing in. Dessert utensils placed horizontally above the plate, fork tines to the right, spoons facing down.
• Water goblets set one inch above the knife. Red and white wine glasses form a triangle with the water goblet, the red wine glass at the apex.
• Napkins folded in the shape of orchids sprout from the water goblets.
• Flower arrangements on the étagère against the wall; not on the table.
• Overhead lights off; scones dimmed; silver candelabras polished and lit. Light classical music.
• White wine, Champagne, and Perrier on ice. Five bottles of the red wine opened and breathing.

Twenty minutes before the guests arrive, François comes upstairs to inspect. He is impressed.

“Très bien, Tedee. Très bien. I teach you well. We squeeze the Bohemian out of you.”

He points to the bottles of Château Lafite Rothschild sitting on the étagère, and says: “Be careful with the red wine, Tedee. That is all we have in stock. Do not over pour.”

He heads downstairs to the main dining room.

The guests arrive. I hear François greet them; hear him direct them up the spiral staircase. I stand at the apex, holding a tray of champagne.

One-by-one, half-a-dozen or so Atari lackeys top the last step, followed by the fat cats: Mr. Atari first, escorting a high-class dame in an off-white Edith Head-type get-up, and a slender, shortish, bespectacled guy in a light-gray suit. He looks familiar; I think I may have gone to high school with him.

So what’s a guy from my high-school doing hanging with Mr. Atari? I offer the guy a glass of champagne. He politely waves it off and asks for a sparkling water instead.

“Yes, sir,” I say.

The petite bar is hidden around the corner from the guests. I grab a bottle of Perrier, pop off the top, pour the sparkling brew into a wine glass (no ice), slip a wedge of lime on the rim, place it on a tray, and head back to the guy. On the way, it hits me. I did not go to high school with him. That little guy is Steven Spielberg. Fucking Steven Spielberg! One of my thousands of unanswered prayers has finally been answered. I am about to hand Steven Spielberg a glass of Perrier. When the universe intervenes on one’s behalf, one gets one shot and one shot only. I had recently purchased a Nikon camera. Took me a year to save for it. I’ve been all over Manhattan shooting photos. I even rented a dark room. I’m getting pretty good at it. If I can get Spielberg alone, I can ask for a job as an on-set photographer: my way into the family of filmmakers.

I control my breathless breathing and approach Steven; he takes the proffered glass.

“Mr. Spielberg,” I say, “I was wondering if you had a moment…”

“Sure.”

But Mr. Atari takes Steven by the arm and leads him off.

The party is now in full mingle mode, with everyone, including me, vying to get Steven’s attention.

Twenty minutes in, François appears, holding a tray of Saucisson en Croûte in one hand, and a silver bowl of Dijon mustard in the other. He announces dinner.

We standby as the party sits.

Then, with two spoons, I deftly place a slice of savory sausage encrusted in flaky puff pastry on each plate; François follows, spooning a dollop of mustard beside each morsel.

The party digs in. François whispers: “Appetizers in five,” and heads downstairs.

I clear the presentation plates and pour the white wine: Mr. Atari first, then his lady friend. Next, Steven. As I pour, he looks up and smiles. I open my mouth to say something, but Mr. Atari again grabs Steven’s attention.

“Steven we’re very excited about–“

I don’t hear the rest of the conversation, as Miguel, Jorge and François arrive with the Escargot. They expertly drop the plates, then rush back downstairs.

The party eat their snails, sopping up the sauce with crusty French bread.

François pops up from downstairs. He inspects the table. Satisfied, he says: “Lamb in five. Clear then pour the wine. Remember…do not over pour.”

I clear, then pour an inch of red wine in every glass. Mr. Atari looks at his glass, quietly gets my attention, and with a subtle hand gesture indicates for me to give them more wine. I fill their glasses.

I use up all the wine.

Miguel, Jorge, and François appear with the entrees. In less than 30 seconds each guest has a gorgeous rack of lamb sitting in front of them. They dig in, ravenously, and guzzle the wine.

Mr. Atari gets my attention and points to his empty glass. He wants more.

Oops.

I clandestinely take two empty bottles and squirrel myself off to the bar. With a funnel, I pour Boucheron, our house wine which costs $5 a case, into the empty Château Lafite Rothschild bottles.

Mid-pour I hear: “Excuse me, where’s the restrooms?”

I look up. It’s Spielberg.

He’s watching me pour really cheap wine into very expensive bottles.

Busted!

All I can think to say is: “Men’s room is downstairs, in the rear.”

Spielberg returns from the restroom. He watches me pour out the errant wine. He places a hand over his glass, declining a refill, but says nothing about it to Mr. Atari. I make a mental note: sometime in the future, when I’m a really successful, I’ll gift Steven with a case of Château Lafite Rothschild ’77, tell him the story, and we’ll laugh like old friends.

Dinner over, the party says their goodbyes, Steven heads to the staircase, sees me, and says,

“Thank you for an…interesting evening.”

Here it is. My one chance…but first I have to make amends.

“Mr. Spielberg, what you witnessed earlier was…”

François appears, interrupting me. He is not happy. Steven must have said something. I’m so screwed.

François takes me aside. Here it comes…

“Tedee, you have a phone call. Your roommate. She says it’s an emergency.”

I head downstairs and grab the phone.

“Cissie, I’m really busy, what is it?”

“We’ve been robbed.”

“What??”

“Well not me, I haven’t been robbed. You were. Someone snuck in and took your camera.”

“My Nikon? Someone stole my Nikon?”

“Yes.”

“You didn’t bolt the bottom lock, did you? We’ve talked about this.”

“I know, but there are so many locks. I get confused.”

“Did you call the police?”

“Yes. They just left. They said they can’t do anything. But they gave me a number for you to call for the police report. They said you’ll need it for the insurance.”

“I don’t have insurance.”

“I told you we should get insured, but you didn’t listen.”

I look up and watch as Steven Spielberg, my golden ticket to the film world, walks off, not before tossing me a look and shaking his head.

“What are you going to do?” Cissie says.

“Die,” I say, then hang up.

Rusty’s

2015

Cissie Gagliardi and I had met in Scranton. About a year after I had moved to Manhattan she showed up toting several suitcases and a WaterPik and reminded me that I said she could live with me when she finally made it to New York. Our cohabitation lasted six months. I tossed her out when she refused to take responsibility for the theft of my Nikon camera. She blamed it on the cockroaches.

Cissie moved back to Scranton and became a born-again Christian through marriage.

I’ve not seen her in 35 years.

Tonight, she’s celebrating her 60^th birthday with 30 friends and family.

When I learn that I’ve been assigned to Cissie’s party, I inform DeeDee the manager of our shared history and ask her to swap me out with another waiter.

DeeDee says, “Don’t let Cissie turn you into a sissy. Just do it.”

Cissie has no idea I moved back to Scranton from NYC. No idea I work here. No idea I’m about to wait on her.

It’s a dull party. No booze. Set menu. Banal speeches. I serve Cissie her chicken strips in butter and garlic. She looks right at me, full-on, eye-to-eye, but does not recognize me. She returns her attention to her plate and devours her chicken strips. When she finishes, her born-again husband reaches over and lovingly wipes the butter that’s dripping off her chin.

Time for “Happy Birthday.”

I retrieve a kitchen knife for the ceremonial cutting of the cake. The cake is decorated with a large photographic image of a much younger Cissie. Memories flood. I recall that we were pretty buddy-buddy for a while.

I study the cake, assessing where to make the first cut. I look up. Cissie is staring at me…no, glaring. I believe she has finally recognized me. A ghostly image of me and Spielberg cordially laughing on the set of his latest movie floats upon my retinas. I lift the knife high above the cake, swoop down and gouge out her head. I put it on a plate, take it to the kitchen.

In the kitchen, I eat Cissie.

A tad overbaked, but delicious.