The Wolverine

    
 
 
        Its Monday night at the wolverine.
 
 which means we will be moving 40 cent hotdogs at the speed of light.
 
 I concentrate on a song playing on the car radio "Karma Police" this song will be a source of peace as I prepare
 
 to do battle with the mindless masses.
 
 I take one last hall on my cigarette and step out to cross the barren gravel parking lot
 
 and enter the gates of hell.
 
  The atmosphere is surreal, to say the least
 
. I raise my head and glance at the building in astonishment, just as I always do upon entering work.
 
 I am amazed at the weak attempts to conceal the hideousness of this building
 
 Originally this cinder block monstrosity was a chicken hatchery and slaughter house;  
 
despite two renovations, death ,blood and fear still hang in the air.
 
 The cinder block walls on the side of the building that embrace the gravel pit of a parking lot have been painted to give the appearance of red brick.
 
 There are painted on windows where real windows were bricked in and peering out of one of the faux windows, nearest the back entrance, a dog glares at me with a sheepish grin.
 
 I hate this fucking dog.  
 
 I imagine that he smiles at me this way because he knows how I whore out my personality to put up with the obnoxious harassment from the drunken blue collar boys.
 
 He is smiling at me now, as I pull open the door and enter the restaurant.
 
 At first I am blind and as I wait for my eyes to adjust, I tie my apron around my hips. I imagine it is a gun belt.
 
 I saunter across the floor slow and deliberate; feeling the clicking of my cowboy boots, swaying my hips
 
 I can almost feel an imaginary six shooter tapping and weighty against my thigh.
 
On every window ledge, every mantle, and all would be available wall space is what must be taxidermy hell.
 
The  marbled eyes of mounted heads of every sort of beast; anguished with snarling lips and crooked skin,  
 
birds, pheasant, turkey, quail, duck, duck goose, owls, even a fucking crow...beaks in screeching, feathers dusty  
 
and misaligned . A Murder of crows. I'm sure at this point they have all paid their dues to join that club some where  
 
in purgatory. Carpeting blood red.  Fuck Dexter Michigan!
 
 Suddenly I hear the notorious whistle of the owner.
 
 This whistle Joe uses to summon us girls is the same whistle he uses for his dog....
 
I guess we are all just a bunch of bitches to him. Every head of every waitress snaps twards Joe,
 
 as if we were simultaneously in a freak car accident and sufferers to be of whiplash.
 
 My head is turned to the right, eyes searching for Joe's massive , bulging form. My pace quickens.
 
 I am hoping his signal is not directed at me.....I run my hand down my thigh, just to fondle my pistol.  
 
  Suddenly I collide with another waitress carrying a try of open ketchup bottles.
 
 Now my black uniform is splashed with bright red....."was there a gun fight?...PULL YOUR SHIT TOGHETHER!'
 
 My head hurts. I remind myself that it is Monday, and I am cursed for sharing the same birthday as Christ.
 
 FUCK I spot Joe, yea he's looking at me, he slowly raises his hand in time to my quickly rising pulse rate.
 
 He casually beckons me over with the smallest effort of his index finger.
 
 Looks like a fucking sausage to me...want to bite it off...."what the fuck, did I just say that out loud?!"  
 
     Joe was the Chief of Police once upon a time There is no question of him being dirty, nor any question that he  
 
and his are above the law and still well connected.
 
 I approach Joe on command with my tail tucked between my legs.
 
 He lets me stand in front of him in anticipation of  some sort of reprimand or humiliation.
 
 He is silent for what seems a very long time. "When and how did I grow a tail" I am asking myself.
 
 The palms of my hands are getting sweaty, I am squirming under my skin, wiping the sweat off of my hands and
 
 onto my apron.
 
 Joe seems to be enjoying this display and grins at me.
 
 I notice a likeness between him and that painted on dog just outside the building.
 
Joe  informs me that he has been sitting there for 15 minutes and his lemonade is getting dangerously low.
 
 I am shocked that he hasn't died from dehydration.
 
 I am sure that he expires more then 12 ounces of sweat in a fifteen minute period.
 
 I speed walk over to the bar where his wife Judy appears to be leading  an Orchestra with a fly swatter.  
 
 I order Joes lemonade.
 
  I over hear one of our regular 'Bar Flies' attempting to have a semi-intelligent conversation with a waitress.
 
" I break it down like this" he says. "there are two kinds of  
 
waitresses here; there are the lifers, who consist of uneducated woman, single mothers, and/or woman who have  
 
been in abusive relationships."
 
 "Then" he continues on. " there are the 'temps'  he goes on about how she needs to  
 
stay in school, her pretty looks wont last forever "because" he says
 
 "you don't want to end up doing this for the rest of your life."
 
 he turns his head towards me and says "oh sorry"  " Don't worry fucker" I think to myself "soon enough  
 
you will find yourself in the pages of my note book and it wont be pretty!"
 
 though I'm not sure he can properly pronounce Budweiser.
 
 The drunk hands the young waitress a wad of cash mumbling something about school books while his eyes slowly undress her.
 
 She pretends not to notice his perverse gazing, flashes him a smile and says "oh thank you for being so generous"
 
 My head hurts again...is this a restaurant or a strip club? I bite my tongue until I taste blood.
 
 By the time I make it back to Joe, the Blue-hairs have started to swarm on in, like night of
 
 the living almost dead.
 
They come from The Pine Box retirement home; where the motto is " the more you complain, the cheaper it gets"
 
They flood my section and it isn't long before I feel like a gold fish caught up in a school of skip jacks.  
 
Soon the drunken golfers join in. A sea of "Tom Collins'"

 I mistakenly bring one of the Chrysler boys a Bud-light instead of a regular Bud. "Fuck him" I think to myself
 
 as I fight my way back to the bar " it was a Fraudian slip to his good health, fat fuck"  
 
Suddenly I feel this cold skeletal hand grasp my wrist, " What is the appropriate tip on a bill of two dollars and 50 cents, is it twenty percent?"
 
"and would you get me a refill on my ice water" All I can think is how she is still touching me, if I move too suddenly with my wrist in her grasp will  
 
 her arm tare off? How does she get that poodle perm so blue?

 I want to kill her. the smell of death is on her...."just put her down, her misery, mine too." Two birds one stone.
 
 There are fifty cheap bastards in my section, 25% of whom could keel over from old age at any minute, and the rest are getting drunker by the  
 
 second; more witty and so much more charming.  
 
All I want to do is make it back to the bar, fix my drink order and get the new order for the family of four that just sat down.
 
My reply to the blue hair is that a fifty cent tip would be just dandy, satisfied she releases her grip and I get the replacement bottle of Bud.  
 
I slink pass the ever growing table of Chrysler plant boys who want to have a deep and intelligent conversation about the size of woman's  
 
breasts, (mine are bee-stings) I find myself torn between playing along so that they might grace me with that bulge in their pants, that wade of  
 
hard earned cash won on the lines of the Chrysler plant, or do I get on top of the nearest table pulling my hands from my apron, pistol like, middle  
 
fingers fully cocked firing the bird in every direction while screaming things that would make an entire ship of sailors blush, finishing with
 
" I Fucking quit "  
 
oh well...another day another dollar.
 
back to the bar. "