I came back to work at 5:00 for the dinner shift. The minute I unlocked the front door, the Joker came inside.
"Hi, there, Space Monkey," he said as cheerfully as ever. "You aren't trying to leave me, are you?"
I said something slightly less intelligent than, "Whuh?"
"Looking for a new job? You're not the kind of girl who would run away from her responsibilities, are you?"
"Um…no. Of course not." I ran away then, but only as far as my side of the counter.
"Good. Because I would really hate to see you go." He cackled, and I decided to give up on looking for a new job. I would hate to be the reason Lai Lai burned to the ground, almost as much as I would hate to get a cyanide pie in the face.
"What can I get you tonight, Mr. Jay?" I asked, adding a silent, please don't hurt me.
He ordered Cashew Chicken, and I said "gesundheit," and he laughed, and I prayed for that to be the most exciting thing that happened to me that night.
It wasn't, of course.
At 6:00, a woman came in and started ranting at me about that old story about chopping up stray cats for Sesame Chicken.
"That's just an urban legend," I explained. "Our Sesame Chicken is made of chicken."
It took a good twenty minutes to get her to believe me. Fortunately, there was no line forming behind her. The store just wasn't as popular as it used to be, although delivery was busier than ever.
Finally, she allowed me to serve her some Sesame Chicken. She paid with a credit card. I checked her ID, which surprised me by matching up just fine. Could I possibly have gotten a new customer who was just a regular Joe? (Or Joan, as the case may be?)
It took me a month to figure out who Selina Kyle really was.