Working as a valet in a posh district, you get to know the security guards. Not personally, you're work buddies, at most, but you see each other frequently and get acquainted. This evening I see a short, pudgy one I recognize, with the baby face, walking down the sidewalk. He must be younger than me. We nod at one another from a distance.
“How ya doin?” I greet him.
“Oh, tired, wish work was over.”
“Oh yeah, when'd you start?”
“4—”, it's hardly 5, and my chuckle interrupts him, “well, I was up late last night. Having problems with my girlfriend.”
“Sorry to hear it, my man.”
“Yeah.”
We stand quietly for a little while, I usually like this best, then he brings up something and chat about a few irrelevant things. Suddenly he shows a burst of enthusiasm and his whole face lightens—“You know R————, right? the girl you've seen me talking with?”
“Yeah, of course I know R————,” I've worked with her several times, she's the only female valet on our staff, chipmunk cheeks and baby-face as well. And I know these two like an infamous duo. She and the security guard were so busy chatting, or flirting?, last time she was running cars for me that she seemed annoyed each time I intervened with a new set of keys. Sorry, customers want their car back, it's just the job; I save my chatter for down time. Anyway, they must have carried on like this for an hour.
“Well, I asked her to hang out, and she wasn't so sure. I mean—I just want to be friends, y'know.”
I'm not sure where this is going, so I interject in a lighter tone, “Maybe it's because she lives all the way out in B————.”
“Yeah, that's probably part of it. Maybe it's also because she's afraid of my girlfriend. I mean, for all she knows, my girlfriend might go crazy and wanna kill her if we hung out.”
Uh, yeah. “Hmm...bummer, man.”
There's not too much to say at these points. We don't really know each other. Why's he spilling these details to me, again? Luckily, either his interest wanes or he notes that I'm not exactly brimming with advice or encouragement, so he ships out, but before leaving—
“So do you get comments on that mustache?”
“Yeah, a couple each night.”
He smiles, “Yeah, ladies love mustaches.”.
At the end of the night, I return to the breakroom to count the evening's cash and finish paper work. Two other valets are already there.
Not longer after I arrive, one says, “So y'know that security guard—”
“The young one with the pudgy face?”
“Yeah, that one. He was talking to me about R————, how he wants to hang out with her, but 'just as friends', and how things aren't going well with his girlfriend.”
“No way, he stopped by for 45 minutes, and was telling me the same things! What the hell are you supposed to say to all that!”
I chime in, “That makes three of us, gentlemen.” Save the mustache.
