The Restaurant Business
Matthew Ryan Fischer
Kay ate the tum ayam Bali and watched the brothers clean off other tables. They had noticed her. Of course they had. The old lady at the counter had served Kay, but they knew. They remembered her with Ruel. The old lady was nice. Probably their mother. Kay guessed they were scared, trying to figure out why she was there. Surely, they didn’t think they could go back to a normal life, not after all that had happened.
They had worked for Arch. Of course, technically she had worked
for Arch for a minute or two herself when Ruel was all about switching sides.
And they had offered to help Ruel when it mattered.
Perhaps they were probably scared that she had come to punish
them, and their mother would suffer as well. That made them dangerous. They
might decide to preemptively attack.
There was still the case of who killed Ruel. Maybe they knew
something, maybe not. Maybe they knew Ruel and Arch were both gone and they
thought that meant they were free. If that’s what they thought, they were
mistaken. If they had anything to do with Ruel, they would pay. Kay had killed
once and discovered that she was capable. She could do it again if she needed
to.
Finally one came over and sat at the table.
“So, what sort of conversation are we going to have?” he asked.
“Good chicken.”
“My mother’s recipe.”
“Good. Strong. A little spice heavy.”
“Next time try the Nasi Tim. You’ll find it quite bland.”
“I don’t mind. Just an observation. You and your family have a
nice thing going here.”
The man winced involuntarily. He must have thought she was threatening
them.
“Relax. I just inherited a restaurant myself. But I’ve never run one
by myself before. You two seem to know what you’re doing. A girl could use a
little help with business.”
“Are you looking for a partner?”
“I think I’m the familiar face. But some people have trouble
behaving around women. I think you two know how to keep in line and keep others
in line. It’ll never be an even partnership, but I’m willing to negotiate and
you’ll find I’m far kinder than the people you dealt with in the past.”
The man looked to his brother.
“Hey, we looking to expand?”
The brother thought for a moment. “Hey Fi, we looking for new
business?”
A woman walked out of the kitchen. She looked Kay up and down. Kay
could guess where this woman came from and what she had done in the past. The
fact that she was here, working as a cook meant that these two were far too
nice to be in this business. That might be a problem in the long run thought
Kay, but right now she needed bodies she could trust who would follow. She
couldn’t run Ruel’s business by herself.
“I don’t see why not,” answered the woman
“A lot of women work here? Or just her?”
“Is that a problem?”
“No. But if I can recognize them, then there are gonna be a lot of
men out there who can do that too. Arch is dead, some of the gangs are broken
or scattered right now, but a lot of those men are still out there. And they’ll
remember faces and might think they’re owed compensation or worse. You might want
to consider how you’ll handle that.”
“We give everybody a chance here. Somebody has a problem, they
come see me or my brother, we take care of things. That’s a promise.”
“Fair. Come by tomorrow and we’ll work out the collection routine
and who does what.”
“You’re not going to leave your money out in big stacks, are you?
Because I’m not sure I can protect you from the number of people who will want
to rob you.”
“No, you’ll find I’m far less gaudy than Ruel was.”
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