Pete’s working, and so is Danny. Danny has enough credits to graduate, so he gets out of school at twelve fifteen. It’s only four o’clock, but the dinner rush is already starting. Every few seconds, Sonya yells, “Order in!” and pins it to the sliver wheel.
The first part of the shift, Pete makes the deliveries. He looks awful.
Meanwhile, I work with Gabie. Sometimes she’s at the register. Sometimes she makes pizzas. It’s the way it’s been all year.
Except a year ago I wouldn’t have thought about the color of her eyes, or the way it felt to kiss her.
The Seventh Day
Gabie
AT PETE’S, I can be someone different than the Gabie I am at school. I can be curt or silly or flirt.
Tonight, I’m more like a machine. I just want to forget about everything. Forget about Kayla. Not think about Drew, even though he’s standing so close that if I stood hipshot I’d touch him. I’m glad it’s busy. Sonya is barely keeping up with the counter, while nearly a dozen orders wait on the metal wheel. Without asking Pete what I should do next, I yank off the first ticket, open the cooler, and pull out a battered flat metal pan holding a large pizza skin. After checking Sonya’s scrawl, I prep it with sauce and cheese. Then I grab a handful of pepperoni and give the pan a little tug to start it slowly spinning. As it does, I lay down the pepperoni in circles that don’t quite touch. Only Pete is really good at this trick, but tonight it works for me too. Pete looks over and nods with respect.
Once I’ve added mushroom and olives, I pivot and slide the pizza from the metal pan onto a wooden peel. When I pull down the oven door, the blast of heat rolls over me. I heft the long handle of the peel, and for once the weight feels like nothing. There’s a trick to getting the pizza into the oven unscathed, a quick jerk forward and back. Do it wrong, and you end up with the toppings burning in the oven and the dough still firmly attached to the peel. It’s even trickier when the oven is crowded, like now. You have to start a pizza out in the back of the oven, where it’s hottest, angling it over the nearly finished pizzas in the front. But tonight my first pizza slides in without hesitation. As does the next and the next.
Usually I would let Miguel or Drew deal with the pizzas once they were in the oven, but tonight I take just as many turns as they do checking on things, popping bubbles, shuffling pizzas from back to front as they get closer to being done. Tonight I don’t mind the weight of the peel or the scorching heat of the oven, and I don’t burn myself once on the open edge of the door. Miguel and Drew and even Pete have old burn marks lined up on their wrists like bracelets.
As the minutes tick by, work becomes a dance, and I lose myself, turning, reaching, bending, using both hands to scatter toppings when I normally only use one. Everyone else seems to feel the rhythm, too, even Miguel, and we step around each other in the small space as smoothly as if we were choreographed. Sonya rings up a bill and slams the cash register drawer closed with her hip, talking to one customer on the phone while she counts out another’s change.
But finally, it slows down. Eventually Danny and Sonya and Miguel leave. And then Pete, who’s so tired he’s staggering. The last customers have eaten and left. It’s just Drew and me. The rhythm is gone, and instead of hearing soundless music, I remember my parents’ voices, how they questioned me after I brought Drew home yesterday. After he ran out. After I told a lie about him thinking of buying a Mini and letting him test-drive mine.
“What’s Drew planning on doing after he graduates?” my mom asked as she filled a plate with spinach salad. I can tell she is worried, because she slides the plate over to me without asking how much I want, like I’m seven and not seventeen.
I take a bite before answering. “I’m not sure.” It isn’t a lie. I don’t
The first part of the shift, Pete makes the deliveries. He looks awful.
Meanwhile, I work with Gabie. Sometimes she’s at the register. Sometimes she makes pizzas. It’s the way it’s been all year.
Except a year ago I wouldn’t have thought about the color of her eyes, or the way it felt to kiss her.
The Seventh Day
Gabie
AT PETE’S, I can be someone different than the Gabie I am at school. I can be curt or silly or flirt.
Tonight, I’m more like a machine. I just want to forget about everything. Forget about Kayla. Not think about Drew, even though he’s standing so close that if I stood hipshot I’d touch him. I’m glad it’s busy. Sonya is barely keeping up with the counter, while nearly a dozen orders wait on the metal wheel. Without asking Pete what I should do next, I yank off the first ticket, open the cooler, and pull out a battered flat metal pan holding a large pizza skin. After checking Sonya’s scrawl, I prep it with sauce and cheese. Then I grab a handful of pepperoni and give the pan a little tug to start it slowly spinning. As it does, I lay down the pepperoni in circles that don’t quite touch. Only Pete is really good at this trick, but tonight it works for me too. Pete looks over and nods with respect.
Once I’ve added mushroom and olives, I pivot and slide the pizza from the metal pan onto a wooden peel. When I pull down the oven door, the blast of heat rolls over me. I heft the long handle of the peel, and for once the weight feels like nothing. There’s a trick to getting the pizza into the oven unscathed, a quick jerk forward and back. Do it wrong, and you end up with the toppings burning in the oven and the dough still firmly attached to the peel. It’s even trickier when the oven is crowded, like now. You have to start a pizza out in the back of the oven, where it’s hottest, angling it over the nearly finished pizzas in the front. But tonight my first pizza slides in without hesitation. As does the next and the next.
Usually I would let Miguel or Drew deal with the pizzas once they were in the oven, but tonight I take just as many turns as they do checking on things, popping bubbles, shuffling pizzas from back to front as they get closer to being done. Tonight I don’t mind the weight of the peel or the scorching heat of the oven, and I don’t burn myself once on the open edge of the door. Miguel and Drew and even Pete have old burn marks lined up on their wrists like bracelets.
As the minutes tick by, work becomes a dance, and I lose myself, turning, reaching, bending, using both hands to scatter toppings when I normally only use one. Everyone else seems to feel the rhythm, too, even Miguel, and we step around each other in the small space as smoothly as if we were choreographed. Sonya rings up a bill and slams the cash register drawer closed with her hip, talking to one customer on the phone while she counts out another’s change.
But finally, it slows down. Eventually Danny and Sonya and Miguel leave. And then Pete, who’s so tired he’s staggering. The last customers have eaten and left. It’s just Drew and me. The rhythm is gone, and instead of hearing soundless music, I remember my parents’ voices, how they questioned me after I brought Drew home yesterday. After he ran out. After I told a lie about him thinking of buying a Mini and letting him test-drive mine.
“What’s Drew planning on doing after he graduates?” my mom asked as she filled a plate with spinach salad. I can tell she is worried, because she slides the plate over to me without asking how much I want, like I’m seven and not seventeen.
I take a bite before answering. “I’m not sure.” It isn’t a lie. I don’t
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