The Table

I remember her hat. It hinted of church on Sunday morning as she called out to me from her seat near the window. He sat next to her with a smile softer than hers. I thought they must be out on a date —the kind that only comes after crying babies and fights over “who said what” have long faded. You could tell they had lived a lifetime beside one another, and they were content.

“Waitress, could you get us a drink?” she quietly asked.

“Of course,” I replied, asking them what they would each like.

“Two waters,” she returned. “Thank you.”

With a smile I began dodging other servers and tables overflowing with patrons as I walked the familiar path from the dining room to the kitchen and back again.

“Here you go,” I said, setting two icy glasses on the table.

A bit later they called out to me again. The restaurant was packed, and orders were slow. I had been apologizing left and right to other customers and prepared myself to do the same for them. But, instead, I heard, “Could we get refills on our waters, please?”

“No problem! I’ll have those back for you in just a minute,” I assured them, glancing towards their waitress, Jenny. She was new and clearly drowning in the room of impatient and frustrated faces. I moved on to my own section once their refills were taken care of, yet my eyes continued to be drawn back towards them. I’m sure they spoke to one another, but I never saw it. Each time they both were just sitting. Quietly. Water in hand.

They should have their order by now. Where is Jenny? I scanned the room, intending to point the couple out to her, but a new table walked in at that moment and then I simply forgot.

Suddenly, I felt a tap on my shoulder. It was my manager. “Could I speak with you?” he asked. Nodding, I followed him to his office. “I just had a table tell me that you wouldn’t take their order because they are Black,” he said once we were alone.

Everything slowed to a blurry stop and all I could feel was my heart beating. My brain flipping through images of customers. Scrambling to find one that wasn’t happy. One that wasn’t still out in the dining room eating. I wanted to defend myself. But I didn’t understand. I stuttered.

He opened the door and pointed toward where they had been seated. His finger selected a lonely table near the window with two waters on it. Oh no.

They thought they were my table. They thought I....

Later that night, the manager talked to Jenny. It was her first night in that room and she just miscounted her tables. As it turned out, no one was refusing to serve the couple. It was just a simple mistake.

But sitting in my car later that night, I couldn’t get the couple out of my mind. I knew their decision to fill in the blanks with the color of my skin was because that was what life had taught them. But now they would never know that, this time at least, it was different. I put my head down on the steering wheel and closed my eyes imagining how they would tell the story of the white waitress who couldn’t see past their melanin. A story that would make it harder for them to see past mine. And I wished I could rewind time and change the ending.

For both of us.