The Harrowing of Hell

Tonight is not John Browns night.

He sits, left leg crossed over right, on an upturned milk crate outside the back door of the restaurant kitchen, and lights a cigarette.

A bucketful of water is thrown out the back door and splashes onto John Browns shoes. It is quickly followed by another. John Brown heavily inhales his cigarette. He looks away from the back door. If the kitchen is flooding, I don’t want to know, he thinks as he exhales the smoke into the air.

Back inside, the dining room is booked out, over 100 guests, each barking and bleating for food and water, red wine, some service. Each waiter sweats through their collared shirt and recites over and over- the mussels are Tasmanian, yes that’s the cost of champagne by the glass, no we don’t serve soy chai tea here, I’m so sorry.

John Brown pulls another cigarette from his pocket. This is literally the worst job in the world, he thinks, as he lights the second smoke and uncrosses then recrosses his legs. The hard plastic base of the milk crate he is sitting on is flat and uncomfortable, but more tolerable than what’s happening inside.

In the kitchen, the chefs de Partie and comme chefs are yelled at while they man the pans on stoves of open flame jacked up to hell levels of heat. Everyone is yelling in fact, “yes chef!” is the answer to everything, “behind!” is screamed out if you dare to cross the kitchen from your station to anywhere else. A head chef is not the maestro modern media wants you to believe, but more a red faced cursing perfectionist with zero tolerance and a sprinkle of narcissism.

Fuck that, thinks John Brown. Fuck chefs.

Usually, a Friday night service should be like running a slightly uphill marathon. Everyone, from the dish washers and kitchen hands, to the sommelier, chef and maître de, knows this. In fact, a booked out restaurant is a buzzing, thriving, heaving place with adrenaline running high; with everyone (yes, EVERYONE) getting a little bit drunk and enjoying the heady atmosphere and feeling a touch out of control. 

Tonight is not like a slightly uphill marathon. 

John Brown squashes his cigarette butt under the twisting heel of his Blundstone boots. He can’t remember any fully booked restaurant dinner service even coming close. He looks down at his white, floor length apron, so ridiculous and constrictive. He fingers the stupid black necktie he’s forced to wear, and loosens it’s knot. There is nothing glamorous about this, he thinks, as he plucks the top button of his shirt undone.

John! Someone was calling to him, John! We need you back inside. The owner’s are here.

Shit.

John Brown waded his way to the back door, hustled through the kitchen and grabbed a dirty plate from the pot wash area. The kitchen floor was about an inch deep in grey, greasy water, and the boys were slipping around. 

JOHN! Yelled the chef.

Yes chef?

We need boxes in here, now, to soak up this shit. Someone’s going to die in here tonight, for fucks sake.

Yes chef.

John ducked around to the garbage area and grabbed some flattened boxes. He passed them to the kitchen hand who had come to see what was happening, told him to “chuck these on the floor”, then slid his way through to the bar.

The whole thing was a mess. The bar tender had hit the weeds and hadn’t come up for air. Open bottles, dirty glasses, random drink dockets, tabs were open when they should be closed, there was no more table water ready, she was sweaty and upset and, John brown could tell, about to pull the pin.

I can’t, John, it’s a disaster. 

I can see, he said, as he looked across the dining room. This is exactly like hell.

Heironemous Bosch once painted The Harrowing of Hell in the fifteenth century. It’s a disgusting and twisted, freakish study from the visionary who seemed consumed by the subject. The Followers of Bosch recreated versions of this painting, of which four survive to this day. 

The dining room on this Friday night looked worse than that painting of hell.

It was as though John Brown had never seen a collapsing restaurant dining room before. It was as though with fresh eyes he could finally see it for what it was: cavernous open mouths, writhing diners like crabs in a bucket, clutching at their silverware with their claws. The table cloths were splattered with spittle, there was spilt wine, the bone’s from steaks and dark rich stews, even the Romans were tame by comparison.

The tearful Bambi eyes of the flailing bartender entered his scope of vision again and he found himself beyond human empathy.

Stop fucking crying and fix this shit up, he angrily whispered into her broken face, and began to look for the owners.

Ahh yes, restaurant owners. John Brown had personally hated each and every one he had had the displeasure of being acquainted with. They were either micromanagers who were in a constant battle with the chefs, or they were in it for the cash and the clout. Regardless, all of them were stingy, reckless and greedy with a palpable disdain towards their subordinates AKA employees. But these particular owners were also delusional sociopaths who were credit card rich, while everything else was bankrupt.

You could say they were hard to miss.

A waiter scurried up to John and started babbling “they just showed up, booted a reservation from the front table and don’t get it. We’re not going well John, to say the least. A table walked out when you were smoking. They waited 47 minutes for wine,47 minutes! That Miss behind the bar is useless. What am I supposed to do with the reservation?”

John interrupted the barrage- I’ll talk to them.

The babbling waiter raised his eyebrows in response, said nothing more, and squeezed past John to, hopefully, answer the incessant ringing of the kitchen bell.

The Owners had taken the best seats in the house, the front table four top, positioned so that those seated there had a beautiful view of the bustling street outside and a sense of being slightly cut off and more private than the rest of the tables. They were holding menus and grossly laughing. She had left her fur collared coat and handbag on the ground and he was thumping the table with his fist, clearly trying to over-dramatize what John Brown suspected was an unfunny joke delivered in poor taste (they were those kinds of people).

You need to move from this table. Now, John blurted out as he approached. The owners looked up at John as he positioned himself beside them.

I mean it, John said, now.

What we need, son, said Mr Owner, is a glass of wine and the entrée special, NOW.

Mrs Owner gave john browns arm a squeeze: Thanks sweetie, she said. Now would be perfect.

Now would be perfect?

Now would be perfect!

NOW WOULD BE PERFECT!?!?!?!?!?!??! I said get up! Tonight is not the fucking night, and I will honestly be surprised if anyone comes back to work tomorrow. The shit has hit the fan, the kitchen is flooded, your bar tender is CRYING for gods sake. BUT NOW WOULD BE PERFECT!?!?!?!?!?

It was just as the dining room fell silent that John brown realized he’d been yelling…at the owners…in front of their full house restaurant and all of his colleagues. He tugged at the ridiculous floor length apron and pulled it off of his body, altogether an anarchistic relief. He handed it to Mr Owner as the kitchen bell started up its tinnitus like ringing once more and walked out the front door.

Restaurants can kiss my arse thought John Brown, as he walked his route home and away from that garbage dump of a job. The nighttime air was mild and the street busy with Friday night friends and families walking around, and a busker. Friday night wasn’t supposed to be a punishment.

In fact, Now, is perfect, thought John Brown, as he tossed his stupid necktie onto the road.