22. Vivienne #2
I am watching him way more than I should be.
I stare open-mouthed at the way water runs down his forearms, following the lines of his tattoos. The way his wet shirt clings to his shoulders and chest.
My mind offers up, entirely without my permission, the memory of those same forearms braced on either side of me on the prep table, his mouth clamped around me.
I force myself to look away and focus on the clipboard in my hands and on the floor plan that’s starting to curl at the edges from the humidity.
Patrick materializes at some point with two large paper bags of groceries balanced in one arm and a cardboard carrier tray holding what appears to be coffee for the entire team in the other.
None of us actually see him arrive. He just simply appears like he’s been summoned, drawn by some parental instinct that senses when people are cold and wet and running on empty.
“Coffee,” he announces, setting the coffee carrier down on the nearest dry surface just inside the door. “And actual food, because I know none of you have eaten today.”
“Dad, you didn’t have to do that.” Callum shouts over the rain, but Patrick waves him off.
“Coffee’s for everyone. That includes you two,” he declares, nodding at the delivery driver and his partner, who look momentarily stunned by the inclusion. “Cream and sugar is in the bag if you need it.”
The driver’s partner actually looks like he might cry.
Patrick then produces a stack of folded moving blankets that the driver apparently needed and couldn’t find, and Patrick had somehow located in approximately ninety seconds, origin unknown.
“These were in the storage closet, second shelf, behind the extension cords.” Patrick shrugs, handing them over like he isn’t some magician.
The driver takes them, bewildered. “How did you —”
“Lucky guess.” Patrick is already moving, grabbing one end of a four-top. “Where does this one go?”
From there, he’s just part of the operation, carrying tables alongside the driver’s partner. He doesn’t get in the way. He just slots himself into the rhythm naturally.
At one point, he and Iris end up on opposite ends of a two-top that needs to go through the side door. They navigate it without a word, turning it on its side in perfect synchrony, tilting at exactly the right angle to clear the frame, then setting it down gently once they’re through.
Wesley works with the solid posture of someone who’s spent his life hauling heavy things on unstable surfaces.
He’s got the stance for it — knees bent, back straight, core engaged, lifting with his legs.
When a box of glassware threatens to slip from Cora’s grip, he’s there before anyone else even notices, steadying it with one hand while reaching for his end with the other.
He and Patrick have an unspoken rotation, trading off the heavier items without discussion, just a nod here and there to confirm who’s taking what.
Hayes does the work of approximately two people without a single comment.
At one point, I watch him hoist a table over his head single-handedly to clear the doorframe then set it down on the other side like it weighs nothing.
He doesn’t even pause to catch his breath, just turns and heads back out for the next one.
Beckett does the work of approximately half a person, loudly and with extensive commentary.
“This one goes in the back left,” he explains, walking alongside me with a folding chair held at chest height. He’s got it gripped with both hands like it might try to escape, taking careful steps to avoid puddles, his tongue slightly out in concentration.
“I know,” I say, consulting the floor plan I’ve got balanced on my clipboard. “I have the layout right here.”
“Right, but if you think about the traffic flow” — he adjusts his grip on the chair, nearly dropping it, then recovers with a little hop — “you want to leave clearance on that side for the server stations, so probably the back left is actually —”
“Beckett.” I don’t look up from the clipboard.
“— the optimal position when you consider the beverage runs and the distance to the kitchen, which means —”
“Beckett.”
“Right, yeah, we’re in agreement.” He nods vigorously, water flinging from his hair.
I point to the back left corner where I’ve already marked it on the floor plan with tape.
He walks over, sets the chair down with exaggerated care, then steps back to assess his work.
He tilts his head, considering the placement from multiple angles like he’s arranging a museum installation, squinting one eye.
“Perfect,” he declares, hands on his hips. “Exactly where it needed to go.”
By the time the truck is empty and the driver has pulled out of the alley with a wave and the look of a man who is glad to be going literally anywhere else, we are all standing in the dining room dripping onto the hardwood floors.
Everyone’s breathing slightly hard, shirts and jackets plastered to bodies, hair askew.
There’s a puddle forming around Wesley’s boots.
Patrick’s wiping rain off his glasses with the hem of his shirt.
Beckett is wringing out his sleeve with both hands like it’s a dishrag.
We’re all silently staring at the furniture we’ve just hauled in.
It is not arranged correctly.
I can see the realization striking everyone. Heads tilting, eyes narrowing, people taking small steps back to get a better view of the whole space. Frannie makes a small hmm sound.
Then everyone starts explaining how it should be arranged at the same time, voices overlapping, hands gesturing at different sections of the room. Nothing moves for two full minutes while the disarray happens, everyone trying to get their point across at maximum volume.
“Maybe we should put the tables against the window first.” Callum points at the wall of windows overlooking the water.
“If you put them all against the window, you lose the center flow,” Iris counters, stepping forward and tracing an invisible path through the middle of the room with her hand.
Callum’s eyes narrow. “The center flow is fine.”
“The center flow has a bottleneck at the pass-through.” Iris walks to the spot in question, plants her feet, and gestures around herself. “Right here. It’s too narrow.”
“It doesn’t have a bottleneck.”
“I was here last Saturday, and it definitely had a bottleneck. I watched three servers nearly collide.” She mimes the collision with her hands, making impact sounds with her mouth. “Boom. Right there.”
Callum opens his mouth then closes it. His hand comes up to run through his wet hair. “That was a staffing issue. Not a layout issue.”
“It was a flow issue, and you know it.” Iris crosses her arms, water dripping from her elbows.
Hayes has moved to stand next to one of the four-tops, his hand resting on the back of a chair. “What if we angle these instead of keeping them perpendicular to —”
“Angles create dead space,” Callum interrupts.
“But they improve sightlines.”
“We don’t need improved sightlines. We need capacity.”
“Capacity doesn’t matter if people can’t see the ocean.”
Frannie, who has been standing in the doorway this entire time in her wet shoes that are leaving small puddles with each shift of her weight, raises her hand like she’s in a classroom. Everyone stops talking.
“What if,” she projects, her voice perfectly calm, “we put the two-tops along the window and move the four-tops in toward the center?” She walks into the room now, weaving between the furniture, touching each table as she passes to indicate what goes where.
“Better sightlines to the water for the window seats, and it opens up the center flow because you’re not forcing servers to navigate around the big tables in a narrow path. ”
She stops and turns, looking at everyone expectantly with an eyebrow raised.
Callum stares at the layout, his head tilting as he visualizes it. His hand comes up, fingers moving like he’s mentally rearranging pieces. “That actually makes a lot of sense,” he says, and the admission appears to surprise him slightly.
Frannie looks at me, the corners of her mouth twitching as she fights to keep a straight face.
I try very, very hard not to make eye contact with her.
I fail completely.
A laugh bursts out of me before I can stop it. I slap my hand over my mouth but it’s too late, my shoulders shaking.
“I told you,” Frannie deadpans even as her own smile breaks through. “I do logistics.”
“Why are we laughing?” Callum huffs, and when I look at him, his face is concerned, but I see the small smile tugging at his mouth.
He’s just standing there in his soaked chef’s whites, his wet hair sticking up in every direction, smiling at me so brightly it reaches his eyes and makes them crinkle at the corners, transforming his whole face into something softer and younger.
For a moment, it’s just the two of us smiling at each other across the chaotic dining room while everyone else is dripping and discussing furniture placement.
My brain takes that exact moment to remind me what his hands felt like on my bare skin, his mouth on mine, the way he’d looked up at me from his knees like he had absolutely nowhere else he’d rather be.
I look back at my clipboard, still smiling.
Then Frannie clears her throat loudly, and the moment breaks.
“So,” she drawls out. “Are we moving these tables or what?”
It takes another thirty minutes to get the room right.
Tables move and move again, being dragged across the hardwood with chairs stacked on top to save trips.
Wesley and Patrick work in tandem, lifting a four-top between them and pivoting it ninety degrees without needing to discuss the angle.
Roman appears from the kitchen with a rag and spray bottle, wiping down each table surface as it finds its final position.
Cora is on her hands and knees with a level, checking each table to make sure nothing wobbles, calling out when she finds one that needs adjusting.