Bad Boss

I'd like to think I am a good boss these days. I want my employees to do their best and feel successful. I am will to help or train those that work for me and if they need a skill I don't have I will send them to training. I fight for them, when they are unjustly accused, as sometimes happens, and try not to come down too hard when there is an honest mistake. I have not always been this kind of boss.

Beep, beep, beep, The fries are done, my foggy brain says. Someone get the fries, I mumble. I my mind I am in the back checking roast beef, shouting to the idiots up front who won't pull the fries. How can these people remember to breath, I think. In truth, the beeping is my alarm clock letting me know it is time to go to school. This happens when you've had a few days of classes then closing Arby's back to back. I figure it out, turn off the annoyance and do the things it takes to get ready.

The glass doors of the restaurant are greasy with fingerprints and the small hall beside the food preparation area is littered with used napkins. It looks like the afternoon shift has been sleeping. The lobby has just a couple people in it, but no one is in line. Kathy, the day manager, and Chiquita practically lay across the counter talking. Lenny is in the back doing dishes. The floor of the lobby is filthy, sticky spilled pop had gathered dirt, ketchup drips from the overfilled container on the condiment stand, there are at least two tables obviously not cleaned. I am tired and already crabby.

I burst through the side door to the prep area. The talkers stand up, up off the counter, and give me a courtesy, Hey. I type my code into the register, clocking in, and walk to the back to see how my evening is going to go. I used to like this job, but it has worn on me.

James, Murphy and I will be closing. It is a good group. The managers log stresses the importance of handing out receipts, especially in the drive thru. It doesn't say it, but I later find out this had to do with some thefts where an employee wasn't ringing an item up and then pocketed the money. They had just figured it out based in sudden inventory fluctuations, but didn't have enough evidence t even declare the problem.

While Lenny is finishing the dishes I give everyone else cleaning assignments. James, who smelled slightly of weed, and Murphy show up and we wait for the dinner rush. I move James to the drive through, where he will be for the night and explain to him he needs to give a receipt with every order. Any receipt not given out, you will either eat or wear. He doesn't have a problem with this crazy suggestion. It is either because he is normally good at handing out receipts, or he knows that arguing with my crazy requests won't do him any good.

I should pause here to say, I like James. Employees I didn't like got special cleaning assignments, like scrubbing the sugary goo from the back room floor by the boxes of pop syrup, or washing out the interior of the bathroom garbage cans, after the bag has slipped to the bottom. I set the tape beside his register, as a reminder. All things considered, wearing a receipt is not that bad.

Dinners is unremarkable. James hands out every receipt, we get the store looking good and I send the day crew home. This is my time.

I hang out in the office. I build a blowgun with a straw, a coffee stirrer and three toothpicks. The evening winds on seeming smoothly. Then it happens, I do my walk to collect the larger bills out of the drawer to put them in the drop safe. I hit the front, where Murphy has had only a handful of customers. A couple twenties. Even before I get to the drive thru, I see it. Half a dozen receipts, loosely stuck together, dangle from the printer. The drive thru is empty, meaning these are all mistakes. I grab them up, turn to Jim. He must see the fire, because his protest is weak.

"Eat them, or wear them?" I say through tightly drawn lips.

One by one, he swallowed them and I went back to the office.