The October Selected Writer is Patrick Lacey
Please feel free to contact Patrick at: patrickclacey@hotmail.com
THE BOSS
by Patrick Lacey
From the outside it was a deformed McDonald’s, the roof coming to a point like a steeple. Perkins had heard enough rumors to at least want to believe the place had actually been a church at one point. The interior wasn’t much better: booths lining dirty windows, a few tables in the middle, and a counter that looked like any fast food restaurant, except with lower standards. The walls were permanently stained yellow, green, and red: the remnants of condiments that had survived.
Perkins was fascinated by Big Ted’s, had gone there almost weekly during high school, and now almost daily since he’d dropped out of college. He hadn’t told his parents yet, but he planned on it tomorrow. He knew his father would kick his ass out of the house, but that was fine. He was going to be a writer, and didn’t it seem mandatory to face tough times when you chose such a profession?
Perkins had his notebook open, ready to write the first good idea that hit him. Pen in hand, he stared at the blank page and smiled. Already he was getting writer’s block before he even got the show running. He’d sold two short stories last month and now he was certain he’d get working on a book, something that could make him some money. And what better place for inspiration than this?
The bells over the door jingled. A large woman with drawn-on eyebrows stumbled in. The man she was with (boyfriend, husband?) held her up, but he was struggling to walk straight himself. He wore a leather vest with no shirt underneath and ripped jeans covered in brown splotches. They were the sort of folks you’d see here any night after eight or nine.
“I want six cheeseburgers,” the woman said. “With bacon, extra cheese, mayo, ketchup, and mustard—but no relish. I fucking hate relish.” She was slurring her words and a line of spittle hung from her mouth.
“I’ll have the same,” the man said, taking out his chain wallet and slapping a twenty dollar bill onto the counter. “But give me extra relish. I’m serious. Make those things sopping with the shit.”
Perkins caught a glance at Lars behind the counter, looked at the scar that ran down his face. He’d always pictured Lars as an ex-secret-agent, flipping burgers in a small tourist trap of a town, trying to forget all the people he’d killed. He wrote that down. In reality, Lars had worked in retail for most of his life and the scar was from a motorcycle accident.
The couple sat down at a booth across the way, behind Frankie, who looked like he was in another world. No one knew much about Frankie. He came in every night at the stroke of eight and didn’t leave until closing. He ordered a small fry and a strawberry milkshake, sat down, and stared out the window for hours. Driving by, if you saw Frankie looking at the road, you got the weirdest feeling he was staring straight at you, that he was looking into you. Perkins shivered and wrote that down too.
Someone set a tray with a mountain of fries on the table. He looked up and saw Lars, his scar somehow illuminated under the ceiling lights. “Hey, Perkins. I made too many fries. Boss says we can’t go throwing away the extras anymore. Says it’s a waste. I figure a college kid like you is probably hungry as hell and short on dough.”
“Thanks.”
Lars sat down. He held a rag that had seen better days, covered with dark stains. “Guess I’ll take my ten now.” He pulled out a cell phone and started texting.
“Lars, if you don’t mind me asking. How’d you afford that thing?” He tried a fry. It was plastered with salt and caked with greasy batter. It was delicious.
Lars held the phone up. “This? Bought it with last week’s paycheck. I’ve been working here almost ten years and the Boss gives me a two dollar raise every year.”
“Two dollars? Shit. You must be making…”
“Around fifty a year or so. Not bad for a burger flipper, huh?” He smiled. Several of his teeth were missing.
“Fifty thousand dollars?” Perkins bit the inside of his mouth.
“That’s right. And full benefits, too. The Boss treats his employees pretty damn good.”
“Order up,” the girl behind the counter called. If it wasn’t for the pimples covering her face and neck, she would’ve been a knockout, but splattering grease that seemed to float in the air had ruined her skin.
The man in the vest stood up and wobbled over to the counter. The tray looked like it would snap in half from the weight of the twelve burgers, six on one side, six on the other, two mounds of thousand-calorie patties.
“What’re you writing down in that notebook of yours?” Lars asked.
“Just trying to come up with some ideas.”
“Ideas for what?”
“A book I’m going to write, but so far I’m striking out.”
“A book, huh? Not bad. Might even make some money out of it. You ever need a job to make ends meet, though, I could talk to the Boss.”
Perkins ate another fry. “Hey, Lars. Who is the Boss, anyway? I mean who runs this place? I don’t think I’ve ever seen any kind of manager.”
Lars put his phone away. “Well the Boss doesn’t like people all that much. He hides out in the back in his room.”
“His office you mean?”
“Well, sort of. He’s got his own place back there. It’s hard to describe. Anyway, he doesn’t come out all that often because he’s not good with customers. Doesn’t take to them very well.”
“What the fuck is this?”
Perkins turned and saw the fat woman ready to explode with anger. “There’s relish on this fucking burger.” She unwrapped another one. “And this one, too. There’s relish on all of them.”
“Might just have been switched,” the man said. “Lemme check mine.” He opened a few of the burgers. “Nope. Mine are covered too. Looks like they messed up, but let’s not make a scene.”
The woman stood up and wobbled to the counter. “Excuse me, but I specifically asked for no relish. In fact, I remember saying I fucking hate relish. How hard is that to process?”
The girl with the pimples looked petrified, her eyes wide as if they’d fill with tears at any moment. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’ll fix this right away.”
“No you won’t,” the woman said, her voice more sloppy than ever. “I want to see the manager.”
The man got up and put a hand on her shoulder, but she pushed him away.
The girl looked over at Lars.
“I’ve got to take care of this,” he said, throwing the dirty rag over his shoulder. He stared Perkins in the eyes for one quick moment. “If you learn anything about this place, never, ever, ask to see the Boss. He’s got quite the temper.”
Lars walked over to the couple and both he and the girl led them back into the kitchen.
Everything went silent. Frankie was staring at him with cold, probing eyes. He looked away, toward the window, but the eyes were reflected behind him. Suddenly, despite the griddle and fryalator sizzling away, the place seemed colder.
Perkins spent a few minutes jotting down ideas: a man with a prosthetic leg tries to adjust to his disability; an actress from Hollywood deals with the consequences of too much plastic surgery; a cop knows his partner is dealing drugs but feels torn between ratting on him and going the same route himself.
It was horseshit.
He looked up when he heard the scream.
It was faint, faraway, but it was obvious from which direction it had come. He stood up, looking down at the dirty tiles and tried like hell not to look over at Frankie. The counter was still deserted and he could see steam rising from the hot oil in the kitchen. For a moment he wondered if he’d heard anything at all. The notebook was in his hand.
Curiosity (and wasn’t that a writer’s best friend?) began to get the best of him. He pushed through the door of the counter and walked back there. It seemed different, being on the other side of things, no longer seeing the place from a customer’s point of view. This was how Lars must feel. Except he was making fifty grand a year and probably didn’t have to worry about his father telling him to pack his shit because his son didn’t want to be a lawyer like his old man.
There was another sound from out back, distant. Perkins walked into the kitchen. It wasn’t anything special. The fryalator looked ancient. Charred and burnt bits lay in the basket that could have once been fries. The oil was dark like the kind you’d put into your car and not your stomach. The stoves and griddles looked ready to crumble from rust. The board of health would have a jolly old time with this place.
The kitchen opened up farther down. On the left was a storeroom with industrial sized cans of vegetables and condiments. On the right was the door to the freezer where burgers were stored for months at a time. In between was a door, not the kind you’d expect to find in a burger joint. Or any kitchen for that matter. It was old, damn near ancient. The wood was splintering and the way it was rounded at the top made it seem better fit for a castle. Perkins looked behind him and for a moment he expected to find Frankie, eyes wide, a maddening grin. He saw only the kitchen and before he could have second thoughts, his hand was turning the doorknob.
Perkins reached for a light switch, but when his eyes adjusted he saw that torches lined the walls. A stairway led downward. The walls were stone.
It felt as if the restaurant was receding into the distance, far away somehow. There were thick spider webs along the way, big enough to hold arachnids he never wanted to lay eyes on.
The stairs seemed to stretch forever downward, finally ending at another door. He opened it and saw a long corridor. The walls here were tile like the kitchen, but they were crumbling and underneath there was something like exposed brickwork. There were figures up ahead. He walked slowly. This wasn’t the kind of place he wanted to be caught trespassing in.
The figures came into view. Lars and the pimply girl stood behind the two complaining customers. Strange: it looked like they were holding them in place. And when Perkins got a little closer, it looked a lot like that.
What stood in front of them, though, that was far stranger.
It was huge and sitting in what looked like a throne. The thing’s skin was slimy, almost transparent, with bulging dark blue veins. It was naked but there was no sign of genitals, not under its obscene gut. Its face was just as bloated. There was a mustache resting on its upper lip at an odd and crooked angle. Like roadkill.
Perkins covered his mouth when he sensed the smell down here, like all the garbage from the restaurant was left to rot in the dark.
“We’ve got a complaint from this woman.” It was Lars talking to the thing. “She wanted no relish on her cheeseburgers, but we messed up her order. It was our mistake and I’m sorry.”
The thing made a grunting noise, almost pig-like.
“I know,” Lars said. “We offered to fix it for her, but she insisted on seeing you.”
The thing raised a fat finger, its arm jiggling like dirty gelatin, and pointed to the man with the vest.
“He’s with her,” Lars said. “What do you think we ought to do about all this?”
There was silence for a moment, and in that moment Perkins wanted to turn around and run. He wished he’d stayed at school and joined the track team.
The thing opened its mouth, big enough to fit the front end of a small passenger car.
“You got it,” Lars said. He looked at his coworker. “One at a time.”
Lars pushed the fat woman forward and her screams were feral. She didn’t sound drunk anymore. The thing took hold of her with its oozing hands and slid her into its mouth. It worked its jaws: the sound of snapping bones and the ripping flesh. He turned his head and lost half the fries he’d eaten earlier.
Lars helped the girl with the woman’s companion. He sounded like he’d been thrown into a trash compactor.
Perkins ran. Webs brushed his face on his way upstairs but he didn’t care. He didn’t realize he’d dropped his notebook until he was back in the kitchen.
Fuck, fuck, fuck, his mind said.
He turned around and ran back to the stairs. The notebook was on a step halfway down. He dove for it, picked it up, and ran faster toward the restaurant when he heard footsteps heading his way.
By the time he got back to his booth, trying his best to not seem winded, Lars was behind the counter with the girl, who was crying. He was wiping his hands with a new rag, but it quickly became dirty.
Lars was trying to calm the girl down but she wasn’t having it. She threw her Big Ted’s hat on the ground and ran out the door and into the night.
Perkins opened the notebook and looked at the words, pretending not to notice.
“How were the fries?” Lars asked, walking over and sitting down.
“Delicious.” His stomach bubbled.
“Sorry about that,” he said, looking at the window. “Some people just can’t handle what the Boss has to say.”
Perkins forced a smile.
“Say,” Lars said, “Looks like we have an opening now. You wanna fill out an application?”
From behind the counter there was a sound that could have been a belch or a scream.
Perkins headed for the door and lost the rest of his supper.
Frankie stared from the corner, a smile curling his lips.
Patrick Lacey is a graduate of Salem State University and an Editorial Assistant in the healthcare industry. When he's not reading about blood clots and infectious diseases, he writes about things that make the general public uncomfortable.
He lives in Massachusetts with his fiancee, his pomeranian, and his muse, who he's pretty sure is trying to kill him. Follow him on Twitter (@PatLacey).