Pompano Beach
Having waitressed at a Cracker Barrel while in high school, Jessica knows how to memorize daily specials, roll up silverware inside paper napkins and balance multiple dinner plates on one arm. Jeans and tees aren’t quite the best interview clothes, so on the bus to her interview Jessica stops at a JCPenney for slacks and a long-sleeve blouse—and to ask a cosmetician for help with eye shadow. They settle on a color called Eternal Sunshine. Changing into her new clothes in the store bathroom, Jessica smiles at the mirror.
“Pleased to meet you. I’m Jessica Aldridge,” she practices. It’s a good thing she can come out with her name because with her tattoos covered and her eye sockets high-beam bright, Jessica barely recognizes her reflection.
Down Airpark Road, Phantom Diner is a brick-and-clapboard building with a blue-tiled roof and quaint bay windows. It looks okay, and then Jessica is inside asking about the job.
“The boss isn’t in yet,” says the day hostess. “We’re not a chain and we don’t have medical,” she adds discouragingly.
“That’s fine,” Jessica says, smiling as though she’d be happy to work here for free. And truthfully, any lack of probing corporate benefit paperwork is all right by her. In a quiet corner Jessica fills out the one-page application.
When she turns in the sheet the hostess, glancing it over, doesn’t inquire about her yearlong employment blank but merely says, “So long.” If this hard young woman has anything to say about it, Jessica will not be getting the job.