Cruel And Petty Bastards

I worked as a server in a fine dining restaurant in a touristy town in Florida. The owners, a husband and wife team, were notorious for being cruel and petty bastards. It was 2008 and I had just been laid off, so I had to take anything. On top of that, I was engaged to be married (paying for the wedding ourselves) and planning a move to NYC.

This could be an incredibly long story, so I will just give a few examples of their batshit cruelty.

1. Dyslexic server, who trained me, was fired a week after I started because he took too long to write the specials on the chalkboard. (They knew he was dyslexic.)
2. His replacement. Was fired less than a week after being hired, for selling the wrong bottle of wine. While this was definitely her mistake, their handling of it was despicable. She accidentally sold a $125 bottle of wine for $35. (Restaurant prices not the restaurant’s actual cost. Those were $56 and $10 bottles.) The owner let the table know of the servers mistake, saying “I hope you are enjoying that bottle of wine, it’s actually a $125 bottle. But don’t worry, You don’t have to pay for it. Your server will have to.” Needless to say, the table was furious for being put in that awkward position, and were gracious enough to give an awesome secret tip to cover the cost. Here is the nasty part. She finished out her shift and paid the total $125 thinking she still had a job. She was fired two days later on Christmas Eve by text message.

I kept quiet as much as I could. I saw that whenever you shared any bit of your personal life with these fucks, they used it to torment you. The wife-owner followed me around the restaurant and berated me in increasingly weird ways with the intent to emasculate.

Once they met my fiancé and from that moment on, the wife-owner would make jabs saying “she doesn’t seem like she is too thrilled to get married,” or “She probably expects better,” and then laugh it off like she was just joking.

It was my strategy to just eat shit and save money, and not let it bother me. She figured this out right away and got downright sadistic, trying to see how far they could push me and see what I would do without complaint. I managed to suck it up for 2 years thanks to alcohol, no backbone, and financial need.

My breaking point was when she told me to take away the chair our hostess was sitting in when no customers were around. Granted sitting on the job is supposedly unprofessional, but she was an elderly woman, sick, working outside. The hostess wouldn’t dare call in sick as she was working here illegally from Hungary, and similarly had to eat as much shit as was thrown at her. So rather than talk to the hostess and possibly take over for her sick employee, she asked me to snag the chair from her without explanation.

Here is the fucked up part. I did it. I fucking did it. The hostess understood. Really, what could she say? she knew what was happening and gave me this look of understanding that I’ll never forget. I got a few feet away and put the chair back, looking straight back at the vile shitstain that asked me to be cruel to another person for her amusement. The owner didn’t say a word to me about my subordination and gave me the cold shoulder for the rest of the evening.

Two weeks later, I was closing out my tips and receipts with the husband-owner. I had counted my bank prior to cashing out with him, as I always did. Everything added up just fine. Turns out he had secretly added in a cash ticket to my till for $150. It showed on the report he printed at 1 minute before running the cashout report. I had only 4 tables, all cash tips on all credit card tickets that night so it was not hard to keep track of. (Lucky me I thought) I questioned this and said I had double checked my math and he must have made some mistake. His response was, “If you don’t like it, there is the door.” That pretty much sealed it.

I knew what was happening and luckily my brain initiated the YOU IS BOUT TO BE FORCED TO QUIT SO YOU DON’T GETS THE UNEMPLOYMENT MONIES Disaster recovery response. I refused to pay him and said I will be returning to work tomorrow for my next scheduled shift, and we can work this out then. He said fuck you, get out. I was fired. This was very important. I was fired. I didn’t quit.

I was a month away from moving to NYC with my wife to try to start a career in my field. I just needed one more month of saving every last penny I made and I was out! This pretty much fucked me.

So I filed for unemployment stating the reasons I was fired on my last night, which met the eligibility requirements. The unemployment office contacted my former employer for verification and he said I was fired for stealing wine and there were witnesses. My claim was denied. The next step was to dispute the claim. I disputed and it went to the adjudication process. Basically what amounted to a phone hearing between my former employer, an unemployment caseworker, me, and any “witnesses.”

This is where I got revenge.

I knew of the upcoming hearing, and my employer was notified by mail of the date. The letter explained the process and instructed to line up any witnesses and materials needed for the case. It also stated that you have a period of time to reschedule the hearing if needed. An unemployment worker explained the process to me over the phone before the letters were mailed. I then paid a anarchist punk guy with beer to steal any of their mail from the unemployment office and bring it to me. Leading up to the hearing I also reported them to ASCAP for playing copyrighted music in their establishment without paying dues, (A fairly hefty fine) and reported some of their more crooked dealings to the IRS. (Namely how the wife-owner would use her name as an employee for several of the illegal workers, underreporting earnings, etc)

I also dropped a dead fish into their gutters above their patio, waited a week for the rats to appear and called the health dept.

At the time of the hearing, the owner was caught off guard and tried to reschedule. He was not allowed to reschedule because the letter (Which he never received…) stated that failure to attend the hearing automatically results in a ruling for the other party. He complied and we went along with the hearing without his fake witness.

During the hearing I kept calm but he lost his temper. I answered my questions in a way to really get his anger going, and it worked. The key question posed to my former employer was, “Had he not stolen any property, would you still have fired him?” He slipped and said yes, sending the ruling in my favor.

A few weeks later I received my check for all the past months of unemployment. It was enough to get me to NYC.

Two and a half years later, I am still married and found an excellent job in my field with great pay, benefits, an awesome boss, and union representation.

I hear the restaurant is struggling to keep the doors open and have both had a host of financial problems.