Chapter 57 · Staff Meal

"Head of Operations." Marites slammed her tray down two seats from mine, rice sliding off the edge. "Wow. And they still let you eat with the help?"

I didn't look up from my plate. "Sit somewhere else if it bothers you that much."

"It bothers everybody." She said it loud enough for the whole staff canteen to hear, and half the room went quiet the way it does right before something ugly starts. "Three months ago you were scrubbing Bianca's bathtub. Now what, you sign payroll?"

"Marites." Kuya Ben's voice came from the kitchen pass-through, flat and heavy, the kind of tone that ended arguments in this building before Bianca ever showed up on a security monitor. "You want to keep your shift, or you want to keep talking?"

She shut up. Everybody did, when Kuya Ben used that voice. Thirty years running this kitchen bought him that.

He came around the counter wiping his hands on his apron and sat across from me like it was any other Tuesday, except his eyes did a slow pass over the room