The Royal Wilder Hotel Pt. 05

"Just explain what happened with the utensils, please?"

Said Rachel, the In Room Dining Manager, who was Nathan's, Dimo's and Natalia's direct boss. She wasn't so hot on disciplining her hard working staff, but she also had a five star rating experience to defend to her absolute capacity.

It turned out, the forks Nathan had polished were needed quite urgently for the restaurant. Dimo had cleverly manipulated the facts to support that Nathan was being lazy - the forks would have been done sooner had Nathan prioritised them sooner. However, this did not account for two facts; Nathan had only started 20 minutes prior to the request for utensils. Second, the polishing of utensils was seen as "secondary" work for Room Service, only when it was quiet would Nathan be expected to lend a hand. His priority was Room Service, after all.

"I had them polished and ready to go, Dimo took them and-"

Nathan paused to raise his two index fingers, he was quoting what he doesn't believe what happened next.

"Fell over."

Rachel wasn't nearly as impressed. "Okay, did he actually fall over though or did you see him pretend to?"

"No, ma'am. But I think that he-"

"Nathan, I'm not interested in what you "think" he did. I know that you two don't have the best track record but you are both colleagues at the end of the day. I expect you to be able to put your differences aside and cooperate as professionals."

Nathan was annoyed at this response. Of course Rachel had every right to dismiss idle gossip, and Nathan couldn't prove that Dimo had deliberately tripped over absolutely nothing on a flat surface. But it was a right Nathan would have to suffer for. Circumstances created solely by Dimo owing to the problem he caused the restaurant over the roster mishap were causing Nathan to have to have his professionalism dragged through the mud only because Dimo couldn't tolerate being made to look incompetent. This was a pill Nathan had no choice but to swallow.

"Understood, it won't happen again."

"I hope so Nathan. We don't expect our most recently promoted staff member to make mistakes like this. I'm going to expect a lot of better effort from here on. Are we clear?"

Nathan nodded, before being signalled to leave the meeting. Dimo had his chance too, but considering he was able to manipulate facts he was given a lot less of a lashing. Nathan was lucky, very lucky to only get off with a verbal warning.

"Hey, are you at work today?" Came a message on Nathan's phone from Natalia.

"Hey. Yeah, in Room Service till 6." He responded. Nathan wasn't really in a talkative mood after that.

"Okay! I will be up there soon."

Nathan read the response, but didn't reply as Natalia had secretly hoped. He was quiet for the most of his shift, handling room service requests, rolling napkins and of course, polishing cutlery. He took "extra care" when walking past where Dimo had "tripped", so as to absolutely certain that Dimo was full of shit. Thank god he was rostered off today, Nathan thought to himself. When he returned to room service, he found Natalia waiting for him like a patient dog.

"Hello! How are you?" She happily said, as she opened her arms to hug Nathan. Nathan returned the hug, but it was obvious his mood influenced his stiffness and almost non-interested response.

"Doing okay, just getting through the day." As he said this an order came through on the Room Service printer. Natalia was stood in front of it so Nathan couldn't access the machine.

"Okay, when you finish I will be done in at 7, do you want to go to the cinema?" She asked. Under normal circumstances this was a very clear I.O.I, but Nathan was still rattled by the earlier meeting. A second print out came through and Nathan's patience finally got the better of him.

"I'll see what I'm doing okay? Let me do these orders and i'll message you when I'm finished today."

"Oh...okay." Natalia resigned, she felt the curtness of Nathan's response and made herself busy by leaving the Cauldron. Nathan would not know it yet, but Natalia was upset by Nathan's change of pleasantness. Of course, she wouldn't know either why Nathan was in such a bad mood, but then again why would she know?

The rest of Nathan's day was largely uneventful. A few more orders were made but the majority of his time up to 6 was occupied with secondary work. He even at one point spent an hour helping the restaurant restock glasses in the bar. At 6:10pm, Nathan was officially finished, and headed down to the men's room to get changed. Lacking signal down there, Nathan waited until he was outside the staff entrance before reaching out to Natalia.

"Hey! I just finished now, I'm gonna head to the pub for a drink if you want to join me when you finish." He said.

Nathan was still at the pub when 7pm rolled by.

7:10pm.

7:20pm.

7:30pm.

Nothing.

Not even a read update on his messenger.

Nathan started to think about it, even though it went against what his date doctor had said. NEVER OVERTHINK. But he did think about it, and suddenly remember his curtness from before. Did he put Natalia off forever?