You’re my waiter and I’m on a really crappy date with an asshole

Okay this is giving me ideas...

“… and I’m close personal friends with Justin Hammer you see, so I said I’d pass the message along, because passing up an opportunity to stick one to the upstarts at Wakanda is akin to treason in my book.” Todd – Natasha deliberately forgot the man’s real name as soon as he opened his mouth – dips his complementary bread into a pool of balsamic vinegar and oil and shoves it in his mouth before continuing, not even bothering to wait until he’s swallowed. “I mean, they think they’re going to change the world with an app for stopping PTSD or whatever. Have you ever heard of anything so stupid?”

“Well, actually – ” she stars, but Todd barrels over her.

“I mean, honestly. And that T’Challa is supposed to be the top Thirty Under Thirty. Ridiculous.” Natasha catches the eye of her server and hopes her send me wine please vibes are coming off as strongly as she hopes. She definitely needs wine to deal with this guy. “I have more business sense in my pinkie than that man has in his entire body. What he’s hoping to achieve, I have no idea.”

“I think he’s – ”

“And his sister,” Todd continues, now apparently ignoring her entirely. “God, she’s even worse. Jumped up kid. No respect for – ”

“Straight white men?” Natasha cuts in, finally hitting her limit. Ten minutes after sitting down. Christ, she’s got to stop agreeing to Tinder dates.

“Excuse me?”

“Because if that’s the case I think Ms King is on the right track, personally.”

“What would you know?” Todd snaps, clearly annoyed at being talked back to. “I’ve worked in tech development since I graduated and have overseen more successful launches that she or you could ever hope to.”

Natasha sits back in her chair and raises an eyebrow. “Well. Todd – ”

“My name’s not – ”

“This has been lovely,” Natasha continues on as if he hadn’t spoken, making sure that her voice practically drips sarcasm. “But unfortunately – ”

“One baked camembert,” their server says, suddenly appearing at their table as if summoned, “and one tomato soup.”

He places Natasha's camembert in front of her and then fumbles and tips the tomato soup straight into Todd’s lap.

“How dare – !” Todd screeches, just as their server says, “So sorry, sir, let me – ” and knocks over Todd’s water as well.

Everything descends into pandemonium, Todd yelling at the server while the server attempts to pat Todd’s crotch dry, Todd the screaming for the manager who turns out to be… the server patting his crotch, and eventually Todd storming out of the restaurant in a huff, yelling about bad Yelp reviews and how no one will ever eat at this place again “mark my words!”

There’s a stunned silence in the wake of Todd leaving, and then the server says, “Well, that went well I think.”

Natasha turns back to look at him practically in slow motion, she’s so surprised. “Excuse me?”

“The water might have been overkill but that was also genuinely an accident, so…” he shrugs and begins cleaning the soup of the floor.

“You – that wasn’t an accident?”

“The water?” the server asks. “I just said that was an accident.”

Natasha rolls her eyes. “Not the water, the soup.”

“Oh. Yeah.” He grins. Natasha valiantly tries not to find it cute. “I’ve got good at faking soup related incidents. See? Not even much to clean up, most of it is on his pants.”

Which is true; the majority of the damage to the tablecloth seems to be from the accidentally spilled water. He has an excellent aim and his acting skills are top notch.

“Your meal is on the house, by the way,” the server says with a wink which, urgh, okay fine, he’s cute. “Wine?”

Okay. Okay so maybe this isn’t the worst date she’s ever been on. Cute guys who save her from terrible dudebros in entertaining ways? And does actually bring wine? Definitely ranks higher than her last date, at least; that doctor was weird.

“Only if it comes with your number,” she replies, unable to stop herself from smiling at his answering blinding grin. “I’m Natasha, by the way.”

“Clint,” he replies with another grin. “And I’ll be right with you with the wine.”

“And your number.”

His grin gets wider. “And my number.”

I love that one was on purpose and one was totally by accident. Brava! Go Clint!

Clint is a special kind of mess, bless him. :D

Bwahaha, I love that Clint is also the manager and the excellent aiming of soup. Well played, sir, and couldn't have happened to a nicer customer I'm sure.

Of course Clint's the manager. He's a very responsible human being.

Edited 2020-09-29 05:24 pm (UTC)