“You Know Very Well Who Did It, Karen”

Karen didn’t breeze into work that day, she downright squalled through the side door of Cherribeez. The hostess, who had been snacking on some room temperature popcorn shrimp in the dingy little supply room, jumped out of the way as the glass door swung open. Her half eaten shrimp fell to the floor as she let out a YIP around a mouthful of food. Karen, in her whirlwind of stress, didn’t notice the poor girl as she yanked the wooden door to the interior of the restaurant open and barreled through.

“I’m so sorry,” she huffed to her manager as she slid her card through the computer by the bar and clocked in, “I’m so late.”

Surprised by her disheveled appearance, the typically strict man shook his head and began a response. Karen was already headed to one of the server stations to shove her belongings in a drawer before she could hear him accept her apology.

She was having a glass of water near the drink station in the kitchen when the hostess strolled in. She stood beside the older woman for a moment before asking, “Are you okay?”

Karen jumped and nearly spat out her drink. The hostess raised her hands in a placating jester, “Jesus Karen!”

“I’m sorry,” Karen sighed, “Today was a mess.” The hostess nodded and waited for her to elaborate. “Well, for starters, before I got the kids out to school this morning there was a huge disagreement about which pancake was for which kid — actually, for starters, we got a dog last week.”

The hostess, who absolutely loved animals of all kinds, squealed with glee and asked to see a picture.

Karen fixed her with the withering stare only a stressed mother of three with a new puppy could manage, and the younger girl snapped her mouth shut.

“She is very cute,” Karen admitted reluctantly, “We picked her up from the shelter on Wednesday. She’s some kind of poodle mix, they think about six months old.” The hostess smiled excitedly and nodded for the woman to continue.

“Well, the first few nights the poor girl cried and cried all night. But the shelter people warned us that we had to leave her in her crate or she would never get used to her new home. So we left the radio on all night, the Beatles channel, which was another form of torture, and the kids filled her crate with stuffed animals. Eventually she began sleeping through the night.” Karen refilled her water glass, and the hostess waited with patience uncharacteristic of a 17 year old girl for her coworker to continue.

“She’s surprisingly well-behaved even though she’s spunky, she’s even house trained, and she loves to nap on the couch. The kids have been so much happier having her around. But anyway, back to today. So the pancake dispute solved, after I cut them all into thirds, I put Fifi – I let the kids pick her name – in her crate and took them to school. On the way home, I got a flat tire. I waited about an hour for Triple A, and when he finally arrived, he didn’t have his tire repair kit or was missing a part or something. I don’t even know. So he towed my car to the shop for free and, three hours later, I finally had a new tire. Great. I needed to go to the grocery store, but Fifi had been locked up for way longer than she should have been so I went straight home.”

Karen took a deep breath and studied her coworker for a moment, a teenager with a bouncy brunette ponytail and not a care in the world beyond how many likes her recent instagram post had gotten, with envy. No flat tires or squabbling kids or screaming puppies. “Was she okay?” The hostess asked, concerned. Karen finally relented and pulled out her cell phone to show the girl a picture. The hostess lit up and gratefully accepted the phone. Fifi sat proudly on a red leather couch, which matched the red collar that contrasted her black curly coat, amidst a sea of stuffed animals and small throw pillows. “She’s so cute! I’m texting this to myself,” the girl squealed before swiping around on the screen with the lightening speed only a true millennial could possess. Or was she Gen Z? Karen could never remember the difference. She slid her phone back in her apron before continuing.

“Oh she was fine, she was sleeping soundly in her crate when I got back. But my couch, my brand new couch, was not,” Karen griped. “The whole underside of the couch was ripped to pieces, like the damn tasmanian devil shrank down to toy poodle size and decided my couch was a tasty snack. And the pillows! My cute colorful throw pillows, were all gutted. Ruthless.”

“Was the crate locked?” The hostess asked, confused.

Karen threw up her hands, “That’s exactly it! I know that I locked it when I left. And when I got home, the door to the crate was closed, but unlocked. How the hell did that little maniac manage to unlock it, get out, and then close it behind her? This was the first time she’s caused any destruction!”

“That’s weird,” the hostess commented unnecessarily.

“I know,” groaned Karen, “I mean it must have been her, but what if we have a rat or something? How the hell did she get that door closed?”

Just then, the manager entered the kitchen. He fixed the hostess with a look that said, “Why aren’t you at the host stand?”

She smiled at him sheepishly and placed her hand on the older woman’s arm as she passed her, “I’m sorry you had such a hard day. But at least you have that little face to go home to!”

The hostess pulled her phone out of the shelf in the host stand. The text from Karen containing Fifi’s photo was waiting for her. She saved it, and opened instagram, excited to post the adorable picture. It would get so many likes.

An ad popped up at the top of her feed. Usually, she barely noticed ads, but this one caught her attention.

A picture of a red couch, surrounded by torn up pillows and their fluffy guts strewn about the living room, had a caption in big white letters superimposed on the top of the photo.

“You know very well who did it, Karen.”