The stakes were high because I was on thin ice with hot shoes on after telling the company’s CEO I was taking two months of paternity leave in the middle of the busiest time in our business.
Out of nowhere, my waiter came back with a giant smile on his face, “Mira lo que te traje.” (Look what I brought you.)
Right there, on a white porcelain plate, staring back at me, black and blue with glistening fat and a bone-in smile, was a 12-oz rib eye.
The refill request works.
It truly works!
The thing is that I was already full.
But I’m not a quitter.
If I was going to have the meat sweat that night, it would be for a good cause. This man risked his neck to get me a refill on a rib eye, and I owe it to him to honor his sacrifice. And I owed it to everyone behind me with the courage to dare to ask for a rib eye refill at a stuck-up restaurant. And I owed my mom because while other kids were learning their please and thanks you, she was teaching me how to be a world-class ball buster.
So I ate the whole thing.
A few months later, I heard about an executive meeting a few weeks after the event. The CEO of the company had received the invoice for the party. On it was a line item for an extra order of rib eye. I want to believe the line said “Rib Eye Refill.”
I was disappointed.
There is no such thing as a free rib eye… for my previous employer, there wasn’t.
I, on the other hand, got a freebie. There IS such a thing as a free lunch. But to get it, you have to knock on the door.
This essay concludes the series, “Knocking on the Door is Not Entering.”
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Author: Carlos Garbiras
Karen O’Blivious – Senior political correspondent who insists she’s neutral but only interviews people who agree with her.