There's a rule in pizza delivery: Wait at the door. Don't go into the customer's house. This isn't an actual law so much as it is company policy in most major chains for which you can get in trouble.
In practice, the rule is violated with some frequency. There are good reasons for the rule to exist, to be sure. If a driver robs something small and valuable from a customer while inside, then it protects the company from at least some liability - they have a policy against it. It helps keep the customer safe from liability if a driver hurts him or herself in the house. And most importantly it's a guideline that can keep a driver safe from getting robbed or assaulted.
Nevertheless, there are times when you're at the front door of the house and you've got an armload of four pizzas and the old woman in front of you is a third of your size and she asks for help carrying them to her kitchen table and there's nobody else around. And in those times you're going to break the rule because the alternative is to be a jerk.
This was not one of those times. This was just me being stupid.
I used to work in a region that was part suburb, part rural, all desert. Big mix of neighborhoods, with well-off working professionals and retirement communities next to trailer parks and junkyards. This particular order - small one, large single topping and a two liter, not much more than ten dollars and change thanks to a coupon - took me out to the far end of our delivery range, where there was nothing but rural blight and broken down double-wides. That should have been warning sign the first.
This particular trailer isn't in worse shape than the others, so no red flags beyond the distance. Besides, I am an egalitarian person who tries not to stereotype based on living condition. I knocked. The man who opened the door was late-middle aged, by my reckoning, probably a hard late-fifties if I had to guess. Taller and heavier than I by a fair bit. A German shepherd padded along beside him. There was a bandage around his neck, but only the front, as if it had been recently slashed. Should have been warning sign the second.
I gave him the corporate spiel about the order, confirmed what it was, and the total. He was quiet for just long enough for the silence to be awkward before stepping away from the door and mentioning that he had the money inside, just come in and he'd get it.Â
That was the third sign, and this too I ignored. I couldn't say why; idiocy on my part, or maybe it was a slow night for tips so far and I felt like if I refused, I'd get exact change and nothing else. But still, stupid. I went inside. The dog fell in step behind me, but stayed by the door, as if guarding it.
"Don't mind him," the guy said. "He just smells dinner." My throat went dry with the knowledge that this was a bad idea, but I was committed.
The place looked like a caricature of a Coen brothers' film, all wood panelling and casual grotesquerie. Porn DVDs everywhere, littering the floor and a coffee table. The man's wife, older from the look of her, wheelchair-bound, smiling thin and not paying much attention to me. Empire Strikes Back on low volume on the TV. I remember that very clearly. It was my only sane point of reference.
The customer sat down in an easy chair directly facing the hallway towards the front door and again said nothing for long enough to be awkward. I glanced over my shoulder, but the dog wasn't moving. Well-trained. Making an assumption, I placed the order on the coffee table, near his wife, and stepped back in front of him for payment. I repeated the total. Silence. Not quite a dead stare from him but not much life in it.
He starts fiddling with his wallet. "You doing this for school?"
Setting aside that I have a face that says "I am putting myself through school for a higher degree," he was right, and I said so.
"What are you studying for?" By now he had a fistful of money and I thought he was just making chitchat. I relaxed a bit and said it was for my Master's in English.
"English!" He snorted and looked at his wife like that was funny. She laughed but it was more of a wheeze. Silence again, and then he split the money into two fistfuls, one in each hand, and looked me dead in the eye.
"So what's the state capital of New York?"
I didn't know why the geography, but I knew a trick question. "Albany," I said, and he looked momentarily impressed that I didn't say NYC.
"What's the capital of New Mexico?" I lived there at the time, so of course I knew that one. "Santa Fe."
He smirked and crinkled the money in his hands. "Answers quick," he said to his wife. "You can see it, he just wants to get the money and get out." Then his attention was on me again. "What's the only state capital that's also the largest city in the state?"
This, I did not know. I said as much, and, looking over my shoulder to see that the Shepherd hadn't budged from its spot near the door, resigned myself to being a victim of the Pop-Quiz Killer.
"That's Phoenix," he said, with some pride in his voice. Then, after another moment's long silence, he offered me the money in his left hand. "You go on home now." The dog moved aside.
I took the money, trying and failing to control the shaking in my hands, and thanked him. Kept my walk controlled until I was outside the trailer and had closed the door. I bolted to my car once I was out of sight and drove fast enough on the bumpy dirt side-road leading to the place to risk my suspension, until I was back on proper asphalt and near a stop-light by the interstate. Then I breathed, and slowed down, and bothered to count the money.
I mentioned that the order was only ten dollars and change. I was holding sixty-one.
I don't have a moral to this. If you get into pizza you still shouldn't go into somebody's house. I wasn't secretly clever all along for having crept into the guy's house, and I had no closure or explanation for the circumstances.
But learn your state capitals. You never know.
In practice, the rule is violated with some frequency. There are good reasons for the rule to exist, to be sure. If a driver robs something small and valuable from a customer while inside, then it protects the company from at least some liability - they have a policy against it. It helps keep the customer safe from liability if a driver hurts him or herself in the house. And most importantly it's a guideline that can keep a driver safe from getting robbed or assaulted.
Nevertheless, there are times when you're at the front door of the house and you've got an armload of four pizzas and the old woman in front of you is a third of your size and she asks for help carrying them to her kitchen table and there's nobody else around. And in those times you're going to break the rule because the alternative is to be a jerk.
This was not one of those times. This was just me being stupid.
I used to work in a region that was part suburb, part rural, all desert. Big mix of neighborhoods, with well-off working professionals and retirement communities next to trailer parks and junkyards. This particular order - small one, large single topping and a two liter, not much more than ten dollars and change thanks to a coupon - took me out to the far end of our delivery range, where there was nothing but rural blight and broken down double-wides. That should have been warning sign the first.
This particular trailer isn't in worse shape than the others, so no red flags beyond the distance. Besides, I am an egalitarian person who tries not to stereotype based on living condition. I knocked. The man who opened the door was late-middle aged, by my reckoning, probably a hard late-fifties if I had to guess. Taller and heavier than I by a fair bit. A German shepherd padded along beside him. There was a bandage around his neck, but only the front, as if it had been recently slashed. Should have been warning sign the second.
I gave him the corporate spiel about the order, confirmed what it was, and the total. He was quiet for just long enough for the silence to be awkward before stepping away from the door and mentioning that he had the money inside, just come in and he'd get it.Â
That was the third sign, and this too I ignored. I couldn't say why; idiocy on my part, or maybe it was a slow night for tips so far and I felt like if I refused, I'd get exact change and nothing else. But still, stupid. I went inside. The dog fell in step behind me, but stayed by the door, as if guarding it.
"Don't mind him," the guy said. "He just smells dinner." My throat went dry with the knowledge that this was a bad idea, but I was committed.
The place looked like a caricature of a Coen brothers' film, all wood panelling and casual grotesquerie. Porn DVDs everywhere, littering the floor and a coffee table. The man's wife, older from the look of her, wheelchair-bound, smiling thin and not paying much attention to me. Empire Strikes Back on low volume on the TV. I remember that very clearly. It was my only sane point of reference.
The customer sat down in an easy chair directly facing the hallway towards the front door and again said nothing for long enough to be awkward. I glanced over my shoulder, but the dog wasn't moving. Well-trained. Making an assumption, I placed the order on the coffee table, near his wife, and stepped back in front of him for payment. I repeated the total. Silence. Not quite a dead stare from him but not much life in it.
He starts fiddling with his wallet. "You doing this for school?"
Setting aside that I have a face that says "I am putting myself through school for a higher degree," he was right, and I said so.
"What are you studying for?" By now he had a fistful of money and I thought he was just making chitchat. I relaxed a bit and said it was for my Master's in English.
"English!" He snorted and looked at his wife like that was funny. She laughed but it was more of a wheeze. Silence again, and then he split the money into two fistfuls, one in each hand, and looked me dead in the eye.
"So what's the state capital of New York?"
I didn't know why the geography, but I knew a trick question. "Albany," I said, and he looked momentarily impressed that I didn't say NYC.
"What's the capital of New Mexico?" I lived there at the time, so of course I knew that one. "Santa Fe."
He smirked and crinkled the money in his hands. "Answers quick," he said to his wife. "You can see it, he just wants to get the money and get out." Then his attention was on me again. "What's the only state capital that's also the largest city in the state?"
This, I did not know. I said as much, and, looking over my shoulder to see that the Shepherd hadn't budged from its spot near the door, resigned myself to being a victim of the Pop-Quiz Killer.
"That's Phoenix," he said, with some pride in his voice. Then, after another moment's long silence, he offered me the money in his left hand. "You go on home now." The dog moved aside.
I took the money, trying and failing to control the shaking in my hands, and thanked him. Kept my walk controlled until I was outside the trailer and had closed the door. I bolted to my car once I was out of sight and drove fast enough on the bumpy dirt side-road leading to the place to risk my suspension, until I was back on proper asphalt and near a stop-light by the interstate. Then I breathed, and slowed down, and bothered to count the money.
I mentioned that the order was only ten dollars and change. I was holding sixty-one.
I don't have a moral to this. If you get into pizza you still shouldn't go into somebody's house. I wasn't secretly clever all along for having crept into the guy's house, and I had no closure or explanation for the circumstances.
But learn your state capitals. You never know.
Verad Bellveil's Profile | The Case of the Ransacked Rug | Verad's Fate Sheet
Current Fate-14 Storyline:Â Merchant, Marine
Current Fate-14 Storyline:Â Merchant, Marine
