Of course I’d be running late for the most important banquet of the fucking month.

I scrambled to check myself in the mirror. The makeup was a thinly veiled hack-job, and my hair was barely kept in line. Image was the name of the game, image and proper representation… but I knew that I didn’t have the time to prepare myself any better.

At least my makeup covers the bases.

It wasn’t going to win me any awards.

But I’d leave a good enough impression.

With a slice of toast between my teeth, I quickly darted down the stairs and hopped in my ancient piece of junk Honda. No time to be cute and civil now, and I was starving. I could touch up my makeup at a red light…of which I anticipated there would be several because, you know, I was running late, and why the fuck wouldn’t there be red lights all the way there.

Twisting the keys in the ignition, I listened as the engine sputtered to life and ignored the obnoxious chime of the check engine light – the constant death knoll was ritual by now.

Moments later, I was on the road, a cavalcade of excuses and apologies whirling through my head. I didn’t know what I was going to say to the others when I arrived.

Forty-five minutes and a minimum of eight red lights later, I finally pulled to a halt in the parking garage, six floors above where I needed to be. I raced to the elevator, frantically punched the button, and rode it down the chasm towards the lobby. It was only halfway down that I realized I probably could have slipped down the stairs faster.

The Marines’ banquet was already starting by now, probably. All eyes were going to be on me as soon as I walked in.

Fantastic.

As I stepped out into the lobby, evading eye contact with absolutely anybody, I marched straight through the doors and to my people. There they were, standing in procession around our portly, impatient leader as his furious gaze fell down upon me.

“Now, if you’ll excuse me…I need to speak with one tardy Clara Campbell.”

Everyone’s gaze fell on me, and I felt small.

“You’re late,” Arnold told me after pulling me aside. Even with his whispered tone, I could see the others judging me as they paraded around the room. “I thought I could count on you to never be late. Where’s my Clara? I don’t see her here, just this tired, tardy young lady.”

“I’m sorry,” I replied truthfully. “It won’t happen again. Traffic was–”

“Don’t let it happen again,” he cut me off.

I nodded quietly, knowing that there would be no further discussion. All those half-hearted explanations in my head fell to the wayside, and I knew that he didn’t care to hear a single syllable.

Arnold cast me one final, judgmental glance before turning to the others, who collectively pretended to be occupied with their own devices.

“Very well then. Places, everybody!”

I grabbed a drink tray.

Oh. Wait. You thought I was going to be in the banquet, didn’t you?

Nope.

I‘m not the plucky romantic lead in a book, fawning over my billowing attired and preparing to take the arm of a sexy, rugged Marine. I wasn’t wearing a nice dress, although I did have a fetching black bow tie beneath my collar.

I bitterly adjusted my bow tie and waistcoat.

That’s right.

I’m on the fucking serving staff.

This was my place in life. My role was to work in the trenches while other people got the nice, glamorous lives. Being a banquet server meant working behind the scenes and making sure nobody saw what was really going on beneath our careful, manufactured smiles and in hidden corridors around the event rooms.

Spreading crisp, flawless tablecloths over ancient, folding wooden tables…

Stepping through concealed staff entrances into dank, filthy hallways, refilling ice pitchers and returning mountains of discarded plates…

Lining up in an assembly line of servers around a massive kitchen – marked with years of use and old appliances – to whisk out huge black trays of carefully plated entrees…

I saw the muck behind the charm.

It was my job to make sure they never did.

I’d never be the beautiful princess, or the intrepid reporter, or the esteemed socialite. I was just Clara – a working-class server, part of a freelance banquet and bartending crew that rounded out local hotels, sports games, and catered events. Being anything more than that just wasn’t the world that was in front of me.

Or so I thought.