"If Mr. Dickerson hadn't always insisted on that place, who would've willingly put up with that kind of treatment?"
"I heard they're ridiculously cheap with their own staff, too." A well-connected guy in the group lowered his voice. "A buddy of mine from back home used to work there as a food runner. Said the owner watched costs like a hawk—eyes practically glowing green."
"Staff meals were basically water with a hint of flavor. And if you tried to take home any leftovers? You'd get a look like you were stealing from the register."
"Year-end bonuses? Delayed as long as possible, shaved down as much as they could get away with."
"Exactly," another voice chimed in immediately. "Business got bigger, but the heart got smaller."
"I used to think it was a solid, reputable place. Now it's all nickel-and-diming. The food hasn't gotten any better, but the attitude sure has."
"Last time my family went there for a birthday dinner, the servers couldn't have cared less. Dishes took forever. Probably figured walk-in customers weren't worth the effort since we weren't spending enough."
"What Mr. Dickerson did this time was..." The first voice wrapped things up with a note of genuine admiration. "Handled perfectly. I'd felt something was off for a while but never said anything. Looks like he'd finally had enough too."
"Something must've crossed the line."
"Honestly, it's a good thing. A new place might give us better value and better food."
"Mr. Dickerson should've looked elsewhere a long time ago."
The chatter gradually died down. I stood outside the break room, never stepping inside, just listening in silence.
These scattered complaints and revelations were like puzzle pieces, slowly assembling a full picture of how Gourmet Grace had quietly rotted from the inside over the years.
That uncomfortable feeling of being nickel-and-dimed—it had seeped into every corner of their daily operations. Not just toward major clients like me, but toward casual diners, and even their own employees.
The notice I'd sent out that morning had drawn little pushback. Most people understood. Many openly agreed. That alone told me everything I needed to know.
Back in my office, I gazed at the Gourmet Grace sign in the distance and thought of Gloria's face the night before—that undisguised glee when she'd pocketed a hundred dollars, that sharp, cutting expression when she'd dressed down the server.
Then I thought of a small restaurant years ago. A bowl of hot soup. A simple, honest smile.
Time can bring scale and profit. It can also corrode the very thing that made you worth believing in.
Thirteen years. Long enough for a restaurant to expand into something impressive. Long enough for a person to become unrecognizable.
I'd lost a hundred dollars. No—probably many hundreds of dollars over the years.
But I'd gained something far more valuable.
At the very least, my employees would no longer have to endure increasingly suffocating penny-pinching and miserable experiences just because of my "habit" or some unearned sense of "loyalty."
As for Gourmet Grace and its owner?
I picked up my coffee—long since gone cold—and took a quiet sip.
You choose your own path.
And you ruin your own business.
After New Year, the company stuck to the original plan: grand opening on the tenth.
Early on the morning of the ninth, a long string of messages from Gloria landed on my phone.
"Mr. Dickerson, Happy New Year! Wishing you a belated happy holiday! May your company have a fresh start and money rolling in!"
"Grand opening tomorrow on the tenth—shall we set up our usual opening banquet for you?"
"I know you're busy, so I've already handpicked all the dishes for you—all your favorites from years past, the luckiest ones on the menu!"
A detailed quote followed right after.
I tapped it open and skimmed the contents. The dish names were as familiar as my own handwriting. Roasted suckling pig, steamed grouper, crab roe tofu casserole...
Virtually unchanged from the past five or six years. The only difference was the numbers next to each item—they'd quietly crept upward again.
I scrolled straight to the total at the bottom. Compared to last year's opening banquet, it had jumped nearly twenty percent.
