Unexpected

Fine Dining

Honestly, how do guys wear these things? Bowties. They always look so dapper on a man, I think, and yet now that I was standing here in the women's bathroom fiddling with my own, I couldn't conceive of anyone wearing these things willingly! Finally it was straight on my neck, black and silky and perfectly knotted against the white, starched collar of my button up shirt that was tucked into my black slacks. I sighed a little as I wrapped a black apron around my waist.

"Ready?" Agent Rumlow's voice asked straight in my ear. His voice seemed a bit staticky so I adjusted the tiny earpiece and nodded. I knew that they could see me nodding as I was wearing a pair of glasses with cameras hidden in the corners of the lenses. I also knew for a fact that another waitress, the same one who'd been training me the last three days, was in the employee bathroom stall behind me and if I said something like "Yeah." or "Affirmative" or whatever she'd be confused and ask questions, and tonight was not the night for asking questions.

About a week and a half ago Agent Rumlow approached me about this mission. Apparently they'd discovered that one of the Chitauri weapon buyers was a rich aristocrat who had his fingers in several criminal pies, including arms dealing. From some documents the field agents found and through some creative interrogation, S.H.I.E.L.D. was certain that this man, Gaspar Broussard, a well-known game hunter, art and car collector, and wine connoisseur, was going to meet his seller at a high-class restaurant in Paris, the very one that I was now an employee of. I was to become Broussard's waitress and plant a video recorder in the flowers on his table and otherwise hang around him to collect whatever information I could.

As I adjusted my glasses one last time I took deep breaths to try to calm down my furiously beating heart. My first mission! It was a simple job and I wouldn't be alone, I knew, as a pair of other agents was disguised as an American tourist couple would be in the main dining room as well. I needed to calm down. So far my mission had been easy. It hadn't been too difficult planting myself in the restaurant, the other wait staff had accepted me quickly, especially my trainer, a blunt, feisty brunette named Odeletta. Under her guidance I quickly picked up my duties and the professional, quiet air I must have to work here and today was my second night on my own.

The stall door swung open all of a sudden and Odeletta stepped out. She gave me a quick glance and her mouth grew instantly into a teasing grin, "Why, Jean, why do you look so nervous?" she asked in French.

My undercover alias was Johanna Cooper, a shy American college student in Paris for international studies in architecture, and since 'Johanna' wasn't a typical French name, the staff had taken to nicknaming me 'Jean'. No one would ever be able to recognize me. Jean looked nothing like Penelope. First off, I was wearing a brunette wig and hazel colored contacts. Then there was the makeup. Natasha had showed me how to use all those brushes, powders, and creams to make my skin paler, paint on a thick smattering of freckles on my cheeks and, nose and make my cheekbones look higher and more prominent. Putting all this on every morning made me wish that I had Loki's powers to change my appearance with a quickly imagined illusion instead of itchy wigs and all this disguise makeup.

"Do I? I guess I'm always nervous before a shift, I'm still so new here you know." I responded in kind, the French rolling off my tongue easily, though I knew I still had an accent, however slight it was, even after all these years.

"There's no need to be nervous at all! You know what you're doing and if you need any help at all you know Valerie and I are always there to help. My section is right next to yours tonight, so if it becomes too much I'll be right there to, how do you Americans say it? Lend a hand?" The last sentence she stumbled over in heavily accented English.