She regretted calling out a nanosecond after she’d done so. Whoever had entered had likely been ignorant of her presence before. That was no longer the case.

Tonya grabbed the mop, which was little more than a stick without its cloth head. She stepped down the hall toward the doorway, wielding her weapon with both hands in front of her body, the way she’d seen in kung fu movies.

Philip emerged from the kitchen’s washroom. His face was red, as if he’d gone out for a run rather than emptied the trash. Sweat pasted down his hair. He looked at her stance with his head tilted to the side before shrugging and unbuttoning his military-style peacoat. Instead of hanging it on the hallway hooks installed for that very purpose, he folded it over his arm.

“You’re still here?” he asked.

“I thought you left,” she said.

Philip’s nose flared. “Yeah. I’d thought so too. But then I realized there’s still work to be done before tomorrow’s dinner shift.”

He strode past. Tonya listened to his footsteps fade before they disappeared behind a door’s clang. Philip had locked himself in his office, she supposed. She couldn’t blame him. Who would want anything to do with a jumpy nutcase practicing fake martial arts with a mop stick?

She shook her head as she reassembled the mop with a fresh pad and resumed her duties. A larger-than-usual number of pots and pans had been used during the evening’s dinner service. Washing them had taken most of her shift. She still had to mop the floors and wipe down all the food surfaces.

Tonya pushed the bucket into the kitchen and got to work, humming to create some sound besides the slosh of soapy water. She finished half the room before determining that the liquid in the bucket was too gray to continue. Mopping with dirty fluids would ruin everything.

Tonya dragged the bucket back to the basin area and heaved it into the sink. Gray soapy sludge splattered inside and slurped down the drain. She righted the pail and turned on the hose, watching the clear, fresh water pool into the cleaning contraption.

The bucket was near full when a metallic whirring pierced the air. Tonya winced at the noise, assuming that some kitchen device had gone haywire, no doubt because she’d erroneously left it plugged in while wetting its area. She rushed into the main kitchen, praying that her inadvertent damage would be of the inexpensive variety.