I cut the Pakistani line cook by accident Saturday night.

I didn't mean to. 

My restaurant serves flan. It comes in a chilled, pie case with a serrated pie cutter already inserted. The underage servers run dessert out willy Nilly, leaving this throwback from the Inquisition laying around for me to wash. 

So the cook in question was an immigrant, who learned Spanish before English. When things got real heated once between him and me, he kept looking at me googly eyed saying, 'Tu Problema?' Which was uncomfortable, but I kept smiling. 

I guess I misjudged his kindness, saving leftover beer bottles from paella orders; then pawning the dregs to me. Didn't know if he spit in them, or what. But this time, things were copacetic as he passed by; but I forgot the 'death wheel' was still spinning in my freshly washed hands. 

So I guess he walked by too close, muttering something Urdu when one of the nibs from the pie cutter caught his forearm. Like a cat with a wounded paw, he held his forearm with the other hand and said to me, "It's ok..." I felt bad immediately and offered my apologies. We didn't say much to each other for the rest of that night.