"Run by a sommelier who was preparing to reestablish delivery and take-out in early February, this restaurant confronted the return of indoor dining with a mix of relief that it might survive and dread because staff were initially ineligible for vaccination. The piece emphasizes the restaurant’s broader role as a community hub—bringing neighbors together, supporting local vendors, and marking life’s milestones—while also acknowledging longstanding industry problems such as abuse, sexual harassment, racism, and xenophobia. It criticizes the reliance on tipping and delivery fees instead of living wages, government inaction that leaves independent eateries at the mercy of landlords and market forces, and public complacency that prizes convenience over workers’ safety. After the governor expanded vaccine eligibility but left allocation to municipalities, staff frantically searched three different websites to book appointments and ultimately received shots at a high school gym in Queens; the narrator recalls a woman administering the vaccine while wearing a hijab and full PPE, describes the cold injection and sore arm, and the flood of relief, anger, comfort, and guilt that followed. Framing the vaccine as protection for colleagues and the community rather than a personal ticket back to normal, the account calls for greater government support and public recognition that restaurant work is a calling central to nourishing communities, not merely a transitional job." - ByMiguel de Leon