Chef sits down, not wearing her whites. She’s got a stray streak of black ink on the back of her hand, the pen it probably came from tucked behind her ear. She sits quietly for a while, looking at me longer and more inquisitively than she usually does. There’s something in that look that feels off. Almost like sadness or pity, instead of the usual disappointment-tinted impatience. Am I that transparent?
She sighs, and I’m momentarily thankful that I’ve got something other than Emma to think about. Then she says, “First things first, that dish last night was great. Incredible, actually.” She pauses to pull the pen from behind her ear and twirl it between her fingers like a drumstick. “For someone with no experience, especially. There wasn’t anything crazy hard to make, technique-wise, but the creativity is...well, frankly, enviable. Lots of people would give up their technique for your ability to think up dishes. The techniques you’ll pick up with experience. I have no doubt you will, ’cause you work hard. You’ve proven that much.” The clock’s ticking seems to have been turned down a few notches, volume-wise.
Chef twirls the pen a little longer, taps it twice on the palm of her hand and then tosses it on to the desk. “You’ve got a rare thing going for you, that combination of hard work and talent. It’ll make you a great cook one day.”
I want to smile, but Chef’s tone is confusing me. She looks tenser than usual; her body language doesn’t match anything she’s saying. “I have no doubt about that,” she continues. “I see that potential in you, and I get pleasure in seeing potential realized. Give it some time and you’ll be able to do whatever you want in a kitchen. It just won’t be in mine.”
For a long moment, I’m sure I’ve misheard that last part.
“I told you to stay away from Emma not because I’m overprotective or territorial but because I know what happens when people like us love the kitchen.” She sighs again, slumps in her chair a little with her head leaned back so she’s looking straight up. “I don’t even care that you went against my wishes. I was willing to overlook your sneaking around because I wanted to see you do great things and because Emma seemed happy. But what you did last night was unforgivable.”
I start to stammer an excuse, or an apology, anything that’ll undo all of this. Chef promptly interrupts.
“You broke her heart, Carlos.” She says it loudly, like she wants it to sink in. She reaches for her pen again, starts tapping it against the palm of her hand. I swear I can see the words leave her mouth, and I have to fight not to pluck them out of the air and shove them back in, make them unspoken again. “I’ll be sad to see you go, because I really do believe you’ll do great things. But I care about my daughter more.”
A pause. And then:
“You’re fired.”
She sighs one last time, sits up straight, pushes away from the desk. Just like that, she’s done with me. Way before I’m ready to be done with her, with Emma, with this restaurant. I want to cling to this chair, to this island, to yesterday. Then Chef stands up, shakes my hand and, in that motion, pries my fingers away from all of it.
CHAPTER 29
ISLA FLOTANTE
4 eggs
2 tablespoons cornstarch
6 cups whole milk
1? cup sugar
2 tablespoons rum
1 cinnamon stick
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
? teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon lime juice
METHOD:
Another lonely walk across the island.
I think of the curious English term, silver lining. What shitty thing, exactly, was supposed to have been lined in silver? Again, I look for Felix to appear and enlighten me, since finding silver linings was pretty much his life philosophy. But he’s nowhere to be found.
Okay, possible silver lining: I am now free to date Emma. Out in the open, hand-in-hand kind of stuff. I could just work at another restaurant. Give it time, like Chef said. Keep practicing fancy shit at home, learn all of Emma’s favorites and cook them for her.
I pass by all the tourists. I walk through the familiar forest paths, hoping that if they regain some sort of glimmer it’ll mean there’s a chance for forgiveness. When I see no evidence of that, I look for my brother. In the trees, the wind, blades of grass, pebbles, insects, in the sunbeams that are cutting through the leaves.
It’s just me and the island, though. Crickets and cicadas, the occasional sound of wheels grinding against the pavement, on the way to the ferry or emerging from it. Horn blasts and the ocean gently lapping at the shore, locals at the lake.
I drag my feet across the road. Only now do I realize that I’ve felt like this before. In the months after Felix’s death, when I was marching my way toward a future Dad imagined for me. It was dread. I felt it then, and I feel it now as I shuffle across the road toward Emma’s house.
I sigh and step up to the door. I ring the doorbell. Why do these things always sound so normal when nothing else feels that way? The inanimate things in our lives should reflect our joys and sorrows, I think. They should act accordingly. I remember thinking this the day of Felix’s funeral too. In the elevator on the way back home. How normally it functioned, whirring and groaning and lighting up the way it always did, as if the world was no different.
The chime happily echoes throughout the house. My stomach turns to stone and settles in my gut. The rest of my insides take the hint and decide to calcify too. Nothing happens. No one answers. I call her again, but, useless fucking thing, it doesn’t get me anywhere closer to her.
So I sit. I wait. I wallow in the awful feeling I’ve brought upon myself. I think of nothing but what I can say to her. I go hungry, because I deserve it.
At midnight, I hear voices approaching. I’ve got my forehead resting on my knees; my lower back is so stiff it’s as if I’ve spent a couple of shifts at the sink. I look up, see shadows stretched out on the asphalt. They turn the corner, ten or so of them. When they get close, I spot Emma at the front. Some tourist-looking dude in khaki shorts and a striped polo has his arm around her shoulder. The whole group smells of booze and joy.
When our eyes meet, she doesn’t burst into tears or demand an explanation. She almost looks bored, like she’s been expecting me, and knows exactly what I’m going to say already. Brandy is with her, and she makes quick eye contact with me before leading the group inside.
Emma gives the tourist guy a hand squeeze, says something about seeing him in a bit. I wait until it’s just me and her on the porch.
I’ve familiarized myself with her mannerisms in the last couple months. The slight ways in which she moves her body, the way her facial features contort depending on what she’s feeling, the variations in her voice. But it’s still only been a couple months. I don’t know her well enough to know what she’s thinking. This is still so new.
Emma leans her arm against the door frame and her head against her arm and she raises her eyebrows, “Just fucking say it so we can move on with our lives,” she says.