Chef

by Throsby, Lynda

  I REALLY THINK I should cancel on Lewis. It’s just he is so sweet in our messages, saying how beautiful I am and asking if I’ve ever considered modelling. He wants to meet to talk and get to know me. Nothing more, he said he has no expectations as he respects me. I mean who does that these days? It’s usually ‘wham bam thank you, ma’am’.

  I just can’t see someone like him wanting to get to know someone like me. I don’t think I’m ugly. I’m curvy in all the right places and in some not-so-right places, but I’m not a size zero by any means. I’m more a comfortable fourteen to sixteen in clothes.

  I’m successful in my business, and it takes up most of my time, I’ve worked hard to get it where it is today. Porter Properties is one of the top property investor/developers in the city, and I’m proud of that. It’s so hard being a woman at the top in a man’s world, but I have this knack of knowing a good deal when I see one. I own several commercial buildings and apartment blocks.

  I have a penthouse apartment in Knightsbridge, not far from my office, which I use during the week, and at the weekends I head to my five-bedroomed house in a lovely area of Chelmsford. I bought a big house because I was hoping mum would move in with me and quit her jobs, but it wasn’t meant to be. It’s very quiet where I live. I love the peace and tranquillity, and I know mum would have loved it too.

  George

  JUST ONE MORE night and I will have that bitch. My thirteenth catch. I may prolong it. Make her suffer like that bitch has made me suffer for weeks. I’ve checked her out on social media, and from what I can tell, she doesn’t socialise much. There are some work references and a few pictures with work colleagues, that’s it. After digging, I found she owns the company, but other than that, there is not much about family or friends. I just hope, as I suspect, she lives alone. They nearly always do or why would they be looking for love on these shitty dating sites?

  In our messages on the dating site: LookingforLove.com, she never gave much away about herself. She was always quite vague and guarded, and I suspect she’s had bad experiences with tossers who go on these dating sites purely to get free sex with no intentions of dating. I can’t blame the wankers really. Why get tied down with some whore permanently when you can have pussy on tap? Looking for love, what a load of bollocks. I know why I go on the dating sites. It’s to rid the world of anyone who looks like my useless mother. They don’t belong here—don’t deserve to live, just like she didn’t. She used to say she loved me, yeah right, like fuck she did. What mother would let her waste of a husband do the things he did to me, do nothing about it, even joining in herself? Sick fuckers—both of them were.

  Who needs love and all that crap when you can just take what you want and then do away with them? Love: what is it anyway? Is it what my father showed me when he used to punch and burn me while stubbing out his cigarettes on me when he couldn’t be bothered getting off his lazy fat arse to find an ashtray?

  He would make me sit in the room with him while he jerked off to his porn. I would have to sit on the floor next to his chair and get him anything he needed. I was his personal slave. ‘Boy get me a beer.’ ‘Boy get me something to eat.’ ‘Boy get me my playboy magazine.’ ‘Boy, light me a cigarette.’ The only thing I didn’t do was shit and piss for him. I had to have tissues ready for him jerking off, or it would be my hands used to clean him up. He even made me suck him clean sometimes, telling me to lick every drop or he would beat me. He used to make me lift my t-shirt up, if I was wearing one that is, so he could pinch and twist my body when he was about to shoot his load. If I cried from the pain, he would kick me so hard that I would fall over and end up bruised, knocked out, or with broken bones. Once, he kicked me so hard, I sailed across the room, knocking the T.V. over. He flew out of his chair to make sure I hadn’t broken it. I had never seen him move so fast, and for that, I got punched in the stomach and kidneys, a black eye and bloody lip. He never once looked or asked me if I was okay. Never. He didn’t care what he did to me.

  I never went to school. No one knew I existed. No one ever came to our house, and I was never allowed to leave except on the rare occasion I was allowed out to help mum with shopping when he‘d severely beaten her and she couldn’t move properly. When the man at the shop asked who I was, she just said I was a visiting nephew. I didn’t know if we had any other family or not.

  My mother used to work all day at a café in town to keep the money coming in for my dad’s booze. God forbid if there was no beer or whiskey in the house for him, then he would lay into her with his fists—always on her body, never visible because she needed to go back to work. He couldn’t have her staying off work and not bringing in the money. I would go days without food, and when they finally gave me something, it was only something basic like rice or porridge oats. Even though she sometimes brought leftovers from the café, I never got any. He got everything, and she was just as bad. She let him treat me like shit.

  He wanted to watch me with my mother. I didn’t know that what he had us doing was wrong. I had no idea. I thought all kids did it with their parents. He used to jerk off, watching me go down on my mother or with my cock in her mouth. He liked to join in sometimes and make her suck me while he ploughed into her backside. The bastard was sick. I know that now. I hated them both so much and the older I got, the worse it got. Being a teenager was a nightmare, but I was plotting in my head. Plotting to rid the world of the vile pair. I was plotting to fight back.

  10 Years Earlier

  SHE’S GONE.

  My life is gone with her.

  This was supposed to be the best fucking day of my life.

  It’s turned into the worst nightmare of my life.

  This can’t be real.

  I have to wake up.

  I’ll find her sprawled out beside me like she is every morning. Me cursing as I’m hanging off the bed because she’s taking up all the room. She says it’s because of the size she is now, that she needs to spread out but it’s not, she’s always done it.

  I love her.

  Time to wake up.

  Except I can’t.

  I’m standing here in the emergency room. I can hear babies crying, but she’s just lying there. They haven’t covered her up — I wouldn’t let them.

  I remember screaming at them when they called time on her.

  I scream when they try to cover her.

  “What the fuck are you doing? Why are you covering her?”

  The doctor tries to put a hand on my arm, but I shrug him off.

  “Fix her!” I cry

  “Just fix her…” I fall to my knees on the floor, my head in my hands. Trying to wake up from this nightmare.

  My wife is gone.

  I can’t fathom what happened. It was a birth. They do this day in and day out, multiple times a day, so why did my wife die?

  “What happened? Why is she gone? She was giving birth. You do this all the time. WHAT THE FUCK HAPPENED?” I scream at them.

  The doctor crouches down to be eye level with me.

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Tourney. Your wife had eclampsia and went into cardiac arrest. We did all we could for her, but, unfortunately, we couldn’t save her. It’s not common to have deaths in childbirth these days, but especially with twins, eclampsia can be a complication.” I stare at him, not quite understanding

  “She had a heart attack? She’s only 27. How the fuck could she have a heart attack?”

  He winces slightly at my outburst. “Mr. Tourney. I’m so sorry. I know this is hard for you, but you have two healthy babies over there.” He nods his head in the direction of the crying babies

  “They could probably do with meeting their daddy. Being born is stressful enough, but they’ve lost their mother. I believe they’ll know that they’ve lost a connection. Would you like to meet your son and daughter?”

  Would I?

  Do I want to?

  Did they kill her?

  What the fuck do I do now?

  I can’t look after two babies o
n my own. They need their mother.

  “Bring her back, doctor. Just bring her the fuck back. They need their Mommy. I need her. She’s my life.”

  I break, collapsing backward on the floor. I’m curled up tight, tucking my legs into my chest as tight as I can get them. I start rocking and wailing. How pathetic must I look? A grown man curled up on a delivery room floor …

  Not something they see every day.

  10 years later

  Present

  “EVELINA, EVANDER, come to daddy, please. No more hiding. It’s school, and we need to finish getting ready,” I shout to the terrible twosome.

  They do this most mornings. Have breakfast then disappear to play instead of getting ready for school.

  My mother in law, Sonia has made the lunches for them. She comes over every day and waits for them to get back from school and looks after them for me. She makes dinner just in time for me getting home from work. I insist on having dinner with them every night. They have baths and are ready for bed, and Sonia does their lunches for the following day. It’s quite a well-oiled machine now. To be honest, I couldn’t have done any of the last ten years without the help of Sonia and Arnold, Evelyn’s parents.

  The school bus will be here for them in thirty minutes. If they don’t get ready now and get to the end of the driveway, they will miss the bus, which means I will end up taking them to school yet again, which in turn will make me late for work.

  “Evelina, Evander! I won’t tell you two again. I’m getting really annoyed now. Get your little butts down here now for school.” I can hear the murmurs from them upstairs somewhere, Evelina muttering, “It’s dad, not daddy. We’re ten, not two.” Cheeky madam. She calls me Daddy when she’s creeping for something like dolls or ice cream.

  Why do I have such an enormous house? It’s easy to lose them in this place. Maybe I need a smaller one. I just want them to have a good life and everything I can give them without spoiling them. Raising twins on your own is hard work. Evelyn had a good upbringing with everything she needed, and she turned out to be amazing. I’m just hoping the Evs — as I call them — turn out as good as she did.

  Evelina is sassy already. God love her, she drives me crazy with her smart mouth. She is the spitting image of Evelyn in looks, but I’m not sure where her little spitfire personality comes from. I sometimes put it down to not having a Mom. Evander is like me both in looks and personality. He will be and, in fact, is a nerd. Takes after his dad — 100%.

  I haven’t dated since the twins were born. I couldn’t. I love Evelyn and always will. She was my college sweetheart. I’ve had sex since I lost her, but that’s all it ever was. I never had feelings for anyone. Even having sex with other women felt like I was cheating. Plus, I don’t have the time for a relationship. I have work and the kids. That’s my life, and it’s all I have time for.

  “Ok, you two. Down the stairs, now. It’s a good job I don’t have a boss to moan at me when I’m late for work.”

  “That’s because you are the boss, Dad,” Evelina shouts at me from over the galley at the top of the stairs.

  She’s right. I am the boss, but it doesn’t mean I like being late. We started the company together, Evelyn and I, back in college. I fell for the hot nerd, and she said she fell for the hottest guy in the school.

  18 years earlier

  WE STARTED DATING in college — both of us majors in computing.

  Evelyn was gorgeous. She was my crush.

  I wasn’t a jock. I was a typical nerd, so she wouldn’t be interested in me.

  I admired her from afar because she was way out of my league. I’ll never forget the day she walked into the lecture hall. I felt sure she was in the wrong room. This class was full geeks and nerds; she didn’t belong here, but wow, was I wrong …

  There are lots of empty seats, but she chooses a place just one away from me on my row. I start to sweat and try not to look at her. It’s hard concentrating, that’s for sure. I’m lucky I excel in computer programming and gaming. Let’s face it, what else does a nerd have to do every night? It’s not like we’re out partying with the popular kids.

  About two months into the semester, our tutor pairs us up for a gaming project. I’m stunned and start to panic. I can’t believe my luck, but when I look over to Evelyn to acknowledge her, she looks as shocked as me. Just trying to speak to her has my heart racing and sweat beading my brow. I do it somehow but make a fool of myself stuttering out the words. We arrange to meet in the library at lunch to discuss how to go about this and see what ideas we have.

  I’M NERVOUS, TO say the least. I get to the Library early so that when she walks in, I can watch her, only I don’t get the chance. It’s like she had a radar or something because as soon as she comes into sight, she looks straight at me.

  I nod my head up in a kind of hello gesture and watch her walk towards my table and put her laptop and bag down. She mesmerizes me.

  “Hi, Theon.” She looks as embarrassed as I feel, and I wonder if she doesn’t want her friends seeing us together, looking around I don’t see any of her friends so we should be good for now.

  She’s a popular girl, and I’ve seen all the jocks hanging around her. I did notice however she didn’t like all the attention that much.

  “Hi, Evelyn.” I’m a little uncomfortable. I blush. I can feel my cheeks burning. I grab my bottle of water from my bag and quickly gulp some down, trying to hide my awkwardness. The problem is, I gulp too fast and start choking, drawing attention to myself. Oh god, kill me now. I’m going to die of embarrassment. Evelyn rushes behind me and starts patting and rubbing my back. I stop choking, I think from the shock of her touching me

  “Thanks, Evelyn,” I manage to choke out. My throat is burning.

  “Call me Eve if you want, Theon. Everyone else does.”

  “I like Evelyn.” I shrug, and she smiles at me.

  We start to discuss the project, and how we are going to work on it. Evelyn says we can work at her house — only if I wanted to. She explains her parents are hardly home, mainly just the housekeeper, and she has her own office set up in her bedroom. She seems a little shy when she suggests it.

  I’m seriously out of my league here. Housekeeper and her own office! Her parents must be mega rich.

  I’m glad she offers her house though. I would be too ashamed to take her to my place. I live in a trailer. It’s just my grandma and me. She brought me up. My mom got pregnant at sixteen, and my dad didn’t want to know her or the baby. She didn’t want me either. She was seventeen and wanted to party. I never knew her — she died when I was two from a drug overdose. My grandma is my hero. I love her to bits. She works hard to keep me.

  I got a scholarship to college. Otherwise, I would have been working somewhere to help her out. I feel bad as it is, so I make some extra money by tutoring in the evenings and weekends. I make good money this way.

  We plan to go to Evelyn’s after college to brainstorm and put our ideas down. I already know what I want to do. I’ve been working on creating games for a while now.

  I wait for Evelyn on the steps as soon as college finishes. She arrives just seconds after me.

  “Hi, Theon. We can walk to mine from here, it’s not that far, if that’s okay with you, unless you drive?”

  “Hi, Evelyn, no, I don’t drive, so walking is good with me.” We start walking, and I’m surprised at how easily the conversation flows. I can’t believe I’m actually here with her, talking about games and nerdy stuff. She is unexpectedly easy to talk to, and my embarrassment seems to be subsiding. It turns out Evelyn has been creating her own games as well. I tell her what I’m currently working on, and she seems impressed. We have so much in common. I’m in awe of her — beautiful and a nerd.

  We reach her house, and I have to pick my jaw up off the floor.

  “You live here?” I ask, just gawking at this huge house in front of me. It’s set back from the road with a sweeping semi-circle drive up to it and lots of garden to the front.


  “Fucking hell,” I whisper to myself but judging by the look on Evelyn’s face she hears, and she looks down in embarrassment.

  “Oh god, sorry, Evelyn. I didn’t mean to say that out loud. It’s just ... well … I’ve never been to a house like this. It looks like a mansion.”

  “I’ve never brought anyone here before, Theon. I never wanted people to judge me based on my parents’ wealth.”

  I feel terrible and look away wondering if I should leave. We could have done this in the library at school.

  “Maybe I should just ... erm … go, Evelyn. I’m really sorry if I offended you.” I look everywhere but at her. I feel like a real ass now,

  “No, I don’t want you to leave. I know you didn’t mean anything by it. Come on.” She links my arm like we are best friends, and we head up the drive. I try to keep my mouth shut because the closer we get, the bigger it gets — it’s huge. I feel her glance at me a couple of times, but now, it isn’t the mansion in front of me making me gawk, but rather the girl at my side who thought nothing of linking me as though it’s something we do all the time, even though this is the first time we’ve spent any time together. She’s touching me, and that alone is doing things to me. Things I like but don’t have much control over. I’m going to embarrass myself. I just know it.

  I look in awe at our linked arms and smile. She suddenly drops her arm from mine.

  “Sorry, I didn’t mean to be so forward. I just automatically did it. It’s what I do with my friends.”

  “No, please don’t be embarrassed. I, erm, I like it,” I said shyly not looking at her. I hadn’t realized we’d stopped walking.

  “Come on, let’s go round the back and through the kitchen. I don’t think my parents will be home yet. Not that it’s a problem if they are. On the rare occasion they are home at this time they like us to have dinner together, but it’s not often they get home early.”