by Nikki Bloom
Still laughing, I held my hand to my chest and mouthed 'ouch.' “Hey, you could have picked up the phone, Acacia. I didn't fall off the face of the planet or anything.”
She nodded her head, the untamable curtain of her hair falling into her face. “True. But you could've done the same, you know?” Shrugging, she tucked the stray hairs behind her ear.
Her presence was intoxication, even among the noise and bustle of my restaurant I focused only on her. “You got me there. Anyway, I heard you're looking for a job. Still interested in working here, even though its owner is a jerk who didn't try hard enough to stay in contact?”
“Absolutely!” She cheered, her lips turned up in a huge pearly white smile. I watched her fold her hands together behind her back, pushing her chest out and slightly rocking on her feet. She had done this so many times as we grew up together, and it was still just as adorable now as it was then.
“Then welcome to Valori familiari forti. You start tomorrow at 8am and don't worry too much about having the correct clothing. I'll provide you with your uniform,” I told her, touching her shoulder – and then immediately pulling my hand back as I turned to walk away. Don't cross a boundary.
“Wait! Don't you want to see my resume? I mean, I haven't done any cooking professionally, but I did attend four years of culinary school and I got my business degree,” she called, pulling out a sheet of paper from her bag.
I turned back around and shook my head. “Acacia, I don't need to see your resume. You're family, and family helps family.”
“That's right. And don't you forget it. I'm sure that Patrick would love to have you over for dinner sometime. Or we can all go out to a movie or something,” she suggested, putting her resume back.
I nodded in agreement. “That would be nice. I haven't seen Patrick in a few weeks. Set it up and let me–”
My words were cut off by the sound of clattering in the kitchen and an audible sling of curse words. I exhaled in annoyance at the kitchen and then turned back toward her with a polite smile.
“It has been great seeing you, but I have to go find out what is going on in my kitchen. I'll see you here tomorrow at eight, okay? Be safe on your way home,” I told her before quickly retreating to the kitchen.
“Okay!” I heard her holler before I rounded the corner.
In the kitchen, two of my cooks were frantically running around, and the third was bleeding profusely into the sink. The color had drained from his face and he was breathing hard as he kept his eyes to the ceiling, clutching his hand in a towel as it quickly changed from white to red.
“What happened?” I inquired, rushing to his side.
At first, they all spoke at the same time and I couldn't understand a single bit of it. But when I held my hand up and pointed to the one bleeding, the other two kept their mouths shut.
“I was doing prep work and the knife slipped over the top of my fingers,” he told me, his voice shaking and breathing somewhat ragged. “I'm okay though. Just need to bandage it up.”
I nodded mutely and grabbed his wrist, gently removing his hand and the towel to see the extent of the damage. What I saw made my stomach lurch and I had to cover it back up again.
“You need stitches,” I told him firmly. “I'll patch it up for now and take you to the ER. Tony and Stephan can handle the cooking while we are gone.”
He opened his mouth to argue with me, the panic was written all over his pale and sweaty face, but he quickly closed it when I rose my eyebrow expectantly. He worked harder than anyone I knew, and never took time off, but he was too stubborn to admit when he needed to. Luckily, I didn't have to fight him too hard and managed to get him into my car with little to no resistance.
After three hours in urgent care, twenty stitches, and an excessive amount of apologies, I dropped him back off at work. He insisted on finishing his shift, but I told him to take a couple of personal days instead – and added that I'd pay him for the days when he tried to argue. After the dinner rush I interviewed three people for the manager position, and I thought I'd found the perfect fit but decided to sleep on it.
I showered away the day's stresses and settled into the recliner in my living room to watch senseless television for a while. Ever since coming back to my little hometown, I've found myself focusing less and less on the things I used to enjoy about the city. Usually, I'd go out every night and drink the night away or talk up a pretty blonde woman and take her home. But, something about being back in this town had me acting differently. I wasn’t interested in anything other than my restaurant, women and drinking so far in the rear view that I couldn't see it.
However, something continued to eat away in the back of my mind, and the more I tried to push it away the harder it centered itself. I wasn't sure what it was or how I would keep it from surfacing, but it stayed there – quietly buzzing. I grew tired of mindless television eventually and busied myself in the gym until my muscles screamed at me.
2
Acacia
The weather was dreary when I woke up the next day, clouds covering the sky, and the air felt dense as I exited the cafe. On my drive to Valori familiari forti, the starting droplets of rain plopped onto the windshield and I was thankful to have listened to my mother when she demanded I take the car. I glanced at the clock on the dash as I put the car in park outside of the restaurant and bit my lip softly. It’s 7:39am and I'm still quite early; what if he isn't here yet? I wondered, looking down at the two coffees in my center console. But, when I looked up again, I saw Kit standing outside the restaurant, smoking a cigarette with his back up against the building.
As I got closer to him, I noticed that Kit wasn't wearing a suit like he had been yesterday. He looked more like a line cook today, donning a pair of jeans and a white tee-shirt with an apron wrapped around his waist. I tried to ignore the sight of his tattoos and the way a single strand of his hair brushed his forehead. It was hard not to notice, especially as I drew closer to him and he looked up at me with a warm, toothy smile.
“Ah, still arriving early everywhere you go, huh?” he teased, exhaling away from me, but the wind caught his smoke trail and pushed it back toward us. I watched him stamp out the cigarette and place it back in the pack.
I handed one of the coffees to him and stuck my tongue out at him. “Ha-ha. On-time is late to me, you know that.”
He took it from my hands and rose an eyebrow at me. “You got me coffee?”
I nodded, smiling up at him. “It would've been rude of me to get coffee for myself without thinking about you, too.”
Kit took a sip from the cup and his eyebrows rose. “How'd you know my coffee order?”
Laughing casually, I shrugged my shoulders. “I didn't, but it's interesting that it is your coffee order. I told the barista to give me the girliest drink they had.”
He smirked. “The girliest drink is obviously pumpkin spice, Acacia. Black cherry mocha is manly, quite possibly the manliest drink besides straight black coffee.”
I had to swallow quickly to keep myself from spitting the coffee from my mouth and coughed. “Oh, is it? I hadn't gotten the memo.”
Rolling his eyes, Kit took another drink and gestured toward me. “Are you excited for your first day? You're officially my most qualified employee.”
I shifted my weight, crossing my leg over the other with the point of my foot touching the ground. “I'm very excited. It is my dream to own my own restaurant, possibly a chain of them. But as a recent college graduate – my pockets have other plans.”
Kit's eyes fell to my feet briefly and then returned to my eyes as he smirked. “Well, converse with me about your ideal restaurant. As a successful businessman, I feel qualified to help you achieve that dream.”
I furrowed my eyebrows at him, confused by the emphasis he put on ‘converse.’ Until it hit me that I was wearing converse sneakers and I rolled my eyes. “Wow, what a pun.” I laughed, straightening my leg once more.
“Thank you, thank you. I'll be here all night, tell your
friends, I do impressions, too,” he bowed and chuckled, winking at me playfully.
“I better get the friends and family discount,” I taunted, pointing my index finger.
He grinned, the sides of his eyes creasing as he nodded. “You know it; family gets free entry and I could never turn away a pretty face.”
I playfully slapped his chest and laughed, though the way my heart squeezed when he said it gave me a rush of heat to my face. Don't go there, Acacia. He's your brother's best friend – and now he is your boss, I scolded myself.
After chuckling for a moment, Kit's body language went serious as we made eye contact and it looked as if he might have something on his mind. The slight clench in his jaw, the way he kept rubbing his lips together, I thought for sure he was going to say something important. But before he could say anything, thunder boomed loudly around us and I yelped as a knee-jerk reaction sent me right into his arms.
“Hey, you're okay,” he whispered as he steadied me.
The sound of his voice next to my ear drew my eyes up to meet his in our close proximity. He was looking down at me with such a soft, endearing look that I had to pull away. I straightened the fabric of my jacket and tittered in embarrassment as the rain began falling steadily.
“Sorry about that. Thunder and I aren't really friends,” I murmured, unable to hold his gaze for more than a few seconds at a time without warmth filling my body. “We should probably go inside before we get sick.”
He nodded, smiling softly, and pulled the front door open for me. “Ladies first.”
Cooking in a restaurant kitchen had been way different than culinary school, which sure was a given, but I had no idea just how hard it would be. Normally, when I was given a meal to cook, I had as much time as I needed to complete it. But not here. Every ticket that came in had to be completed in a certain amount of time and cooked to perfection every single time. I found myself getting flustered and overwhelmed very easily. Even with the help of Kit and the two other cooks –Tony and Stephan– I had to breathe to keep myself from overreacting.
The kitchen was hot, and I had small burns on my forearms from oil popping me. I was sweating and my hands shook as I did prep work, a simple task that I should've been able to perform without a problem. Tickets kept coming in steadily and in large numbers for an hour, and as the other cooks ran circles around me, I started to feel as if I were in the way. Kit was hovering over me as I worked, offering me pointers, and giving me short cuts. I appreciated his help in the first few hours of my shift when it had been slower and I felt less pressured. But in the middle of this rush, his help felt like a hindrance and I couldn't help the anger that flushed my cheeks.
“Acacia, you are doing a great job. Relax,” he told me when my head dipped and I leaned heavily on the counter.
I shook my head. “Please stop, Kit.”
“I'm just trying to help you out,” he told me softly, touching my shoulder.
I shook it off and turned my anger on him. “Well, you aren't! So, just stop, okay?”
His chocolate eyes dilated and he nodded once. I expected him to yell back, to tell me to drop the attitude. But when he grabbed my arm firmly and drug me out the back door, my anger lessened and I began to worry. Great job, Acacia. Four hours into the job and you've already managed to screw up.
Once the door had shut behind us, Kit let go of my arm and folded his over his broad chest. His lips were a straight line and he looked at me expectantly for a few moments. And when I stood there silently, he sighed heavily.
“Tell me what is going on. You're not usually this impatient nor do you let yourself get overwhelmed,” he demanded, his facial expression firm – but it didn't reach his eyes.
I inhaled deeply through my nose and the breath tumbled from my mouth quickly. “I'm frustrated because I shouldn't be struggling with this. I spent four years in culinary school, Kit, with top marks. So why does it feel like I'm drowning in the work? None of the items on the menu are difficult by any means, but I keep getting overwhelmed and then my work suffers.”
“You've never worked in a kitchen before. It is more difficult and you don't have all the time in the world. I know that you're feeling frustrated, but you have to give yourself a break. It's your first day and you're already doing so much better than most people. Just breathe,” Kit reminded me, smiling softly.
I nodded understandingly and took a deep breath. “I'm sorry that you had to see me like that. It was completely unprofessional of me.”
“Don't apologize. Just remember to breathe. Do you think you're ready to go back in and try again?” he asked, pulling me into a short but warm hug.
Inhaling and exhaling deeply once more, I nodded and gave him a sheepish smile once we'd parted. Even though I felt embarrassed for letting myself get too emotional, I did feel better after he'd pulled me away to speak with him. Kit had always been this way with me, hyper-attentive to my emotional state and a great listener. Looking at him now, that rebellious lock of hair grazing his forehead again and his passionate brown eyes looking down at me calmly, I knew working for him would be difficult.
3
Kit
A week later, during Acacia's last shift for the week, I had made the conscious decision to ask her out for drinks. I spent the entire day watching her from afar, admiring the way her face lit up as she cooked, keeping up with the lunch rush and the dinner rush effortlessly. Several times, when she thought nobody was watching, Acacia had done this adorable little happy dance around the kitchen. Her smile was brighter than the sun as she plated the meals. After our conversation, her attitude towards her abilities and skill had dramatically changed. She looked –and worked– with confidence and absolute determination. And during breaks in rushes, she would ask me questions about running restaurants. I enjoyed speaking with her about it, watching as she took meticulous notes and beamed, her eyes shining brightly. It made it difficult to keep my feelings for her in check; I constantly found myself staring at her when my focus should've been elsewhere.
Her shift would've technically ended an hour ago, but I’d made up an excuse about teaching her how to close for the night and asked her to stay later. It wasn't necessarily a lie, as she would eventually be on closing shifts before I could call her training a complete success. But to say my intentions weren't selfish in essence would also be a lie. It may have been overwhelming to ask her out to drinks in front of the other staff members, so I sent them home early. Which left only Acacia and me in the restaurant, cleaning up the remaining parts of the kitchen and setting the tables.
“Do you normally take such a hands-on interest in training your cooks? Or am I an exception because you know me personally?” she asked as we rolled silverware into cloth napkins, smiling at me in a teasing way.
I smirked and chuckled softly. “I'd be lying if I said you weren't a special case. I have a personal interest in your success because I know you and I know that you'll do anything in your power to achieve whatever goal is on your mind.”
She gestured around the restaurant with a toothy smile. “I'm obviously not the only one. You have a beautiful, wildly successful restaurant.”
“Restaurants,” I corrected her, setting another set of rolled silverware in the tub.
Her nose crinkled when she laughed and my heart skipped a beat. “You're right, restaurants. How many do you have and where are they?”
“Well, obviously I have this one. Plus one in New York and another in LA. All of them go by the same name, but the most successful is the New York branch. Our rushes here in town are nothing compared to those rushes,” I explained.
She smiled when our eyes met. “Oh, I'd love to visit the other restaurants. Are they the same as this one?”
I shook my head. “The décor is different, but the food is the same. Once this place started doing well, I was able to spend more on the actual design. So it's more expensive-looking and sells a sophisticated dining experience.”
Acacia looked around the restauran
t and then back at me, intrigued. “Fancier than this place? Do you have any pictures of it?”
Nodding gently, I pulled out my cell phone and started scrolling through my photos. Once I'd found them, buried deep within my camera roll, I passed it to her and told her to scroll left. I watched facial expression, the way her eyebrows lifted, and the curve of her lips.
“I absolutely have to visit the other restaurants. They're so beautifully decorated and I have always wanted to go to a restaurant where I have to dress up to get in.” She laughed, handing my phone back.
“Maybe I can take you with me to LA when I go back to check-in. I think you'd really love it there. The beach is amazing and in the next few months we're having a special event,” I offered with a wide smile, leaning on my folded hands and gazing into her eyes.
“I'd really like that.” She beamed, placing another set of rolled silverware into the pile. “Can we make a road trip out of it? I've always wanted to drive across the states, and I definitely don't want to take an airplane again.”
“That could be fun! Should only take about a day to drive, and we can listen to corny music like we used to in the morning before school, do you remember that?” I asked, fondly remembering the mornings I drove her to school.
Acacia's cheeks tinted pink and the curtain of her wild locks fell over her eye; my hand moved on its own to brush the hair behind her ear. And when I'd realized what I had done, I immediately felt the urge to apologize. But when she smiled softly and looked down at the table –thick eyelashes brushing pink cheeks– I held my tongue. If she wasn't offended, maybe I didn't have to apologize.
“It wasn't corny! They were love songs, and you don't get to judge Mr. death metal,” she defended a few moments later, crossing her arms over her chest and jutting her lip out.
My heart skipped a beat as I looked at her. She looked adorable with her little pouty face, and though the urge to run my finger over her lip was hard to ignore, I resisted the urge.