Taste

by Juliet Madison

  “The one I filmed you making?” asked Savannah.

  I nodded. “So I guess I’m making it again, but now that I know, it’ll just feel like it was planned and wasn’t a natural prediction.”

  “Then don’t make it,” said Serena. “Keep doing things normally, then see if somehow you’re inspired to make it, or asked to make it, or something.”

  “But now I feel like it.” I pouted. “Anyway, it’s late, so I’m not making it now. And with my job, how am I going to have much time for baking and cooking anyway?”

  “Girls, I think there are more important things to talk about,” said Talia.

  “But hang on,” said Savannah. “Don’t you want to know what I saw in the vision of the chocolate cake?”

  “Chocolate ganache cake,” I corrected. “And yes, please tell me.”

  Talia opened the journal and got her pen ready. In her other hand she had the meditation stone she had decided to keep close during each connection, to intensify its power and connection to her and all of us. Apparently.

  Savvy sat on her bed. “You were giving a slice of it to Leo.” She grinned.

  My eyes bulged. “I was?”

  “I saw his face, and your hand holding the plate with the cake on it and giving it to him.”

  “Oh my God. So maybe he gets me to make it at the restaurant or something? Oh wow, what if they want me to start making some of the desserts! That would be a dream.” I paced the room. “I’d better practice it to make sure I can perfect it. Oh, but you said, Serena, that I should wait and see what happens with the prediction first.”

  “Yep, do that,” said Savannah. “Your cake is already good. No need to perfect it.”

  “Thanks.” I smiled. “So, did you hear Leo say anything, Serena?”

  “Well I didn’t know it was him, but I guess it was. The male voice just said: “See you next week.”

  “That’s it?” I asked. “He could just be saying that to me when I work on a Saturday. Nothing intriguing about that. But hey, he’s talking to me, so I can’t complain!”

  “I also heard a few of those ping sounds, like from Facebook messages,” Serena added.

  Talia jotted notes. “Anyway, enough with the cake and Leo business. Savannah, did you see someone getting grabbed? Because I felt like someone was grabbing me from behind.”

  Sasha shuddered. “Don’t say that.” She sat on the bed next to Savvy. “I don’t want to know about it.” She covered her ears.

  Savannah put an arm around her. “It’s okay. No one’s going to hurt you again.”

  She shrugged. “Guess so.”

  “Sorry, Sash,” said Talia. “Just trying to explain what it felt like. It didn’t feel like I was attacked, just grabbed or pulled back or something. Then I felt…” She nibbled her bottom lip as she glanced at Sasha, trying to explain things without triggering bad memories of the night our sister was attacked. “Like there was weight on top of me. Like someone was stopping me from getting up. But I didn’t feel scared much, more annoyed. And then kind of sad and disappointed in myself.”

  “Weird. All I tasted was something metallic and a bit gritty.”

  “Like silver?” Savannah straightened.

  “Exactly. Was it symbolic of something?”

  “Must have been. Because unless you want to lick a car…”

  “A silver car?”

  She nodded. “I think I might have seen it around town, actually. It’s a rich-person sort of car. I don’t know the type, I’m no good with the names of different car models.”

  “A Porsche? A Mercedes?” I asked.

  “Dunno. Not too rich, like not too fancy, but would cost a decent sum of cash to own one. Lucky bastard.” She crossed her arms.

  “Anything else?” Talia tapped her pen on the page.

  “Is Chasers or Chaser a model of car?” Savvy asked.

  “Not that I know of,” I said. “But it could have something to do with a car chase, or racing, or a police chase?”

  “Then why not just see the word “chase?” Why the “er” on the end?”

  “Could it be something to do with the person who’s doing the chasing?” Serena suggested. “The chaser. They could be significant somehow.” Her eyes did that thing where she appeared to look inside her brain for answers, as though there were a virtual search engine in there ready to compile relevant results. “Unless—it wouldn’t have something to do with Dad, would it? Could he have been chased? And the chaser is the person responsible for his disappearance? And he could own a posh silver car. Ooh! So if we could find out who owns nice silver cars, we could maybe narrow things down and get a new lead on Dad.”

  This seemed to be far more enjoyable for Serena than it should be. But I knew she felt empowered when she thought she had a way to achieve something.

  “Oh man, this is doing my head in,” said Sasha. “Let’s just write it down and move on. Besides, I only smelled someone’s BO, so to be honest, I’m quite over connecting at the moment.”

  “Ew.” I shot her a sympathetic glance. “What else did you hear, Serena?”

  “Metal clanging, something crunching, like gravel or pebbles on the ground, and glass being smashed. So, that could be something to do with cars. Driving up a driveway, metal, and then the windows could have been smashed.”

  “Maybe,” said Talia. “Noted down.”

  “Do you think that BO was Leo’s?” said Sasha, seemingly oblivious to the other things we’d been discussing. “Does he smell?”

  “Sasha! Don’t be rude. And no, he doesn’t smell.”

  “Riley does, after he’s been working out at the gym. But I make him shower before he comes too close.”

  “Ew, guys! I don’t know whose body odor you smelled, and I don’t really want to know. You sure you didn’t sense anything more about Leo?” I asked.

  Like, could he be doing the odd bit of stealing to make ends meet?

  Heads shook.

  “And hey, I told Sasha and Mom that there’s a thief making trouble in town, so keep an eye out,” I said. “A girl at work said she had some money stolen, and the guy at the newsstand was setting up a camera after some things had been stolen. Apparently there’ve been a few more thefts, too.”

  “Could our vision have something to do with that?” asked Talia. “Could I have been feeling what the thief was feeling?”

  “It’s possible,” I said. Just like it was technically possible that Leo was the thief. If Talia had felt sad and disappointed, and Leo had been doing something bad for a greater good, then he would surely feel sad and disappointed in himself.

  Anyway, I couldn’t jump to conclusions. I was sure he was a good guy, and would give him the benefit of the doubt. But Dad was a good guy too, and he got caught up in bad stuff. It happened, sometimes, and made me wonder how well we could really know anyone.

  Chapter 9

  The next week and a half passed without any major visions or insight, so I tried my best to work on my English assignment about the newspaper articles, and decided to give my teacher a D for giving boredom-inducing assignments. I just wouldn’t tell her about it.

  The evenings I worked at the restaurant were the highlights of my days, and I didn’t feel like as much of a klutz or an alien in foreign territory. Not that a kitchen was foreign to me, just that kitchen. But now, it was becoming my favorite place to be.

  And like Leo had said, I was even starting to anticipate when the chefs would need something done. When I saw Emilia, Lachlan, and Lucy (who I had finally met, and who hardly spoke a word compared to Emilia) picking up plates from the tables, I would quickly try to clear space for them around the sink so I could be ready to wash them immediately. The dishwasher hardly needed to be turned on, I was so on top of the washing. But it was a bit tiring. School, then a bit of homework, then work, then a bit more homework, connecting with my sisters, then passing out in bed from exhaustion. I didn’t have much of a social life, except online. I really needed to make a few more frie
nds and not just hang with my sisters all the time. I mean, I wasn’t shy, and I had friends at school, but we rarely did things on weekends together. To be honest, ever since Savannah’s coma, I’d always felt like other girls just didn’t understand. Didn’t understand me, us, or life. Some of the things they talked about were so trivial, I felt like shaking them and saying, “My dad disappeared, and my sister almost died, and then we found out my dad died, and then my mom was almost killed, and then my other sister too!” It made me feel all angry and sad at the same time. Nothing bad had ever happened to me personally, but bad things had happened to people I cared about. So unless someone could talk to me about grief, or food, I found it hard to get close to others.

  Leo. He knew about both. Though I had yet to talk to him about grief.

  Sometimes, when he was cooking something easy or doing something monotonous, I’d catch him staring into the distance, like into some other, alternate reality. And I had a feeling he was thinking about the past, and his life, and how he had gotten to this point. I knew, because I did the same. I wished I could go up to him during those times and put my hand on his back and say, “I understand. I get you. I’m here.”

  I wished—longed—for someone to do the same for me.

  Especially on days like today.

  “I hope Damon likes the song I made for him!” Serena had only moments ago come home from her violin lesson, changed into a different outfit, then gone back to the front door with her violin case. “See you later. My Valentine’s Day picnic dinner at Dad’s bench seat awaits!”

  I thought it was a little weird for her to be having a date on Dad’s bench seat overlooking the ocean, as though he would be there supervising or something. But Serena said it held a special place in her heart, since she and Damon had shared a “moment” there once.

  I wanted a “moment” of my own one day.

  And a date. Or a gift. Valentine’s Day or no Valentine’s Day.

  I sat at the dining table and started eating homemade fried rice that I’d frozen for quick meals. I knew tonight would be busy at Harborside, so I wasn’t sure how much time I’d have for breaks and snacks.

  Savannah came out into the living room wearing tights, a fitted T-shirt, and tennis shoes.

  “No big date tonight?” I asked.

  “Riley’s at work till seven, so I’m going there, and we’re doing one of the exercise classes at seven thirty.”

  “How romantic.” I put a hand over my heart.

  “I know!” She grinned. “But it’s still over two hours away; what am I supposed to do till then?”

  “How about help me in the kitchen?” Mom called out.

  “Oh, I just remembered I have some homework to do!” Savannah replied.

  “I bet you do,” said Mom. “Homework in the kitchen!”

  Savannah trudged off to help, and Talia came in from the patio outside, her meditation stone in her hand. It really was like a pet rock, one she couldn’t seem to let go of. “I’ve just cleansed it with the energy of the earth,” she said.

  Sometimes I wondered if she knew she sounded like she was from another planet.

  She held up the stone. “I dug into the soil with my hands and sat the stone in there while I blessed it. The vibration of the deep layers of the earth help to balance it against the man-made materials of the house. And therefore the healing power of the earth also transfers to me when I hold the stone and meditate.”

  She’d lost me at “vibration.”

  “Sounds like you know what you’re doing.”

  “And tonight I’m going to sew a little velvet pouch to store it in.”

  “How cute! Like a little bed for it.”

  She smiled. “Remember, it’s not a pet rock.”

  “I know, I know, it’s just cute how you treat it like one. Are you going to give it a name?”

  “No, it’s just my meditation stone.”

  “Okay. But if you change your mind, I kind of like Rosie.” I winked. “Sort of like Mom’s name, but different.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind,” she chuckled.

  I finished my meal and cleaned my teeth, then grabbed my phone and bag. “I’d better go!” I called out.

  “Okay, sweetheart, let me know if you need picking up after work, if Leo can’t drive you home when you finish,” Mom replied.

  “See you there later.” Sasha popped her head out of her room. “Date time!”

  “Yep, bye!”

  God, sometimes it was so confusing living in my house. There were voices everywhere! It was like having multiple personalities bombarding you from every corner. Sometimes I even got confused about whether my voice was my own or one of my sisters’. A busy restaurant was calm and easy compared to the chaos of home.

  • • •

  “Remember folks, it’s the day of love, so put some love into everything you do. Let’s give all these lovebirds a night to remember!” Sam finished his motivational speech, and I wondered how I could imbue my dishwashing with love. Maybe I could pretend I was lovingly caressing each dish, each bowl, each plate, as though it was a ceramic god or goddess. “I love you, plate. I love you, dish.” It sounded like something Talia would actually do. She believed everything had a soul. “We are all made of the same materials,” she often said. “We’re all atoms. We all vibrate at the microscopic level.” Serena agreed with this—from a scientific viewpoint, at least. She wasn’t quite up to spiritually cleansing pet rocks with the vibrational energies of the earth’s deep layers just yet.

  Or, I could simply think about Leo as I washed the dishes. But that was probably more lust than love, I mean, I hardly knew the guy. But somehow I felt comfortable around him, like I knew him more deeply on a level that didn’t quite match the progress we had made in real life. Maybe we shared some sort of energetic bond at the microscopic level, like what Talia had talked about. Maybe there was a way to connect with someone unconsciously, without realizing it. Anyway, I’d always felt something around Leo, and whatever it was it was growing each day.

  Emilia was naturally flirty and confident, so she had a ball romancing all the guests. Lachlan went all red when some older lady stroked his hand and said he was a handsome young man, and Lucy just acted the way she normally acted—efficient, poised, and professional. Even her blond ponytail seemed perfect, holding its shape without a single loose strand. Sam sang as he cooked, and Leo occasionally covered his ears to tease him. At one point he put the oven mitts over his head like giant earmuffs, and I laughed so hard I dropped a skillet into the sink, sending sprays of soapy water all around me.

  I officially loved my job.

  Though I did feel a bit jealous when I observed Emilia fiddling with some of the meals, adding her own decorative touches. She said that even though Sam and Leo made the meals look great, some of them needed a woman’s touch. So she’d add something else, like an edible flower, or just rearrange some of the ingredients when the chefs weren’t looking. Apparently, she loved baking and cake decorating, but said it was easier to earn money at waitressing. Especially since her charm often brought extra tips.

  I kept glancing out toward Sasha and Jordan. They looked so cute, as the youngest couple in the restaurant. Some of the older guests pointed and smiled, watching them enjoy their romantic date.

  When most of the guests had gone, Leo stretched his arms up above his head and yawned. “I’m going to sleep well tonight,” he said. “Oh, almost forgot.” He went to the office and returned with a stack of flyers. “There’s a baking competition if anyone’s interested, in a little under six weeks. So, plenty of time to prepare. Tamara, I thought you might be interested. And you too, Emilia.” He handed us some flyers. “Lachlan, Lucy, are you guys keen on baking?”

  They both shook their heads. “I’ll leave that to the experts,” Lachlan said.

  “Aren’t you entering, Leo?” I asked.

  “Not allowed. It’s only for those who aren’t working as chefs or bakers in the industry. They want to ki
ck-start an aspiring young cook’s career.” He pointed to the flyer. “You’ve heard of the TV show?”

  I speed-read the flyer. “Oh wow, the Dancing Chef is judging?”

  Leo grinned. “Yep.”

  “I’m definitely entering,” said Emilia, determination in her eyes.

  “And the prize is—”

  “A paid traineeship working behind the scenes on his TV show?” My voice had taken on a tone resembling a chipmunk’s. “I love his show! This would be so awesome!”

  Leo seemed amused. He scratched his cheek. “You mean you’d give up Harborside to work on a celebrity chef’s cable cooking show? No way!”

  I chuckled. “It says it’s only Saturday work, at the Fern Ridge studio, to help prepare the set and the ingredients, then be on hand to help during the live recording of the show. So, I could still work at Harborside, as long as it didn’t matter if I didn’t do Saturdays.” I had it all worked out. “Oh, that is, if I win. Emilia might win. Or someone else.” I smiled at her.

  “Gotta be in it to win it,” she said. “And there are too many male chefs on TV. It’s time for a woman to get a chance in the spotlight.”

  Exactly.

  Game on.

  • • •

  When the others had gone home, and I was preparing to leave with Leo, he looked at me and smiled. “You really are excited about this, aren’t you?”

  “Is it that obvious?” I grinned like an idiot. “It’s just that I’m so passionate about food and cooking, and I want to take every opportunity there is. And working on a TV show would be so damn awesome. I have a few ideas, but how am I going to decide what to bake?”

  “Be unique and original,” said Leo. “Actually, why don’t you show me some of the recipes you’re thinking of, and I’ll give you my opinion?”

  My belly fluttered. “Really?”

  “Sure, I’d be happy to help.”

  “Wow, thank you. Is that allowed? I mean, what with you being a professional and all.”

  “There’s nothing in the rules that says you can’t get input on what to make. All you have to do is sign a disclaimer to say you created the recipe yourself and made it by yourself on competition day without any assistance. I wouldn’t be surprised if some entrants enroll in a cake decorating course in the meantime.”