Yes, Chef

by T. Neilson

  Luke nodded. “Just exhausted.”

  “And all the stress.”

  Luke nodded again. “The first big event is always brutal, and she didn’t even have time to prepare to lead it. She did well.” He shifted a little in the chair and pushed himself a little more upright, as though he were starting to recover some of his energy. “If you want, I’ll talk to Nikki Nakayama and see if she has a space for Jenny. I can personally recommend her. I don’t know Nikki, not really, but my recommendation might carry some weight.”

  Simon bit back a no and nodded. His dad had never held a chef back, and neither would Simon. His kitchen would be a nursery kitchen for great chefs as long the place was in Love family hands.

  “Jenny would love that,” he said softly.

  “But you’ll be sad to see her go.”

  “It’ll be tough,” he admitted. Then he found himself yawning hugely, his head thrown back, swept away by a sudden rush of exhaustion.

  Luke chuckled. “Me too,” he agreed. He seemed to hesitate, poised like summer at the apex of the year, holding a breath before he plunged down. “If you have a minute, there’s something I’d like to show you.”

  Simon started. Oh shit. Was there something wrong with the kitchen? A dead mouse in the dry storage? A leak in the cold room? Simon straightened up and pushed his exhaustion away. “Sure. Of course. What’s up?”

  Luke pushed himself to his feet and gestured, so Simon got up and followed him.

  THEY walked through the hall together. Every alternate bank of lights had been turned off, and though there was still muted conversation and low murmuring coming from the kitchen and the whirr of a vacuum cleaner from the entranceway, the place seemed weirdly empty.

  “I can’t thank you enough,” Simon blurted as they passed the storage rooms, the kitchen, the dining room, and then walked out into the walnut field.

  “I think maybe I’m the one who should be thanking you,” Luke said as he cast a wry and tired smile in his direction. “I had a good time tonight, a very good time. I had forgotten how much I loved mentoring chefs. There’s nothing like seeing the next generation just”—he gestured vaguely in the dark summer night—“just blossom like that.”

  Simon smiled and nodded too. “That’s part of how we run things,” he murmured. “It was my dad’s ethos. I kept it.”

  “You kept a lot of things your dad did, didn’t you?” Luke asked.

  Simon laughed a little bitterly. “I think… I think I kept too much,” he admitted. “I think I was trying to be him there for a bit.”

  Luke nodded, but his eyes were hidden in the darkness. He started into the tall grass, and Simon followed and crunched after him. “It’s no good trying to be someone you’re not,” Luke said. His tone was offhand, but Simon had a hunch the comment wasn’t.

  “No,” he agreed. “You can’t make yourself be someone just because you want to be.”

  “But then, what do you do when you figure that out?” Luke glanced over his shoulder. His grin, like Simon’s laugh, was mirthless. “How do you know who to become?”

  Simon sighed, too tired to seek answers or dredge up wisdom. “I don’t know, man. I run a fucking hotel and a restaurant. I think I just am who I have to be depending on the day.”

  Luke stopped and waited for Simon to catch up. “I guess that’s as good a place to start as any,” he said as he gestured.

  Simon looked down.

  A picnic blanket lay spread in the grass with a bowl of tiny, perfect strawberries, a plate of soft white cheese, and loaf of black bread. Near it, a bottle of champagne sat open to breathe in a silvery bucket of partly melted ice.

  Simon looked at Luke, and Luke nodded. “Sit down,” he said. “I’ll pour you a drink.”

  “You’re kidding, right?” Simon asked.

  Luke frowned. “Why would I be kidding? It’s the end of service, you’re probably starving and thirsty. Plus, it’s the biggest event of your year, and you nailed it. Sit down, eat something, and let me pour you a drink.”

  Simon settled awkwardly on the edge of the picnic blanket. The tall grass rose around him like a palisade and blocked out the lights from the town and the hotel. Luke settled on the blanket and passed him the bread and cheese. Then he filled a glass with champagne. Simon took the glass and looked doubtfully at it.

  “This better not be the d’Ambonnay,” he murmured. At a price that made Simon hyperventilate every time he ordered a crate, it was certainly not an item on the staff menu sheet.

  Luke laughed. “Are you kidding? This is a Bolly. Hiro paired it.”

  Simon lifted the glass, took a sip, and savored the tiny bubbles on his tongue. He chewed a little more of the bread while Luke poured a glass for himself. Behind Luke, a streak of light burned in the sky and faded.

  “Hey,” Simon said, pointing.

  Luke turned. “See one?” he asked.

  Another streaked overhead, and another flared to life and then fell out of sight beyond the trees.

  “Wow,” Simon whispered. He leaned back, braced himself on his elbows, and looked up. The Milky Way glimmered and shifted like a living thing, and across it, streaks of light flashed and then subsided an instant later. Stars were falling. He stared.

  “Beautiful, isn’t it?” Luke murmured.

  “It really is,” Simon answered.

  And in that moment, everything was as it ought to be. The sounds of the kitchen were far away, the breeze sighed sometimes in the trees, the stars shone overhead, and champagne fizzed and bubbled a counterpoint on his tongue. And Luke lay shoulder to shoulder with him on the picnic blanket and sometimes raised a hand to point as a meteor made a long, swift arc across the sky.

  Simon found himself falling asleep more than once, slipping down into velvet darkness only to wake when Luke whispered, “Wow, that was a big one” or “Amazing.” And that was fine. There were worse places to be than there in the grass with the warm length of Luke’s body stretched out beside him, the taste of strawberries and champagne on his tongue, and the stars above, falling like confetti.

  “Simon,” Luke whispered, and something in the tone of his voice brought Simon sharply awake.

  “Hmm?” he asked, afraid that to speak would give away that he’d been dozing.

  “I….”

  Simon heard Luke exhale.

  “Nothing,” Luke murmured, “never mind.”

  Simon turned. Luke was staring at the sky, but staring resolutely, not with interest, as though the sky had promised to do something and wasn’t doing it as promised. And Simon, a little muzzy, perhaps, with the champagne and the light dinner and the warmth of Luke beside him, smiled faintly. He took a breath.

  “There’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you,” he said softly.

  Luke turned his head just a little and raised his eyebrows.

  “When I quit culinary school, I quit because of you.”

  Luke’s eyes went wider and it was Simon’s turn to stare resolutely at the sky.

  “You were so good, such a natural. And I was just useless.”

  Luke said nothing. Simon didn’t dare to look at him. He just plunged on, as though nothing could stop him once he started to confess. “And you were so gorgeous and so confident. I wanted to be able to hate you or be jealous of you, but I couldn’t because you were too fucking nice.” He laughed softly and heard Luke laugh just a little too. And Simon was aware that he could stop there, theoretically. He could stop and never tell the rest of the story to anyone—just carry it around in his pocket like an old receipt his whole life. But he’d been doing that for ten years, and all it had brought him, even if he hadn’t known it, was loneliness. “I saw you,” he whispered. “And Andre. Together in the alley.”

  Luke’s chin came up just a fraction, and his eyes narrowed and changed—grew wary, perhaps. Simon took a deep breath and plunged in. “And I couldn’t stand it. You loved it, every second of it.” He closed his eyes so he wouldn’t have to see the shocked expressi
on on Luke’s face as he confessed. “I hated him. I… didn’t get it then, but I guess I was jealous. I guess I wanted it to be me.”

  “What?” Luke’s voice was low and soft, hardly more than a breath.

  Simon opened his eyes, afraid of what he would see—anger, perhaps, on Luke’s open face, or perhaps disgust. But he saw neither there. Luke’s eyes were wide, his mouth had dropped open. He seemed stunned, almost hurt.

  “But you’re straight.” Luke said it very softly, as though he were afraid of being too loud and being overheard by the trees, the lake, the August night air.

  Simon felt the little laugh, nearly silent, just a staccato exhalation in his throat. “Yeah. About that….” He shrugged and shook his head and showed his empty hands all in one motion. “I thought so too. But….” He swallowed, his throat aching and dry.

  Luke exhaled a long, soft “Oh.”

  If he had more energy, Simon might have laughed. But he was too weary, too worn, too muzzy from good champagne, too old to keep pretending, and too tired to keep running.

  “I didn’t realize until you came to the restaurant,” he admitted. “I spent most of my life trying to be my dad. But, as my brothers keep telling me, I’m not. Really not, I guess. And so I’m… not really sure who I am. But when you came to the restaurant, when I saw you again, I….” He laughed sheepishly. “I felt like that all over again—jealous of somebody who wasn’t even there anymore.”

  Luke stared as though Simon had confessed to having three heads or being a member of a cult. He stared as though Simon had told him the world was coming to an end or that he secretly hated the taste of wine. He turned on his side and looked Simon in the face.

  “I think I came here to get you,” he said quietly. “You were the one thing I always wanted but could never have. I knew as soon as I met you that I wanted you. But you were never in my world to begin with. At least, that’s what I thought.”

  Simon wanted to move closer to Luke. He longed to, but he was pinned in place. And if there was any sound but the sound of his heart and Luke’s voice, then Simon couldn’t hear it.

  “I knew that I was always going to go back to Argentina,” Luke said. “But I couldn’t make myself go without saying goodbye to you. I think I wanted to try one more time. I didn’t realize I was checking to see if it really was impossible. I stopped daring to hope a long time ago.”

  Simon exhaled, but Luke didn’t. His expression remained hopeful, pained.

  “I planned to say goodbye tonight—to you, to everything. To put it all behind me and start a new life.”

  “And now?” Simon whispered.

  Luke sighed and closed his eyes, and a little smile softened the corners of his mouth. “And now I want to stay here forever, in the grass under the stars, just like this and never move or change.”

  Simon would have liked to smile at him, to laugh or tease him, but he couldn’t because he felt the same. It was as though the moment were glass, as though the wrong move or thought could shatter the moment and push them apart like oil rising off water. He wanted to lean in and kiss Luke’s mouth, to taste the residue of strawberries and champagne, but that was too much all at once, a massive movement in a soap-bubble world.

  Instead he moved one hand to grasp Luke’s and tangled fingers with Luke’s fingers. Luke smiled and ducked so his forehead rested against Simon’s forehead, close enough to catch the scent of sandalwood and leather, the champagne and the strawberries, of sweat and soap. They lay like that for a long time, and Simon was more content than he could remember ever being.

  “We’re missing the show,” he whispered after long, warm moments had passed.

  “Hmm. And falling asleep,” Luke murmured.

  “Yeah, me too,” Simon agreed. He wanted to ask Luke to come back to his place with him, wondered if he could work up the nerve to do it, wondered further what the hell he would do if Luke said yes. He had pushed well out from the shore of what he knew and was sailing in uncharted waters.

  “Let me walk you home.” Luke started to move, and Simon nodded.

  “Sure,” he agreed. Let things go as they would. What difference would it make? He got to his feet and looked around. Light still spilled from the hotel foyer and from two of the upstairs windows, but the kitchen and restaurant were dark. While Luke gathered the dishes, Simon picked up the picnic blanket, damp with the first of the dew and the condensation from the champagne bucket, and then they walked in weary, warm silence toward the hotel.

  He left all the things in a heap on the front desk and didn’t even bother to call out to the clerk who should have been at the desk but was probably watching TV in the back.

  He turned to Luke. “Would you like to come up?” he asked.

  Luke laughed softly. “Why am I not surprised to find out that you live at the hotel?”

  Simon glanced around and shrugged. He knew that Luke understood, probably far better than anybody in any of his previous relationships ever had, considering Luke had told him that he had been sleeping in his office before he left his restaurant. Simon might be devoted to the restaurant and the hotel, but at least he wasn’t that far gone.

  Luke seemed to read his face. He nodded. “I would love to come up.”

  For the first time, some anxiety percolated through the warm haze that had formed in Simon’s brain. By the time they reached the stairs, he realized he was going to have to say something.

  He found himself glancing sideways at Luke as Luke kept pace up the red-carpeted stairs toward Simon’s room on the second floor. He had taken Room 201 because it was the smallest of the rooms in the hotel, had a bad view of the back of the kitchen, was too low to get a good view of the lake, and was right beside the stairs, so it was noisy in the morning. He unlocked the door, pushed it open, and hesitated at the dark threshold. He looked at Luke again.

  “You can change your mind. You know that, right?” Luke asked.

  Simon laughed softly as some of the anxiety untwisted in him. “I know. I…. You know I have no idea what I’m doing, right? I don’t know what I’m doing, and I don’t know what I want or even who I am.”

  “I know,” Luke said. His voice was low, a murmur that sent a bolt straight through Simon. “Honestly, I’m in the same boat. No fucking clue. Should we find out?”

  Simon laughed at that, and flicked on the light. Then he stepped inside and looked around the place with fresh eyes. It was pokey and unlovely, with old paint on the walls and battered carpet on the floor. The little desk in the corner held the laptop that served as his TV, the queen-size bed was rumpled from his last sleepless night, the wet towel from his shower that morning still hung over the bathroom door, and the bathroom door stood open because the fan had stopped working some time ago and he kept forgetting to mention it to the maintenance staff. The blinds were permanently closed on the unpleasant view, and it made the room seem smaller. And on the table by his bed was and elderly and battered copy of Lonely Planet Korea that had languished unclaimed for weeks in the lost and found.

  “Home sweet home,” he said with little enthusiasm.

  Luke’s hands settled on his hips. “You’re as bad as I was,” he murmured into Simon’s ear. His voice made a strip of goose bumps rise along the side of his neck and his shoulder. Luke brushed the lobe of Simon’s ear with his mouth, and then moved to the nape of his neck. More goose bumps.

  “Never meant to stay,” Simon confessed. He closed his eyes on the dismal room and leaned in to Luke’s warm mouth, which was suddenly the source of everything good.

  Luke answered with increased pressure. His mouth was warm on Simon’s neck, and he tightened his hands on Simon’s hips—not hard and not demanding, just present.

  Simon sighed and leaned against him. “This is nice,” he said. It occurred to him that he had never had anyone up to the room, that he’d left all his relationships behind when he ran from culinary school and the alley and what he’d seen—when he ran away from who he was and what he wanted. He closed
his eyes.

  “I’m such a fucking idiot,” he whispered. Luke’s mouth was still working, traveling steadily and slowly from his earlobe down, down, down to nip and suck where his shoulder joined his neck.

  “I should’ve told you,” Simon said. “I should’ve told you years ago.”

  Luke slid his hands around the front of Simon’s hips to settle on his belt and fly. He seemed to be waiting, and it occurred to Simon that he had been waiting for a long time—maybe ten years. Luke had been waiting too, maybe for longer, and Simon was tired of waiting.

  “I don’t know what I’m doing,” Simon said again. “But I know you’re a hell of a teacher.”

  Luke chuckled, though the sound was muffled by Simon’s shoulder. “Are you applying to work in my kitchen?” he asked. “Because there are no open positions right now.”

  “Don’t be stupid.” Simon turned so he could see Luke’s face. “I’ve never done this before. You have, though.”

  Luke nodded. “Mm-hmm.”

  “So give me a little direction.” Simon shrugged helplessly. “I hate not knowing what I’m doing.”

  “I will give you anything you want. Even if this is only tonight, I’ll give you anything.”

  “It’s not just tonight,” Simon said. “At least I hope it’s not. I know you’re planning on going back to Argentina—”

  “And you,” Luke said, and Simon could hear a smile in his voice, “need a vacation.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “And some education. You’re buying a herd of cattle that you know nothing about. Have you considered doing a crash course on a long-established ranch in the middle of nowhere with a man who would like to ravage you?”

  Simon laughed helplessly. “Well I am now. What’s it going to cost me?”

  Luke made a noise as though he were considering. “Only your virtue,” he said.

  Simon laughed again. “I haven’t been with a guy. That doesn’t mean I haven’t been with somebody.”