A Menu For Loving

by Olivia Gaines

  It was a thick soup, but it seemed easy to swallow. She made a few notes on her tablet and collected the extra calculator, leaving the pad on the table.

  “You are amazing. Do you know that?” Tony asked her.

  She scoffed at him. “Of course I know that. And now, so do you.” She grinned at him.

  “I already knew it. This... this just confirms it. The way you handled her, brought her into the process, made her a part of it. I just... I don’t... wow,” he said with wide eyes.

  “Don’t get too happy, yet. You don’t know my rates.”

  He stopped grinning. “What are we talking here, 100 bucks an hour?”

  “More like 500. But you... I may let you work it off, with yo’ fine ass,” she said with a chuckle.

  He lowered his voice but did not move from where he stood. “Again, Jennifer, anytime... any place... any moment of the day or night, I will be yours,” he said with a mischievous grin.

  “Good Lawd!” she said as she crossed her legs, wiggled her hips and collected her things. “I’ll send you an invoice so I can start buying the items.”

  She shook his hand again and made her exit.

  A thin soup...

  “Chef Jennifer,” she said into the cell phone as she tried to sort through the wrong shipment of cabbage that came from the market.

  “Jen, it’s Tony,” he responded. She could hear the tension in his voice.

  “What’s up?”

  “I have a couple of problems. The date Sasha booked her party is the same night of the Kitty Berry concert and her friends are all going. She is pretty upset,” he said in the line.

  “Does she have an alternate date in mind?”

  Tony sighed heavily. “That’s why I called. Is it an inconvenience for you to stop by tonight?”

  “Yes,” she said tersely.

  Tony was unclear about what she was saying. “Yes, you can stop by or yes, it is an inconvenience.”

  “It is an inconvenience and no, I can’t stop by. I will have my assistant print my schedule and you two come by here tonight. I will make you dinner,” she said. “Will that work?”

  He was surprised at how smoothly she transitioned everything. “Yes, we can do that.”

  “See you at about six,” and she hung up the phone.

  Tony was feeling a bit off key because of the conversation earlier with Jennifer. She had been almost rude to him on the phone, but maybe he was reading too much into it. He dressed for the evening, trying to make sure he looked good. Why, he was uncertain. He and Sasha had added a bit of color to their wardrobe as she wore a brightly colored yellow dress and he a matching yellow tie. He was stressing a bit because she told him to be at the restaurant at six yet it took him nearly 20 minutes to find a parking space.

  Once inside, he found out why. There was at least a 30-minute wait for a table, the quaint little bistro he had lunch in a few days ago was now a madhouse full of customers. A young man dressed in all black asked, “Do you have a reservation?”

  “Ah, Chef Taylor is expecting us,” Tony said with some hesitation.

  “Mr. Peay and Sasha?”

  “Yes,” Tony said.

  “Follow me,” the waiter told them as he led them through the throng of tables, past the bar, into a private area near the back. “Can I take your drink order?”

  Sasha ordered a lemonade and Tony an unsweetened ice tea as they waited for either Jennifer or a menu to arrive. Five minutes later, she came out of the back with a chef’s rag on her head, two salads and a blank look on her face. “Hey guys,” she said as she took a seat.

  “Wow, you guys are really busy,” Tony told her as he looked about.

  “No, this is about normal for a Thursday. Friday and Saturday nights are the money makers and speaking of which,” she said as she turned in the chair and raised her hand. A pretty young blonde in an apron came over with several sheets of loose paper. She gave Tony a huge grin and he returned a smile, yet his eyes were on Jennifer, who paid neither of them any real attention.

  “Chastity, please go ahead and bring out the dinner for these two, while I go over some new numbers,” she told the server, who grinned at Tony again before she bounded off.

  To Sasha, Jennifer asked, “So what is the new date you have in mind?”

  The girl sampled the dressing. “This is really good. Did you make this, Chef Jennifer?” She poured the vinaigrette over her salad. “It’s yummy. Oh, sorry, I was thinking the following Saturday.”

  Jennifer thumbed through the stack of papers and located the date. “So you are looking at two days of prep work, plus pulling me off an extremely busy and profitable night. Hmm,” she looked at the girl. “Let me see your hands, Sasha?” She showed Jennifer her hands. “How good are your knife cuts?”

  Sasha crinkled her brow. “What do you mean knife cuts?”

  Jennifer stood up and went to the kitchen, returning moments later with a zucchini and a paring knife, along with a mini cutting board. “Show me how you would cut this vegetable.” She also had Tony’s attention, who watched his daughter snip the ends, and make a clean slice down the middle. Carefully and meticulously, she cut even sizes of the vegetable and laid it on the tray. Sasha was very proud of her work. Secretly so was Jennifer, but she had a couple of surprises for the young lady as she praised her work.

  “In order for me to make your next date, you are going to have to come and work here at my side to learn to prep the food for your party.”

  Sasha’s mouth got wide. “Why? I mean my dad can pay you for your time. Why do I have to come and work here?” She said the last part as if here was the soup kitchen down on Peachtree.

  Jennifer pulled a zucchini out her pocket and laid it on the cutting board. From her chef’s coat sleeve, she removed her favorite paring knife. In two flicks of her wrist, she snipped both ends of the squash, made four even slices and her wrist skimmed so fast that the vegetable was laid out with a decorative design and in perfectly even sizes. “Because my time is valuable. Your father told you there was a budget. You cannot just assume that the money in his account is there for you to use for whatever you need. If you want me to cater your party, you are going to have to help me get everything ready for it.”

  Sasha looked at her father who said nothing. He wasn’t sure what Jennifer was doing, but he would go along with it for now. “Dad, can’t you just pay her?”

  He had to ask. “Chef Taylor, how much will it cost me for changing the date?”

  “It will cost you $5,000. Or you can go with another chef,” she told Tony with a flat expression.

  Tony took the cue. “So what time will Sasha need to be here and on what dates?”

  Sasha was visibly upset until Jennifer spoke to her softly. “Sweetheart, you cannot believe that your father will be able to buy or write a check for everything you want. Some things, you must work to have. And other times, life will give you a very thin bowl of soup that you have to be willing to add some things in order to make it palatable. This is my business. I cannot leave my business and shut down my ability to make a living to come and cook for your birthday. I am willing to be there for you, but you have to be willing to be there for me, as well. Can you do that?”

  “Yes, I guess so,” she said as their dinners arrived.

  “Good, I have to get back to work. Enjoy your dinners. Bon Appetit.”

  Tony was starting to like Jennifer Taylor more and more.

  “Dad,” Sasha touched his arm while he was driving. “Is it true what she said?”

  Tony kept his eyes on the road. “What do you mean, sweetie? Is what true?” Although he knew what she was referring to, he wanted to give her an opportunity to vocalize what was on her mind.

  “About you not being able to write a check for everything I need? I mean, we are rich, right?”

  Tony started to choke. “No, we are not. By no means, whatsoever. We are better off now that we were a few years ago, when it took everything I had to keep the lights on and p
ay the mortgage. But, we are a long way from rich, darling.”

  “So, how did Chef Jennifer know that we didn’t have enough money to change the date and pay her?”

  He thought about it as he maneuvered his 6-year-old car through the nighttime Atlanta traffic. “Because your budget for this party is what she gets paid an hour.”

  Sasha’s mouth dropped. “She is paid $500 per hour?”

  “Yes, she is,” he told her.

  She stared out the window quietly. “So how did you manage to get her to do this for me?”

  “She owed me a favor,” he said softly as he thought about the feel of Jennifer under him, how responsive she was to his touch. In truth, he was more in her debt than anything. One night with her and he felt more alive than he had in years.

  “I will do a good job and make you proud, Daddy, and I will learn everything she can teach me about cooking,” she said as they pulled up in front of their home.

  “Fair enough,” he said as she kissed his cheek and went to her room. Jennifer had made a very clear point to them both and he felt like an idiot. His daughter had no understanding of money, time, or anything other than what he gave her. All of the time Cleo had been telling him the same thing, and one conversation with Sasha, Jennifer had broken through.

  Even if he added some chunks to the pot, he was still swimming in a thin soup with no nourishment. He looked upwards and pressed his hands together. “Lord, order my steps....”

  His train of thought was broken by the ringing of his landline. Who can that be? Tony yelled down the hall to Sasha that he had picked up the call.

  “Hello,” he said into the receiver.

  “Tony, this is Tino Boehner.”

  It took him a minute to remember the cousin his mother often dragged him off to see. “Oh, hey, cuz, what’s going on?”

  “I was heading to the ATL in a few weeks and was wondering if we could get together for dinner, maybe a drink or something?”

  Tony saw no problem with it. “Sure, let me give you my cell, and let me know, I would love to see you. I’m sure Mom would as well.”

  It was so sudden, so abrupt that Tony was taken aback. “No,” Tino said, “I don’t want to see your mother on this visit. Just us guys. I will see her on another trip.”

  “Okay,” Tony said as they worked out the details and he hung up. He dismissed the abruptness as thoughts of Jennifer filled his head.

  Oh, Shellfish...

  We never walk through life alone. Even in your darkest hours and brightest moments, there is someone at your side to either regale your achievements or laugh at your failures. Yet, some are lucky to find friendship that crosses the line into family and brotherhood. Raheem Bonner was that type of friend to Tony Peay.

  Right now, he sat on the couch, pretending to watch whatever dumb movie his best friend of 23 years had ordered from Netflix. He found it more interesting to watch Tony, who obviously wasn’t watching the movie either. He knew he wasn’t watching the movie because he was sitting there, staring at the ceiling with a really dumb look on his face. Tony almost appeared happy. Normally, when and if he landed a lucrative contract for a graphic design project, he would have this look. But the twinkle in his eyes suggested Tony P had scored some one-on-one game time with a lady.

  “Dude, you are sitting there like you just ripped a bean burrito fart that had been lodged in your lower intestines all day,” he said to Tony, who turned and looked at him with a face full of concern.

  “For you to be a writer, your analogies and similes are rather disturbing and very base considering your overly expensive education,” Tony told him.

  “Come on, spill it.”

  “Spill what, Raheem?”

  “Who is she and what does she do?”

  The grin that covered his friend’s face lit up the entire room. “I don’t know what to tell you. I mean, I guess, we are kind of seeing each other,” Tony exhaled. “I really like her and oh man, how she deals with Sasha is amazing.”

  Raheem sat up on the couch. “Stop. Wait. Hold it right there! She’s met Sasha already?”

  “Yeah, and Sasha likes her. Well she did until Jen told her she had to come and do some work for this birthday party thing,” he was laughing. “The look on Sasha’s face was priceless!”

  Raheem’s jaw was hanging loosely as he gawked at Tony. “Hold the hell up! Back up and tell me everything. Where did you meet... wait, when did you meet her?”

  “I met her last Saturday and...”

  “... Last Saturday and she has met your daughter?”

  “Yeah, it was funny actually. Jen picked me up in the hotel bar at the Marriott,” he said as he started to laugh.

  “No. It’s not funny. Some woman in a bar picked you up and you’ve introduced her to your daughter already? After only a week?”

  To say that Tony P was smiling would be to trivialize the expression on his face. The look he held was more like a diabetic standing in front of the display case in an Amish bakery. The loopy distant gaze. The semi-smile smirk. The forward thrust chin and eyebrows that had slid down the sides of his forehead, giving him a puppy-like appearance. Raheem reached over and punched him.

  “Snap out of it!”

  “No! And you can’t make me!” Tony told him as he stuck out his tongue.

  “Back up and start from the top,” Raheem demanded. Tony was all too happy to oblige. For the next 30 minutes, he filled him in on the meeting in the bar, the class reunion, his invitation to his room, which made him grabbed a pillow to cover his lap just thinking about it. He told his longtime friend about the credit card, the flowers, feeling like an intruding fool and her making him a light lunch. “She is an amazing chef,” he said with pride.

  “That’s how she came to meet Sasha,” he told Raheem.

  It did not escape Raheem’s notice. “Out of curiosity, Tony, did it ever occur to you that maybe Cleo was right? That Sasha is too spoiled and is accustomed to getting everything she wants from you?”

  “I know, right? And that is what I mean about Jen handling her so well,” he said again with even more pride.

  Tony went on to explain about Jennifer coming to the house and the initial meeting keeping Sasha on budget. He spoke to Raheem about the change of dates and then, he stood up as he attempted to demonstrate how proficient Jennifer had been with the knife. He was in full on roleplaying as he described Sasha’s voice and facial expression. “Man, you should have seen it. She handled her so well, and when she got to the thin soup analogy, I knew. I knew!”

  “You knew what?” Raheem’s eyebrows were up.

  “I want something more with her,” he said as he flopped down on the couch. “I really like this woman, Raheem. I like her a lot.”

  “What do you know about her other than where she works and what she does for a living?”

  “I... uh...” Tony stopped. That was all he knew. That, where she went to high school and the year she graduated. Based on the school and the zoning, he had a general idea of where she grew up.

  Raheem felt like a defense attorney. “I rest my case.”

  “Oh, shellfish!” Tony said. Raheem was right. He was jumping the gun and had a great deal more to learn about the lady chef. He changed the subject. “Hey, I got a call from my cousin, Tino, the other day.

  Raheem didn’t move. “He said he was coming to town and wanted to get together, you know, guy stuff. I don’t know what to do with him. What is guy stuff?”

  Slowly, turning to face Tony, Raheem said, “Your cousin?”

  “Yeah, I told you about him. Tino Boehner. We went to his high school and college graduation in North Carolina.”

  “Your cousin, Tino, from North Carolina?”

  Tony was getting irritated. “What are you, a parrot? That’s what I said.”

  “Like that real estate dude, Tino Boehner?”

  “Yeah, that’s him,” Tony said, surprised. “You heard of him?”

  “Everybody has heard of him, you idiot! No ki
dding, that is your cousin? I want to meet him... I want to meet this chef, too,” Raheem said.

  Tony was quiet as he tried to figure out how to broach the subject of Jennifer’s race, not that it should matter. He sighed. Then waited. He sighed again. Then waited.

  “Oh, for the love of football, man, spit it out,” Raheem yelled at him.

  “No, I was trying to work something out in my head. You know when he comes to town, maybe we can go out as a group, on a date or something, if he brings his wife... girlfriend or whatever....”

  He looked at Raheem. Maybe now was not the time to tell him Jennifer was black.

  “Yeah, I will rustle up one of my ladies to come with....”

  Tony left it at that, saying no more.

  Antipasto...

  At 11:30, Tony sat behind his computer, staring at the latest renderings of a vector for an album cover for a local hip hop record label. It had been years since he worked with the owner on a new album release, and it felt good to work this side of his brain. Most of the work he did as a graphic design artist were small jobs for independent authors, small businesses and one-offs from ad agencies. It was lucrative enough to keep the mortgage paid and the power on. He was a fast and clean designer who normally got the concept right the first time, which also saved time, billable hours and increased his chances for bonuses. Rarely, if ever, did he take on a project that would last more than a month. Last year, he landed a contract with a small architectural firm that put him way over in the black. He loved his job and being able to work from home.

  It had been a necessity initially as a single father. The cost of day care was ridiculous, he was in college, and had to move back home with his mother and sister. It had all been worth it in the end. He still managed to finish college on time, studying, working a part-time job to keep Sasha in diapers and formula, and to maintain some balance in his life. It was an early lesson in love that made him move away from trying to date, when he broke up with a young lady whom Sasha had become attached to when she was two years old. After that mistake, he swore the only woman that would meet his daughter would be the one he planned to marry.