North of Happy

by Adi Alsaid

  I disappear back behind my partition. It is so much more satisfying to clean pans that I am responsible for dirtying. Even the ones that come in afterward feel easier because of the sheer fact that I have cooked today. Elias shows up around eleven. “What did your crazy ass come up with for us today?” he asks.

  “Flor de calabaza, shrimp and mushroom gyoza in an orange-basil broth,” I say.

  “You are out of your fucking mind,” Elias laughs. It’s a pretty accurate comment, I realize, which should make me panic that maybe Elias has noticed something, maybe Matt told him about seeing me talking to myself, my ill-advised confession. I have been talking to Felix too loudly, interacting with inanimate objects or nothingness. But this time, for now, it’s a compliment, not a diagnosis, and I swell with pride.

  Elias doesn’t have to tell me to put the music on to let everyone know food’s ready. And when I do it this time, I feel no nervousness, no doubt about the food I’m presenting. I don’t even wonder if I’ve gone wrong anywhere. If I have, the struggle will lead to a climb.

  I plate a bowl for myself. A mini ladleful of broth, eight dumplings, garnished with the green onions and the smoked chili oil. The dish looks beautiful, worthy of the TV shows Felix and I used to watch.

  I might be deluded. I might be good at this or I might be fooling myself—it’s hard to tell. In this moment, I don’t particularly care which it is. My coworkers serve themselves, slurp at the broth, add more chili oil. Elias is loudest with his compliments. Chef has no discernible human emotions, so she doesn’t react. I catch Matt going back for seconds, serving himself quickly and pulling away as if he doesn’t want to be seen.

  I feel like I’ve finally arrived. Whatever life was supposed to have been waiting for me after graduation, whatever has been lost since the Night of the Perfect Taco, I know this is where I belong.

  CHAPTER 23

  THE PERFECT OMELET

  3 eggs

  Way more butter than you think

  A touch of cream

  Salt and pepper, added in the pan

  METHOD:

  On my fourteenth day of training, Chef actually makes it halfway through the omelet before she decides it’s not up to her unspecified standards and pushes the plate away. I’m still repeating Elias’s words to myself, that she’s pushing me hard because she believes in me. But I wish she would just give up on this stupid lesson, let me move on, really teach me things.

  That night, Emma and I meet up at two in the morning. Everyone else goes out to The Crown, but it’s the first chance we have to sneak away. We’re swimming again. I’ve never loved the act so much. The feel of jumping in, how gravity falls away from my limbs. Everything is light. Emma’s a terrific swimmer, so graceful in the water that at times there is barely a radiant ripple in her wake. “I’ve always had this dream of swimming from here to Seattle,” she says as we tread water. “I really think I could do it.”

  “You should,” I say. “Were you on a swim team at school?”

  “Nah. Just another by-product of neglectful parents,” she says. “Lots of days to escape here, get good at swimming on my own.” She dips below the surface, legs barely making a splash. When she resurfaces, she wipes the water from her forehead. “I’m gonna miss this place when I go,” she says.

  A silence settles in, smoothing even the ripples of the lake so that it’s a perfect mirror, despite the fact that we’re still kicking to stay afloat. We haven’t yet discussed the future, and I’m not ready for it to interrupt this. “How could you not?” I say.

  Fireflies dance at the edge of the lake and wispy clouds pass in front of the waxing moon. Emma swims over to me and we kiss. A breeze picks back up, like a breath, like the island itself is sighing in pleasure.

  * * *

  On my seventeenth day of training, Chef eats the entire omelet. Except she doesn’t offer a compliment. She pushes the plate away again, holds up a finger and says, “Wait a sec.” She comes back about five minutes later with a cup of coffee, and it almost looks like she was on the way to her office, like she’d forgotten I was there at all. “Big fucking whoop, you can cook one omelet at a time. Anyone can do that. Make me five.”

  Another paycheck disappeared into these morning sessions, but I’m somehow okay with it.

  That night, Emma and I go bowling with Brandy and Reggie. It’s loud, it’s fun, it’s normal. It’s silly, with stupid trick shots when we get a little bored of the scores. We eat nachos, instead of potato chips covered in hot sauce and lime like we would in Mexico. There’s another group of teens a few lanes down, people Emma and the others clearly know from school.

  I keep looking around, expecting someone from the restaurant to walk in, discover us. Matt taking pictures on his phone so he can blackmail me. Chef trailing us, suspicious of me from the start, just waiting to catch me in the act.

  At one point, when Brandy and Reggie are laughing, changing our names in the scoreboard, Emma tugs on my sleeve. I was looking toward the door again. “Hey. We’re all right here,” she says. In her eyes I see the sadness of a kid too used to being alone, and I promise to myself to stay present. I remind myself how quickly joy can be undone.

  * * *

  On my twentieth day of training, I finally manage to plate five omelets at the same time. Except they’re all different levels of doneness; one’s flat-out burnt, one’s still kind of runny, the other three are somewhere in between, each somehow a different hue on the yellow scale. It’s like Chef is fucking with the laws of thermodynamics or something. On this island, I’m not so sure that natural laws hold steady anyway. It’s easy to believe that Chef of all people could manipulate heat.

  That night, Chef gets on a ferry to the city, so Emma invites me over. I’m uneasy about it, though, not sure when Chef will come back, so I ask if we can hang out at my place. She shows up an hour late, her words terse and her touches light in a bad way.

  “Everything okay?” I ask. Elias was on the couch in the living room, so we’re on my bed, a popcorn bowl between us, Emma’s laptop set up at our feet.

  “Sure,” she says, in a tone of voice that makes me tense.

  Usually, we make out before movies. Now she leans over and clicks a few times until the credits start to roll. She’s quiet, withdrawn, and I tell myself she’s just tired. Maybe her dad pissed her off again. We watch the movie quietly, wonderful weight of our bodies pressed against each other. I try not to ask myself if we’re as close to each other as usual. I try not to think of August.

  * * *

  July’s nearing its end, and I’m nearing a month into my training with Chef Elise. Felix is in the kitchen with me, hovering over the five pans I’ve got going, little fairy wings on his back. “Looking good,” he says, but Chef is hovering nearby too, scrutinizing my every move.

  I turn off the burners and start to plate the omelets, starting with the one that I know has been cooking the longest, even if just for a few seconds. Five golden omelets at a time, each identical. I stack the pans I used on top of each other, look around to make sure nothing’s out of order.

  Chef leans in, takes her fork to the corner of each omelet. I swat at Felix, who’s buzzing irritatingly by my ear. “You’re not a cook,” she says. “You’re a kid playing pretend. You’re just fucking around, wasting my time, wasting yours, wasting food.” She slides them into the trash. Five omelets, three eggs each. I’ll need to buy another dozen for tomorrow’s session.

  Felix climbs out of the trash can, all five omelets on a plate. “The food waste feels particularly sad in this situation,” he says. “You’d think someone in her line of work would revere food a little too much to chuck it in order to make a point.” I haven’t seen much of him lately, and it’s just now that I realize that.

  Later that day, when our breaks line up, Emma and I don’t sneak away for a rendezvous.
We don’t steal kisses in the walk-ins the way some of the servers who are hooking up do, muffled moans emanating from within that everyone either ignores or draws attention to for kicks. We don’t text each other across the room, because I feel eyes on us all the time, and I’m terrified they’re Chef’s. Emma looks annoyed, and she leads us to the back.

  “This shit is getting old,” she says. She pulls a berry from the meadow from her pocket, digging a nail into the rind and pulling it free from its fruit. “I’m all for sneaking around. But I barely see you. When I do, you’re constantly nervous, your mind on other things.”

  I fall quiet. That perfect view of the island and the ocean grows a shade darker, and I look overhead for the cloud that caused it, but the sky is clear.

  “It makes me feel lonely.” She takes a bite. A trail of juice leaks down her chin, and she uses the back of her hand to wipe it away. “I want to spend time with you, Carlos. You get that, right? If I didn’t...” She trails off, finishing the berry with another bite. “Which, you know, whatever. I’m not someone who needs to spend every moment together. I know the kitchen means a lot to you, but the summer’s gonna end eventually and then...”

  “You’re right,” I say, before she can finish the thought. I don’t want her to go down that rabbit hole. “I’m sorry. Let’s go on a date. Let’s go to the city, spend a whole day together.”

  Emma smiles halfheartedly, puts a hand on my cheek and quickly pulls it away. She walks over to the Dumpster and tosses the rind inside. “Okay,” she sighs when she comes back. “Just...you know, I heard empty promises from my parents a lot. I know what it’s like to lose battles of importance to a restaurant.” I try to cut in again to argue, but she interrupts me. “I’m not saying you’re doing that. I’m just saying that my parents made promises too.”

  I nod eagerly. “I won’t do that. I couldn’t live with myself.”

  “You could,” Emma says. We stand side by side with our backs against the restaurant wall for a bit, looking out at the water, legs touching, beauty surrounding us. Tightness clutches at my chest.

  CHAPTER 24

  OMAKASE

  A ton of sushi

  METHOD:

  I’m at the dock, waiting for Emma to arrive. I almost want her to be late, so that we’ll miss the ferry and not leave the island, have our date within its magnificent borders. But I want things between us back where they belong, moments shimmering with lake water and joy.

  I still went in for my training today, served Chef five omelets with sundried tomatoes, goat cheese and basil. She devoured one in minutes and then offered a couple of the others to Sue and the guys delivering produce. It’s the best I’ve felt hanging up my apron at the end of our sessions, and it almost made me wish that Emma and I could move the date to another day.

  But that feeling falls away when I see Emma. She’s in a sundress, her bag’s strap across her chest. I can see a cardigan tucked inside the bag and the corner of a book sticking out. The smile is automatic, and, by now, if we’re not near the kitchen or our coworkers, so is the kiss hello. It is an incredible thing to have every day, this kiss hello.

  “Fancy date time in Seattle!” I say, doing a weird little jig.

  “That was interesting,” she says, eyebrows angled in amusement.

  “Yeah, I don’t know where that came from. Let’s pretend it never happened.”

  “Okay, but I accidentally took a video and uploaded it to the internet. Sorry.”

  We take a seat on a bench at the dock, hiding from the afternoon sun. There are a couple of cars waiting in line to drive onto the ferry, which is just now in view. Inside, families of four and five sit looking bored. One kid is crying, while his mom tries to calm him and his siblings try to sleep.

  “How’s your day been?” I ask.

  “Pretty good. Slept in. Went to my meadow to do a little yoga. Now I’m here with you,” Emma says, folding her hands in her lap.

  “Well, I guess it was good for a while, then. Sorry to ruin things.”

  She nudges me with her shoulder and smiles. “How’s your day been?”

  “Not bad. I think I’m the best omelet maker in the world right now. Your mom asked for some tips today. I think I’m going to start charging her for the lessons or maybe go start my own restaurant.”

  She gives a little tight-lipped smile and cleans her glasses on the hem of her dress. She gets a little quiet. I should know better by now than to bring up the kitchen all the time. A sea breeze passes by, cooling the sun on my face. I close my eyes to it for a moment, try to let everything else float away. I’m young. I’m alive. I’m here. “Thanks for coming with me,” I say and give her hand a squeeze.

  It brings her back to me, removes her mind from whatever worries her when she quiets down. She scoots closer to me, lays her head on my shoulder and we look out at the steel blue of the Pacific extending beyond us. No worries today, I tell myself. Just Emma.

  The ferry arrives from Seattle with a couple of horn blasts and unloads a fresh smattering of tourists. “If you could start your own restaurant,” Emma asks, “what kind would it be?”

  “I don’t know. I haven’t really thought about it,” I say. We rise to our feet as people start to shuffle onboard. “I’ve been so focused on just learning little things. I’d have no idea where to begin. It feels impossibly far away.”

  “Throw something out there.”

  I think for a while, and the only thing that comes to mind is crazy concoctions, things that I would have no idea how to pull off technically, things that might not even be able to exist. “I don’t know. Something unreal.”

  Emma laughs, leads us to the stairs to go up to the second level of the ferry. We stand at the front of the boat, leaning against the rails. “Unreal? Like...those every-flavor Harry Potter jelly beans? A whole restaurant of that?”

  “I mean, not exactly, but that’s not far off. It’d be like...fusion. But not between different cuisines. More like between something real and something magical. Have you ever read Como Agua Para Chocolate? Like Water for Chocolate?”

  Emma shakes her head.

  “It’s this crazy love story where the food being cooked in the chapter has an emotional effect on the characters. Like, the main character cooks with rose petals given to her by this guy she’s in love with, and it causes her sister to go into this lustful state and run off with a revolutionary soldier.”

  Emma takes her phone out to write down the title. “So, you want to cook so well it makes people horny.”

  “Exactly,” I say, laughing. The ferry blasts a few deafening horns again and then pushes away from the dock, creating a slight breeze. “If I ever owned a restaurant like your mom does, I’d want the menu to read like that book. Dreamy ingredient combinations, entrées that sound like poetry.” I think for a second, look at Emma, who’s looking out at the water. “I guess what I’m saying is I’d want a super­pretentious restaurant.”

  “With really long menus,” Emma says with a smirk. She leans over the rails, looking down at the hull splitting the water. “I guess you have time to figure that out.”

  “I’m in no hurry,” I respond. We both fall quiet, looking out at the San Juan Islands passing us by. What a crazy notion, I think, that there’s a wealth of time out there for all of us.

  After about thirty minutes, the Seattle skyline appears in the distance, and Mount Rainier, snowcapped and unobstructed by clouds. It looks superimposed onto the scenery, like skilled but still-obvious Photoshop. The city gets closer; the waves are a little rougher, sending a fine mist up to their deck, the tiny droplets sticking to Emma’s glasses and her hair. I wipe at her cheek and wonder how it is that I still get goose bumps at her touch.

  When we reach Seattle, Emma and I follow the small crowd downstairs, toward the exit. “We’ve got a couple of hours before o
ur reservation,” I say. “I figured we could just explore for a bit? If you know any cool spots you can lead the way, but no pressure. I like wandering.”

  “Sure,” Emma says. “Do you want to see the touristy spots?”

  I shrug. “If they’re on the way. I just want to walk with you. Then shove food in your face.”

  “So romantic,” Emma says. “You pick.”

  I look left, look right, pick the direction that seems more interesting (crowds, trees, restaurants). “You never told me what really made you decide to leave Mexico,” Emma says. “I know you said your brother had something to do with it and that you ran away against your parents’ wishes, but what was the thing that made you actually bolt? Was it a train of thought, an epiphany?”

  I sigh, try to guess what her reaction would be if I said, A pigeon told me in my brother’s voice. She’d think I was joking.

  “A little birdie told me,” I say, following it up quickly with a shrug. “It had been building up for a while, I guess. I’d always looked up to my brother, and I had never really thought of doing what he did when he said no to college and just went traveling. I admired the fact that he could find random jobs as a construction worker in countries where he didn’t speak the language, that he’d seen so much of the world because that’s what he wanted to do. But I never wanted it for myself.

  “After he died, though, I started thinking about it more and more. Not exactly doing what he did, but, just, reconsidering doing what my parents expected. The life path I was on being the only one I could choose. It was like he was telling me that the world had more to offer. Every day it got a little louder. I’d find myself hearing—” I pause, think better of the phrasing “—or thinking more and more: leave. Find a change of scenery. Get out. Then at my graduation party, my dad made a stupid speech basically saying we should all forget my brother.”

  “Jesus.”

  “Yeah,” I say. “He just put on this whole act like he was heartbroken, but when he wasn’t in front of a crowd...” I trail off, not wanting to rekindle these thoughts about Dad. “It was just the tipping point for me. I had to finally heed the voice and leave.”