by Sera Taíno
Her proud smile nearly provoked a desire to cast the cake aside and kiss her. “It’s my Saturday Special. I offer it together with flan and crème brûlée. Do you want to try them, also?” She made to step away, but he caught her by the hand before she could pull some other wonderful delight from what he was starting to think was a magical refrigerator.
“No, it’s too much. Save it for next time.” He paused, steeling himself. “That is, if next time is okay with you.”
She settled onto the stool, shuffling her feet into and out of her Crocs. “I wasn’t really looking for anything tonight.”
“Neither was I. But here we are.”
Her eyes flicked away again. “That breakup I told you about? That was the last time I’ve been with anyone.”
“Same. It’s been a while for me, too.” Maybe too long, if his complete lack of confidence right now was any indication.
“Just managing expectations.” She poked at her cake, swirling the fork in the fragrant cream. “I’m really not up for anything serious.”
“That’s fair.”
She took a bite, chewing slowly, the gears of her mind visibly working. He didn’t rush her, and his patience was rewarded when, after a full minute, she said, “Okay. Next Saturday. I don’t work Sundays.”
Joy surged at her words, but the exultation was short-lived. Who he was and what his company was doing in East Ward hung like a shadow in the darkest part of his brain, prodding him in accusation. And still, the confession died in his throat.
The gleam of passing headlights sneaked in under the shutters of the front windows, leaving the blush of sunrise after the car lights had passed.
“I can’t believe what time it is,” Val said as they carried the plates to the sink.
“I’ve got these,” Philip said, taking the sponge and soap from her.
Val crossed her arms, watching him work. “You know, I already said yes.”
Philip raised an eyebrow at her. “That’s not why I’m doing it. It’s only fair that if you cook, I clean up.”
“Hmm,” she purred, and it was obvious she was having a quiet laugh at his expense. Another version of her to file away.
The lack of sleep or the sugar rush made him reckless, because he was talking without even the pretext of thinking about what he was saying. “What if I can’t wait until next Saturday?”
Val spread her arms to indicate the kitchen. “My culinary empire demands my complete attention during the week.”
Philip set down the last plate and shut off the water. “But I know where you live.”
“It’s like that?” she whispered.
“It’s like that,” he answered, and she was suddenly so close, if he leaned forward, it would be impossibly easy to kiss her. And he wanted to kiss her badly; the wanting burned hot in his chest. But he couldn’t. It would be a lie. He couldn’t kiss her if he wasn’t able to be fully himself.
He pulled back and took out his phone instead. “Can I have your number?”
Val blinked several times, dispelling what lingered of the moment before reciting the number to him. Her phone dinged somewhere with his text. Sensible, yet this pedestrian exchange felt momentous to him. She was in his contacts now. Something of hers that he could return to.
He gathered his things and she accompanied him to the main exit. He stepped out under a lightening sky, which contrasted with the partially dim streetlamp that flickered sporadically, mocking his lack of courage. Just tell her, it seemed to say.
He’d ruin everything if he did. And he wanted to do this again. Wanted her to like him for him and not judge him by what he did, which she would inevitably do if she knew. And given the little he’d learned about her, she would judge him hard.
He pressed the button on the fob to unlock his car door, glancing back at the sight of her leaning against the doorjamb with arms crossed, her purple Crocs at odds with the black-and-silver outfit. Jarring, yet so domestic. It was charming.
“We broke night!” she called out, pointing at the brightening sky, her voice ricocheting across the empty avenue.
He looked up at the gathering morning, a different person than he’d been the day before. It took extraordinary effort not to close the space separating them and give in to the indulgence her lips promised—sweet and intoxicating like the chocolate and cake she’d served him. But he knew if he did, it wouldn’t taste sweet at all, but bitter, like guilt seasoned with a dash of cowardice.
He waved goodbye instead, before climbing into his car and pulling away.
Chapter Three
After Philip left, Val sneaked quietly upstairs to the half apartment she shared with her sister, the other half occupied by Rafi and their father. When their mother was still alive, they combined both sections to create one unit, separated only by a door. But as soon as Val began culinary arts school, her father separated them again, allowing the girls to have one side while he stayed with Rafi on the other, giving everyone a measure of privacy without sending any of the Navarro children into the world to look for it.
She slipped into her bedroom, shutting the door softly so the reverberations wouldn’t wake her sister, who was sleeping like a normal person should on a Saturday morning.
Val wasn’t looking for a relationship, had even told Olivia she wasn’t interested. She had bigger problems to worry about—keeping developers from devouring her neighborhood, running the restaurant and taking care of her family. Nati had one more year of med school left to go, and Rafi, bless him, spent all his money on his classroom.
But Philip was...incredibly tempting.
Val had no business feeling this way. She’d been through all this before. Getting wildly infatuated as if it were the solution to all her problems. She wasn’t going to do that again. She had to come down from the high of spending half the night with a person that didn’t include sex. There had been nothing to distract her from him.
And damn if it hadn’t been amazing.
Besides Philip’s good looks, she liked his little gestures in a way that surprised her. Holding doors open, offering her his jacket, steadying her when she stumbled. The man was obviously well-off, but that didn’t prevent him from getting his hands dirty and washing dishes. As if it was the most normal thing in the world to get up and wash a strange woman’s plates.
They even liked the same things, and he didn’t mind geeking out with her.
Val peeled off her outfit and hung it on a chair to be dry-cleaned, debating whether to return it to Olivia or not. It would always be the outfit in which she first met Philip, with its too-low décolletage and too-short bottom imprinted with echoes of this night.
But that made no sense. She’d only just met him. There was no reason to make a monument out of it.
She took the fastest shower in history and pulled on her favorite pajamas—soft cotton Yoda print pants and matching green shirt with the phrase Stay for Some Soup, You Must—a gag gift from Nati.
Val tucked herself in, shoving thoughts of Philip firmly away. Not this time. Even if their attraction had been immediate, Val wasn’t going to walk that road again. Luke had taken a lot from her, but the worst thing he’d stolen was her ability to trust.
And worse, he’d humiliated her in front of everybody. Her friends and her cousin had come to her defense, but it had only compounded the betrayal with the one thing she couldn’t tolerate from anyone.
Pity.
Val wasn’t one to be pitied.
So for months, she’d stuck to her restaurant. Her family. Tried to give her heart the space to heal.
It had been hard work and she wasn’t about to undo it for a new pretty face and a fancy car. Even Philip’s attitude toward East Ward’s development was a little suspect. Nope. She wouldn’t play the fool again for anyone. No matter how sexy he looked or how good he smelled...
She picked up the Sta
r Wars novel she’d been reading, but after a few paragraphs, exhaustion overtook her. In her increasingly dissociative state, images of Philip fused with whatever lay scattered in the clapboard box of her unconscious until she drifted into a dream.
She stood by the sea, a place she’d visited with her family as a child. The glimmer of a half-hidden sun rose over the horizon, as a man moved toward her. A bronze-tinged heat suffused her, coming in equal measures from both the sun and the man who approached. Val was torn between the impulse to wait for him or to run away and hide in the caves embedded in the rock cliff. Frozen in place, the dream dissipated before she could do either.
* * *
When Val woke, she looked at the clock and calculated that she had exactly eighteen minutes to get down to the restaurant for the lunch rush.
She was out of bed and dressed in record time even though her body was screaming for more sleep. Thank God she’d prepped the food yesterday afternoon before heading to the salon to get her nails done. That way, her father wouldn’t have as much to do in the morning.
She checked her phone, nudging away the disappointment when she found no new messages, and stuffed it in the back pocket of her jeans. Racing downstairs, she burst through the back door of the restaurant, the aroma of coffee freezing her in her tracks, reminding her that she hadn’t had anything for breakfast.
“I’m losing my mind,” she muttered as she reached beneath the breakfast counter for a mug. “How did I leave my house without coffee?”
“Maybe you have something on your mind.” Nati handed her a mug of coffee exactly the way Val liked it—steeped with cream and sugar. But Nati didn’t fool her. She smiled so widely, she looked cartoonish.
“What’s got into you?” Val grumbled as she took a long, hearty sip of her loaded café con leche.
Nati’s tightly coiled, dark blond curls bobbed as she tried to suppress a girlish giggle, though the ruthless gleam of her green eyes was anything but innocent. She had taken after their mother’s side of the family, with her lighter hair and complexion, whereas Val and Rafi were dark in every way, just like their father. “Hmm, nothing. I just heard from a little birdie that you had fun last night, that’s all.” Nati crossed her arms, oblivious to Angela trying to squeeze by her with a tray of roasted pork.
“A harpy’s more like it,” Val snapped. “Dios mío, the day’s barely started—”
“It’s already eleven o’clock—”
“And Olivia’s already gossiping? I’m surrounded by predators.”
Nati’s body vibrated with barely suppressed laughter. “So, tell me about him.”
“I think they need plátanos out front.” Val plucked a slice of plum cake from an overfilled cake dish and slipped into the kitchen, hoping her sister might take the hint and go away.
She had no such luck. “Don’t try to boss me around. Spill.”
Val used her fingertips to collect the crumbs that fell on the kitchen counter. “I met a guy. We hung out. That’s. All.”
“That’s all? You stayed out all night and all you did was hang out?”
“It wasn’t all night. And you can hang out with a man without having sex.”
“There’s also no shame in a woman taking a man home if that’s what she wants,” Nati retorted. A snarky response sat on the tip of Val’s tongue when her phone vibrated. Her irritation evaporated when she read the notification with Philip’s name.
“Esa sonrisa! Who’s making you smile like that?”
Val looked up, glowering at her sister. “¡Ay, callate!”
“Don’t tell me to shut up,” Nati retorted between giggles.
“Then go away.” Younger siblings were supposed to grow out of being annoying, but Nati had missed that developmental milestone.
Val settled in to read Philip’s text message.
Hey. What are you up to?
Trying not to murder my sister, she quickly typed.
When he responded with several laugh emojis, Val imagined the husky, resonant quality of his voice, the way his laugh bubbled up, warm and masculine, through his body. She remembered the way the sound had coiled around her like a silk scarf, how it had sent electric pulses racing down her spine. Her father called Val but Nati answered instead.
“I’m coming, Papi,” Nati shouted. “Val needs to be alone with her phone.”
Val rolled her eyes before returning to her phone. She had another text.
What’s the daily special?
Val was proud of her stewed and grilled dishes, introducing unconventional ingredients to traditional recipes with mostly successful results. She was tempted to invite him over, then thought better of it. Not only was it contrary to her commitment to keeping things cool between them, but her entire family was working the restaurant today, and she’d rather shove a sea star under her toenail than subject anyone to that baptism by fire.
She texted an answer, which started off a brisk exchange.
Braised codfish with eggplant over a bed of cassava, avocado and grilled onions
Sounds delicious
And roasted goat with rosemary potatoes
Maybe not
You haven’t lived until you’ve had my father’s goat
I’ll take your word for it
Bet I can talk you into trying it
Bet you can talk me into anything
His words sent splinters of fire like shrapnel throughout her body. She tingled, her skin stretched too thin, too tight to inhabit, and her body called for a kind of relief she knew she wouldn’t soon find.
She typed and retyped her message, her fumbling fingers missing the intended letters until the words made sense. The last thing the lunch rush needed was for her to lose her head.
I’ve got to run. Can I text you later?
Anytime. And thank you for last night. It was...
Val waited, counting the seconds, growing impatient when ten had gone by without any follow-up.
It was...?
A beat and then... It was incomparable.
Val smiled, then giggled, biting her lip to stifle the ridiculous sound. She breathed loudly through her nose, exhaling as if she’d just run a marathon before typing:
That’s a big word.
The laugh emoji came instantaneously.
I have a big...vocabulary
Val groaned aloud.
So lame.
They texted their goodbyes, after which Val stood for a moment longer in the kitchen, trying to steady her racing heart. Calmate, she scolded, willing herself to come back down to earth. It was just a few text messages, that’s all. No need to act like a punch-drunk teenager. It’s not like he’d done anything special to make her feel all queasy inside.
Val sought out her father—the only person who could ground her in reality. Work was the perfect antidote to the way her body had responded to Philip’s attention.
She found him at his usual post, working the cash register. His dark curls hung over his forehead, his deep brown eyes clear and friendly as he murmured something to the young woman he was serving, resulting in shared laughter. He wore a pale yellow guayabera under his apron. The pockets of the short-sleeved, button-down shirt bulged with pens, paper clips, bits of paper and rubber bands, a habit Rafi had inherited, as well. Whoever helped Papi with his laundry had to make sure to check all the pockets or there was no way of knowing what they’d find in the dryer.
“Papi, where do you want me?”
“Mijita.” He smiled as if twenty customers weren’t in line, waiting to be served. Whenever he saw Val, or any of his children, his face lit up as if he’d won the Powerball.
“Take the à la carte line. Angela isn’t having a good day. Send Nati out to serve.”
“Pobrecita,” Val said as she took a post next to Angela, who’d recently lost her husband and often went into th
e office to pray for comfort to a wall calendar of Father Pius next to a picture of Val’s late mother. Val always made a point to be extra patient with Angela. After all, the Navarros were well acquainted with the ebb and flow of grief.
Val jumped into the workflow, hoping to put Philip out of her mind. She grabbed plates for dining in, and carryout containers for to-go customers. She breathed in the homemade sazón she used to season the rice, which always left her fingertips orange. The sting of tomato sauce and cilantro in her stewed chicken battled with the sharp bite of onion in her bistéc encebollado. She was in constant motion, retreating to the kitchen to refill hot plates or fulfill a custom order.
Sometimes she redirected customers to the sandwich and bakery line, where Rafi sold bread and baked goods, filling wax bags with alcapúrrias, empanadas, papas rellenas, surullitos and other Caribbean snack foods. Val concentrated extra hard to keep her thoughts from wandering to Philip.
As usual, the place was packed and loud, with the speakers pumping old-school salsa and merengue. Almost everyone knew each other, but the clientele was changing. Families that had been in the neighborhood had begun to move out, replaced by a revolving door of new people Val didn’t recognize. She followed her father’s example and was respectful to everyone who frequented their restaurant, but it was hard to watch people she’d known all her life struggle and disappear because a group of suits somewhere had decided East Ward was a good place to make money.
By late afternoon, the rush had dwindled, except for a pair of older women who were having coffee and dessert after spending most of the day shopping. The front doorbell chimed as it opened and a familiar voice cut across the low drone of their conversation.
“Darth Cupcake!”
“Here we go,” Val muttered.
“How’s my girl? Nati, has your sister recovered from last night?” Olivia began, and Val couldn’t help but groan inwardly.
“Take a breath, will you? I can’t believe you already put my business out there.”