by Robin Huber
Sam walks up behind me, but he doesn’t say anything. He just watches me read them, one by one.
I touch the felt-lined case displaying his gold medal. “This is…” I can’t find the words to express how truly unbelievable it is. “It’s incredible.”
He manages a soft smile, but it’s clouded in sadness, a reflection of the joy and pain I feel when I see all that he’s accomplished and who he’s become without me. “I did it for you,” he says, burying my heart under a heap of guilt and confusion.
“Sam.”
“It’s true.” He shoves his hands into his pockets.
“Sam…I can’t.” I close my eyes. “I just…can’t—”
“Are you hungry?” he asks abruptly.
“What?” I blink a few times.
“I’m hungry. Are you hungry?” he asks again.
I shrug and nod mechanically.
“Let’s go see what’s in the fridge.” He leads me out of the gym and out of the fog I drifted into.
Chapter 9
Lucy
I stand behind Sam, watching him pull an arsenal of food out of his fridge and pile it onto the kitchen counter. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that he requires so much food, but I’m surprised that he knows how to cook it.
“You cook?” I ask.
He pauses and looks at me and then eyes the greens in his hand. “Oh, um, I, uh…no,” he finally says, laughing.
I smile and take the leafy bunch from him. “Do you even know what this is?”
“No.”
“It’s Swiss chard. It’s kind of like kale. You can cook it down or put it in a smoothie. Why do you have all this food if you don’t cook?”
He rubs the back of his neck. “I have a chef. He comes over and cooks for me.”
“Ahhh…”
“I was hoping to find some leftovers, but I guess I ate them all.”
I push my lips together over a smile and ask, “Want me to make something?”
“Are you sure?” he asks, raising his eyebrows. “We can just order something.”
I look at the various ingredients heaped on the counter and begin sorting them. “Let’s see…” I reach for the limes, some cilantro, and an onion. “Do you have any honey?”
He opens one of the cabinets and pulls out a little golden bear. “Is this okay?”
“Yeah, that’s perfect.” I peer into the fridge and find two thawed chicken breasts. “How long have these been in here?”
“Just today. Jean-Luc stocked the kitchen this morning so that he can cook while I’m gone.”
“Jean-Luc,” I say, unable to hide the amusement on my face. So fancy.
“What?”
“Nothing.” I shake my head and take inventory of the refrigerator shelves. “Okay, how about some sriracha?”
He reaches over my shoulder and the scent of sandalwood fills my nose. “Right here,” he says, handing it to me.
“Thanks.” I set the ingredients on the white marble counter beside the sunken sink and turn toward Sam’s grocery mound by the fridge. I start loading it all back inside, and Sam steps beside me to help. “Can you see if you have any quinoa?” I ask, needing to put some space between us.
“Sure.”
“It kind of looks like rice.”
“Okay.”
I finish loading the fridge and close the shiny stainless steel doors. “Salt and pepper?” I call across the kitchen, wondering where he disappeared to.
“In the cabinet,” he answers from somewhere nearby.
Which one? I begin opening the cabinet doors until I find one that’s filled with spices. I grab some kosher salt and a pepper mill. Still no sign of Sam.
“Sam?”
“Yeah?”
I follow the sound of his voice.
“Where did you go?” I ask, rounding the corner. I find him standing in the middle of a small room that appears to be the pantry, scanning the shelves dutifully. There’s enough dry ingredients in here to feed him for a year. I stand beside him and scan the stocked shelves until I see the quinoa. “There.” I stand on my tiptoes to grab it, but barely brush it with my fingertips.
Sam reaches over me, gently pressing me against the shelves as he stretches for it, and I breathe in his warm scent as his body blankets mine.
He lowers the box between us. “Here.”
I blink up at him. I’m desperately trying to absorb the oxygen in the small room, but there doesn’t appear to be any left. “Thanks.”
“So what exactly are you planning on making with this?” he asks, trying to hide a small smile, which calls his dimples front and center.
I take a step back. “You’ll just have to wait and see.”
“I’m good at waiting.”
I chew the corner of my mouth and spin around. “Where are your pots and pans?” I ask as I walk back into the kitchen.
He opens a deep drawer below the gas range and pulls out a very large stockpot. “Will this work?”
I laugh and shake my head. “That’s a little too big.” I find a saucepan and a sauté pan and set them on the metal grates. “These will do. Where are your knives?”
He points to a drawer beside me. “In there.”
I open it and find a chef’s knife, a santoku knife, and a couple of wooden spoons. “I’ll need a couple of cutting boards too.”
He finds two plastic cutting boards and places them on the counter beside me. “Can I help?” he asks, watching me take the paper off the chicken breasts.
“Sure.” I set the onion on the cutting board in front of him. “Can you chop this up?”
“Absolutely,” he says confidently, reaching for the chef’s knife.
“Not that one.” I hand him the santoku knife. “This one is for chopping vegetables.”
He eyes the knife curiously and takes it from me.
I point to the little divots on the side of the blade and explain, “Those help break the suction when you cut into the onion so that the pieces don’t stick to the blade.”
“Oh, okay,” he says, creasing his eyebrows.
I begin slicing the chicken breasts into cubes, watching him fight with the onion skin out of the corner of my eye. He picks at one end, pulling a few slivers of the papery skin off, and then starts on the other end.
“Try cutting it in half first. It should come off easier that way,” I encourage, but he gives me a dubious look. I smile and say, “Trust me.”
He cuts the onion in half and manages to get the skin off one side by the time I’ve completed my task.
I wash my hands and reach for his knife. “Here, let me show you.” I cut the end off the side that still has the skin on it and add, “If you cut one of the ends off after you cut it in half, the skin should peel right off.”
He watches me intently.
“Then you just make long slices along the top,” I explain as I begin cutting. “And because there are layers in the onion, you just have to cut across to get little dices.” I look up at him. “Want to try?”
“Okay.” He takes the knife from me and begins slicing.
“Good.” I place my hand over his and guide the knife a little closer to the edge. “Like this, so the pieces aren’t too big.”
He pauses and looks at me, and his skin flames under my palm.
I pull my hand away. “Keep going.” I look down at the small pieces of chicken on my cutting board, struggling to remember what I need to do next. “Olive oil,” I eventually say. “I need olive oil.”
Sam looks over his shoulder. “Try the cabinet next to the stove.”
I walk across the kitchen, taking a deep breath of Sam-free air to clear my head, and find the olive oil. I drizzle it into the sauté pan and turn the burner on. It clicks and flames under the pan. I go check Sam’s progress while I wait for it to get hot. “Good job,” I say, eyeing the pile of diced onion.
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah, that’s perfect. You want to drop it in the pan over there?”
> He carries the cutting board over to the stove while I season the chicken with salt and pepper. “You want me to put it all in?” he asks.
“Yep, just scrape it right into the pan.” When it hits the hot oil, it sizzles and fills the kitchen with its savory aroma. “Grab a spoon and stir it around a few times until the onions begin to sweat.”
He turns around and looks at me. “Until they what?”
“Sweat.”
“That can’t be the technical term for cooking onions.”
I laugh and walk over to him, and take over with the spoon. “Look, see how the juices are coming out? Onion sweat.” He shakes his head and grins at me, and I give him back the spoon. “You just keep sweating your onions and I’ll get the chicken.”
“Does it sweat too?”
“No.” I drop the pieces in. “Chicken doesn’t sweat. Only onions sweat.”
“I don’t know, that looks like chicken sweat to me,” he teases.
I scrunch my nose. “Chicken sweat is gross. There’s no chicken sweat.”
He holds his hands up. “Okay, okay, you’re the expert.”
I press my lips together over a small smile and he shoves the spoon in the pan again. “No, not yet. Let it sear for a few minutes. Get a bowl and a whisk and we can make the sauce while it cooks.” I go grab the limes and slice them in half.
“Now what?” Sam asks, placing a bowl on the counter beside me.
“Add the sriracha and honey and squeeze in some juice from the limes.”
He follows my directions and begins whisking the ingredients together while I tend to the chicken and get the quinoa going. He stands beside me, holding the bowl, still whisking obediently.
“Okay, now pour it over the chicken,” I instruct, and when he does, it fills the air with sweet, savory spice.
“That smells amazing,” he says, smiling, and I can’t help but smile back. It really does.
By the time the quinoa is done, the sauce has thickened and coated the chicken. I fill a couple of bowls with the fluffy quinoa. “Okay, scoop the chicken into the bowls, and don’t be shy with the sauce.”
I grab the cilantro, give it a quick rinse, and tear a few leaves over the top of each bowl.
“And that, Mr. Sam Cole, light-heavyweight champion of the world, is how you make sriracha chicken and quinoa.” I smile and hold the pretty bowls up between us.
He smiles and nods. “Should we go sit?”
I nod once and follow him to the long rectangular kitchen table. He sits at the end of it, and I take the chair next to him. I’m actually really hungry. I was too anxious to eat earlier today, and by the look of the sky outside, it’s starting to get late. The sun is glowing orange in the reflection of the mirrored building across the street.
Sam takes a bite and so do I. “Oh, wow,” he says over his mouthful.
“You like it?”
He nods and gets another forkful. “With you around, I might have to fire Jean-Luc.”
My heart flutters inside my tight chest. Is he planning on me being around? I force a smile over my bite, which suddenly feels too big to swallow.
“How did you learn to cook like this?” he asks, and I see the realization fall over his face before I have to answer.
I press my lips together into a flat line and shrug. “I had a good teacher.”
He pulls his eyebrows together and drops his chin, and pushes his food around with his fork a few times.
“Eat,” I say, stabbing a piece of chicken with my fork. I pop it in my mouth and give him big eyes, and after a few seconds he does the same.
We eat in semicomfortable silence, until we’ve finished our bowls, then we take our dishes to the kitchen sink. Sam rinses them and loads them into the dishwasher, and we clean up the rest of the kitchen together.
I watch him dry the last pan after I wash it and something about seeing him standing barefoot in his sweats, holding a dish towel, drying a pan we cooked a meal together in, fills me with sadness. This is how it was supposed to be.
He puts the pan away and we both look around the spotless kitchen.
Sam reaches inside the fridge. “Do you—” “I should—” We both speak at the same time.
“Do you want a beer?” he asks.
Do not say yes.
“Sure,” I say, against my better judgment.
He opens a bottle and hands it to me, and I follow him into the living room where we take our previous places on the couch.
The sun is pouring into the room now, painting the pale gray walls amber. Sam watches me sip my beer, and I feel my fair skin flush under his stare. He must notice, because the corner of his mouth turns up. “Do you love him?”
I lower my beer and answer honestly. “I wouldn’t marry someone I didn’t love.”
He sips his beer.
“He’s a good man, Sam.”
He takes another sip of his beer and rests his arm on the back of the couch. “You never told me why you came to the fight in New York—why you wanted to see me.”
A long silent second passes between us as I contemplate an answer to the question he asked me earlier. “I don’t know. My head has been kind of a mess lately, and I just thought that seeing you might help, or help me realize that I’m insane, which I must be.”
“I was really happy when I saw you that night.” He smiles softly, and I fight the urge to touch the dimple in his cheek.
“You were?”
He narrows his eyes. “Happy is probably an understatement. But I was also really confused.”
I ignore the way my heart is twirling around inside my chest. “You said that you had your team try to find me after the fight.”
“Yes,” he says tentatively.
“Have you done that before?”
“Lucy, I’d be lying if I told you I didn’t have the resources to find you. The truth is, I didn’t want to come looking for you if you didn’t want to be found.”
I crease my eyebrows and consider that.
“But when I saw you”—he studies me with his knowing eyes—“I wondered if maybe you wanted to be found.”
I pick at my thumbnail and shake my foot, which is dangling off the couch. “I’m happy, Sam,” I finally say, but I can’t look up at him.
He sips his beer and watches me carefully. “I think if you were happy, you wouldn’t be here right now.”
I mask my disquiet with a smile. “Well, I am.” I’ve already hurt Sam so much. How do I tell him that I came here only to say goodbye?
He leans in and whispers, “I know what happy looks like on you.”
I pull in a weak breath that does little to ease the wooziness in my head. “Are you happy?” I ask, diverting the question to him.
“Depends.”
“On what?”
“The day. The match. The party. The girl,” he says, throwing a dagger at my heart.
I look down at my lap and accept the deserved stab. “Yes, you are quite popular with the ladies.” I peek up at him, but he’s looking down at his beer bottle now. “Is there anyone special?”
“No. The girls I go out with are…they’re not…”
“I know. You’ve got a reputation to uphold. It can’t be easy being boxing’s most eligible bachelor,” I say, quoting a headline I saw once.
His eyes flash to mine. “They’re not you.”
My heart flutters wildly inside my chest like it’s grown wings.
“It’s hard to meet people that don’t want to take advantage of someone in my position,” he adds. “Everybody wants something.”
I pick at the seam that runs along the inside of my jeans, feeling sad for him. “That must get pretty lonely.”
He holds my stare and laughs softly, but I don’t get the joke. I crease my eyebrows and wait for the punch line.
“I slept in a cement room without windows for three years…waiting for you to come visit me. That was lonely.”
I look down at my lap and part my lips, hoping to ease the pain in
my stomach with a quiet breath. I worked so hard to block out thoughts of him living in prison, I never really came to terms with it. The reality of it now is overwhelming. “I’m so sorry, Sam. I can’t imagine what it must have been like for you.”
“It wasn’t all bad. I got my GED. I even got an associate’s degree.”
A smile spreads across my face. “You did?”
“I know it’s not a four-year degree, but…”
“That’s wonderful,” I say, smiling so big now it hurts.
He smiles too and I see the pride in his eyes. “I knew you’d want me to.”
I press my lips together and hold my breath until another wave of emotion passes. “I’m really proud of you, Sam.”
“I’ve waited a long time to hear you say that.”
I stare at him, feeling completely lost in an emotional black hole.
“So tell me about your studio,” he says, shifting my thoughts. “It seems pretty great.”
“It is,” I say, blinking at him. “I, um, I’m still getting used to the idea of it being mine, but it’s a dream come true. It’s starting to get some notice now, and I’m hosting an art exhibit later this month that will hopefully open a lot of doors for me.”
“Is the exhibit for your paintings?”
“Some. And other pieces that were submitted to me from artists around the city. If it’s a success, I might have a chance to participate in a show in New York next year.”
“New York?”
I smile and nod. “That’s my real dream. There’s this gallery in Chelsea that’s hosting an exhibit for emerging contemporary realist painters next year. If I can get their attention with my show, I might be able to earn an invitation.”
“Well, they’d be lucky to have you.” He smiles and sips his beer.
I tuck my hair behind my ear and glance up at the windows. Twinkling lights have come on around the city, and the indigo sky is almost dark now. “I should probably get going.” I stand up and Sam follows my cue.
“I’ll get your jacket,” he says, taking my beer to the kitchen. He returns a few seconds later with my jacket and purse. “You know, I didn’t really have a chance to look around when I was there, but maybe you could show me your studio sometime. If that’s okay. I’d really like to see your paintings.”