Chapter 6
6
Hayden
senior year
My finger skims over the jumble of words on the thin sheets of paper in my mom’s cookbook. I study the measurements for brown sugar and flour before scooping both from the respective containers and dumping them into the glass bowl on the kitchen counter. Just as I’m holding up a measuring spoon at eye level, carefully pouring out the exact amount of vanilla extract the recipe calls for, my mom enters the kitchen.
“What’s going on in here?” she asks, looking at the scattered mess on her kitchen counter.
“I had a sudden hankering for your oatmeal chocolate chip cookies,” I explain, adding the vanilla to my wet ingredients. “I promise I’ll clean all this up once I’m finished.”
“Do you need any help?” she asks, rolling up her sleeves .
“No, I’m good,” I answer, my attention still focused on the measuring spoon and bottle of vanilla extract that looks too small in my large hands.
She lifts a small bottle of a spice that isn’t normally used in her recipe. “What’s this?”
I look at the bottle held in her hand, peering between the hair hanging off my forehead. “I looked up online that if you use nutmeg, it brings out the warm, nutty flavor in the oats. I thought I’d try it out.”
Her brows rise with a silent nod of approval. “Make sure to bring me some when you’re done,” she says, turning to leave the kitchen. “It’s going to need to pass my taste test.”
“I will, Mom,” I answer, letting out a small chuckle.
As I return to mixing all the ingredients using my mom’s KitchenAid mixer, the lingering scent of warm vanilla wafts into the air, reminding me why I had that sudden hankering for my mom’s cookies in the first place. It had a little less to do with an actual craving for something sweet and a lot more to do with someone where our dynamic went beyond a simple “how did you do on the protein synthesis test” question or an “I should have taken an art class” rant.
The kitchen starts to warm, the sweet smell from the oven filling our home. And for a moment, I forget about everything that surrounds my life, full of everything that I’m so unsure of. And instead of focusing on this undecided future, I wrap myself in my past. A past of freshly baked cookies and Xbox marathons. A past of middle school hallways, crowded with people that I didn’t know would mean so much to me.
present
“Stop dicking around, kid,” Pat teases as I walk past him. His hand lightly taps the back of my head at the same time I duck, breezing past him.
As I enter the dining room, I’m welcomed by the sudden boom of Chef DuPont’s voice entering the kitchen through the back door. His angry voice can be heard clearly all the way from the hostess desk.
Chef DuPont once held the torch as New York City’s visionary for French cuisine, earning Michelin stars for various restaurants throughout the city. He was an amazing chef. Keyword: was. During his heyday in the early 2000s, he was an artist. A maestro in the creation of culinary art. But all of that fizzled when his consistently raving reviews dwindled into mediocre ones while he shoved those Michelin stars down every food critic’s throat.
Pat hired him three years ago for his experience and knowledge. What Pat didn’t know was that he was bringing into his kitchen an egotistical asshole who treated his kitchen staff like sewer rats, me included. Not long after I met Chef DuPont, Pat confessed to me that he needed a new sous chef because the previous two refused to work with him after seeing the kind of kitchen he ran. One that thrived on uncomfortable tension and irrationally fueled blowouts.
I know I need to suck it up for however long necessary so that I can gain the experience and knowledge I need, all in the name of opening my own restaurant one day. Still, the past few months working under Chef DuPont have been torture.
Chef DuPont is here, hours ahead of the dinner rush, to discuss our dinner menu and the lack of zest it carries. Pat, Chef DuPont, and I settle in the far corner of the fairly empty restaurant with a tablecloth spread underneath the mock menus and a tray of bite-sized appetizer samples.
“We need something that will wow the customers,” Chef DuPont claims. “I’m tired of hearing that my work is second-rate and passable.”
“Gus, we changed the menu barely a month ago,” Pat says. He runs a hand through his thinning hair, frustrated with how difficult it is to keep an artist of Chef DuPont’s expectations satisfied. “I don’t know how else we can change things unless we do an entire menu revamp.”
“Then that’s what we’ll have to do.” Chef DuPont came into this meeting determined. I’m realizing that now. He doesn’t want to merely discuss subtle changes that are feasible. He wants to jazz up this menu to what he thinks will be mind-blowing. But the thing is that he no longer holds that sort of prestige. He lost his touch, and he should be thankful that he still holds a place as head chef anywhere.
“We discussed this during that last revision.” Pat is starting to turn red with frustration. I sit between them, my eyes ping-ponging back and forth as I play a silent bet on who’ll win. “I can’t keep making changes like this. While I support our menu evolving, I need some sort of consistency.”
It’s one thing Pat and I have always agreed on: consistency. During the last menu revision, the three of us decided that this was it. We made the changes we needed to, and we were going to stick with them for this season, making small adjustments as we went along. Nothing big or transformative, just changes that allow us to keep up with industry standards.
“Hayden?”
I turn as one of our hostesses, Hailey, faces me.
“I’m so sorry to interrupt but a shipment just came in, and they need you to sign off on the produce.”
I turn to look at Pat, who nods, excusing me from the meeting.
I suppress a sigh of relief before walking back into the kitchen. A bright light streams in through the back door that’s propped open for this week’s shipment. As I sign the list, ticking off items as they come off the delivery truck, I let the tension ease off my shoulders knowing I don’t have to sit through the rest of the meeting in the dining room. I’m thankful that Pat includes me in decisions that revolve around restaurant logistics but sometimes, I prefer being left on the sidelines. Especially if it comes with having to deal with Chef DuPont.
As I stock the walk-in fridge with our weekly produce, my mind wanders back to running into Natalia just before we sat down for our meeting. If I hadn’t been going over the wine list with Hailey at the bar, I wouldn’t have seen her. And if I hadn’t looked up as Natalia’s laugh echoed off the windows and she threw her head back with eyes twinkling in amusement, I wouldn’t have gone after her.
She’s no longer that reserved girl who hides behind her random books and color coordinated highlighters. Instead, she’s shifted into a brighter, more confident version of that girl, finally growing comfortable in her own skin. Her voice rings like an upbeat song instead of a whispering mumble when she talks. And her laugh. She hardly laughed when we were seventeen, not that either one of us had much reason to in biology class, but I somehow know she didn’t laugh like that in the five years we spent together going to the same schools. All bright and buoyant while using every expressive muscle in her face. Like the ones that form the little wrinkles down her nose and the corners of her eyes, or the ones that make her forehead crease as the laughter makes her weak.
Suddenly, I feel this urge to embrace Natalia’s return into my life. To bring back memories of us growing closer in the span of our senior year, reminding me what she meant to me back then while trying to rewrite everything that could have been. Of what I’ve been missing for the past eight years.