1. Croissant aux Amandes

The air is sweltering without a hint of breeze to sweep away the punishing heat of the sun. It’s the hottest summer Paris has seen for a decade. And the hottest summer I’ve felt in my twenty two years of being alive. Sweat drips down my skin, coating my lips in a sheen of salt. I run my tongue over my full bottom lip, savoring the natural taste of it. Flavors don’t just live in food, they’re everywhere—in the air, in the earth, in your skin. You can feast before even setting foot in the kitchen. You just have to open your senses to the experience.

Bells ring out loudly, the local cathedral keeping everyone in the Quartier du Louvre on schedule as they walk or bike about their days. Eleven chimes echo through the narrow streets as birds flock to the sky, painting the crystal blue in fluctuating ripples and spirals of black. I take this walk every afternoon, soaking in the scent of warm croissants and fresh baked baguettes.

I pop into my favorite bakery, Le Fournil, waving at Sophie behind the bar. Thankfully, it’s not too crowded right now, and I don’t have to squeeze my way through throngs of people to make it to the end of the counter. While I wait for Sophie to finish with her customer, I untuck the newspaper from under my arm and open it up to attempt to read the latest news.

I’ve been in Paris for two years, and I’m still not fluent in French, even after a couple semesters of language courses. I read the paper during the week to try to practice, but Sophie still makes fun of my French every time I try to talk to her in her native tongue. She begs me not to, but I still assault her ears with my hideous French attempts at flirting every chance I get.

Sophie is a Paris native of almost seventy years. She says she looked like Brigitte Bardot when she was younger, and I believe her. She’s still stunning, her smile lighting up the room when she chooses to give it. And I’m lucky enough to earn her rare smiles more often than most. The woman acts like I’m damn salt in her yeast, but I know she secretly loves me. And even though I give her a fair bit of hell, she knows I love her too.

I worked at Le Fournil when I first came to Paris, fresh out of my first year as a business major at the University of Chicago. I hated it. Paris was my escape, my chance to see if I could make a life for myself without having to do something that I despise every day of my life. Sophie was my salvation. She took a kid that was all passion and no skill and patiently showed him how to make pastries by hand. Hundreds of croissants day by day until I got my technique perfect. And I never did. I’m terrible with pastry, always have been and probably always will be. It’s too precise—I like to explore rather than replicate.

As abysmal as my croissants looked, I had good flavors. Sophie was kind enough to let me experiment. Different flavors, different natural dyes in the dough, eventually different toppings and fillings. Soon, our pastries were discovered by one of the larger bistros around the corner when our lines started running down past their door at lunch time. And after an unexpected visit and tasting from the head chef, I was offered a job as a commis chef. I didn’t want to take it, but Sophie made me. She told me that I was meant for more than slaving away in a small boulangerie kitchen. And she told me she couldn’t wait to get rid of me because pastry work “c'est quand même pas terrible.”

I kissed her on the cheek, thanked her for everything she’d done for me, and accepted the job.

After working at the bistro, I moved on to my first Michelin star restaurant. The atmosphere was different—harsher, more exacting. I was an outsider. I wasn’t classically trained, I didn’t speak French, I didn’t follow the rules, and I had the very great disadvantage of being American. It was a complete hazing to put it lightly. But I survived, and when I finally earned the respect of my peers, I thrived. I earned chef de partie by the time I left to pursue a new opportunity.

My last restaurant was world-renowned. It had an incredible three Michelin stars, served celebrities and public figures from around the world, and it fucking ate at my soul. There was no creativity, no room to experiment. Everything was austere, precise, boring. The kind of place where you spend an entire day using tweezers to place three microgreens alongside a wafer thin slice of wagyu and a puddle of aerated foam and call it an entrée. I held out for six months before taking the first enticing escape I could find. And turning in my resignation last Friday was one of the most rewarding moments of my life.

There’s a new restaurant in the heart of Paris with a fresh concept being trialed by one of the most respected executive chefs in the country. Dix. No menus. Everything is cooked from ingredients locally sourced that morning. Dinner only. Ten courses. Limited reservations that max out at one hundred diners. And Dix was fully booked for the year before the last brick of its foundation was even laid.

The only obstacle to their opening in the fall—there is no sous chef.

Chef Matis has chosen ten chefs, all with various skill sets and backgrounds. I’m lucky enough to be among them. We’ll be trained and tested over the course of the summer. Given challenges. Expected to innovate and improvise on the spot. And when the summer is over, one of us will be Dix’s new sous chef. It’s all very Roman gladiator, battle to the death. You’d think there wouldn’t be any actual casualties, but you never know. Chefs are vicious, and kitchens are full of knives.

It’s going to be me, and I’m not speaking out of pride. My appetite to succeed is insatiable—it will never be enough until I’m perfect. And even then, I’ll keep working to improve. This challenge was made for me. And I was made for being the sous of Dix. There simply aren’t any other outcomes.

“Are you nervous?” comes a rich, deeply accented voice beside me. I look up to see Sophie carrying a café crème from her personal espresso machine in the back and my usual croissant aux amandes. She sets both on the flat top of the glass display, and my mouth is already watering. Croissants are good, but croissants with almonds are a harmony fit for heaven.

“Why should I be nervous?” I scoff before biting into the tender pastry and listening to the satisfying sound of the flaky layers crackling against my teeth. No matter how many of the world’s top restaurants I eat in, very little compares to the simple perfection of Sophie’s handcrafted pastries.

“Because you’re about to cook for one of the most well-known executive chefs in Paris. And you’ll be competing against chefs who are far more skilled and educated than you.” Sophie rests her bony elbows on the countertop across from me and looks at me with doubt in her brown eyes.

“Fuck me,” I groan with a heavy dose of my usual dramatics. “Tear out my heart, why don’t you? You may look like a sweet old lady, but you’re a stone cold killer.”

Sophie scowls at me, the expression making the crinkle between her brows more pronounced. “Call me old one more time, and I won’t make a liar out of you.”

She’s not bluffing. The woman wouldn’t think twice about going Mrs. Lovett and baking me into a pie.

I reach across the counter, take her thin hand in mine, and hold it close to my chest, “Soph, you are as beautiful as La Seine sparkling in the moonlight and as youthful as the dewy bulbs of spring bursting into bloom.”

She can’t help but laugh—my skills at poetry are about as finessed as my skill with pastry. But it gets her to smile, and that’s all I need.

“Such a Casanova,” she tuts, smacking me in the chest before crossing her arms and staring me down. “I mean it, though. Are you worried?”

“Not at all,” I answer her, mirroring her stance with my arms crossed over my chest. “There’s only one chef in that kitchen who matters, and you’re looking at him.”

She gives me a knowing smile at the confidence that would come across as arrogance to anyone who doesn’t know me. “We’ll see. One of those other chefs might surprise you.”

“It’s a kitchen, Soph. Nothing surprises me in a kitchen.”

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