Chapter 20
— Chapter 20 —
I forgot to ask Sam about the dress code. I mostly wore jeans and Thirsty Clam t-shirts at Buck’s. But when we did catering, we had to wear black and whites. I still have my thrift store tuxedo pants that thankfully have a hidden elastic panel, so they fit my still-bloated belly. But my last white shirt was obliterated by an airborne tray of barbecued ribs when a drunk groomsman crashed into a folding table at a beach wedding we catered in August.
I raid the coat closet by the front door where Step kept his dry cleaning and find a plastic bag with one white shirt among the blue and yellow ones. Step was only a few inches taller than me. The shirt is baggy, but I leave the first two buttons undone and pull it back so it looks blousy. The cuffs are threadbare, blue ink scuffed into the edge of the right one. I roll the sleeves. Try to convince myself the wash-and-press obscured any scent of Step. It’s work to prevent what’s spinning in my head from getting too close to my heart, because sometimes you just fucking long for people, even when you shouldn’t—even when they aren’t worth the longing.
Each time a new thought begins to coagulate, I say “Nope” out loud like my therapist taught me.
What shirt did Steena bring to the funeral home?
Nope.
What was my mother buried in?
Nope.
Did Step ever miss me?
Nope.
Nope.
No.
A shirt is a shirt, not part of a person. I have to commit to that mindset.
Upstairs in the bathroom, I use Aubrey’s makeup, twist my hair into a bun, securing it with a plastic claw clip I find under the bathroom sink. I’m pretty sure the clip was Steena’s, so I nope my way through that choice too.
I can’t remember how long it took me to drive to work, and I’m nervous about being late. I leave forty-five minutes early and end up sitting in my car in the bank parking lot for twenty before I drive over to The Aster.
The front door is locked. I walk around back, where the kitchen door is propped open, steam streaming into the cold air, just like when Enzo would parboil the vegetables and preboil the pasta for the day. I hear someone whistling a familiar tune, warbling the highest notes, and I am instantly overwhelmed with joy.
“Carlos?” I call, walking into the kitchen. “S’that you?”
Carlos, Enzo’s sous chef, is chopping onions. He’s a little thicker, gray at his temples, but he hasn’t changed much. He looks up, tears streaming down his face.
“Freyalina!” he shouts, which is what Enzo always used to call me.
“Well, I didn’t mean to make you cry!” I say.
He wipes his hands on his apron and rushes to hug me, laughing. “Yes, this is from you and not the onions.”
I kiss his wet cheek.
“Ah!” he says, stepping back so he can see me. “You look different. But the same!”
I’ve known Carlos since I started working here at fifteen. He had just turned twenty. We washed dishes together that first summer. He made up silly songs about the different kinds of dirty plates, and the first time he sang “Baked on cheese!” like an opera singer, I laughed so hard I almost wet my pants. When I turned sixteen and complained that Step was too nervous to teach me to drive, and my mother yelled too much, Carlos taught me how to parallel park in the empty lot before work, lining up garbage cans we pretended were other cars. And when I was seventeen and his wife went into labor with their first child, I drove him to the hospital because he was so excited he could barely walk straight. I didn’t think I’d ever see him again after I left. We had the kind of work friendship that never translates to phone calls or letters—the way we fit together was in person, working as a team—but Carlos was, so often, the best part of my day.
He kisses me on both cheeks. “Sam told me to look out for a girl named Freya, and I thought, ‘That can’t be my Freya!’ But how many Freyas gonna work here, right?”
“How is Lily?” I ask. Carlos points to a photo taped to the side of the fridge: a bright, willowy girl in a sequined dance costume holding a bouquet of roses. She has the same shining grin and sparkling eyes as Carlos. Next to her are two younger girls in matching pink dresses making peace signs with their fingers, and a pouty toddler in a blue jean jacket with the collar popped.
“That’s Lily?” I say, pointing to the dancer. “She’s gorgeous!”
“And Rosie and Sophia and Rocky.” Carlos points to each child proudly.
“All yours?”
He winks. “Far as I know.”
“Congratulations, sir!”
Sam walks in carrying a flat of strawberries. “You two know each other?”
“This girl,” Carlos says. “She’s alright.”
“Yeah, I don’t mind him.”
“Oh, that’s so good!” Sam says. “Enzo told me I’d be an idiot not to hire Carlos when I bought the place.”
“You’re still an idiot,” Carlos says, laughing.
“True. But I have a great sous chef.”
“Damn straight!” Carlos goes back to chopping onions, extra loud with a big flourish at the end.
When Sam brings me up front to walk through the new register, he whispers, “That guy’s amazing. I can’t believe he never went to culinary school,” and I feel like I have his number.
Guys from the Culinary Institute always seem to think it’s the only path, but head-to-head with a kitchen-trained chef, I’d put my money on the kitchen guy every time. I learned so much from watching Carlos learn. He never carried shame around not knowing how to do something, so he asked questions freely. He always wanted to know why Enzo did things a certain way so he could figure out if he wanted to do the same or try to engineer a better process.
“Enzo was a great teacher,” I say. “And Carlos soaked it all up. He’s a kitchen genius.”
For a moment, I worry I may have pushed too hard against Sam’s ego. But he just grins and says, “You’ll have to convince Carlos to teach me all his tricks,” and it makes me like him better. Which is helpful when he hands me the list of specials typed on a smudgy typewriter on triplicate paper, and it requires physical effort to refrain from rolling my eyes.
“Let’s read through so you can pick up the tricky pronunciations and ask questions,” Sam says.
I wonder how different the clientele is now. There was very little that needed explaining on Enzo’s menu.
Sam brings a trio of tarnished silver photo frames to the bar. I peel the white page from the yellow from the pink, and we place the menus in the frames while he tells me about each dish.
“For soup, we have a purple corn potage with braised homegrown leeks, topped with a feathering of coconut crème fra?che.” He pauses like he expects me to applaud.
“That sounds good,” I say.
“My produce guy is incredible. Just wait.” Sam finishes his frame and leaves me to do the third. “Okay, the salad is shaved icicle radish over minced lacinato kale, with a truffle Dijon vinaigrette. And the entrée is roasted bone marrow on a bed of microgreens with sage gremolata and Uyghur bread toast points.”
I stifle a laugh. “Just marrow?”
“Well, it comes in the bone.”
“Is there meat on the bone?”
Enzo’s weekly osso buco special was a Gus and Shorty favorite, but that was a hearty meal.
“No, just marrow,” Sam says, eyes wide. I can’t tell if he’s shocked by my provincial palate or worried my reaction is a prophecy. “We have beautiful little marrow spoons at the utensil station. Make sure to serve with one on the side.”
I smile and nod, because I know sharing my thoughts will not help me stay gainfully employed.
“And you’ve got the pronunciations?” he asks.
“Uyghur,” I say, the same way he said it, even though I have no idea what it is. Asking feels like a hassle. “Potage, lacinato, gremolata.”
“Wonderful!” He starts to walk away but turns back. “Do you think they’ll like it?” He looks like a little kid worried that no one will come to his birthday party.
No matter how ridiculous someone may seem, it’s impossible for me to dislike them if they care earnestly. By that measure, Sam has already wheedled his way into my heart. “Who wouldn’t?” I say. “This all sounds amazing.”
“Okay. Good. Thank you, Freya. My goal is to put The Aster on the map as a culinary destination. Brewster’s on the train line. I don’t think it’s an impossible—”
He keeps talking, but I notice the time, so I nod along while I check levels on my ice and the bottles in the speed rack, figure out which beers are on tap.
The bell on the door rings. I hear boots stomping on the mat.
“Well, will you look at that!” Gus’s booming voice fills the bar, and suddenly everything feels brighter. Gus is what you’d get if a wizard turned a grizzly bear into a man, and he hasn’t changed a bit. He’s wearing the same blue coveralls and a canvas Carhartt jacket that’s either dirty gray or faded black, but you’d have to time-travel to know for sure. “We’re back in the Frey!”
“Gross!” I shout, as a reflex. Sam looks shocked.
“Get over here, kid,” Gus says, and I run around the bar. “What’d you do to your hair? You look like Marilyn Monroe!” He scoops me up in a hug, lifting my feet off the ground. My scar stretches. He smells like turpentine and motor oil.
“Careful with me, Gussy. I’m an old lady now.”
“Hot damn, it’s good to see you.”
“You too, buddy.”
“You visiting?” he asks.
“I work here.”
Gus’s eyes get glassy, and he hugs me again. No theatrics this time. Just a big strong hug. “Glad to hear it, kiddo.” He pats me on the back. “Now get me a beer!”
“Still drinking Bud?”
Gus snorts. “Sam won’t let Bud in his bar!” He flashes Sam a sharp look. “Get me one of those Whenheineystephens.”
Sam chokes back a laugh, slipping into the kitchen before he erupts.
I’m pretty sure I know what Gus is asking for. Buck went through a German beer phase. In the cooler I find a row of Weihenstephaner Originals up top.
As I’m pouring Gus’s beer into a lager glass, the door opens again and Shorty walks in. He looks nothing like the Shorty I used to know. He was a mousy little Italian kid with crooked teeth, Coke-bottle glasses, and a lazy eye, but now he’s bulked up and the glasses are gone, his eye and teeth straightened out. Even though it’s cold, he’s wearing short-sleeved coveralls, and his arms are massive and covered in tattoos.
“See who it is, Shorts!” Gus shouts.
Shorty looks at me and his whole face lights up. “Freya!”
I walk out from behind the bar to give him a hug. He’s bashful about it. Awkward over where to put his arms.
“So good to see you, Shorty! You look great,” I say, and watch his face turn red.
“Yeah, you too, Frey,” he says. “You too. And thanks. I—did a little work, you know? Self-improvement.” He has a high-pitched voice and a slight lisp, and he talks at a volume slightly lower than most people from around here, so he sounds extra gentle.
“Can I get you a beer?”
“Nah, nah. I don’t drink at lunch anymore,” he says. “But I will take a coffee.”
“Good for you. Give me a sec to start a new pot.”
“Sure thing,” Shorty says.
“Hey, Frey,” Gus shouts. “Whose home were these leeks grown at?”
When I look up, he’s holding the framed specials with a smirk on his face.
“Your mom’s,” I tell him.
Gus laughs. “Alright then. I mean, if they were from this guy’s…,” he pokes Shorty. “Who knows what kind of toxic waste he’s got in his yard.”
“Hey!” Shorty says, and at first I think he’s pretending to be hurt, but then he adds, “I had a great garden last year.”
“I’d eat leeks from your garden, Shorts,” I say.
Gus snickers.
“I did not miss you one bit,” I tell him.
Gus stares at me. I stare back. We both break, laughing at the same time.
“Frey, is this osso buco?” Shorty asks, squinting at the specials menu.
“No. Just marrow.”
“Just marrow?”
“Well, it comes with the bone.” I raise my eyebrows at him.
Shorty laughs. “Can I have one of Carlos’s quarter pounders? I gotta big rig with a dented wind deflector coming in this afternoon.” He shakes his head. “Twelve bucks for marrow.”
“You want fries?”
“Yeah. Just short of burnt. Carlos knows.”
“I know too.”
“You remember how I like my fries?” He looks genuinely touched.
“How could I forget anything about you, Shorty?”
“Ah, you’re a good guy, Frey,” he says, staring at his dirty hands, blushing. “I’m glad you’re back. Especially under these…,” he glances toward the specials, “circumstances.”
Gus orders a real turkey sandwich even though it’s not on the menu. I put the order through because it was on the old menu and Gus seems convinced he’ll get what he’s asking for. Carlos looks at the slip on the clothesline and nods at me. Sam is busy draining a giant pot of fettuccine, the steam rising over the sink and clouding the window.
Like Enzo, Sam doesn’t bring a waitress in for lunch unless there’s a big reservation, so I work the tables too. Mrs. Raskin sits in the same booth by the door. She’s using a walker now. Doesn’t remember me at all. But she’s delighted when I bring her a cup of Earl Grey with a lemon wedge before she can ask.
There’s a four-top of women in polyester slacks and jewel-toned sweaters who probably work at the bank. And a trio wearing scrubs from the dentist’s office down the road. Everyone looks out of place in Sam’s updated decor. And they all order the simple stuff on the menu: Caesar salads, pasta primavera.
When Mrs. Raskin orders a grilled cheese sandwich and I run into the kitchen, Sam is working the griddle while Carlos kneads dough for dinner rolls.
“Can we do a grilled American on white, no crust, for Mrs. Raskin?” I ask.
Sam groans. “Yeah.”
Carlos grins at me and sings “Baked on cheese!” at the top of his lungs. I laugh so hard my eyes tear.
Sam is stunned. “This guy is so quiet, and then you get here and he’s an opera singer?”
Carlos winks at me.
When I get back to the bar, two guys in EMT uniforms walk in. They’re both tall and muscled, with a little bit of beer gut. One of them has a beard and a mess of red curls sprouting from his head like the fronds of a palm tree. The other is wearing a blue SFD cap low over his face, brim curled. He looks familiar, but I can’t see his eyes.
“Tommy Tom!” Shorty yells.
“Shorts!” the redhead shouts, curls trembling. “How ya doing, man!” He reaches out and slaps Shorty’s hand.
“Hey, Freya,” Shorty says. “Get Tommy and Eddie here some beers on me, okay? These boys saved my mom’s house last year!” He claps Eddie on the back. “The best, man. You’re the best.”
“Eddie Davis!” I say, putting the pieces together. “How the heck are you?”
In my normal life, if I ran into Eddie at the gas station or grocery store, I’d avoid calling attention to myself. I am still painfully shy in certain situations. At work, I can talk in corny bar phrases, bust balls, or be a kind ear, and it’s almost effortless, like an actor saying lines in a play. Out in the world, without a specific role or a set of coherent parameters, I don’t know how to talk to someone like Eddie. We’re not close and he’s not a stranger, and those are the people who leave me tongue-tied if I’m caught without purpose.
“Freya!” Eddie stands across from me, spreading his arms like he’s coming in for a hug, and then realizes there’s a bar between us. He switches to offering his hand. I shake it and watch his face turn red. He holds his hand out for a moment longer after I pull mine away. It’s awkward and he laughs about it. “Sorry, I don’t know what to do with myself.”
“Who does?” I say, smiling.
“Good to see you.”
“You too.” I can’t remember the last time I talked to Eddie Davis. His house was on the opposite side of Deans Pond from mine. When we were little and ended up down at the pond at the same time, we made sand villages together. Not just a castle. We’d take up more than our fair share of the tiny man-made beach, building an elaborate network of houses and roads and a lake filled with water. I’d collect gravel and twigs to embellish our architecture, and Eddie would venture into the swampy side of the pond with his yellow plastic bucket to collect “the good mud” that we used like stucco. He was shy and sweet. We worked well together. He always seemed to understand my vision, I understood his, and I remember the calm I felt existing in our shared perspective.
Once we got to intermediate school and boys were teased for playing with girls, Eddie and I didn’t spend much time together. But I rowed my boat over to Eddie’s house whenever I lost my house key, because his mom told me I should feel free to come over any time. In high school, we had a lot of the same classes. But after we stopped building sandcastles, we didn’t spend time alone together.
“What kind of beer is Shorty buying you?” I ask.
“Root,” Eddie says. “We’re on call.” His smile is the same as it was when he brought me a bucket of the good mud, but now his chin is square and his jawline is sharp and close shaven. He takes his hat off, and I can see his bright blue eyes.
“You know,” I say, looking away, feeling suddenly shy. “Whenever anyone talks about England and refers to it as being ‘across the pond,’ I always think of you.”
Eddie laughs. “I’m still over there. Or… again, at least.”
“Yeah? Me too.”
“Oh, man, yeah,” Eddie says, looking at me straight and clear. “I’m sorry about your parents. When the call came in, I was on deck, but the crash was at the border. Yorktown got to them first. I know those guys, though—they took good care of your folks.”
“Thanks.” In my head the accident was like a light switch. They were here, then they weren’t. I hadn’t thought of the accident scene and first responders. It’s a strange mix of shock and comfort to imagine a guy like Eddie trying to help my parents at the end.
Eddie pats the bar, like maybe he was going to touch my arm but wasn’t sure if he should.
I blink, shake my head. Smile. “So, you really want root beer?”
“I was joking about the root beer, but actually, yeah.”
“Should I see if Sam’s got vanilla ice cream in the kitchen?”
His face lights up. “Hell yeah.”
“Tommy too?”
Eddie nods. “He shouldn’t. He’s supposed to watch his sugar. But he’ll do it anyway.”
When I go to the kitchen in search of ice cream, Sam says, “Is that my brother out there?”
“Eddie?” I ask, which is stupid because I know Eddie’s brother, and of course Sam’s not him.
“Tom.”
“Yeah, he’s there.”
When I bring out pint glasses of ice cream, Sam is at the bar showing Tommy Tom something in a notebook. Tom catches my eye, pretends to fiddle with his beard, but lifts his index finger to his mouth to signal the secret. I stash the glasses in the fridge under the bar when Sam’s not looking, and as soon as he goes back to the kitchen, I give the guys their ice cream and open two bottles of root beer.
“Thanks!” Tommy Tom says, poking a straw into his glass. “My brother’s always on my case.”
I feel bad for supplying him with goods he shouldn’t have, but that’s my part in the play. No one should be drinking their lunch every day either. And even though my threshold for liability as a bartender is “visibly intoxicated,” most people who walk out of bars shouldn’t be driving whether or not they look drunk. But I don’t stop them. I wouldn’t have a job if I did.
Once we’ve wrapped lunch, I leave through the kitchen to say goodbye to Carlos. He’s down by the reservoir, sitting at the end of the little wooden pier he helped Enzo build the first summer I worked here. The low winter sun beams through a break in the clouds, and the smoke from his cigarette forms dense plumes in the brisk air. When I sit next to him, he pulls another cigarette from his pack of Camels, holds it in his mouth to light it, and hands it over.
“Thanks,” I say.
He puts his arm around me, giving my shoulder a quick squeeze. I lean into him for the briefest of moments. And then we go back to sitting side by side, smoking our cigarettes. We watch the water lap under the broken icy edges of the reservoir, and it feels like a long-lost ritual. If this moment was home, I would understand the concept of homesickness.
An airplane flies over, breaking the quiet. Carlos shakes his head like he was somewhere else and now he’s back.
“Oh, I’m so tired, Freyalina,” he says, his words turning into a yawn. “Too many shifts. And my kids have hard homework! When I’m not working, I’m trying to figure out this shitty new math they do.”
“I didn’t understand old math,” I say.
“Me either.”
“How is it working here? Without Enzo?”
Carlos picks at a rotting board on the pier. “I miss him, man. He was kinda like my dad, you know?”
“I know,” I say, remembering how Enzo used to kick guys out of the bar for looking at me funny.
Carlos shakes his head, blowing smoke. “Sam’s kind of a mess. His food budget is out of line. He keeps hiring young, pretty people who quit in a week. He’s a good guy, but like, the CIA isn’t the real world, you know?”
“Oh, he’s one of those undercover cooks.”
Carlos looks at me, as if he’s worried he’ll have to explain the Culinary Institute of America.
I grin.
“That’s a terrible joke.”
“Damn right it is!” I hold up my hand.
Carlos gives me a reluctant high five.
“You think he can pull it together?” I ask.
“Hope so. I don’t want to start over in a new kitchen. I wanted to buy the place from Enzo. But I got four kids. How am I saving money, right? The building was falling apart. Enzo wanted out sooner, not later. Said it was time to see what living among the daytime people is like. He deserves that.” Carlos takes a quick drag while he’s talking, barely missing a beat. “Sam’s a rich kid. He’s got family money to pump into this place. I’d always be treading water. Upside, it’s easier on the ticker to work for a guy with cash, you know? I don’t want to be fixing no leaky roof.”
“Tell me about it,” I say.
“Least you’re back.” He nudges my shoulder with his. “Oh, thank the goodness!”
I laugh. That was one of the expressions Carlos and I called Enzoisms.
“Thank the very good goodness,” I say.