Chapter Twenty-Eight Madison
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Madison
The door to the Greenhouse’s kitchen is humongous. I mean, in reality it’s a normal height, but in my mind—the land of anxiety—it’s a freaking castle door. And just on the other side? A fire-breathing dragon. Or at least that’s what my brain seems to think every time I step in there.
Since my initial introduction with James, I’ve avoided this kitchen and only cooked at the cottage or his house.
Logically, I know everything will be okay in there.
There is a less than two percent chance Chef Davis will pop out of a cabinet and scream at me for being worthless.
But the thing is, my nervous system doesn’t seem to operate on the same wavelength as my logical brain.
Which is why even now just thinking about going in there and feeling the sterile countertops and squinting against the fluorescent lights has my lungs pinching and heart thundering.
I back several steps away from the door until I land in a puddle of sunlight, beaming in through the overhead windows. The warmth is enough to keep me from running from this place completely.
Like a cat, I sit down on the concrete floor, soaking in the rays and staring at the kitchen door. Maybe if I sit here long enough, it’ll become less intimidating. But after an hour passes and the pool of sunlight shifts completely away from me, I am no closer to stepping foot in that kitchen.
Movement at the restaurant entrance catches my eye, and I sigh with relief when James walks in. His brown boots gently thud across the floor as he comes to stand in front of me, frowning down at where I’m sitting, surrounded by tote bags of ingredients and produce.
“I think in order to have a picnic you’re supposed to unpack the food and eat it,” he says with a lopsided grin.
“Ohhhh. My bad. Want some?” I dip my hand into a tote and pull out my middle finger, flashing it up at him.
He laughs and then lowers himself to sit beside me, so close his shoulder presses against mine. I haven’t seen him much since New York, but apparently the easy air of affection still lives between us. It’s . . . soft. Life turns into a land of marshmallows when he’s around.
James sits back on his hands and eyes the door. “We feeling heavy today?”
We. I bite my lips together and nod.
“Do you want to talk about it?”
Do I? No. I don’t want to let the words out.
I’ve gained so much confidence lately, and I hate how this feels like a step back.
When I packed these tote bags full, ready to chop, slice, and season my way through the night, I was sure I would breeze right into the kitchen and get to work. I was excited to cook in there.
But then—the door.
My confidence dried up on the spot.
So I shake my head no and we sit in silence for a minute before I ask him, “Do you think I’m just being dramatic?”
It’s what I’ve been called plenty of times before.
“You’re asking if I think you’re being dramatic for having a physical response to a traumatic incident in your life?” His brown eyes slide to me.
“Well, when you put it like that . . .”
He presses in a little more against me. “No, Madison. I don’t. I think the fact that you’re still sitting here, working up the nerve to go in, proves how strong and determined you are.”
There he goes again. . . .
“Hey. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you from the beginning about . . . this.” I gesture to the vicinity of my head. “I should have been honest with you from the start about the panic attacks.”
He shrugs a shoulder. “Wouldn’t have changed anything.”
“But we weren’t really friends back then.”
“Sure. But I wanted to be.” When he can tell this announcement has made me stop breathing, his gaze finds mine again. “I just never knew how to get us there. You gave me the perfect window when you called that night.”
I’m speechless even though a thousand thoughts are soaring around my mind. He wanted to be friends. All along. Did he ever want to be more than friends?
That kiss hums in the back of my mind. The way he held me so delicately.
Because I don’t know how to respond to that without being a little too honest about rising feelings, we sit in silence for another minute. And then . . .
“Hey.” James bumps my shoulder with his. “Have I ever told you I’m a terrible cook? I try but it always comes out disgusting or I slice my finger and gush blood. It’s awful.”
“Sounds bad. But I’m not surprised seeing as you’ve been living off of canned beef stew.”
“Maybe we can fix that. Maybe . . . you could teach me how to make something tonight?”
I raise my eyebrows. “Teach you to cook?”
“Yeah. We’ll go in there together, unload all this stuff, and then, whatever you were planning to make, walk me through it step-by-step.” He pins me with a look, then slowly reaches over and locks our fingers together. “Let me go in with you.” And then he amends. “I want to go in with you.”
I breathe in and out. In and out.
“Okay.” I stand from the floor, readying myself to pick up a tote bag, when James’s hand catches mine again.
“Before we go in, though, give me a few minutes. I smell like shit from the farm, so I’m going to go wash up first. I’ll come get you at the cottage when I’m back.”
Wash up, my ass! I mean, he did wash up because he smells incredible, but he was doing much more than that.
Emotion stings my eyes as I take in the softly glowing kitchen. The harsh fluorescent lights are off—unnecessary, since James has filled the room with the gentle warmth of every lamp he owns, lighting the space just for me.
He studies me as I walk inside. And when I don’t say anything, he rubs the back of his neck and asks, “Was this dumb? I thought it might help your reintegration. I remembered you saying the lights were sometimes triggering for you. But . . . if it doesn’t help, we could always just go back to my house and cook.
Or—god, Maddie . . . say something. Are those good tears or bad tears? ”
A laugh slips from my throat even as tears trail down my cheeks.
James watches them fall, then finally relaxes.
“Good tears. Thank you,” I say, but it doesn’t feel like enough.
It was over a month ago when we made cinnamon sugar toast and I told him that little fact about the lights. He not only remembered it but came up with a way to fix it.
“How do you feel in here now?” He’s being so gentle with me, and my knee-jerk reaction is to assume that inside he’s actually laughing at me. Pitying me. Thinking I’m making too much of it.
“Good!” I chirp out a bright answer to throw him off.
“Mm-hmm. So why are you still standing in the doorway?”
“Because I’m just taking it all in.”
“Come on.” He steps closer to me, bends a little toward my ear, and whispers, “When are you going to believe me when I say, ‘I know you, Madison.’ That means I know when you’re lying too.” He lifts the tote bags from my hands, skin brushing against mine. “Take as long as you need.”
He carries the bags to the long worktable in the middle of the kitchen, where he sets them down and begins unloading.
I’ve always thought those industrial islands look like surgical tables. Sharp. Threatening. Where you’ll lay your hopes and dreams and either come off healed or with your heart carved out.
But James is there. My eclectic tote bags. Farm produce and the shadow his body casts.
It doesn’t look so scary.
“I think I’m ready to move,” I finally say.
He looks up at me, a wry smile in place. “Today, or . . . ?”
“Actually, next week sounds great! Maybe after the opening! By the way, I quit! Bye!” I pivot to run, but James is behind me in an instant, forearm hooking around my abdomen and pulling me back in. We’re both laughing, playing, as he turns me around and plants my feet back on the ground.
I like the press of his chest against my back. But then his hand slides down to hold mine, and I think I like that even more? I like everything he does all the time. It might be a problem.
“You can’t decide to quit before we’ve even reached step two.”
“You have an itemized process?! How many steps are there?”
“Somewhere between two and a hundred and eight.” He leads me to the countertop where the bags are all laid out and begins talking—one hand holding mine, the other unloading produce.
I don’t have the heart to tell him I’m actually doing well.
That my heart rate is steady and the usual panic isn’t showing its face.
That he doesn’t have to hold my hand anymore.
I keep these thoughts to myself because I’m selfish and it feels so damn good to have his hand clasped possessively around mine.
I would say that I’ve missed having this physical contact with a man, but that would be untrue. I’ve never experienced this—whatever it is—with anyone else. It has nothing to do with hormones and everything to do with the organ thudding leisurely in my chest.
Reluctantly, I pull my hand away and help unload. I don’t need to feed this desire more than I have already.
“Did you bring any flour, by chance?” James asks casually.
“I did. It’s in that green canvas bag,” I say, pointing to the one on the far side of the counter. “Why?”
“No reason.” He pulls it out, opens it, and scoops his hand directly inside the bag. I’m horrified. Even more so when he hurls it onto the empty stretch of stainless steel.
My mouth falls open. “James. What the hell are you—”
I don’t get to finish. Flour explodes in the center of my chest. White powder mars my black T-shirt, and I stare down at the stark contrast. I’ve been hit.
I raise my eyes to the man with flour-covered hands. “Why?”
His only response is to sprinkle more around himself, like rose petals at a wedding. Deliberate. Defiant. Never breaking eye contact.
The more flour he dispenses, the harder my heart pounds.
I try to keep them at bay, but there’s a breech in the walls. The memories rush inside.
My elbow knocking the sauce ladle. The arc of red across the line, the ruined plate.
Chef Davis’s face in mine, voice like a knife.
“That sauce took two hours. Your stupid, clumsy hands ruined it in five seconds.” And then: “When will you ever prove to me you’re worth keeping on here? My guess? Never.”
The whole kitchen listened.
No one said anything.
I lurch forward, grabbing his wrist as his hand dips inside the bag of flour again. “Stop. You can’t do that!” My voice is hard. Devoid of any playfulness.
“Why?” His tone is a mirror of my own.
I scan the ruined kitchen, and my breath trembles like I’m balancing on a shaky tree limb. “Just—! You can’t!”
James inches closer, voice softening. “Because why, Madison?”
“Because . . .” I’m blinking quickly, tears clogging up my eyes. “Because! I’ll get in trouble!” My answer cracks through the air, ringing like a strike of lightning in the dark.
I want to curl up in a ball and hide. Scurry into a hole where no one can find me. This shame was my shadow in New York, and it’s found me again.
“Who is going to get you in trouble?” He phrases this like a question, but in his eyes I see that he already knows the answer.
It rises in front of me.
“No one,” I whisper, barely audible. “I won’t be in trouble with anyone. There’s no one in here but us.”
“Exactly. This is your kitchen.” He sets the bag of flour aside and moves in close to me, brushing a smudge of flour off my cheek.
“It’s yours, Madison. No one else’s. There’re no rules yet for how you can behave in your own kitchen—because you’re the one to set them.
And that prick, whoever he is, has no power in this kitchen.
Never will.” His voice is impossibly tender, like his thumb running against my jaw.
“Tonight, make a mess if you want. Have a hell of a good time. You’ve earned it. ”
New York taught me that imperfection equals pain. That it’s a flaw to be chiseled away, one brutal critique at a time.
It’s hard to remember that imperfection once meant joy. Creativity.
It was the spark behind late-night recipe experiments, fueled by cheap wine and lit with my sisters’ laughter.
Imperfection used to be my friend. Maybe it’s time to take it by the hand again.
I find the bag of open flour sitting on the counter and dip my hand inside. The fluffy powder is soft against my palm as I scoop it out and toss it into the air.
We’re in a snow globe, and James’s smile is something I’ll never forget.