Drake
I looked up in surprise at Grey’s appearance. If I’d thought him casual and unruffled earlier, this was a huge difference. His face was so plainly and coldly furious that I almost took an involuntary step back.
But even from the moment he stepped inside, it was very clear that I was not the target of his anger.
That was directed straight towards the dishwashing alcove, where Luca still stood working away at the sink.
I shot my eyes back to the door; it had swung shut, but the diners were still out there, and it was hardly soundproof. Yes, a lot of the noise was reduced when the door was fully closed, but a loud shout would easily be heard by the diners nearest to the kitchen. Was Grey going to make a scene right now, after we’d all worked so hard to pull off this intense service?
He stalked towards the sink with his fists clenched, and before I had the chance to say or do anything, Rafael was moving in step with him like a silent shadow. He had a wary expression on his face and open hands like he was preparing to step in between them.
Should I do something? Or leave it to Rafael, who has been here longer and knows Grey better?
“What is this?” Grey asked, waving a piece of rectangular white paper in the air. Even from here, far enough away that I had no hope of reading the words on it, I could tell what it was: a customer’s bill.
“Um,” Luca said. He stopped washing dishes, letting the one he’d been working on slip back under the foamy water.
“It says here,” Grey continued, in a voice that was deadly quiet – a deliberate choice, it seemed, to avoid disturbing the customers while he took his pound of flesh. “That one of our customers had to be served the same dish three times because of dirty plates.”
Luca swallowed. “I heard, but –” he started.
I winced. Anyone in the room could tell that the word ‘but’ was not going to be what Grey wanted to hear.
“Can you please tell me,” Grey hissed. “Why I’ve just had to comp a steak dinner, a cheesecake, and five drinks for a man who was served with not one, but two dirty plates?”
“Grey,” Rafael said. His tone was low, a warning, but a respectful one. “He’s just a kid, and he’s new. It’s a mistake. That’s all.”
“ Don’t interfere,” Grey snapped like thunder. “Luca, I’m waiting for an answer.”
“Sir, I…” he started, but his words fell into stammering and he seemed to have nothing to say. His face was pale and he seemed unable to lift his eyes to meet Grey’s. I felt for him – badly.
But I was also in a lot of pain, and I was starting to have trouble concentrating on anything else. The last few hours had been brutal: on our feet, no rests, no breaks, just constant plating and prepping. I wasn’t sure how much longer I was going to be able to hold up without the adrenaline of service pushing me forward, and as much as I felt bad for not stepping in, Rafael was already there.
And not doing a hell of a lot of good, from what I was seeing.
“Why did I just have to give away free food and drink to the tune of more money than you’ve earned tonight?” Grey asked, relentlessly shaking the bill in the air. “I would say I’d dock your wages, but you can’t afford to pay me the difference!”
“That’s enough,” Rafael said. “I know Luca understands that he made a mistake. We’ve all made mistakes here and there.”
Grey’s nostrils flared and he opened and closed his fists, rolling his head to look at Rafael. “Luca,” he said, without looking back in the kid’s direction. “Go wait for me in my office.”
“Yes, sir,” he muttered, starting to walk across the kitchen, drying his hands on a rag tucked into his belt as he went.
“ Not through the restaurant,” Grey said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. “Go around back.”
I hadn’t even known there was a back entrance to the office, and I’d been working here just slightly longer than Luca had. I frowned. How was the kid supposed to win this one? He looked like he was about to burst into tears.
“Rafael, I would advise you not to question me in front of my staff,” Grey hissed. “You are not Head Chef yet. This is a very quick way of showing me that I can’t trust you with that level of responsibility.”
Rafael opened his mouth like he was about to say something, and then closed it. I watched him visibly back down; he put his hands behind his back, ducked his head, and looked at the floor.
“Good,” Grey snapped and spun on his heel back towards his office.
I took the moment, in which everyone else was staring at him and Rafael was still looking at the ground, as my chance to escape.
I had to.
I couldn’t take the pain anymore.
I walked calmly towards the hall that led down between the storage units, made a split-second and not particularly thought-out decision to head into the dry storage rather than the walk-in, and grabbed the pills out of my pocket. I shook the bag and two fell out; I only needed a moment of thought to add a third. It had been a long time since I’d been in pain this bad, and there was no way I was going to get home without relief.
I had just managed to bring the pills to my mouth when I heard him behind me.
“What the hell are you doing?” Rafael asked. He’d seen it all. I hadn’t thought about my angles, about how to hide what I was doing; he’d had a clear view of my face from the side, and besides, the bag of pills was still in my hand.
I swallowed.
Nothing else mattered right now apart from getting relief.
“Are you taking drugs in here right now?” Rafael spluttered, grabbing me by the shoulder and swinging me around to face him. I moaned under my breath, just slightly; the pain in the motion of my arm was offset now by the rapidly growing relief of the pills taking root in my system.
“I’m not taking drugs,” I said. “They’re painkillers.”
Rafael stared at me. His eyes were wide behind his glasses, his expression almost blank with how amazed he was. “You’re… you’re popping painkillers like candy? Is that supposed to be better than if they were a different kind of drug?”
“It’s just a painkiller,” I sighed. I was exhausted, the pain had been so intense I felt weak, and the relief now flooding my system wasn’t exactly making it easier for me to pay attention. “Please, Raf. Give me a break, right now. Isn’t there something more important for you to focus on?”
I wanted him to go away and leave me alone. To go check on Luca and defend him like the white knight he so obviously wanted to be. I wanted to just go fucking home.
“My name,” he said through gritted teeth. “Is Rafael .”
“Okay, okay,” I said. “Rafael. Whatever.”
“Not whatever.” He held out a hand. “Give me the pills.”
“Why?” I frowned.
“So I can see what they are.”
“You’re not going to be able to see what they are,” I said. “Unless you were once struck by lightning in a drugstore and now you have the ability to identify any type of medication through sight alone.”
Rafael glared at me. “Because they’re in a bag, not a bottle? That’s what I saw, isn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“Where’s the bottle?”
“I don’t have it with me. I bag them at home.”
Rafael shook his head. “Why the hell would you bag them?” he asked, raising his hands and then pushing his glasses up his nose as if he was dealing with the most illogical person in the world.
“The bottle rattles,” I said.
“… So you take the pills and put them into a bag in order to avoid being caught taking them?”
I took a breath. That hadn’t been what I wanted to convey. I mean, he was fucking right, but not for the reasons he thought he was. “I…”
“Do you have a prescription for these?” he asked.
“Yeah,” I said.
“Can I see the proof?”
I shrugged. “It’s on the bottle.”
“Which is where?”
“At home,” I said exasperatedly.
“So, I can’t see the proof?”
I groaned with frustration and put a hand against my forehead. It was a good job I’d taken the pills already, or Rafael would have been giving me a headache.
“Just because you’re upset about Luca being yelled at doesn’t mean you can take it out on me,” I said. “Or whatever it was that you were mad about earlier that had you slamming the pans around whenever Grey came into the kitchen.”
Rafael scoffed. “You mean you seriously think everyone in that kitchen couldn’t figure out what you were doing when you went into the walk-in earlier?”
I thought back. Had he already suspected back then that I was taking pills? How? I’d been careful until now. I hadn’t been this desperate before.
Rafael shook his head with disgust at me, and I felt my resolve crumble.
I was tired. I had given everything today. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad if I told him what was really going on and admitted my one weakness. Even though we were rivals, I had a feeling that Rafael would never be the kind of person to use it against me.
I opened my mouth to answer, raising my head –
And realized that Rafael was gone, stalking out of the storage room and back through the corridor toward the exit.
I didn’t have to follow him to know where he was going, but I did anyway. By the time he got to Grey’s office, I had to have something prepared. I needed to deal with this before all hope of winning the Head Chef position slipped away.
But the pills had made my reaction times slow, and – just as I was thinking to myself that maybe, on this dosage, I had better not drive myself home after all – I reached the office’s back door as Rafael was coming back out of it.
“Here he is,” he said with some triumph.
“,” Grey said, pronouncing my name like a sentence. He clearly still hadn’t calmed down from his earlier confrontation with Luca. “You’d better come inside.”