Chapter 16
“Gemma!” Mebel says, rushing forward and engulfing the girl in a hug. She’s missed Gemma so much, and also, she doesn’t want to give her the chance to slam the door in her face.
“Mebel,” Gemma says, shock apparent in her voice. “What are you doing here?”
“I come to find you,” Mebel says. She releases Gemma and takes her in. To her surprise, she feels tears moistening her eyes. After all this time, she can’t help but see Gemma as an honorary daughter, and the sight of her standing there is bringing up so many emotions.
Gemma’s expression softens for a moment, but then she glances over Mebel’s shoulder and tenses. “Look, Mebs, I left because I just—the atmosphere at the school just got so toxic, and it was wreaking havoc on my mental health. I don’t really want to talk about it.”
“What?” Mebel’s head is swimming. She tries her best to parse through these terms that Gemma is saying.
Toxic? Mental health? Sammy has said these words before, but Mebel has always dismissed them as a “young people thing.” She scours her mind for any signs of toxicity in the culinary school.
Well, she can’t deny that there’s certainly a lot of it recently, but it only happened after the competition was announced.
Before that, they were doing just fine, weren’t they?
They’d created their own little friend group, and the camaraderie was wonderful.
“I don’t understand,” Mebel says. “We talk about it over tea. I got clover honey for you, I know you like it.” She hands Gemma the bag of honey and takes off her shoes before letting herself into the house. “Oh, and Alain is here also.”
“Uh—” Gemma says, struggling with the bag of honey and hurrying after Mebel. “I really don’t think—”
“This is a nice place, is very you,” Mebel says, plopping down on the sofa and looking around her appreciatively.
It is the tiniest house Mebel has ever been in.
The ceiling is so low that if Mebel were to stand on tiptoes and reach up, she would be able to touch it, and she is barely five foot two on good days.
The living room can only fit a two-seater sofa plus a chair and a coffee table the size of a wine crate.
In fact, Mebel realizes, the coffee table is made out of a wine crate.
Gemma has taken care to put a vase of fresh flowers on it, which makes the whole thing look rather charming.
The walls are painted a muted dusty pink and hung with watercolor paintings.
“Um, thank you. Sorry, it isn’t very big. It’s not a very good place for guests, I’m afraid.” Gemma stands there, her wide-eyed gaze bouncing back and forth from Mebel to Alain. “Mebel, I just don’t think there’s very much to discuss. I’m quite a lot happier since leaving the school.”
“Why?” Mebel says, confused.
Alain sits down next to her. Gemma glances at him, and Mebel kicks herself for bringing Alain in here. She should’ve told him to wait in the car. Of course Gemma wouldn’t want to talk bad about the school in front of him, especially with the knowledge that he holds so much power there.
As though sensing their discomfort, Alain says, “I’ll wait outside.
Take your time.” He stands and plants a kiss on Mebel’s cheek.
As he leaves, he reaches out and gives Gemma a single pat on the shoulder.
“I hope you work out whatever it is that’s been bothering you. ” With that, he leaves the house.
Mebel turns back to Gemma. “Well? You explain yourself.”
Gemma hugs the bag of honey to her chest. “Wha-what’s there to explain?”
“You leave without telling anyone!” Mebel cries. “Why you don’t even tell me?”
Gemma’s eyes roam the room, as though searching for an escape route. “I don’t know—I just—it all got too much. I struggle with anxiety, and it was getting worse in the school.”
“Anxiety?” Mebel says. She has no idea what “anxiety” means in this sense. “You mean like stress?”
“Something like that, but more persistent. It’s something I feel most of the time, whether or not there’s something worth getting anxious over.
Obviously it gets worse when there are triggers, like the competition,” she says, her words coming out faster and faster as she speaks.
She stops herself, and as she looks at Mebel, her face falls.
“I’m sorry, Mebs. Oh, I hope they let you partner up with someone else after I left. ”
“They don’t,” Mebel says. “I am doing the duck course all alone. You need to come back. This anxiety thing, I will give you some Chinese ginseng, it will cure for sure.”
Gemma laughs, but there is no humor in it. “I don’t think it’s something that can be cured with ginseng.”
“How you know? You never try before.”
“I just know, okay, Mebel?” Gemma cries, frustration bleeding through her usually soft voice.
The anger in Gemma’s voice reminds Mebel of Sammy when he says things like, “Ma, you just don’t get it, okay?
” She’s always felt so hurt when he says stuff like that, because she’s always prided herself on being understanding, on being one of the more open-minded parents in her generation.
She listens when he tells her things, she got herself familiarized with social media so she can have a peek into the lives of youths nowadays.
She really does try to keep her mind flexible so it can accommodate the new generation’s needs and quirks.
The ones who don’t get it aren’t her; it’s them.
They don’t get that old dogs can learn new tricks, if the old dog is appropriately motivated, and Mebel is very much motivated.
She digs deep and draws from her experience with Sammy, draws from the times where she did manage to reach past their generational gap and get to him.
“You’re right,” she says to Gemma. “Maybe I don’t understand. But I know one thing, and that is you belong at the culinary school. You are talented cook, Gemma. Everyone knows. Your technique is very smooth, you learn all the method so well, and you have good instinct for flavor.”
Gemma looks like she’s about to burst into tears. “You’re just saying that to be nice.”
Mebel snorts. “I have never been accuse of being nice.”
Gemma rolls her eyes, but she looks like she’s suspiciously trying to hide her smile. “That’s true. Look, Mebs, I appreciate you coming all the way here—although, hang on, how did you find my address? Did the school give it to you? Because that’s a serious breach of privacy.”
“No, I have my ways,” Mebel says with a flippant wave of her hand. “Are you sure you not coming back?”
Gemma nods, not meeting Mebel’s eyes. “I’m sure.”
“Okay,” Mebel says.
Gemma’s eyebrows rise up into her hairline. “Okay? Just like that?”
Mebel shrugs. “Yes. I accept your decision. If you say you not coming back, then, okay, you not coming back.”
“Wow, okay. That’s surprisingly accepting of you. Thank you.”
“But I still need your help.”
Gemma frowns. “What with?”
And so Mebel tells Gemma about her duck course being pirated by Kate and Matt.
“Oh, those bastards!” Gemma cries. “I knew they weren’t trustworthy. Kate’s always got this shifty look about her, and Matt—”
“Matt look like he is drug dealer,” Mebel says.
Gemma laughs. “Oh my god, he really does, doesn’t he? Ugh, how could they do this? Well, I know why they did it, because orange peel and brown sugar syrup? That’s brilliant, Mebs. I can’t believe you came up with that all on your own. That’s amazing.”
“Thank you, yes, it is, but now I don’t know what new thing to come up with.”
“Hello, earth to Mebel, you’re with Chef Alain? One of the most well-regarded Michelin-star chefs in the world? Why don’t you ask him?”
Mebel shakes her head. “Because if I do, then people say, ‘Oh, you win just because you sleeping with Chef Alain.’ No, I need to do this myself. Or with my partner, which is you. You owe me, Gemma.”
“Okay.” Gemma taps her chin for a moment, then gets up and leaves the living room. When she comes back a minute later, she’s carrying a notebook. “All right, let’s see.”
Mebel leans forward. It’s a book containing all of Gemma’s notes on anything food-related.
There are recipes, notes on different methods of cooking, musings about different ingredients, and so on.
The entire thing is very impressive, and Mebel has to bite her tongue from using it as proof that Gemma belongs at a culinary school.
“How about dry-aging the duck with butter that has Chinese spices mixed into it?” Gemma says. She glances at the bag of honey and adds, “Oh! That’ll go really well with clover honey, actually, won’t it?”
Mebel considers this for a second before nodding. “Ah yes. Chinese five-spice powder, star aniseed, cloves, soy sauce, and sugar. I love this combination, I always eat Chinese boiled peanuts for snack, and they use this combination.”
“Yep, except instead of sugar, I think you should use the clover honey.”
Mebel nods more enthusiastically. “Yes, it go so well with the Peking duck confit dish. But you don’t think is too traditional?”
Gemma grins. “No, because you are going to top the dish with this.” She holds up the open notebook and points to a page filled with barely legible writing.
Mebel squints at it. “I need my reading glasses to read your chicken scratch writing, Gemma.”
Gemma laughs. “I came across a review of a Michelin-starred restaurant that tops their duck dish with crumbled crunchy duck skin. How amazing does that sound? I haven’t eaten there, obviously—can’t afford to—but I did my own research and experiments, and I think I’ve got it.
Here’s my recipe for crumbled duck skin. It is divine, Mebs.”
“Crumbled crunchy duck skin,” Mebel muses, shaking her head in awe. “I don’t know how people think such things. And you figure out how to do yourself?”
“It took a while, but yep.”