Chapter 10 #2
I wanted to go to culinary school, but I didn’t.
For the first time, I see that as a beautiful thing.
Everything I know about cooking and baking, I learned here.
And not just from my dad. My mom might not have grown up with this as her family legacy, but she married into it.
It might not be her passion, but she loves my dad, and she loves me.
She’s imparted plenty of knowledge to me over the years, things my dad wouldn’t have thought to tell me.
Of the two of them, he’s more patient, but she has a way of explaining things that makes them so easy to understand.
Luca and Dad wash up at the big stainless sink. Dad tosses him a full apron and a hair net, and Luca gives a rueful laugh as he sheds his hoodie.
Dad doesn’t miss a beat, and Mom keeps her eyes on me. We know about Luca’s accident, but I’m not sure what they were prepared to expect. To their credit, they give nothing away. They don’t stare, and they don’t make him feel like he’s broken or ruined or an outsider.
I didn’t just learn how to bake in here.
I learned so much more about life. About kindness. About patience, persistence, continuity, teamwork, and love.
That’s what I went to New York to save. It wasn’t a building. It wasn’t even a family legacy. It was our hearts. Our family.
I clench Mom’s hand, and we sit and watch my family’s kitchen miracle play out in front of our eyes.
Dad works on the filling. Apple and blackberry.
It’s one of our blue-ribbon-winning pies from a few years ago.
It also happens to be my favorite. My parents could have picked anything.
The bakery has over fifty different types of pies available for custom order.
It hits me right in the feels, and it’s already feeling, thank you very much, like they did this for me.
It’s doubly as special that Luca is side by side with my dad.
Luca doesn’t make pie crust like anyone else I’ve ever seen.
I mean, his methods are strange.
I have no idea why he’s putting cream cheese into it, but my dad just watched him go into the walk-in cooler and get it, so this must be standard practice for them.
Secret recipes.
I try very hard not to watch Luca specifically, but the counter is across the kitchen.
He has his back to me most of the time, and it’s a struggle to keep my eyes from continuously seeking out his ass like a homing pigeon and then fixing my gaze there.
I decide the apron strings are the safest place to look, but they’re tied at the small of his back, right above his rock-hard, incredible ass.
Not very helpful.
Full temptation mode was activated ten minutes ago.
Is there anything sexier than watching someone in their element?
Speaking of miracles, it’s definitely a miracle that I haven’t spontaneously combusted or had to reach for the fire extinguisher to put out the internal smoke show that’s going down in my insides.
If my ovaries get any hotter, we won’t even need an oven to bake that pie.
I could make comments about my nipples being sharp enough to cut the pie after. Yeah.
I really need to focus on not being Captain Total Fucking Obvious while my parents are right here, but I’ve had more than a low-level buzz going on ever since I second-hand tasted that champagne straight from Luca’s mouth.
That was the strangest and also the hottest thing anyone has ever done with me.
It makes me think Luca would be a little bit… on the wild side in bed. And into things that other people wouldn’t even think of trying.
Great. Not helping.
I focus on the pie instead of on Luca. It’s hard but not impossible.
The longer I force myself, the easier it gets.
I’m not just warm in a physical sense. The spirit of contentment in this kitchen wraps around me.
This is the sense of peace that’s been missing.
I couldn’t comprehend it because I wasn’t here the last time it was this real. But I see it now. I get it.
It’s not just my dad. It’s Luca too. They don’t say very many words to each other, but they work side by side as though they’ve done it for a lifetime.
Their postures are easy. They exchange smiles, and they laugh with their eyes.
They pass each other ingredients and make space for each other.
When they divide the dough and start rolling it out side by side, my mom and I both sigh. I’m officially slain.
The curse might not have been real, but this is. Happiness. Contentment. Elation. Joy. Camaraderie. Brotherhood. And the boundless depths of friendship. If I keep thinking about it, I’m going to get weepy again.
The pie isn’t anything fancy. My dad doesn’t do some wild design with the pastry, creating edible artwork like he sometimes does.
When Luca has the bottom rolled out, he sets it in the pan with a single motion that speaks of years of practice.
He empties out the filling, and my dad crosshatches the top.
I thought the pie was it. The hard part. The silent communications. The unspoken apologies. The line from the past to the future.
I don’t know why Dad has such a solemn expression on his face when he comes back from putting the pie in the far top oven.
He never uses anything to measure out ingredients, and he doesn’t set a timer.
Ever. Some people have an internal compass when it comes to directions.
That’s my dad, but with baking. It’s years of practice, but I also call it passion and genius.
Mom reaches over and takes my hand again. She squeezes tightly, holding onto me like an anchor and like she needs anchoring all at once. I snap my eyes to her face. She’s wearing the same kind of heavy-lined, shadowed expression that my dad has on.
Luca leans against the prep table and crosses his arms over his massive chest. The stance makes his arms do delicious things and his veins something even more decadent. I quickly flick my eyes to his face. He’s watching my parents carefully, and he has himself locked down.
If he’s silently doing the fuck’s sake, here we go, the pie was just a test, and now the real shit is going down thing in his mind, I can’t tell.
Dad stops, creating a Lucahug and group hug between us in the chairs and Luca over at the prep table. He sighs so long and loud that it seems to creep into my chest and wind me up, tying my lungs and stomach in knots.
“This may not be the right time to tell you this, Dulcie, but I’ve been doing a lot of thinking. Your mother and I both have.”
This kitchen is so tense now that I understand my poor rental car’s pain at hearing the crack and knowing it was right in the path of the sound of major destruction and couldn’t move or get away.
If the car could have thoughts, that is.
I sympathize. I know Dad is about to drop something major on me.
“The bakery has been in the family for generations. As the oldest son, I didn’t get a choice.
It was made for me before I was born. I’ve tried to make it my passion, and I feel as though I’ve failed, but that’s on me.
” Dad points to himself, his finger trembling in mid-air.
He turns to Luca with one of the saddest expressions I’ve ever seen.
“It was convenient to say you took the magic when you left, instead of looking at myself. The truth is, when you were here, this was fun. It was more than bearable. It was something I didn’t have to wake up every day and endure. ”
Crack? No. This is no mere tree falling.
This is the sky coming down. More like BLAM, SCREECH, CRASH, WRENCH, GRIND, SILENCE.
All in screaming capitals. Especially the last part.
The silence in the kitchen is the loudest sound I’ve ever heard.
The soft buzz of the oven is nearly unbearable as it’s so magnified in my brain.
You never realize how painful your own head can be until you’ve got a migraine or one of those frontal lobe headaches that settle in right behind your eyes.
Dad’s words just drilled through my skull and burrowed into my brain.
They fly out from there as impulses, shooting through my bloodstream and embedding themselves in my tissue and bone.
“You can’t be… Dad…” I choke. “Why did you never say anything?” I’m so sorry in advance for my poor mom’s hand. Because I’m clenching the ever-loving shit out of it.
Dad hangs his head. “I should have. I just… never felt like I could. That’s the real reason your mother wanted you to choose your own path. She hoped that one day I’d retire and sell the bakery, and we’d go and do the things we’ve waited a lifetime to do.”
I lean so far forward in the chair that I nearly tip myself out of it.
All those pieces I should have put together and kind of did, but not really…
they all hit hard, making a terrible kind of sense.
I used to think my family had no other choice in their destiny when their last name was Piecroft, and maybe Dad thought that way too.
He had a lot of pressure on him and expectations from the family.
My grandparents, especially. It makes so much sense why he felt he couldn’t say those words out loud.
Did he ever even dare to whisper them to my mom?
Or did she just know and coax him into conversations about what my future should be?
“I love this place,” I protest, though I’m not sure what I’m protesting about. It just needs to be said.
“That’s good. I’m glad you’ve been inspired here and that you have fond memories.”
“They’re more than fond!” I exclaim.