Chapter 29. Liam
Griff calls me into his office, and my first thought is: what did I do now?
I run through the past week in my head as I walk down the hallway.
I haven't smoked anything. I haven't snuck into restricted areas… I mean, I was fucking Ethan in his office, but it couldn’t be that, or he’d be furious.
I haven't punched anyone. I've been eating my monitored meals without vomiting, which should probably count as a huge win. I've been going to therapy with Dr. Herrera twice a week like a good little boy. I even did my homework. Yeah, I only did it because Ethan supervises it and tells me if I don’t do my homework, he’ll punish me. I do love when he punishes me, but only when it’s for fun.
I still kind of dread that belting he gave me, that was insane, and he promises to do it again if I’m not good.
He also says no more sex unless I walk the line, and, damn, that’s mean.
He says only good boys get to cum, so that’s very effective for me to be good.
Anyway, why does my stomach drop every time Griff wants to see me?
I knock. He grunts, which is Griff for "enter."
He's at his desk, those faded military tattoos peeking from his rolled sleeves, pen in hand. He doesn't look angry. He doesn't look anything, really. Griff's face has two settings: angry and slightly less angry. A little bit like Ethan.
"Sit down, Liam."
I sit. My leg bounces immediately. I press my hand on my knee to stop it.
"I've been speaking with Dr. Herrera," he says. "And with Santos and the dining staff."
Here it comes. More monitoring. More supervision. Probably a new rule where someone watches me breathe.
"They tell me you've been consistent. Eating your meals. Attending your sessions. No incidents." He looks at me over the desk. "That true?"
"Yes, sir." My voice comes out smaller than I want it to. I wish I could be very brave and very unbothered and always say all the things with the incredible confidence Ethan displays. Instead, I sound like a little scared puppy.
"Good." He leans back. "I'm satisfied with your progress. You're not out of the woods, and you'll continue your sessions with Dr. Herrera. But I'm lifting the meal supervision."
I blink. "You're… what?"
"Santos won't be joining you at meals anymore. You'll eat with the others."
Hell fucking yeah! The relief is so sharp it almost hurts. No more corner table. No more silent guard watching me chew. No more every kid in the cafeteria glancing at the freak with the babysitter.
“For real, sir?”
“For real,” he says and smiles.
"Thank you, sir!" I manage to say without crying, but my eyes are burning. Don't cry, don't cry. Not in front of Griff, for the love of God. I mean, he’s seen me crying almost as much as Ethan, but still.
"There's more." He smiles and it looks like he’s genuinely pleased to tell me that.
"You've lost your kitchen duty privileges for some time now.
I'm reinstating them. Starting tomorrow.
Same schedule as before, Tuesday and Thursday afternoons, and you can see Dr. Herrera on Wednesdays. Don't make me regret it."
"I won't, sir. Thank you. Thank you so much!"
Griff's expression is warm, but just for a little bit. Then it's gone, and he's back to his clipboard.
"That's all. Get out of my office."
I chuckle and get out of his office. I walk down the hallway. And then, when I'm sure no one can see me, I pump both fists in the air, bouncing in place.
I get to see Lu again. And Margarete. And Dora. My kitchen crew. My family!
Tuesday takes approximately nine hundred years to arrive. But it does, eventually, and I'm standing outside the kitchen doors fifteen minutes early, bouncing on my feet, probably looking insane as usual.
The kitchen is warm and loud, the way it always is. Someone has the radio on, a small one on the shelf, tuned to a station that plays salsa. The air smells like onions and garlic and something roasting, and I swear my eyes water just from the smell.
Lu spots me first.
"LIAM!" She drops her ladle into the pot and comes at me with her arms open. She's so much shorter than me, but when she hugs me, it's like being swallowed by a warm cloud made of flour. She smells like cumin and coffee.
"My boy," she says into my shoulder, squeezing hard, and I’m squeezing her back. "Where have you been?! We thought they sent you away! We asked that old dog, Griff, and he said you got in trouble but wouldn’t tell us anything anymore. I almost removed his food privileges."
"I'm back!" I say, hugging her just as tight. "I'm back. I missed you all so much."
"You're skinnier," she says, pulling back and holding me at arm's length, inspecting me with those sharp dark eyes. "We need to fix that."
"Lu, I'm fine!"
"Margarete! He's skinnier!"
Margarete appears from behind the industrial fridge, wiping her hands on her apron. Her hair is more red than orange now. She’s also smiling when she sees me.
"Welcome back!" She pulls me into a hug. When she pulls away, she straightens my collar. Dora comes out then, carrying a tray of bread rolls. She sets the tray down and hugs me with one arm, the other hand still in an oven mitt.
"We saved your station," Dora says, with that thick Brazilian accent, pointing to the prep counter near the window, and it means the world to me that she’s actually trying to speak with me in English, something she hates.
“The best station! Thank you, guys,” I say. There are five or six more people working around us, and they all smile at me as well, still focused on their tasks. It really is home.
Lu puts me to work immediately. No small talk, no easing in, she hands me a knife and a pile of onions and says, "Dice. Small. Don't cry."
"The onions or in general?"
"Both."
“But I love crying!” I exclaim, and she laughs, loud.
“You always surprise me, boy, even though this shouldn’t come as a surprise at all,” she says.
“Are you calling me a cry baby?” I ask, pretending to be hurt. She laughs more, and that right here is the reason I wanted to come back to kitchen duty.
I dice, and yes, I do tear up. Only because of the onions, of course. Lu works beside me, chopping peppers with terrifying speed.
"You know," she says casually, not looking up, "we heard some things. About you not eating."
My knife pauses, I look at her, and for half a second, I’m terrified she’s going to scold me or tell me she’s terribly disappointed at me. I can take people angry at me, but disappointed? Oh, boy.
"People talk," she says gently. "Small place."
"Yeah." I resume dicing. "It's... I'm working on it."
"Good." She reaches over and squeezes my wrist once, quick and firm. "You work on it. And you can come here and eat my food, every day. The good one, the one we make only for staff, seasoned, not caring about allergies or nutritional value. Okay?"
"Yes, ma'am."
“I mean it. I’ll talk to Griff. He listens to me,” she says, proud.
“Yes, ma’am,” I repeat. She nods, satisfied, and we keep chopping.
Margarete calls me over to help with the stew. She shows me how she builds the base, browning the meat first, then deglazing the pot with stock, scraping up all the fond from the bottom.
"You can't rush good food," she says. "Unfortunately, good things take time.”
I don't think she's only talking about food.
I'm stirring the pot, following Margarete's instructions about heat levels, when I hear the kitchen door open behind me. I don't turn around because I'm focused on not ruining the stew, but Lu looks up from her station and frowns.
"Can I help you?" she asks, in the tone she reserves for people who enter her kitchen without invitation, which is to say, a tone that could curdle milk.
"Sorry to bother you, ma'am."
It’s Ethan's voice! My heart does a stupid little flip, and I turn around, my mouth hanging open.
"I'm here to check the inventory logs for Griff. He needs the supply numbers for the monthly report."
That is, without a doubt, the most made-up excuse I've ever heard in my life.
Griff has never once in his career asked a student leader to check kitchen inventory logs.
Ethan is here because he wants to see me.
The thought makes me so giddy I almost stir the stew off the stove, and I'm standing there with the silliest smile, bouncing like a chihuahua.
"The logs are in the office," Margarete says, nodding toward the small room in the back. "Help yourself."
But Ethan doesn't go to the office. He lingers, looking around the kitchen with genuine curiosity. His eyes land on me, and I watch him fight the smile. He loses.
"Liam, I didn't know you were back on kitchen duty," he says. Liar. Such a terrible liar. I told him yesterday. Twice. And then again this morning.
"Yep. Just started." I stir the pot and try to look casual. I'm failing. I can feel my face doing the puppy thing.
Lu looks between us with narrowed eyes. She's not stupid. "You want to come in, you wear a hair net. Those are the rules."
I turn around so fast I almost knock the ladle off the pot. "You should! Come in. I'll show you around. I mean. Lu, can I show him around?" I'm way too eager. I need to calm down. I can't calm down.
“If he behaves,” she says.
“He’s the best ever at behaving! I pinky promise!” I exclaim. Lu chuckles.
“Then, sure,” she says. I grab a hair net from the box by the door and hold it out to him.
He takes the hair net and stretches it over his head. His brown hair pokes through the elastic in weird tufts, and he looks so ridiculous, so un-Ethan, that I try not to laugh but immediately fail.
"Don't," he warns.
"I'm not saying anything."
"You're thinking it."
"You look great. Very professional. Very sexy."
"I'm leaving."
"No, stay! Come on." I grab his arm and pull him toward my station. "Lu, Margarete, Dora, this is Ethan. He's my... leader. And we sleep together. I mean! We room together!"
"The famous Ethan," Lu says, looking him up and down. "Liam talks about you all the time."
"He does?" Ethan glances at me.
"No, I don't," I say immediately. "She's exaggerating. I mentioned you once. Maybe twice."
"Every single shift," Margarete whispers to Ethan from behind her hand. "So you're the one keeping this one out of trouble."
"Trying to," Ethan says. "It's hard. A full-time job."
"Tell me about it," Lu says. "This boy burns everything. He set a towel on fire. And his own hand!"
"The towel was near the burner! It wasn't my fault!"
"It was on the burner because you put it there, even if I told you a million times not to do that," Lu says and hits me with a dish towel.
“Sorry, Lu,” I say, in my best puppy voice. She rolls her eyes but she’s smiling.
Ethan is smiling too.
"Can he cook?" Ethan asks Lu about me, like I'm not standing right here.
Lu smiles. "Of course. He’s learning with us, after all. He's good with a knife. Terrible with heat. No patience. But he learns."
"That sounds about right," Ethan says.
"Hey!"
"Come, come," Lu says, waving Ethan toward her station. "You want to try? I'm making chili."
I watch Ethan step up to Lu's station. He picks up a knife, and Lu adjusts his grip.
"No, like this, you're not stabbing it, you're guiding it," and he listens with that intense focus he gives everything, and it’s very fucking sexy. Within a minute, he's dicing peppers with a precision that makes my dicing look like a baby tried to do it.
"Oh, he's good," Margarete says, leaning over my shoulder. "You should teach Liam.”
"Hey!!" I repeat.
"He has steady hands," Margarete observes. "The nursing program?"
"Yes, ma'am," Ethan says.
Lu beams. "Very good. A natural.”
“His ego doesn’t need this much praise,” I say. Lu laughs. Ethan chuckles.
He stays for almost an hour. Helps Lu with the chili.
Asks Margarete about the stew technique.
Listens to Dora explain how she learned to make bread from her grandmother in Bahia, and Dora actually talks nonstop to him, which makes me so jealous.
He doesn't talk much but he's present, and attentive, and the women are eating him up.
At some point, Lu hands him a spoonful of the chili to taste. He blows on it, takes a careful bite, and his eyes close for a second.
"That's incredible," he says.
"Of course it is," Lu says. "Now imagine if they let us cook like this for everyone. Instead of that cardboard they make us serve."
"Can I have some?!" I ask, and Lu points her spoon at me.
“You must have some,” she says and fills a whole plate for me. “We’ll help you take care of him, Ethan.”
“Thank you, ma’am, I truly appreciate it,” Ethan says, and looks at me like he’s proud of me.
My eyes water again. I’ve never had people take care of me like this. I feel ridiculous, as usual. I always want to cry.
When it's time for Ethan to go, as he does have actual duties, even if the inventory logs were fiction, he pulls off the hair net, and his hair is ridiculous. I resist the urge to fix it. In front of everyone, at least.
"Thank you for letting me visit," he tells the kitchen crew. Formal. Polite. So Ethan.
"Come back anytime," Lu says.
Ethan catches my eye on his way out. One look. And he’s smiling. Fuck, that man kills me with just a look. Then he's gone, the kitchen door swinging shut behind him.
Lu watches the door for a moment. Then she turns to me, ladle in hand, eyebrow raised.
"Leader," she says, knowingly.
"Yep. My leader. That's all."
"Mm-hmm. The same way he came here to check inventory logs." She goes back to stirring. "He's a good one."
"I know! I mean, yes, he is," I say, a little too excited, as usual. She chuckles.
"Don't screw it up."
"I'll try my best. Really, really."