Chapter 16 The Food We Kept Forgetting on the Stove
The Food We Kept Forgetting on the Stove
Olivia
Carmello had his hand tangled in my curls, my lips were kiss-plumped, face flushed when we were caught by the deep freezers in the back room. I was shivering a little, goose bumps visible when his mom switched on the light.
“This is a business. My restaurant,” said Celia. “Show some respect.”
For days after that, I was too embarrassed to be in the kitchen.
I couldn’t even look Carmello in the eye.
And I really didn’t want to lose my job.
When Carmello first asked me why I never seemed to want to go home, I wondered if he thought my parents were abusive or if I was unhappy with them.
Neither of those things was true. But for the first time since my house burned down, I had a place that I kept wanting to come back to.
At Celia Rodriguez’s restaurant, Paula taught me to bake time-consuming things like pumpkin cheesecake.
She talked to me about prom and glitter eyeshadow.
Celia showed her love by letting me look through her family recipe books and answering my food-related questions even when she was busy.
I started to dream about what it would be like to walk the stage with my new friend Veronica.
And there was Carmello too. Of course there was.
We were becoming real friends, and two days without talking to him was feeling like an eternity, but I didn’t want to risk losing any of it.
I told my parents I was worried I’d get fired, and my mother said, “Maybe it’s for the best. We can’t take him with us when we go, and there will be other restaurants.
Other passions and hobbies. When you’re a teenager, everything feels like a crisis, but there are real crises we have to help with. These feelings will eventually pass.”
It’s what she said about everything since the fire.
Pack light. Don’t buy things you don’t need.
We won’t be able to take them with us when we go.
But I was convinced nowhere would be like Celia’s.
And no one would ever be Carmello. Still, I reminded myself of my mother’s words when I went to work the next day.
My feelings for him were growing too big, coming on too fast, and what the hell would I do when I had to leave?
I had to save myself the heartache. So, I tried to seem detached, but Carmello wouldn’t stop searching for me with his eyes.
Halfway through the day, I realized our bodies were like magnets: it took force to go in the opposite direction as him.
When my shift was over, Celia asked to have a word with me and Carmello.
I sat beside him on an upside-down milk carton, sure that a lecture would lead to me getting fired.
But Celia folded her hands together and said, “If you’re going to use my restaurant to…
spend time together, do it right. None of that kissing while you work.
Stop staring at each other. I’m sick of you two burning food.
Your first date will be here. After hours on Saturday. Wear something nice. Both of you.”
Neither I nor Carmello argued with her order, and I left the restaurant that day wondering if the person that might be hardest for me to detach from when I had to go would be Celia.
***
On Saturday, I showed up at Celia’s Place with a ball of nerves in my stomach, but the worst part was the heels.
I always had an eye for fashion, but because I spent time with my parents protesting and helping people after hurricanes, my “packing light” consisted of comfort clothes and shoes.
They also didn’t make much money doing what they did for work, so I didn’t want to ask them for a new dress.
When I confessed to Veronica that I had a date with Carmello but nothing nice to wear, she said, “I can help you with that.”
We had started talking months before when I ran into her at Celia’s Place.
I recognized her as the outspoken girl in my gym class, but it shocked me hearing that Celia was her aunt and Carmello was her cousin.
That night, she taught me how to apply makeup for my face shape and let me roam through her closet, putting together an outfit that looked like something I’d saved on Pinterest. I felt so damn pretty looking in the mirror.
Even though her heels were half a size too big, and I kept tripping on my way into Celia’s Place, I thought it was worth it when Carmello looked at me with the kind of wide eyes that told me he thought I looked pretty too.
The boy was naturally quiet, but rarely was he speechless.
Celia made appetizers and Paula made the banana pudding. The two of them decorated the restaurant with fresh flowers and color-changing lighting. There was sparkling water waiting for us inside of champagne glasses, and music was playing on a speaker.
“Have fun,” Paula said to us. Celia gave us a nod and they left us alone.
And then we laughed and teased and talked. I smiled so much my cheeks hurt. Carmello asked questions other people were scared to—like what memories I had of my home before the fire. If I missed it there. What it felt like when I escaped but had to watch it burn to the ground.
I told him I remembered almost everything, including the color of my bed skirt and the smell of my mom’s cooking still lingering in the house from that morning.
I told him it felt like my world was turning to ash while it was happening.
All of my dolls, books, clothes, gone. But I didn’t watch it burn to the ground because I was in an ambulance, rushed to the hospital for the third-degree burn on my hand.
Kids are resilient, they told my parents once I was feeling a little better, and I tried to remember how much worse it could’ve been.
Carmello listened quietly, and I loved that I knew him enough by then to know he didn’t think I was talking too much.
When the song on the radio changed, I asked him to teach me to dance salsa.
He said he wasn’t great at it, but if I wanted to learn he’d show me.
So, I took his hand and tried my best, but he quickly noticed how horrible I was in heels.
“Do those hurt?” he asked, smiling a little.
“It’s excruciating,” I confessed. “I’m now convinced heels are the devil’s work.”
He laughed and led me to a chair. My stomach somersaulted watching him get on one knee to gently help me out of them. Afterward, he spun me in silly circles all around the room.
But when Frank Ocean’s “Thinkin Bout You” started to play, he pulled me into a slower dance, and I couldn’t tell what he was thinking.
My mind was racing, wondering what it meant that we were on a date with him staring into my eyes like that.
He was a foot taller than me without the heels, and had to bend low to kiss my lips.
It was the first time we had kissed since his mom caught us, and I missed the feeling so much.
But when he broke away to raise my hand to his mouth so that he could place his lips to my scarred palm, I knew I’d eventually miss more than just his touch.
I couldn’t feel his kisses against my leathery skin, but my heart caught fire.
My belly too. The tips of my toes. I was spinning inside but we were standing still.
That’s when I realized there was one question I still hadn’t answered. I wouldn’t. Not that night. If I wasn’t shy about my feelings for him at fifteen, I might’ve said that sometimes I missed my home, but I believed in fate. We wouldn’t be dancing together if it didn’t burn down.