Chapter 3
As promised, Priya arrived at Alethea’s apartment early the next afternoon with a big brown paper bag full of produce, and a massive grin that gave away just how excited she was to finally get a chance at teaching Alethea to cook. “This is going to be so much fun!” Priya squealed as she darted to the kitchen, her suede kitten heels lightly clattering across the tile. Alethea had never seen polka dot suede shoes before, but leave it to Priya to find a gem like those. They did perfectly coordinate with the polka dot apron her friend had tied around her waist before she began unloading the veggies onto the dark granite counter, the brightness of the leafy greens accentuated by the stark black countertop.
“You have such a weird definition of fun sometimes,” Alethea complained, but she made her way over to the island and took a seat on one of the leather bar stools, watching Priya pull one vegetable after the other out of the bag. “Ok, so what are we making?”
“I figured we’d start with something pretty basic. Easy and fast to make but it tastes like you spent forever slaving away in the kitchen.” Priya picked up a small yellow onion and a big bunch of dark green kale from the bounty on the counter. “Okay, while I chop this onion, you wash off the kale leaves.”
Alethea sucked in a deep breath and surrendered to the fact that she would be spending her afternoon doing the one thing that she was famously bad at. Rationally, she knew she had no other choice but to start cooking for herself. She was broke. This resignation made that ever-present knot of anger and hurt in her belly start to swell. The promotion she had been expecting would have brought her up to a six-figure salary, yet now here she was pinching pennies. She had looked up to Susan. Respected her, trusted her! Worst of all, Alethea had even tried to emulate the woman she had thought of as her mentor. Thinking of that now made her stomach churn even more.
“Merrup!” Dandelion made a soft noise as she nuzzled against Alethea’s shin, jarring her out of her spiraling thoughts.
“Oh, you want a better view of the action, do you?” Alethea scooped up her purring feline and gently set her down on the barstool next over. Dandelion seemed fascinated by all of the activity, which made Alethea smile. Well, I guess there’s nothing left to do but try to make the best of it, she thought begrudgingly as she reached over and grabbed the kale.
Dandelion did have a much betterview now in fact. She had always liked Priya, and surveying the scene in front of her further validated her keen sense of intuition. Well, of course she had been right about the human. When was she ever wrong about these things? Priya had placed a large stock pot on the stove and the smells and sounds of cooking began filling the air. Dandelion raised her all-black paw to her face and began delicately cleaning her whiskers. Better to be prepared, she thought sagely. Anything could happen now.
Twenty fairly painless minutes later,Alethea stood over the big metal pot stirring the bubbling white bean and kale soup. That actually wasn’t too bad. The thought surprised her. She had somehow managed to make a soup from scratch without accidentally burning down the kitchen in the process. Well, okay, maybe Priya had shown her what to do step-by-step, but still. In Alethea’s own estimation this was definitely a win.
The fragrance of thyme and bay leaves permeated the whole kitchen, and she inhaled deeply as she stirred. She really did love the smell of those fragrant herbs. Just as she was beginning to let her thoughts drift, a strange feeling came over her and a light tingling sensation started buzzing around the crown of her head. It felt almost like static electricity yet inexplicably more complex than that. Suddenly, an overwhelmingly intense sense of deja-vu hit her like a ton of bricks, and the tingling started to spread down her body until the hairs on her limbs felt like they were vibrating. So incredibly familiar. She was in the backyard of her childhood home, her mother kneeling down next to her, showing her something. The air in the kitchen seemed to warp all around her, like the way the air above the pavement on a scorching hot summer day seems to dance.
“You okay, Alethea?” Priya asked, looking concerned. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.” And just like that, at the sound of her friend’s voice, the air in the room seemed to snap back into place, the deja-vu and the odd tingling sensation vanishing instantly.
“Yeah. Um, yeah, I’m fine,” she said as she let out a shaky exhale. “I just had some really weird deja-vu there for a minute but it’s gone now. I guess…well, I guess I was just thinking about my mom.” Priya raised her eyebrows at that. Alethea rarely spoke about her parents or her childhood.
“Did your mom cook a lot?” Priya asked gingerly. Alethea furrowed her brows and frowned.
“I’m not really sure.” She shrugged. “I don’t remember very much about her.”
Priya nodded understandingly and Alethea managed a quick smile. While trying to cope with the grief of losing both parents to a hit and run, she had locked those memories away. Trying to think of something to say, she was interrupted by Priya’s phone buzzing on the counter top.
“That’s probably Jake checking in to see how it’s going.” Priya wiped her hands on a towel before she reached over to grab it.
“He’s never going to believe that I made soup from scratch,” joked Alethea, picturing the look on his face when Priya told him that it was actually edible. When Priya didn’t respond, Alethea looked up from the pot of simmering liquid. “Okay, now you’re the one who looks pale.” Alethea watched Priya just stand there, staring at her phone with her mouth hanging open. “What is it?” she pressed. “Is everything ok?”
“He did it!” Priya exclaimed finally and let out a whoop. “That crazy husband of mine actually got accepted into Le Cordon Bleu’s mentorship program!”
“What?” Alethea asked in confusion. “You mean the real Le Cordon Bleu? Like most-prestigious-culinary-institute-in-the-world Cordon Bleu? But I thought that was in France.”
“You are correct, Madame.” Priya laughed with glee as her massive smile stretched from ear to ear. “The institute runs an intensive two month course every summer for culinary instructors that pairs them up with one of the school’s Masterchefs. They only accept four instructors a year so it’s an incredibly huge deal to get selected!” She was barely holding herself back from jumping up and down now. “It’s always been Jake’s dream to study with a Masterchef there but, to be honest, I don’t think either of us seriously believed he had a real chance. I mean, they get hundreds and hundreds of applicants every year!” Priya was absolutely radiating with pride.
“How incredible! Tell him I said congratulations!” Although the news was completely out of left field, Alethea wasn’t all that surprised that Jake had achieved something of this caliber. He was an astoundingly talented chef, and Alethea devoured anything he had ever cooked for her. She thought back to the first meal of his that she’d eaten. Simplicity at its finest, a grilled cheese sandwich made on a hot plate in Priya’s dorm room. To this day, Alethea didn’t think she’d ever eaten a better grilled cheese.
“Layering,” he had answered when she had asked why the sandwich tasted so delicious. “When you properly season and bring out the individual flavors in each ingredient of the meal, the pieces combine to make a perfect whole.
“Whatever that means,” she had retorted jokingly, shaking her head and taking another huge bite of the buttery bread that was grilled to perfection, careful not to lose any of the cheese oozing out the sides.
Jake had made himself a small fortune day trading a few months after he had graduated high school but had known almost immediately that the nouveau riche techie lifestyle wasn’t for him. Instead of dancing and drinking with the guests at a yacht party he had been invited to, he had ended up below deck in the galley with the caterer who had trained at Le Cordon Bleu, learning how to perfectly sear whitefish. It was at that moment that Jake knew what he wanted to do with his life and applied to the Cedar Bay Culinary Institute the next day. Alethea couldn’t be happier that his dream was finally coming full circle.
“Okay Al, you think you can handle the cleanup yourself?” Priya asked as her fingers flew furiously over her phone, obviously texting Jake back all sorts of excited emoji faces. “The soup just needs to simmer for about ten more minutes then it’s ready for you to dig in.” Putting down her phone and turning to her friend, she looked Alethea in the eyes. “See, I told you that you could do it.” She sounded satisfied, the excitement making her eyes sparkle. “You gonna be ok? I can stay if you need me,” she offered.
But Alethea shook her head. “Don’t be silly, I’m fine!” she insisted, and actually felt like she meant it. “And thanks again for being here for me. As always.” She squeaked the words out, aware of her emotions bubbling up again. “Now you get out of here and go celebrate with Jake!” she ordered as she waved her friend towards the door.
“Okay, okay! I think I’m still in shock.” Priya shook her head in happy disbelief as she gathered up her things. “What an unbelievable day. I’m definitely picking up a bottle of champagne on my way home!” she said through her laughter as she wrapped Alethea in a big bear hug and gave Dandelion a quick pet on her head to say goodbye.
…….
With all the excitement over,the kitchen cleaned up, and the leftover soup put into containers in the fridge, Alethea looked around the empty apartment and plopped down on the couch. She set down her mug on the coffee table and reached over to pick up her laptop. The steaming cup of coffee wasn’t nearly as good as the oat milk latte she was craving, but she had made it herself and had to admit it was a whole heck of a lot cheaper. She had changed into her favorite comfort outfit, an old faded pair of black quarter length leggings and an oversized tee shirt with her university’s mascot and the initials CBU emblazoned across the front in bright purple and green letters. The shirt had been washed so many times that it was almost see-through in some spots, which made it the most comfortable thing she owned, albeit not the prettiest thing to look at.
Dandelion jumped up on the couch next to Alethea and started turning in little circles until she found just the right spot to snuggle into. “Look at me go, Dandelion,” Alethea said out loud as she began lightly scratching the curled up cat behind her ears. “Brewing my own coffee at home, cooking soup from scratch. If I’m not careful, I’ll turn into a regular domestic goddess before all this is over.”
If cats could groan,Dandelion was quite certain that’s what she would do at that very moment. Instead, she just gave Alethea one of her unblinking, withering stares, but her human didn’t seem to notice. Dandelion had instinctively known that cooking with Priya would be good for Alethea, but she had been hoping for something a little more dramatic. No matter, things were beginning to unfold now, which made her extremely pleased. She flipped over and stretched out so she was even closer to Alethea, getting a lovely chin scratch for her effort.
“Okay, here we go,”said Alethea, turning on her laptop. She had procrastinated as long as she could, but now it was time to face reality. So what if she had been horribly wronged by two of the most despicable people on the planet? That still didn’t change the fact that she needed to find a new job and a new place to live, like yesterday. Jackson’s ice-cold departure had left her feeling so vulnerable. It had sucked away every last shred of her self-worth. But cooking this afternoon with Priya had managed to restore a little bit of her confidence, even if it was just a smidge.
Alethea tried to stop the scene from replaying in her mind’s eye for the millionth time. Jackson had acted so unbelievably nonchalant when he had looked up at her standing in the doorway, staring at him and Susan together. She might as well have told him she had picked up his drycleaning on the way home for the emotionless way he had reacted to being caught. Not that Jackson had always been the most sensitive of souls, he definitely could have his moments, but this iciness was on a whole other level of detachment. It was like a light switch had been flipped off and all traces of his love for her with it. Had she really meant so little to him after all this time? Feeling this profound sense of rejection to her core, there was no doubt to Alethea that she had hit rock bottom.
For a second, that odd tingling sensation seemed to start up again, but this time it was so faint Alethea thought she must have imagined it. Alright, enough wallowing, she thought to herself. Hitting rock bottom means there isn’t any farther to fall, so it’s time to start climbing out of this pit. Feeling a sense of determination within her that she thought had all but shriveled up, she began searching the job hunting sites. Of course she would find something, she just needed to press forward. Getting a good job was paramount. She’d need that secured before she’d be able to apply for a new apartment rental. But the more she scrolled, the more anxious she became. How was she supposed to handle past work experience on a job application? The opportunity to intern at the agency had landed in her lap her senior year, and they had offered her a full-time position the day after she graduated. Outside of working on campus and a few seasonal retail stints, the agency was the only job she’d ever had. She couldn’t, no she wouldn’t, give Susan the satisfaction of crawling to her to ask for a reference. Just the thought of ever having to face that woman again made Alethea cringe.
Looking up as a tap tap tap noise caught her attention, Alethea let out a squeak of exasperation. “Dandelion, no!” she chided and waved her hand at her mischievous feline. She had been so absorbed with the job listings that she hadn’t even noticed Dandelion getting off the couch and onto the coffee table, where she was currently batting Alethea’s phone ever closer to the edge. “You stinker, seriously cut that out!” But before she could lean forward and grab her cat, the phone was flung onto the carpet with one final push from a paw. “What’s gotten into you?” Alethea grumbled as she picked up her phone. At that, Dandelion leapt off of the table and darted out of the room, out of reach from Alethea’s grasp.
“Guess it’s a good time to take a break anyway.” Alethea sighed and gently massaged her temple with one hand while she looked down at her phone with the other. Seven missed text messages and one missed call from her Aunt Scarlet, yikes! She groaned at the thought of talking to her aunt, calling her back would have to wait. Unsurprisingly though, the texts were all from the group chain between her, Priya and Danica. No doubt it was Priya sharing the good news about Jake’s acceptance into the Masterchef program. It made Alethea smile to see how proud her friend was of her husband. Danica had responded with a gif of a woman doing a backflip without spilling her glass of champagne that Alethea couldn’t help but watch three times in a row.
“There’s lots to celebrate!” exclaimed Danica’s last message, suggesting just that - a celebratory brunch on Sunday. Apparently, she had some good news of her own, her online yoga classes were starting to really blow up.
“I’m in!” Alethea texted back, feeling some of the tension in her neck dissipate. Priya had been right, she wasn’t alone, she had her wonderful friends. Alethea got up and went to the fridge, emptying the last of the bottle of dry ros? into a stemless glass. If she was going to spend the rest of the evening job hunting, she was definitely going to need a good buzz.