Chapter 38
W atching Alex prep the ingredients and delegate roles to every single person in the kitchen was a study in my own self-control.
He was in his element, orchestrating as if he were at the helm of a symphony.
With his organization and precision, his passion for food was readily apparent.
When Willow was slicing cabbage for the coleslaw, he gently instructed her to make the ribbons thinner without being chastising.
I could practically see the hearts in her eyes when she gazed up at him.
When Aya was given the grater to shred massive piles of sharp cheddar for the macaroni and cheese, Alex passed through just to tell her good job and she beamed like his approval meant everything to her.
Jasper was put to work on the homemade breadcrumbs, and Ravi was playing DJ, singing along to his choices, trying to take his eyes off Benny, who was cutting corn from the cob into a large bowl while giggling with Mom.
Alex had us all in the palm of his hand and he knew it. Every time I caught his eyes, they were shining with genuine joy. I forced myself to focus on peeling carrots so I wouldn’t just sit there on a stool and worship him.
Eventually, I had to use every bit of self-control to stop imagining a life where this was a weekly event, a group of artistic characters being put to work by an effusively beautiful chef named Alex Perry and a woman, on a stool, peeling carrots, adoring him.
We’d all adopted a “yes, Chef” approach and each time we said it, Alex would guffaw with charming laughter, little hints of pink on his cheeks from the slight embarrassment, looking over at me because he knew the sexual undertones of those two words within our own private world.
When he passed by me to check on my carrot peeling, I purred, “Yes, Chef” into his ear and he told me to stop or he’d need to clear the kitchen and have his way with me.
I told him I wasn’t against that idea and he told me I was “a bad influence,” and I have to say, when it came out of his mouth, I didn’t hate the sound of it.
Friday nights in my old life were so stale and lifeless. Some bland dinner, asleep by 9:00 p.m., waking up on Saturday morning just to work more. I can’t live the same day over and over and call it a life . I understood it now, the vast emptiness of a life like that.
Benny found me when the mac and cheese was in the oven with the corn bread, Alex at the stove with the chicken, oil popping loudly over the soundtrack of Ravi’s varied and vast selection of songs ranging from Redbone’s “Come and Get Your Love” to Tracy Chapman’s “Fast Car.”
Benny nodded toward Alex’s back. “Have you seen the way this man looks at you?” she whispered. She was holding a wineglass full of sparkling water. “It’s in the eyes, Charlie. He’s gone. Nobody else in this house matters except you.”
I brushed her off with a pfff. “We just spent three days in bed together, Ben. That’s all it is.”
Benny let out a sharp laugh. “No, it’s not. It’s decidedly not all it is, not even a little bit. That man is one open invitation away from risking it all for you.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” I told her. “He has a job to get to.”
“I know this might come as a shock to you, Char, but some people are willing to turn down a job for love. Crazy, I know. But it’s been known to happen.” She leveled me with a wry grin.
“I wouldn’t ask him to do that,” I said resolutely.
“You’ll regret not knowing where this could go,” she said back, just as firmly.
“And what about Ravi, then? He’s been watching you all night. I think it’s love at first sight.”
“A masterful change of subject,” she said appraisingly. “Fine, I’ll allow it. I’m into him, but it’s actually not going anywhere.”
“So you can tell me all about risk, but will never take any of your own, is that it?” I meant to say this jokingly, but it came out with a bite.
“First,” she began, “Ravi and I just met. We didn’t love each other secretly as teenagers, so there’s that.
Second, he’s at the cusp of his career and so am I.
The difference between you and me is that I’m not afraid of love, Charlie.
I just don’t want to be tied down right now.
But if I met someone I could really love, I wouldn’t turn away from them. ”
“What happened with the shoot?” I asked softly. Some online brand had hired Benny to do pictures for their website. She hadn’t been thrilled about it, but she’d said yes.
“They fired me,” she said. “On day one.”
“What? Why?”
I expected Benny to quip about how what’s meant for her will always find her, bring some levity to it all like she usually did, but instead her smile fell, tears shining in her eyes, and she ran out of the kitchen.
It stunned me. When I followed after her, I found her quietly crying on the stairwell, head in her hands.
“Benny,” I said, squeezing in next to her and placing my arm around her shoulder. “Whoa. What happened?”
She didn’t speak for a while, just vibrated and let out little hiccups of sobs.
It nearly broke my heart in half. I was about to ask again, but then she lifted her head up, cheeks streaked with tears, and she said, “I did some test shots. They hated them. Fired me right there. It was horrible. I’m horrible.
I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m not good enough for this industry.
LA is too cutthroat. I’m an imposter. I feel like an idiot.
What was I even thinking trying to become a photographer?
A pipe dream. I need to find something realistic.
You’re right. You’ve been right all along and I just didn’t want to see it.
I’m twenty-five. I’m not a kid anymore.”
She threw her face back into her hands and I heard her sniffling.
I had no idea what to do.
She sounded... like me.
The distress I felt nearly made me choke.
I hated hearing my own protestations coming out of her mouth.
“Benny, listen to me,” I said, not sure where I was even going with this, trusting I had some wisdom I could impart.
“You’re an incredibly talented photographer.
You love doing it. It’s your calling. Truthfully, I wish I had something like that.
I wish I had your courage and determination, and your optimism.
It’s not a pipe dream. Don’t give up.” I almost didn’t say the next thing, but I wanted to use her words back on her.
“What’s meant for you will be for you, remember?
Maybe this is making space for something better. ”
She finally looked at me, wiped her eyes.
“You really think so?” she asked, hopeful. “And here I thought you were going to judge me.”
“I’ve done that for a long time, haven’t I? Judged you?”
Benny shrugged. “You haven’t always approved of the way Mom and I approach life.”
“Understatement of the year,” I said, laughing. “Have I apologized for that yet? Because I’m sorry. What the hell do I know, Benny? Seriously?” I lifted my hands up. “What do I know?”
“I thought you knew everything.”
“Well, I don’t. I think I’m finding out that I know nothing.”
She laughed. “Join the club!”
I hugged her and whispered, “Sorry. For everything.”
We stayed grasping each other for a long while, until Benny pulled back.
“You okay?” I asked her, knocking her on the shoulder.
“I am now,” she replied. “You know, we need you, Charlie. You make us better.”
“I do?”
“You really do.”
I extended a hand out to help her up, and we then made our way into the kitchen. When we did, it was time to eat.
Benny had set the table with tapered candles and the fancy burnt orange napkins we never used, along with ceramic plates with various flowers on them, each one different than the other.
Handmade, apparently, by a ceramicist that Benny and Mom had met a couple years back.
Of course they were. The candles were soy, from a candlemaker down the road.
The vase was from the ceramicist, the flowers from the farmers market—every single thing had been selected with love and cherishment.
Back home, I ate off paper plates to avoid doing the dishes.
I couldn’t remember if I’d ever set a table.
We all sat down amid the soft glow of candlelight, a foreign sense of belonging suddenly washing over me. Fear came alongside it, as if any good thing was a matched set to my terror.
How do you love people without knowing when you’ll lose them? How do you bear it? Isn’t it easier to just not love at all?
And why did it seem like it was so much easier for everyone else to go through life unguarded? Every single day, people made vows. Every single day, they had children and promised to love them. Every single day, they brought each other closer even though they knew that one day, they could be gone.
It was unfathomable to me, the pain of it.
The heartbreak.
And, somehow, the beauty.