Chapter 24
Olivia
Now
“Someone’s overly happy this morning,” Steven mutters.
He’s throwing thinly sliced pork on the grill for Filipino barbecue, has a black hoodie over his head, and he hasn’t sung all day.
Where Carmello is pensive and quiet, sometimes quippy in the kitchen, this man’s moods swing from sarcastic with a slice of joy to the definition of broody, I swear.
But he’s right. I’m buzzing. My body vibrating while I flash cook steak, the savory aroma hitting my stomach.
I’m hungry and I haven’t given myself time to sit still all day.
For the past few days, really. As prep work for later, I’m reading the guys some questions from the cards because tonight we’re putting my idea to the test.
“Maybe we should use the date night to match you with someone, Steven,” I say with a wink. “You might be more pleasant to work with.”
“Or consider this,” Steven says, unfazed by my jab, “I might be worse.”
“A test we shouldn’t force on him, O,” Carmello says, wiping sweat from his brow with his shirt.
When he turns back to the burner, I smile big because he’s been casually dropping my nickname.
Little does he know that small show of closeness means so much to me.
I’d missed his friendship more than I’d realized.
And there’s something else making me vibrate today. I may have just thrown a jab at Steven, but I’m realizing that here, in this particular kitchen, with these two, I feel happy.
I pause, registering that feeling as want. Joy. An urge to keep doing what I’m doing right now.
But…Tokyo is waiting for me, it’s the best choice for all of us, so I clear my throat and that thought from my mind.
“Okay, guys,” I say. “What’s your favorite thing about yourselves?”
“Are these going to be interviews or dates?” Steven asks.
“Listen, the cards are going to be available at the table to help encourage conversation. If the date is already going well then people don’t have to use them.
But, as a woman, if a man refused to use cards that had the potential to tell me if he’s the man for me, then there wouldn’t be a second date. ”
Carmello’s eyes find mine across the room and a blush burns my cheeks as I think of him offering to run through the cards with me. I pull my eyes away and see Steven shrug.
“I know I can sing,” he says, “but I’d say my humor.”
“Some of us do love a man with a good deadpan, dry-ass humor,” I say.
“Many of you,” Steven says, mirroring my wink from earlier, though he’s better at it.
I snort, though I can’t help grinning too. This is going to be a good day, I can feel it in my bones. I place the cards down and put on gloves. “Carmello? Favorite thing about yourself. Now.”
“Yes, sergeant, ma’am,” he says. Then: “I…don’t give up when I want something.”
“True,” I say. “Remember when your mom wouldn’t let you make main courses? I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone so determined to show why someone else should change their mind. I ate real good that week from the meals you made that she wouldn’t send out.”
“Yeah. But I guess I can consider that quality my least favorite thing about myself too,” he says.
“For sure,” says Steven. “Sometimes you say the same thing over and over and don’t notice, or you do things repeatedly during our shifts, and a lot of times you…”
“Everyone has to have some sort of balance, Steven,” I cut in, and begin marinating chicken thighs.
What he’s saying about Carmello isn’t a lie; the man has his ticks and repetitive tendencies, but I feel defensive of him for a second.
He’s a great boss, and Steven’s a great sous-chef, but he can be a jerk too.
“And Carmello,” I say, “your determination is probably why the restaurant is still thriving after all you’ve been through this past year. ”
Something softens in his expression at my acknowledgment. “Thanks for saying that, O.”
Steven kisses his teeth like he’s unaffected by my comment to him. “Am I really gonna have to suffer with you two going down yet another ex-lovers memory lane?”
***
For the trial date night, we only have three couples coming. It’s not something we advertised, so there isn’t a crowd when Laniah and Issac Jordan enter the restaurant.
Two nights ago, she invited me over and we sat on her front porch with her friend Katrina.
It was my first time meeting Kat, but we clicked like we’d known each other our whole lives.
So, I wasn’t that shocked when she shrugged her shoulders and said, “I’ve been talking to someone that has potential.
Maybe he’d be down for a different type of first date.
Lord knows I need to be able to weed these men out a little faster.
” But when Laniah jumped in with: “You know, Olivia. It could be good if you have a seasoned couple for this trial of yours. Two people who already have a great relationship and want to keep it that way,” I was caught off guard.
We’d been digging in on the deep stuff, and what we had in common was a bridge for comfort.
It was something that told me we could have a real friendship, but it surprised me when her introverted self offered to bring her famous husband to a date that would be scrutinized later.
I’m still a little surprised to see Issac Jordan in the flesh. He thanks me and Debra for giving him something new to do with his wife and tells us to forgive him if we happen to see a man with an angry face and a shiny bald head in the parking lot.
“That’d be Bernie, my manager, prepared to run interference. Just ignore him.”
Debra laughs nervously, then waits until Issac whisks Laniah away to their table before she whispers, “Did you hear the way he introduced himself? Like he doesn’t have superfans. Like I’m not one of them. Like if he wasn’t with his beautiful wife tonight I wouldn’t…”
I gasp. “Debra! My jaw is on the floor, you frisky girl. You’re married too.”
She takes one last look at Issac and hums the way she did eating Paula’s blueberry pie on her break earlier. “I’m gonna go give Bobby a hug before everyone else arrives.”
There are still things I should focus on before the event starts, but I watch Debra make her way over to Carmello and Bobby by the bar.
She wraps her arms around Bobby, and Carmello pats him on the back.
I don’t know what Bobby’s going through, but I know he refused Carmello’s offer to take PTO, insisting that being at work was a good distraction.
Carmello says something to him now, and it’s the first time I’ve heard Bobby’s big laugh this week.
Suddenly, I realize that if I had to pick a favorite quality about Carmello, I wouldn’t be able to. He shifts like he can feel my eyes on him, and when he smiles at me the way he does, butterflies beat a storm in my belly.
***
So that I’m not looking like a creep, I creep behind the kitchen door.
Staring through the glass, trying to get hints at what’s going on during date night.
The downside of Veronica not waiting tables for the trial is that we can’t get any juicy details on what she might’ve overheard.
The plus side? She seems like she’s having a great time.
She and her man have spent most of the date laughing at the card questions.
They’ve hardly touched their food. I can’t say the same about Laniah and Issac.
The two of them can eat. We made sure to pull back on adding extra salt to the small bites menu so Laniah’s not feeling sad about missing out on sodium-dense foods.
But they’ve been feeding each other and sharing kisses over the table.
The song switches to something with soul.
Aretha Franklin’s “I Say a Little Prayer.” And Issac pulls Laniah out of her seat.
They dance to the song like no one else is in the room, and a thought that may be an idea forms in the back of my mind.
But something else takes precedence: my heart aches with want, and I know I won’t settle until someone sees me that way again.
I’m swaying to the song when Steven comes over and says, “Zeke made a decent playlist, but isn’t this song screaming old folk?” I cock an eyebrow up at him and Steven ignores me. “Who’s that?” He taps his pointer finger against the glass door impatiently. “Her.”
My eyes land on a willowy Katrina, long limbs and smooth russet-brown skin, stunning in red. “Laniah’s best friend. Why?”
“Because she’s cute,” he says. “And she looks bored as hell with that dude.”
His delivery is simple, but I’m confused because that hadn’t been my assessment.
I thought so far it seemed like her date was going well.
Nothing overly exciting, and I don’t think they broke the touch barrier since I’ve been spying, but they’re using the cards, and she looks interested in how he’s responding. “Why do you say that?” I ask Steven.
“Look at her body language,” Steven says. “Her face is tight. The way she’s leaning away from him probably means she’s ready for the check and not because she wants to go home with him. Either his breath stinks or he’s boring. I was trying to be nice by bringing up the latter first.”
I look harder and realize he’s right. All the signs are there, because for someone who talks a lot, Katrina seems to be saying very little compared to her date.
And Steven’s assessment feels proven when I watch her raise her phone and I wonder if she’s sending an SOS text like I’ve done with Denise on dates.
“Now do you want to know what I see in your body language whenever Carmello’s within twenty feet of you?” Steven asks.
“Shh…” I say, glancing behind me to make sure Carmello’s still in the back room checking on the desserts in the fridge that Paula prepared this morning.
“Is that a no?” Steven asks.
“That’s a hell no,” I say. “And why do you care about Katrina? Gonna try to swoop in?”
“Shit. Possibly,” he says, and then he’s smirking. “Maybe I should take it as a sign that my plans for tonight fell through right before you got me to say yes to being here.”
“Does that mean you’ll be here Tuesday nights permanently?”
Even though I got him to agree to help out tonight, he hasn’t promised he’d be available to help Carmello every week if this proves successful. I give him a hopeful face.
“I’ll discuss that with Carmello in the future. If…I feel like it,” he says.
“Fine,” I mutter. “But where’d you learn to read body language like that?”
He shrugs. “My momma taught me. Didn’t want to be raising a bad man then letting him loose on the streets.”
“I love that, but did you just miss the lesson on general manners or…?” He rolls his eyes, and I look back at Katrina through the window. “How do you read people so quickly?”
“Need to make quick deductions for my other job,” he says.
I didn’t even know he had another job. Where does he have the time, working so many hours at the restaurant? No wonder he’s a grouch. “What’s your other job?”
“I teach self-defense,” he says, like it’s nothing.
It’s always so hard to know whether he’s being truthful. “Really? Like at a studio?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know,” he says.
I call him childish, but he’s too busy staring at Katrina to pay me any mind.
Finally, he says, “Maybe if you matched me with her, I’d consider being more pleasant.”