Chapter 25
Olivia
Now
The whole thing is timed to last about two hours, but I feel like I’ve been holding my breath for twenty-odd years.
I want to go up to each table and ask them to fill out a questionnaire, but I guess our trial couples need time to digest how the night went like it’s the real thing.
I still rush toward the door when I see Katrina and her date standing from their table though.
While Debra’s in the bathroom, I try to make myself seem busy by adjusting the things on her host stand.
As Katrina’s date passes me, he says good night, but she says, “Girl, thank you for this,” with wide-eyed emphasis and a tone that confirms the date sucked like Steven said.
When they leave, I shift my gaze. Issac leans down to cup Laniah’s face with his large hands, and the kiss is so sensual I have to look away.
A hot feeling rushes through me. It’s been a long time since I’ve been kissed like that.
And once she’s in the car, she texts: Olivia, this was perfect.
We needed it more than we knew. I think you’ve got something special going on here.
Give you deets tomorrow, but my husband can’t wait to get me home.
That’s the text I’m smiling at when Carmello comes up to the hostess stand with the server book, holding their check. “The man…left a two-thousand-dollar tip,” he says. A stunned sound leaves my mouth. “Yup,” Carmello says, handing it to me. “Here. You should have it.”
I push the book back at him. “No. Why?”
“O, you did all of this. Call it a partial payment for your time here, if you want to.”
“Mello, we did this,” I say.
“But this idea wouldn’t have come from me,” he says, tone soft yet firm, “and I don’t think anyone else could’ve pulled it off like you.
” I’ve been worried about how he was feeling while cooking for the sampler platters.
He was concentrating and hardly spoke to me and Steven.
At one point he left the comfort of the kitchen to check in with the couples about the food, and when he came back in, I swore his hands were shaky.
“And abnormally big tip aside,” he continues, “I want to move forward with this idea, so let me repay you somehow.”
“That makes me so happy,” I say. “And I agree with everything you said. I pulled it the hell together.” He smiles at my confidence. “But Carmello, we both know this tip was probably intended for the entire staff tonight. Stop feeling so guilty for me….”
“I agree,” Vero cuts in, coming up from behind us.
“The woman knows exactly what she’s doing, Mello.
If she wanted money, she’d have it by now.
Plus, I’d like a cut of the tip, even though I’m not in work uniform tonight.
” The tension toward me is clear in her tone, but I still smile when Carmello sighs in defeat.
“Night,” Veronica’s boyfriend grumbles when he passes by her for the door, not bothering to say a word to me or Carmello before he leaves Celia’s Place without her.
That’s when I notice there are tears in her eyes she’s struggling to hold on to.
Carmello’s brows stitch together, noticing too. “You good, cuz?”
She sucks in a breath. “I’m fine. Let’s recap.”
“Are you sure?” I ask. “We can talk about the trial tomorrow.”
She hops up onto the host stand like she’s an expert in shaking sadness. “I’d prefer to do it tonight, because I’m calling out tomorrow. Take this as advance notice.”
Carmello scoffs, but I can tell he’s still worried about her while she gives us a rundown on everything she thought we could’ve done better, including more variety for the small bites and an extra hour for lingering.
“Everything else was great,” she says. “The music, the atmosphere, and especially the question cards.” Her forehead creases, and she glances at her lap like she’s reliving them.
She hops down from the stand. “Anyway, I’d help you two with the cleanup, but that tip is only so big and I don’t work for free.
” Carmello calls her annoying, then wraps her in a hug.
“I said I’m fine, Mello. Stop being a helicopter human,” she says, but I think she needed that hug.
She grabs her purse just as Steven walks by and gives us a two-finger salute.
Once they’re both gone, I ask, “Does Steven really teach self-defense?”
Carmello nods. “His family owns a Filipino martial arts studio in Cranston.”
“Wow,” I say, blinking at the knowledge. “That sounds like a very serious job.”
“His grumpiness kinda makes sense now, doesn’t it?”
“It kinda does,” I say. Then I look around. “Well…I guess we’re on our own here.”
“You could go,” Camello says. “It’s not that much to clean up. I got it.”
“Do you want me to go?” I ask.
“No,” he says.
“So, I’ll stay.”
***
While we’re cleaning, I tell Carmello that watching Issac and Laniah dance made me realize how nice it must have been for them to have the place mostly to themselves.
How I think we should make sure the events are intimate.
With no more than five couples at a time, it’ll feel exclusive too.
People will have to book in advance for the limited slots each week.
“I think the exclusivity will make the restaurant more desirable in general, and it’ll be a lot less work for you than opening up to max capacity,” I say.
“I was thinking the same thing about keeping it small,” he says.
“I can definitely handle something like tonight every Tuesday, even without Steven. But I have been meaning to get the patio fixed up for a long time, and this might be the perfect reason to put fire under my ass. Could give us room for a couple more slots.”
I tell him how perfect that would be, and while he’s telling me his plans for it, images of an intimate night on a patio eating Carmello’s food flood my mind and my heart aches.
I won’t be here to see it through. Opening night of Table for Twos-days is in a few weeks, but I should be flying back to Houston before then to prepare for the move to Japan.
“I don’t think I’ve been this excited about anything in a minute,” Carmello says. “But I do have one big concern considering whatever the hell happened with Veronica, and the way you said Katrina left. I’m not tryna be known as the owner of a spot where people break up.”
“Damn, that’d definitely be a problem,” I say. “I really wasn’t expecting two out of three dates to go badly, but I should’ve realized it’d be a strong possibility. I’m glad you suggested a trial run. Celia’s needs to be seen as a place where matchmaking happens. Not as a curse.”
“How do we fix it?” Carmello says, and I try not to get hung up on the word we.
“I’ll think about other details, but there’s one glaring thing to consider.
Everyone seemed to love the cards,” I say, “but where there’s good, there’s potential for bad.
The universal balance. Maybe the cards are prodding deeper conversation and causing people to know more than they can handle in such a short period of time.
I can work to make them a little lighter. ”
“Okay,” Carmello says. “I can help with them after hours, and maybe you can help me get more variety into the menu?”
“Wait,” I say. “That might be the answer. What if the questions on the cards correspond with the small dishes menu? As people are picking their platters, they can choose what sorts of questions match the flavor profiles.”
Carmello is quick to follow. “So if they choose a sweet dish, the questions match?”
“Yes,” I say. “And if they choose spicy small dishes, the questions for that course are risky, spicy.” Carmello’s eyes flick across my face in a way that makes me remember us sitting down at the booth, talking about first times.
My stomach warms the same way now. “It could be a good way to get dates to interact with the cards and the food at the same time.”
“Sounds fun too,” Carmello says. “Gives our guests more control over their own fate during their dates. Okay. I like this. Let’s work on it together.”
“Meaning, you cook and I taste test and match a question?”
“We can both cook,” he says. “And both taste.”
I bite my bottom lip. Why is he standing so close looking this good talking about tasting?
How much harder will it be to leave Rhode Island in a couple of weeks if we have to ask each other spicy questions while cooking in close proximity…
alone? While he’s looking into my eyes like he is right now, I have the sudden urge to say something stupid to make the moment less intimate.
We’re going to be okay as friends, and I want that for us.
So I smile and say, “But just for clarification, you want me to cook with you because I’m the better chef, right? ”
“You have more experience cooking a variety of foods than I do as a chef,” he says.
“That was close enough,” I say.
He narrows his eyes. “You’re smirking, which means you’re going to be smug the whole time.”
“Smug me or no me, take your pick.”
He smiles, those white teeth so bright in this dimly lit space. “You,” he says.
That single word sends a spark up my spine. Our eyes linger for a moment, then he shifts to survey the room. We’ve already put everything away, swept, mopped, and wiped down the tables. It was quicker working together than I thought it would be. “Looks like we’re done.”
The song switches from “Not Another Love Song” by Ella Mai to “Unchained Melody” by the Righteous Brothers.
Zeke sure did make an interesting playlist. “Except for the music. I’ll go turn it off,” I say, because he’ll be able to read straight through me while this song is on.
My mom played it on repeat in our van during our cross-country road trip when we moved here, and it was one of the songs I played over and over again when I missed Carmello after I left.
But when I start to go, he reaches for my wrist, shifting me back to face him.
He pierces me with those dark eyes and doesn’t let me go.
I wonder if he can feel my pulse racing beneath his fingertips.
“Let it run through,” he says. “My mom…she listened to this song so much before she died.” His confession triggers something in my brain, but it’s the first time I’ve heard his voice crack while talking about her and that realization takes precedence.
I know he misses her, and he’s had no choice but to put one foot in front of the other every day, to keep moving.
I’m sure it feels heavier than he’d ever let on.
And suddenly I have a vision of a different life—one where I was here, sliding my hand into his while we waited for Celia at the doctor’s office.
Listening to her crack jokes on the way home, trying to lighten the mood for all of us, even though she was the one who was sick.
“I’m sorry that you lost her, Carmello. I’m so sorry,” I say, my throat waterlogged.
“I’m sorry you lost her too,” he says, and the words open something inside of my chest. Emotions and memories of Celia well up in me, and I can’t blink the tears away fast enough.
I won’t tell Carmello that I’m crying because a couple of years ago, I sent Celia a video of me cooking for a client in Italy.
This song was playing in the background and when she wrote back she asked me the name of it.
And I’m not saying she was playing it before she died because she wished I was here to comfort her too, but maybe she missed me more than I knew.
When Carmello reaches out, I’m not sure what to expect, but then he brushes my wet cheek with the pad of his thumb and my whole body vibrates.
“I know what I said about touch, but is this okay, O?”
He can’t see it but my heart is glowing. All of me aches. I miss him. “It is,” I whisper.
He drops his warm hand from my face and pulls me into his arms. My belly dips at the suddenness of it, and my skin hums like hugging him is a brand-new feeling.
But it’s muscle memory the way our bodies fit.
The way my cheek finds his chest and my arms hook around his back, the way he dips his head so that he can rest it in the crook of my neck. “And this?”
His shirt smells like fabric softener and my favorite foods. “This too.”
“Good,” he says, “because I really needed you.”
The word choice hits for romantic reasons, but where I settle is somewhere deeper than that.
It’s in memories: him making Bobby feel better today, comforting Veronica knowing she needed it and wouldn’t ask herself.
Him, holding me through the night when we were young and I’d wake up drenched after a dream about the fire.
A kind boy who grew up to be a kind man.
Someone who took care of his mom until the end and needs care in return.
I hug him closer, bury my face in his chest, rub his back, wishing I could take some of his pain in my hands. While the song runs in the background, we cry together like we haven’t spent a decade apart. Earlier, I wanted to dance with someone, but I think my soul needed this more.