“Spent a year at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris.” I shrug, as if it’s no big deal. “Turns out I’m pretty good in the kitchen, but not so good at spending twelve hours a day reeking of cooking fat and getting yelled at in French.”
Holly’s eyebrows shoot up. “You went to culinary school? In France?”
“Among other things.” I pour the batter into a container and set it aside to rest. “Let’s see, after high school there was the semester of being pre-law at Stanford, three months as a ski instructor in Aspen, that summer I tried to become a professional surfer in Hawaii...” I count off on my fingers. “Oh, and I almost joined the Peace Corps, but then I realized I’m not great with structured authority.”
“Wow.” Holly looks genuinely intrigued rather than judgmental, which is... refreshing. “What else have you done?”
I lean against the counter, warming to my subject of my own inadequacies. “I dabbled in photography for a while—had a show in a little gallery in Seattle that actually sold a few pieces. Worked as a barista, a bartender, a dog walker, and briefly as a model for a snowboarding magazine.”
“A model?” Holly’s lips twitch into a smile.
“Don’t look so surprised,” I protest, feigning offense. “Patagonia wouldn’t be who they are without this face in that random ad campaign in Teen Vogue, I’ll have you know.”
That gets a laugh out of her, a genuine one that transforms her face and makes something in my chest flutter unexpectedly.
“I must sound pretty flighty to someone like you,” I admit, turning to the stove to heat a pan. “You probably knew you wanted to be a doctor since when you were, what, twelve?”
Holly’s smile fades slightly. “I’m not sure I everchose to be a doctor, actually. It’s more this thing I’ve known I was going to do for as long as I’ve known that adults have to work jobs.”
I pour a thin layer of batter into the hot pan, swirling it to create a perfect circle. “Parental expectations?”
“My mother has had her heart set on me becoming a doctor since before I could talk,” Holly says, adjusting her blanket. “But I do love what I do,” she adds quickly. “Wilderness medicine is a pretty good fit.”
“Still,” I flip the crepe with a practiced flick of the wrist, “must be hard living up to those expectations all the time.”
Holly looks down at her hands. “I shouldn’t complain, especially to you. At least I still have parents to worry about disappointing.”
Ah, there it is. The awkward moment when people remember I’m an orphan and don’t know how to handle it. “Don’t worry, if ghosts can be disappointed then I’m sure my parents are managing it.”
“I’m sorry,” Holly says, clearly embarrassed. “Here I am complaining about my mother when you lost yours.”
“Hey, no. My struggles don’t invalidate yours.” I slide the finished crepe onto a plate and pour another. “And if my parents were still alive, they’d probably be doing any number of things to annoy me too. Dad would be critiquing my investment portfolio, Mom would be setting me up with the daughters of her friends until I settled down.” I wave the spatula dismissively. “Parents are parents. Being dead doesn’t automatically make them saints.”
Holly looks down, still seeming uncomfortable. “I guess.”
“Keep talking,” I encourage her. “I’m interested. Really.”
She hesitates, then continues. “I just...I don’t think you should feel bad about being a searcher who hasn’t found their purpose yet. Life is too complicated for anyone to have a single thing they’re meant to be doing.”
I raise an eyebrow. Keen insight into the human condition is not a typical symptom of an omega heat. “Go on.”
“My mother always talks about how circumstances made it impossible for her to live her dream of becoming a doctor. But she faints when she has to have her blood drawn and gets squeamish at any mention of bodily fluids. She probably would have hated medicine if she actually got the chance to go to school for it.”
I laugh, flipping another crepe. “So why the fixation, do you think?”
“It’s a story she tells herself,” Holly says thoughtfully. “An explanation for why she’s so hard on me. But being a doctor is just one of a hundred things I could have done and found success in it. Thinking about what could have been is just a good way to drive myself crazy. The hard part is recognizing that you can only ever walk through one door that life opens for you at a time. Regret is wasted energy.”
I stare at her, spatula frozen mid-air. That’s...unexpectedly profound for someone who’s supposed to be in the throes of heat-induced hormonal chaos. There’s a depth to Holly Chang that I hadn’t anticipated, layers beneath the careful, professional exterior she presents to the world.
“What?” Holly asks, suddenly self-conscious under my gaze. “I’m sorry, I’m rambling. It must be the heat making me philosophical.”
“No, no,” I say quickly, realizing I’ve been silent too long. “I was just?—“
“Are you fucking serious right now?”
Noah stands in the kitchen doorway, his expression dark. His eyes dart from me to Holly and back again, nostrils flaring as he scents the air.
“We’re making crepes,” I say, gesturing to the pan with my spatula. “Want one?”
