“What’s that, Leo?” I ask, smirking.
“What’s that,Chef,” he says, pulling down the sleeve of his T-shirt.
“Did you get a drunk tattoo?” I say teasingly.
“I did, Olive.” Leo puts both hands on the counter and leans toward me. “But I try not to do things when I’m drunk anymore,” he says, raising an eyebrow at me.
Does he mean last night? Is he talking about our near kiss?
I feel a flutter in my belly. I’m teenage horny for him and I cannot ignore it.Fuck me, I think to myself.
“Let’s cook,” I say, before Leo reaches into the brown paper shopping bag and pulls out chilled fresh spaghetti.
“I figured we both know how to make pasta, so let’s just cut out some of the faff.”
“No faff? Who are you and what have you done with Leo?”
“Come now, Olive, stop flirting with me and let’s cook,” he says, tossing a pan onto the stove.
“I’m not flirting, Leo,” I say, mortified to be called out.
“I’m not flirting,Chef,” he says, as he slides a huge knife out of its leather pouch. “Show some respect,” he adds, turning to grab a chopping board. I catch his grin as he turns his back, and I want to smack his butt so badly, but I refrain. Instead I reach for an apron and tie it around my neck and waist, covering most of the flirty sundress I’m wearing.
We’re standing between the gas stove and a long stainless-steel bench. Leo and I have a chopping board each and we work together cutting, while Leo pulls the dish together in the pan, testing quantities as we go.
Small bowls of the dish are prepared—one with a slightly larger quantity of raisins. One with more pine nuts. A version heavy on the saffron. Breadcrumbs made with panko and lemon rind or plain ciabatta (I eye-roll at this, but Leo will not be deterred). A version with fresh fennel and one with fennel seeds. After an hour, we stand and taste from our seven versions. I have scrawled the quantities in my notebook and torn each page out, placing them under the dishes so we don’t forget what is what.
“See. I told you,” says Leo, pushing the fresh fennel version toward me. “It’s too much. The seeds work better.”
“I’d love a little fennel beard to garnish, though,” I say.
“Nowwho’s being fussy,” says Leo.
“It’s just a garnish,” I say, rolling my eyes.
“Yeah, but we’d have to get people to go to Tesco’s to buy a fennel bulb just to tear off the beard?”
“Yes, fine.I agree,” I say reluctantly. “Idolike the saffron. What if we added saffron to this version?” I tap the edge of the second dish.
He drains some bucatini, a thicker spaghettilike pasta with a hole running through the middle. And after some adjustments he plates up the dish according to both of our notes.
“Now, that,” I say with a grin, “isfine.”
“We’ve cracked it,” he agrees, grinning too.
“Okay, let me make the final notes.”
I start to scribble the final quantities in longhand in my notebook underpasta con le sarde, while Leo tidies up around me.
“Dad used to make this dish when he could get fresh sardines. It was a regular special from late July,” I say.
“It was,” he replies, stopping cleaning to listen to me.
“How would you do this dish at Nicky’s?” I ask.
Leo leans back on the stainless-steel work surface and tosses his tea towel over his shoulder, raising his eyebrow. “How would Ielevateit?”
“I’m just wondering,” I say.
