I snorted. ‘Exactly.’
‘Ew, wait, you want to work in a kitchenforever?’
‘Yes, even when I’m burning in hell. No, Iwantto be a pastry chef or baker. Kitchen stuff is stressful. Baking is soothing.’
Baking was how I calmed my brain. Sometimes I could get overwhelmed and start worrying about school or work or my future. Basically spiral down about things that could go wrong – if I were still going to therapy, they’d say it was probably left over from the trauma of losing a parent. But baking, and trying new recipes or tweaking old ones, always calmed me. I knew that by the end I’d either have something that worked, or I’d have something that I could learn from.
It was easy to throw away a loaf of bread that didn’t rise properly, or even turn it into something else, like bread pudding, croutons or stuffing. When things went bad in life it was so much messier.
Life could take longer and hurt so much more.
‘Are you going to college?’ I asked.
He sighed. ‘Unfortunately. That’s why I’m here.’
‘Clearly not culinary school.’
‘God, no! What kind of loser do you think I am?’
For half a second I thought he was serious, but then I saw that smirk. And those dimples. Then the worry – that he thought I was a loser – went away and was replaced by the warm fuzzies.
‘No, I want to go to film school,’ he said. I liked that he was going to school for something artistic, too. And that one of the things I knew about him – the Saturday afternoon movies – was still something he enjoyed. But I tried to play it off like I wasn’t getting the big-time feels and instead fell back on old faithful: solid gold cynicism.
‘On twelve dollars an hour? Good luck with that.’
‘Hoping for a scholarship, too.’
‘Where at?’
‘USC.’ Then, off my puzzled look, ‘University of Southern California – it’s in LA. Well, there or NYU.’
Wait. Those were both locations with La Mère campuses. This was all starting to feel a bit more fate-y than just the universe putting us back together for the first time in six years before we went our separate ways in college.
What if this was the start of something bigger? I let myself fantasize at a million miles a second: the two of us meeting here, kissing for the first time, our first date – where I would come clean and tell himwe’ve met before!– sex, prom, getting into the schools we wanted to go to and still staying in the same city, becoming a gay power couple, opening my own restaurant, Gabe getting an Oscar and thanking me, our three kids and a dog.
Okay, that got out of hand quickly. And yet it still seemed like a possibility. Like all this could be possible, and the universe was conspiring to make it happen.
I realized I hadn’t paid much attention to the dining room for a bit, so I stepped back again to check our section.
‘Hold the school talk,’ I said to Gabe as I grabbed the water pitcher. ‘We have another table.’ I led him out from the service station just as Alvin Turner and Willa Vaughn sat at our final four-top.
‘Evening, Al,’ I said. ‘Ms Vaughn, I love that jacket.’
She plucked at the jean jacket and waved away the compliment. ‘I got it at Goodwill.’
‘How you doin’, kid?’ Al asked. He pulled out the chair for Willa as she swatted at him. Then he saw Gabe and his eyes went wide. ‘Oh! Who’s this, now?’
‘Calm down,’ I whispered, flicking his arm. He gave me a firm handshake as I pulled out the chair for him and started filling their water glasses. ‘Al, Ms Vaughn, this is Gabe. He just started.’
‘I’ll be gentle, Gabe.’ Al batted his eyelashes at Gabe and gave him a pleasant smile while Ms Vaughn rolled her eyes.
‘Al,’ I warned.
‘You need to cut that shit out,’ Ms Vaughn said. I bit my lower lip, trying not to smile. I looked up at Gabe to see his eyebrows raised. ‘Or they’re gonna kick you outta here. Or put you on a list or something.’
Al held out his hands. ‘What? I can’t be friendly?’
‘Notthatfriendly,’ she said, whipping her napkin and placing it on her lap. ‘It’s not the eighties anymore.’
