Cockney:A Stepbrother Romance(21)

"What?"



"Nothing, chef."



"Marco, Jesus, what?"



"Nah, mate, you're like, the boss right now, and we're at work."



I roll my eyes and punch him in the arm, "Fuck you, spill."



He darts his eyes around the kitchen full of cooks all busily preparing  their stations and getting pots simmering and basically not looking our  way before he huddles close to me and reaches into his pocket, "Need a  bit of medicine to get through?"



Fuck.



I stare at the little baggie of coke in his hand. Coke is never a good  plan for me, even when I'm out to party. It messes with me too much,  makes me crazy.



Of course, I'm practically seeing double right now with sleep  deprivation, so perhaps this is what they might refer to as "desperate  times, desperate measures." I check the time on the wall, the minute  hand ticking dangerously close to when we'll open for our first seating.  Yeah, sniffing drugs might not ever be a good plan, but I'm suddenly  wondering if it's the only plan.



I look over Marco's shoulder at Chloe off in the corner of the kitchen.  She looks up and then glances at me, as if feeling my eyes on her. And  for a second, I'm about to push Marco away and tell him to fuck off and  just get on with my night. But then my eyes meet hers and she just  glares at me, like I've wronged her in some way.



And it pisses me right the fuck off.



Fuck it.



"Oy, let's do this," I mutter at Marco, rolling my eyes when his light  up. We haven't done this shit years; not since before the army when we  were into the street life. It was a bad idea when we were young, dumb,  and broke; it's a fuckin' awful idea when we're older and at our fucking  job.



Just the same, when we're out back by the kitchen entrance, I can still  feel the giddy rush you always get when you're about just about to do  something incredibly fun but incredibly stupid. Marco's tapping lines  out on the flat of his chef's knife - "cutting cold" we call it in  kitchen-speak - and I'm still trying to convince myself this isn't the  worst idea in the world when the backdoor suddenly bangs open.



Marco swears and dips the knife down behind his back as we both glance back; it's Delia.



"Oh, um," she turns to head back inside, the cigarette she was about to  light resting between her lips, when she suddenly pauses and looks at us  more curiously, "What are you two doing out here?"



"Never you mind love," Marco says, grinning at her. She arches an  eyebrow, and then like a Goddamn idiot, Marco makes a little sniffing  motion with his nose.



I'm going to kill this fucking guy.



Delia's eyes light up and she checks behind her before stepping towards us, "Oooo … .do you mind?"



"Not at all!" Marco beams, bringing the knife up from behind his back as  Delia move to join us. She's all smiles at me, but I'm too busy glaring  daggers at Marco to even bother noticing.



This is way off book. Being out here doing fucking cocaine right before  service with my buddy the grill guy is one thing; doing it with the damn  wait staff is fucking pushing it.



But then again, I am fading here. I'm on zero fucking sleep, my heads  all turned around and upside-down from whatever the fuck is happening  with Chloe, and I just need to Get. Through. This. Night.



The powder is cold as it hits my nostrils, and then fire when it hits my bloodstream a second later.



Theeere it is.



I'm letting the rush wash over me, and pushing the knife away towards  Marco when the door opens again. And this time, it takes me a second to  turn and focus, and realize that it's Chloe.



...Chloe standing in the doorway, glaring at me as I stand there with a  rail of coke on a fuckin' knife with Delia giggling and stroking my arm.



I'm opening my mouth without even really knowing what to say, but then  she's shaking her head and just walking back inside anyways.



Fuck.



I shrug Delia away from me with a growl and start to march after Chloe  when the door slams open again and this time I'm face to face with Ian.



His eyes dart behind me and then focus on me as he narrows his gaze, "You ready?"



I frown, "Yeah, of course."



His eyes drop to my nose, and he arches his eyebrows and makes a little  brushing motion on his nose. Shit. I quickly bring a hand up to brush  away any remnant powder.



"Are you sure you're ready?"



"Ian, fuck off, I'm fine."



He's not smiling. "Oh, you are? Lovely, because the shit is about to hit the fan inside."





The London times is here. The fucking London Times food reviewer is at Jolie.



To put this in perspective, picture finishing filming on a small  independent movie and having Roger Ebert pick it up to take a quick  look. Or imagine finishing your solo song on the stage and then having  to face Simon and the other judges of that talent and singing show you  happen to be on.



Yeah, it's like that.



Okay, the reviewer's supposed to be this big secret, but any modern  restaurant in London worth it's truffles knows who he is, fake mustache  or not. He'll come twice before writing his review. You get two hits to  make it perfect. There's no third chance, ever.



Needless to say, there's an absolute chill over everything in the  kitchen as soon as Ian drops the bomb on us. Well, a chill over almost  everything, because I'm still seething mad at Oliver. It's stupid  because it's not like I have any damn right to feel jealous or whatever.  But...ugh, I don't know. I guess there was just something about seeing  him out there, with her, that has me seeing red. And it's the absurdity  of me feeling jealousy about someone like Oliver that maybe bugs me even  more.



His face it etched in wood when he comes back inside following an  utterly white-faced Ian. Yeah, this is a big fucking deal. It may not be  the Michelin guide, but it's the Times. This is the sort of review that  will make or shatter a place like Jolie, and we all know it.



There's a silence as Oliver stands in the middle of the kitchen,  blinking and swallowing thickly. He finally looks up and around at  everyone, his face stony. His eyes catch mine, and for a second I think  about giving him some sort of encouraging word or gesture. A nod, a  smile; anything I guess.



But then the back door opens and Marco and Delia scurry guiltily inside, and that second passes.



Yeah, no, screw him.



Oliver nods sharply at the silent kitchen staff, "Alright, stations; let's do this."



We fall into the rhythm of a working kitchen, everyone lost in their own  jobs and their own tasks as orders come in. But this time, it's  different. This time, there is silence aside from the sounds of knives  chopping or grills sizzling or whisks whipping. The whole place is  standing on this knife edge, just waiting for that order to come  through.



It does, finally. And from then on, the whole place goes into overdrive.  Ian is hovering at the service window, making sure each and every thing  that goes out looks perfect, even if it's only going to be walking past  the reviewer's table. And Oliver is a freaking mess. He's sweating, his  eyes darting all over the place as he starts to get more and more  agitated at the window. I can see his movements getting more erratic,  his muttered swears getting louder and louder.



Finally, I manage to find some sort of excuse to move past the front  line right by him. I tap his arm, "Hey, are you gonna be okay?"



"I'm fine."



"Oliver," I hiss, "You're a mess-"



"I said, I'M FINE, cook!" I flinch as he turns, roaring at me loudly.  Loud enough that Ian jumps back from the service window and that half  the kitchen looks up quickly. I clench my jaw, my eyes seething as I see  the fire in his.



"Get back to your fucking station, Chloe," He growls, glaring at me and  all business now. All cocky, arrogant, firing-on-all-cylinders Chef  Oliver.



"Fine," I sneer, and turn sharply on my heel to head back to my station.



"Fine WHAT?!" He roars.



Oh you've gotta be kidding me. He's going to pull this NOW?



I grit my teeth and turn back, glaring at him defiantly, "I said fine-"



"I heard what you said!" He roars again. He suddenly snatches up a plate  and hurls it against the wall, shattering the plate, scattering broken  shards and an array of radicchio salad everywhere; "It's YES CHEF; do  you fucking understand?"



It's like a slug to the gut, and I can feel my whole body start to  tremble, and I'm furious at myself when I feel the sting of tears in my  eyes.



Do NOT cry; do NOT fucking cry in front of him.



"Are we clear, Chloe?"



I'm shaking my head at him slowly, the tears stinging my eyes and my  pulse thundering in my ears. I'm thinking of the way he made me feel,  the things I let him do, and the things we should have said yesterday,  or this morning; things I can't imagine saying to him now.



The charming, rough-and-tumble boy I knew from before is gone, and it's  so stupidly obvious to me now that I'm suddenly ashamed at myself for  not seeing it before. The boy whose charming and quirky antics, whose  bold and cocky bravado swept me off my feet all those years ago - the  boy I thought I was finding all over again - is gone.