Love and Food (8 page)

              “I completely get it.  Many of the cooks that I’ve meet over the years say exactly the same things that you’re saying.  They say they knew from a very young age that they wanted to cook and it was something that was always present.  I like to think of it as a need given by God.  I don’t mean to get spiritual on you, but I totally believe that we all have that need inside of us.  I think that we all have something that we love to do and we need to do.  Yours was cooking and mine was restoration or revival.  I like bringing things back from the dead.  It doesn’t matter what it is.  It could be a bird with a broken wing or a restaurant.  Restoration has been something that has been with me since I was young.  I remember when I was probably about eight or nine….” Ethan stops and looks at her.  “I’m so sorry.  This meeting isn’t about me.  I do that sometimes – hijack conversations.  I apologize.”

              “No apology necessary.  I would like to hear where you were going.  What happened when you were eight or nine years old?” she says, intrigued by the man sitting in front of her.  Along with cooking, she’s always had an interest in people and what makes them tick.  He’s interested in how the restaurant came to be, but she is also interested in what’s behind Ethan Saint and how he’s become who he is in his life.

              “Okay, if you insist,” he says, raising an eye and looking at her.

              “I insist,” she says, nodding for him to continue.

              “Well, as a child, I grew up on a farm.  When I was bored, I would explore.  In my mind, I would call them adventures.  Anyway, one day I was walking through the wooded part of our property and I found a raccoon and its paw was stuck in a trap.  I remember I was furious that my parents had placed a trap on our property, but after speaking with them, I found out that it was done by the previous owners.  I remember when I found the raccoon, I ran as fast as I could to the house to get my mother.  My mother, who by the way is one of the greatest women I have ever known, didn’t even question me.  She immediately stopped what she was doing and she rushed back with me to save the raccoon.  She helped me release the raccoon and we brought him back to the barn.  To make a long story short, we nursed him back to health and he never left my side after that.  I named him Ralph and he was my best bud for a long time.  That is when my love for restoration begin”

              “Sounds to me like you should have been a veterinarian.”

              “I thought about it, but it wasn’t what I loved,” Ethan says, fiddling with a fork on the table.  “So, back to you, when did you decide that you wanted to open a restaurant?”

              “When I was in culinary school.  I weighed what my options were when I finished school and that was the one I decided on.  I knew that I wouldn’t be happy working for someone else.  I wanted to be the boss.  I decided that I wanted to be the overseer and not be overseen.”

              “So what did you do to make it here?” he says, gesturing with his hand at their surroundings.

              “When I graduated, I got a job working at an upscale restaurant called The Renaissance in town.  I worked day and night and I saved up ever cent I could until I had enough money to pay for everything I needed to start this place.”

              “How long did that take?”

              “About ten years.”

              “Wow.”

              “Yeah, it took awhile, but I was patient and determined.  I knew what I wanted and I went for it.”

              “Okay, so I have a good idea how this place came to be, but can I ask you something?”

              “Of course.  Ask me anything.”

              “Every time I’ve seen you so far, you’ve been sitting in that office in the back.  I have yet to find you in the kitchen.  Do you still cook?”

              “Honestly, no.  I may cook a meal at home every now and then, but it’s been a long time since I’ve spent any significant amount of time in the kitchen.  Cooking was put on the back burner once the restaurant was opened.  Once the restaurant started, I got swamped with paperwork.  Other things became priority, like ordering food, scheduling, organizing functions and things like that.  Cooking wasn’t as important anymore.  Plus, I had Mack who does an amazing job back there.”

              “I see,” Ethan says, folding his hands on the table.

              “Alright Ethan, I can’t take the suspense anymore.  What are your plans for this place?”

              “Well, I always like to hear the bad news first, so I’m going to give you the bad news,” he says, leaning towards her. 

              She can’t help but groan.  “What’s the bad news?”

              “Since we’re going to renovate this place, you’re going to have to close the restaurant for a couple of weeks.”

              “Okay, I get that, but what about my staff.  They have bills and families.”

              “Paying your staff for their time away is part of our budget.  I’m sure they wouldn’t mind a little time off with pay.  We may need some of them occasionally around here, but their presence isn’t really necessary.”

              “Okay.  What else?” she says, the nervousness she felt at the words closing down the restaurant disappearing.

              “We’re going to have a grand reopening.  What we want is for people to forget the old and be entranced with the new.  We want people to think of the old restaurant as never have existing.  You get what I’m saying?”

              “I do,” she replies, feeling a little disappointed at having to say goodbye to everything that she had created.

              “It’s a hard thing to do, I know,” he says, reaching across the table and putting his hand over hers.  Usually she would recoil at the touch of a man who isn’t Kyle, but his touch is reassuring.  It’s not intrusive or unwelcome.  She believes that he understands what she’s going through.  He pats her hand and pulls his hand away.

              “So, what is entailed in this reopening?”

              “Like I told you before, it means new décor, a new name and definitely a new menu.  What can you tell me about the current menu?”

              “The menu now was completely created by Mack.  I told him what I envisioned and he put it all together.  I, of course, gave the green light, but the dishes are his creation.”

              “Okay, so here’s what I’m thinking.  I think that this time around, you need to create the menu.  I think what needs to happen is that you need to get back to your love for cooking.  You need to find your passion again.  I think that the menu needs to be created with love, by you.  No offense to Mack, I think that he must be an amazing chef or you wouldn’t have hired him, but I think that you need to be the one beyond the menu.  I like to believe that customers can tell and feel when an owner, who is a chef, has put their all into the food that they’re eating.”

              She sits back and silently thinks about what Ethan has said.  It isn’t something that she considered during the creation of the menu for the restaurant.  The thought that customers could tell things about the food they’re eating was never something that crossed her mind, but she knows that what’s he’s saying is true.  There have been times when she herself has thought the exact thing.  There have been times when she has pushed her plate away after just a few bites because she thought her dish had been put together haphazardly and what she thought was without care.  “Okay, I will do it,” she says after contemplation.

              “It a big undertaking, but I believe that you’re more than capable of doing it.  This is your restaurant and I think that every single aspect of it should be a reflection of you, including the menu.  I want people to come here because of you.  You’re the shining star.  Anyone who sees you must be blind if they don’t recognize that you are someone very special.”

              She can’t help but laugh.  “Is that what you tell all your clients?”

              “Haillee, I only speak the truth.  If I didn’t believe that you had something special going for you, I wouldn’t be sitting here.”

              “Well, thanks for the kind words.  I appreciate them.”

              “Just telling you how I see it.  I think that we’re off to a good start, but I have a meeting, so I’ve got to run.  I want you to think about the menu and the next time that we meet, I want to discuss the décor.  I have some ideas that I want to run by you and we’ll go from there.”

              “Okay.  Sounds good,” she says as they stand.

              She walks him to the door and watches him disappear from view.  She turns and looks at the restaurant.  Soon it will look very different.  Soon everything about her surroundings will be very different.  She knows that she is more than ready for it to happen, but she can’t deny the small amount of grief that she feels inside.  It will be like saying goodbye to a very dear friend.

              As she walks through the dining room and thinks about what Ethan said about cooking, she allows herself to accept the fact that he is right.  She has lost her spark for cooking.  She has lost what was once her only passion in life.  She doesn’t know why she didn’t put together the menu herself in the first place.  She guesses that it was just a matter of time.  She didn’t have enough time to do everything, so she left it in what she thought was good hands.  She wonders what Mack is going to think when she tells him that she is revamping the menu.  She is sure that he will understand her choices.  He’s been with every single day.  He knows what’s been happening.  He knows that a change has been needed.

              She walks into her office with a newfound confidence.  She wants to get her spark back.  She wants the feeling that she had when she first conceived the restaurant in her mind way back when and she is determined to get it.  The feeling that nothing is going to stop her is starting to reemerge and bloom.  She is beginning to feel her old self returning.  She is starting to feel very sure that her decision to allow Ethan into her world it going to pay off.  She needed Ethan to point out to her that she had lost some of her original spunk and desire.  She is already grateful for his presence.  She is starting to believe that he is her miracle.

Chapter 6

              “Kyle, where have you been?” she asks, angry inside, but trying not to let it show in her voice.

              “Out,” he says dismissively.

              “Where have you been?” she asks again calmly.

              “I just told you.  I was out.”

              “Why won’t you tell me where you’ve been?  If you weren’t up to no good, why won’t you just tell me where you were?”

              “Haillee, we’ve been over this.  You need to trust me.  When I tell you that I’ve been out, you need to believe that I was just out and not with some other woman.”

              “Kyle, trust is earned.  If you want me to trust you again, you need to give me a reason to.  When I ask you where you’ve been, you need to tell me where you’ve been, so that I can trust you.  When you gave my vague answers and then get defensive, it leaves me suspicious.  Can’t you understand that?”

              “I was out with Barry and the guys.  We went out and had a couple of drinks.  You happy now?” he says, going into the bathroom and slamming the door.

              She wants to believe what he’s told her, but his behavior is making every alarm she has go off.  If he was just out with his friends, why is he acting so strange?  Why couldn’t he just tell her that in the first place?  Why did he have to make a huge scene and cause an argument? 

              He’s been acting very strangely for the past couple of weeks.  She’s tried to ignore it, but it’s become too much to ignore any longer.  It wouldn’t be realistic not to wonder if he’s cheating on her again.  She wants to believe that he’s telling her the truth, but the disappearances without explanations has just become too much to put aside.  She has to find out what’s going on.  She needs to know the truth.

              When Kyle comes out of the bathroom looking angry, she has no choice but to tell him how she’s feeling.  “Kyle, come and sit down.  We need to talk.”

              “What now, Haillee.  I’m done with all the accusations and the questions,” he says, taking the spot next to her on the sofa.

              “It’s about the wedding.  We’ve been doing nothing but fighting lately.  I think that we should postpone the wedding.”

              “Why?  There is nothing going on.  I don’t know how many times I can tell you the same thing.  I don’t know what to do to make you believe me.”

              “Kyle, I’ve thought about this a lot and it just seems like the right thing to do.  I have a lot on my plate with the restaurant and I just think that putting the wedding off until the reopening of the restaurant is over is the best thing for us right now.”