Page 9 of Taste

Where I would usually flirt and laugh, I was now hiding in my back office, only emerging to deal with the small disasters that a busy service would bring. I was supposed to be the ringleader, moving through the tables with a smile, sprinkling compliments and chitchat over my diners like colourful confetti. Instead, I had Mabel running the show, and the sheer fact that they were doing the most brilliant job of it had the remains of my happy thoughts crumbling into dust.

I’d met Mabel in a grotty drag bar years ago and offered them a job on the spot. Mabel was fabulously fabulous, swinging from sharp suits and even sharper haircuts to flowing wigs and dresses that hugged their perfect figure and made even the most strait-laced humans gasp with envy. They were officially gender-fluid to the bone, and even I, who had known them long before they came out, sometimes forgot what body parts were hiding under their clothes. Today’s outfit was a pencil skirt and high heels, and Mabel was charming the pants of an elderly couple, handing them menus and gushing over the woman’s vintage handbag before moving effortlessly into discussing the front page of theFinancial Timesthat the gentleman had placed on the table. That was Mabel in a nutshell: people skills and customer service excellence served with a blinding smile and an outer shell that made people sit up and pay attention. They were the right-hand human every boss deserved, and I knew how lucky I was that they had toed the line with me for this long.

Mabel was sunshine on a rainy day, whereas I was rain falling from a leaking ceiling. I was back on the higher dose of my medication, back on the lower parts of my firm ground. Back to being nothing but a shadow of my former self.

“Honey,” they said, coming round the corner carrying a pile of menu folders. “There are typos in the specials menu, and only half of them are updated. Would you like me to have a quick look and print replacements?”

I stared at them like I couldn’t understand a word they were saying but willingly moved out of my chair so they could take their seat. My body was slow and sluggish, my mind overwhelmed by expectations I suddenly failed to fulfil.

I’d dug out the most colourful shirts in my wardrobe, trying to lift my mood. Tried to make the world a happier, prettier place by wearing loud floral prints and shiny coloured accessories. I still felt like I blended into the grey carpet, and all I wanted was to curl up and cry.

“It’s okay to feel off, babe. We’re one chef short on the line. Fancy going in and taking the veg section? It’s simple therapy, just for an hour or two. Ben would appreciate it.”

“Leaving you short here?” I snipped, internally laughing bitterly at my naivety. I wasn’t any help as it was, my useless bones sat here like I was part of the furniture.

“Go cook samphire for a while. Butter some carrots. Grill off those asparagus. It’ll make you feel better, and even if it doesn’t, it’ll make me feel better. Ben’s at it with those knives again, and we know what happens when we let Ben hold kitchen utensils.”

“Blood,” I said in a spooky, overdramatic tone, pulling a smile out of Mabel.

“Blood, indeed,” they smooched back, blowing me a small kiss.

I’d tried so hard over the weekend and had even gone for a walk in the local park to feel some sunshine on my too-pale skin, only to come home exhausted and drained. I’d reactivated that goddamn app and hooked up with someone in a club. It had barely met my needs and left me empty and sore. Then I rang an ex in desperation, hoping to at least wake up with a warm body in my bed. Skin against my back to soothe the growing feeling of panic in my chest. She told me I was sweet to ask but that her fiancée might disapprove of my invitation to a friendly sleepover.

I’d deleted that app again, because I didn’t do well hooking up with strangers. I preferred people I had some kind of connection with—another reason I’d so often got myself into these ridiculous situations, as it usually meant hooking up with someone through work, someone who saw me for what I was.

I was starting to realise that beyond the walls of work, I really didn’t have a life. In my small basement flat, I was surrounded by the sounds of neighbours every hour of the day. Laughter and humanity constantly rang through the thin walls, yet I felt more alone than ever and so goddamn out of control. It wasn’t good. It never ended well.

But I took Mabel’s advice. I covered myself in an oversized chef’s apron and pulled a hairnet over my gelled-back locks before nodding at Ben, my favourite chef in the whole wide world, who was, just like Mabel had predicted, already sporting several blue food-handler plasters on his right thumb.

“Boss!” he called out; the line chefs barely took notice of my presence. I walked through the stations, carefully managing my steps to avoid those choreographed moves with heat and sharp tools that could seriously injure you in an unguarded instant. I still grabbed a spoon to get a taste of today’s sauces as they came off the stove—a silky hollandaise with just a touch of chilli being poured onto a lush, pan-fried sole—and I nabbed a mouthful of deep-fried courgette, which brought a rare smile to my face.

“You all right, Boss?” one of my new chefs asked with a smile, a heavy-set youngster with a wild mop of dreadlocks who swung a ladle like he was part of a high school marching band. His aged minute steaks were sizzling in the butter on the hotplate in front of him, and I grinned when he flipped them over at the perfect moment, unaware until then I’d been holding my breath as I watched them tighten up over the heat. He was good. On the ball. Small mercies in a world where I cradled so many worries.

“Where do you need me, Chef?” I shouted to get Ben’s attention. He was at the stove, sampling the soup of the day and nodding appreciatively at the poor fraught youngster brandishing the ladle. Another apprentice from the local culinary school no doubt, but a good one. The not-so-good ones usually ended up in stewarding, washing equipment until they cried. Not that it should be a punishment. I’d lost count of the nights I’d stood behind those dishwashers, being part of the vital chain of a well-functioning restaurant. There was no job I couldn’t do in this place, well, apart from that I was a bloody terrible baker, terrifying Aaron, our extraordinary patisserie chef, whenever I offered to lend a hand.

“Mabel said to put you on veg,” Ben said, “but the fish section is falling behind, and I could do with someone on the meat. That good for you?”

“Perfect.” I hoped Ben heard the gratitude in my voice. I needed distraction and simple rules, and I could cook steak however you ordered it. I had also been through the menu in detail this morning, so throwing the slab of pork fillet on the hotplate felt like relief, watching the pumpkin seed coating pop on the oiled surface. It needed browning then roasting off in the oven before marinating in a chilli-infused glaze in the fridge to become a cold delicacy that we served with sweet potato mash for dinner. I cheerfully acknowledged the chef next to me, who was demolishing butternut squashes at her station like they were made out of jelly, and shot a smile of gratitude towards Ben as he called out the next round of orders.

This was soothing. I’d missed the high tempo of working the line, and happily shouted “Yes, Chef!” to confirm my orders, feeling like I was eighteen again, a spotty teenager back at culinary college. Keeping my hand in was good, and the familiarity of being told what to do and when to deliver it was better than any chemical drug I could pump into my veins.

I crawled back to my office at the end of service, tired and exhausted, but those feelings were good. My hands were raw from scrubbing my station, my brain having had a good few hours break from myself. Not that I was granted the use of my office chair. Mabel banished me to a stool while they finished off tallying up the covers and splitting tips off the final sales figures.

“Good job,” they cooed, tapping their perfectly manicured fingernails against the keyboard, the clicks making me long for a little silence.

“I could do with a nap,” I muttered, knowing those small luxuries were long gone.

Mabel stroked my hair as they left me to the solitude of my office for about two minutes before I grabbed my radio to make the rounds, hoping that seeing a few friendly faces would keep the light I’d captured in the kitchen and stave off the dark haze that surrounded my life. I loved my staff. The waiters waving cheerily from their stations as I walked the restaurant floor, and the kitchen was silent now, the chefs on a well-deserved break, yet the dinner preparations were in full swing in the back room, where Ben was shouting down the phone at some unfortunate soul as reports spewed from the printer on the raised platform where he masterfully orchestrated our line.

I wandered to the back corridors, taking a quick peek into our storage rooms and freezers, calming myself with the orderly cleanliness, smiling at Sadaat, a middle-aged former head chef who kept her pacemaker and my sanity in check with her impeccable storekeeping and flawless records. “Breathe, Quinton,” she instructed, her accent thick through the constant noise of chillers and freezers. “We’ve got it all under control. The cheese man is running late, but I threw some threats at him, so he’ll be here in time to get those slabs up to room temperature. Got him right scared under that attitude of his.”

“Little fucker,” I said with a grin, feeling my moodiness momentarily flutter away.

“Want a piece of this Cornish goat’s cheese?” She stabbed a thick cube with the tip of cheese knife, expertly popping it in my mouth before wiping the blade on her apron. “Also, Tarnowski Wines dropped by with that order of port you’d asked for—there was a personal delivery of red for you—and Mrs Winter at the laundry asked you call her with regards to the napkin situation. How’s the goat’s cheese? Lush, eh?”

The taste was dry and sharp on my tongue, waking my senses in a way that calmed my desensitised heart. I had always loved food, different tastes connecting to happy memories of my childhood. The places and people were long gone, but the tastes were still there, lingering in my mouth as I nodded and blew kisses at her and continued my lonesome stroll through my small kingdom, past the stewards handling the noisy dishwashers, who smiled when I saluted them and boogied to the Bollywood music blasting from a tiny radio in a corner. Iwasin control here; I knew all the people who followed my meticulously scheduled orders.

I took the long way, climbing the stairs up to the in-house booking department where people with headsets smiled and waved as I did a well-practised dance, weaving my way past their desks and gaining myself a disapproving smirk from Saffiya, heading up the accounting team from her corner office throne. I blew air kisses towards the salespeople in their open-plan glass cage towards the courtyard area, and then took a sharp left down towards the IT office and the staircase leading up to our extensive engineering rooms.

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