Dedication
For those who have faced a difficult situation and lived on…
you are a survivor; persevere.
"Never be ashamed of a scar. It means you were stronger than whatever tried to hurt you "-Unknown
Hidden Recipe Box (found in the attic)
Inside the lid read a label scribbled in faded handwriting
Card 1: Scotch-On-The-Rocks
Ice, cubed; glass half-empty
[Ethan]
When are you ever going to own your own home, E? I ask myself as I ride my Harley through the quiet streets of my small town.
When I grow up, I counter.
Isn’t thirty-three grown up enough?
By most people’s standards and also by my standard, it is, but I’ve had some setbacks on my journey through life, like giving up a promising job near Detroit to come back to the area for Mum. Cancer sucks. My previous employment at The Elk Resort wasn’t bad. The name is impressive on a resume but moving from one kitchen to another as a chef is only lateral. I want to move up. I want to own my own place. A restaurant is more important to me than a house.
Then again, if it was so important, I shouldn’t have gotten caught with my cookie in the cookie jar of the resort owner’s barely-of-age daughter. In my defense, I didn’t know she was so young or related to the boss. I needed that job, dammit, if for no other reason than I had a rent-free room at the resort. Working to save every extra penny for my dream, I refused to move back home when I returned to this lakeside town. I cannot live with my dad, a cherry farmer whose disappointment in me is larger than all the orchards of this area combined. My father stopped caring about my life the second I announced I was dropping out of college to work in a restaurant kitchen. I need practical experience, not a classroom education, I argued back then.
“It was your turn to take your mother…” My dad’s voice rings in my head as I recall our fight from yesterday. Even the sound of my engine can’t melt away the tone of his gruff voice, the displeasure in it, and the sheer exasperation at my lacking responsibility, according to him.
“To treatment,” I added because my father could hardly finish his sentence. My mother’s chemotherapy scares the shit out of him.
“I forgot.” It wasn’t true, but the alternative—telling him I had an interview—is something I wasn’t ready to share yet.
“You forgot? You forgot! Ethan, I don’t know where this irresponsible side comes from.” I tuned out the rest of his speech, where he reminds me I’m over thirty and still don’t have my shit together. Not everyone is perfect like my sister, Karyn, or successful like my brother, Gavin. Some of us just take longer to bloom.
Letting loose a bit on the throttle, I open up on the one-lane backroads, whizzing by a cherry orchard similar to our own. As I weave my way through the area, I let the blacktop beneath my tires loosen my anxiety. The overcast morning is gloomy for early September, hinting that fall is on its way. Change is coming, my mother would always say on a day like today. My mum is a ray of sunshine during a storm. Being her baby son means we’re tight, and even though she’s more understanding of my dream compared to my dad, I hate that I also disappoint her in some ways. While she’s smaller in stature, and even more frail under her current condition, her strength is the size of her heart. She just wants me to be happy. I just want to be happy.
I’ll need to head to my new employer’s place soon. I can’t go without a job, and although the situation seems sketchy, I’ll do anything short term for money. The end goal needs to stay in sight. I want to prove to my dad, but more so to myself, that I can have my dream and live it too.
Pam Carter set up the arrangement for this new gig. I’m close with the woman I once had a crush on as a young boy. Her petite form with miles of curves and straw-blond hair were a trigger for my adolescent libido. Now, we’re practically family as our older siblings are married to each other. She’s been good to me over the years, perhaps better than I deserve at times. I’m not sure how she knows my future boss, but I didn’t question her.
The interview process returns to my thoughts in a cluster of images.
Pam directed me to the coffee bar in the main lobby of The Elk where I would find a man reading a book. She described him as forty with a nearly shaved head and salt-n-pepper scruff. “He’ll look like an MMA fighter but studious.” I had no idea what that meant until I saw the man.
He introduced himself as Jacob Vincentia, shaking my hand and eyeing my outfit, which was clean but not pressed. He asked me the most random questions.
“Have you ever been in a fight?”
Maybe once or twice—just simple bar scuffles. I didn’t know if he wanted me to answer in the affirmative, so I said no.
“Pam tells me you like women.”
Was there a question there?
“What’s your favorite food?”
Does any chef have a favorite? I liked simple meals with basic, natural ingredients. I didn’t need heavy glazes and sauces to mask what I considered the essence of an item. Foods should work together, complementing one another instead of fighting to overpower the flavor.
He told me his favorite food was pizza. “It covers all the food groups in one.” I wasn’t checking him out, but his solid form did not live on pizza alone. He could kick my ass, even if he was four inches shorter than me. His body language alone told me that.
“Pam trusts you, so I trust you.”
And that was it. I was hired on the spot to do God knows what.
Cook a little. Grocery shop some. And be a presence, whatever the hell that means.
He mentioned trusting Pam, and as I trust her and need the money, I took the job. He offered me a ridiculous amount of cash for a few weeks of service. I don’t understand all the secrecy and vagueness behind it, but I’m not going to look a gift horse in the mouth, or in this case, some scrappy guy willing to trust me and pay me thousands of dollars to make him a meal or two.
Eventually, I head for the highway leading north from Elk Lake City and make my way to Winter’s Road. Then I take a sharp left onto Winter’s Trail, a curvy dirt drive surrounded by deep woods. Rather narrow, it’s more like a broad path with the heaviness of pines and maples on either side of it. The branches overhead make the ride ominous and foreboding as though a suffocating weight presses on the thick foliage. My eyes leap upward for only a second, seeking any sign of sunlight.
When I lower them, something’s in my way or rather, someone.
Slamming on the brakes, I’m jolted forward. My bike skids on the pebbly surface, fishtailing left and right. I’m creeping up to the slender figure before me, coming in too fast on this unstable road.
Why isn’t she moving?
There’s no doubt it’s a woman before me because no other body could be sculpted in such perfection from the backside.
Long, firm legs in black leggings strut like a gazelle, graceful yet athletic. A tight, heart-shaped ass melts under a too-thin waist. The formfitting shirt hints at muscles in a slender back. Elegant limbs bend, holding a runner’s pose as she struts forward. A cap covers her head, securing her hair.
I twist and turn, attempting to keep the bike from colliding with a tree or clipping her, but I’m still slipping out of control. My trajectory is too fast. The front tire nears her perfect foot, and I call out to her.