Love On the Line: An Enemies to Lovers Standalone

by Adriana Peck

  “What are you going to do about it?” Mason smiles devilishly, leaning onto a rack as he sets the onions down.

  “Nothing,” I say honestly. “You leave alone, and I’ll leave you alone.”

  “What if I don’t want to leave you alone?” Mason takes a step toward me. Normally I’d be freaking out if a guy acted like this to me, but I’m frozen in my place. I want to grab Mason, put my arms around him and…kiss him, I think. I don’t really know if I want to punch him or make out with him.

  Mason makes that decision for me. He takes another step, leans closer towards me.

  “You and I can be really good friends, Rosa. You just have to give me a chance.”

  I smirk. “And how, exactly, would I do that?”

  That’s when it happens.

  Mason leans down and kisses me. It’s short, sweet, and to the point. I can hardly believe it’s happening by the time he pulls back, and it’s over just as suddenly as it began. He stands back up without a word and takes his bag of onions back out to the kitchen and drops it off with one of the other chefs.

  I have a dinner rush to prepare. And all I can think about is Mason. Mason this, Mason that. How his green eyes can pierce even the dark of a pantry, and how he can go from bad boy to a comforting force in an instant. Our boss won’t like hearing about this, that’s for certain. Chef Gambio probably won’t like the idea of us making out in the pantry. Not one bit.

  I stand up, wipe my sweaty palms on my smock, and get ready to cook the best dinner I’ll ever cook in my entire life. And now I can’t get Mason out of my head.

  Great. Just great.

  Five

  The entire staff is working double-time by the time I make it back out to the kitchen. My chicken cacciatore is gone, taken outside by either Chef Robby or Chef Julia. Chef Robby looks over at me and shakes his head as he goes back to cutting up a zucchini into paper-thin slices for the ratatouille dish I had started a while earlier. I could tell my role as head chef had certainly diminished in the past five minutes. Chef Gambio is nowhere to be found, probably locked away in his back office close to the door. I look around the kitchen, watch as the rest of the kitchen staff scrambles to fill orders without direction.

  A fire lights in my gut. I know the only way I can keep my job is to start giving orders and to get this kitchen under control.

  “Benicio! Come over here, you can help me out with something.” I call out, and the dishwasher comes running. Benicio’s hands are waterlogged and pruned from a night of dishes. He’s clearly exhausted, but still comes to offer a hand. I thank him for his help, but we’ve still got work to do.

  “Still more work? Such as?” he asks quizzically, raising an eyebrow.

  “Get my station cleared. I need space to prep.”

  “Prep?” Benicio asks. “But tonight’s already in a full swing and we don’t have time to—”

  “Just do it!” I practically bark at him, channeling my inner Mason. Now I’m going to take what I want. I have one shot to make this right, and it’s going to be with an old dish from back home. I never spent any time in the old country, but my Ma did. And she taught me one dish that I knew I could pull out at any time for a hit—ratatouille, of course. It’s the easiest first course, and when it’s good, it’s good. Despite ratatouille being a French dish, most Americans can’t tell its not from the right country anyways. And Chef Gambio keeps it on the menu anyways, despite this being an Italian restaurant. It doesn’t matter. It’s time we get to work.

  “Robby, Julia!” I holler out. “We’re making ratatouille first, get the eggplants and squash ready!” I started prepping tomatoes on the cutting board, dicing them into perfectly bite-sized chunks. I’d always learned to make ratatouille with smaller pieces in the soup. Easier way to combine flavors that way. I tell Robby to cut the zucchini into almost paper-thin slices to line the bowl, and Julia preps the eggplant as he does so.

  I start prepping the sauce as the other chefs get the dish ready. I sauté oil, garlic, onions and peppers all together until they create a delicious scent, sizzling in the pan as we preheat the oven.

  I can’t believe it. The sauce was incredible. The plate looked like it belonged in a culinary magazine. We toss the dish together, throwing it in the oven as we wait the forty minutes it takes to cook the dish. No worries, onto the next one.

  Just as I’m getting started on a standard order of Chicken Alfredo, Mason comes in the kitchen, hands full of order cards. “We’re getting swamped out there. Any help, boss?”

  Gambio sticks his head out from his office, where I assume he can hear everything going on in the kitchen. He sighs, throws up his hands. “I’ll take orders, fine. See how this plays out for you later.”

  Benicio puts his dishes away, runs over to me. “Let me help, Rosa, please!” He practically begs me. I can tell it’s his way of flirting, but a dishwasher trying to impress a chef like that just doesn’t work for me.

  “Get those dishes done,” Gambio barks at his nephew as he cranes his neck around. “That’s how you help.”

  I don’t have anything to say to Benicio, but I see the look he shoots me before going back to his dish station. It’s a sly grin, one that he probably learned by watching Mason on the rare occasion he would whip one out.

  There’s still another thirty minutes on the ratatouille. I finish the Chicken Alfredo, throwing it on a plate and tossing it onto the partition for Mason to come collect. I have a while before the ratatouille is ready, so I pop outside for a moment for a breath of fresh air.

  Outside I can’t feel time pass. It’s calming out here in the alleyway, and I take a deep breath, collecting myself as I lean against the brick wall. I tell myself everything’s going to go okay. I don’t know how long I’ve been out here, but after a few minutes I figure I better pop back inside.

  I go back inside, and find that the ratatouille is ready and out of the oven. Robby moves aside, slides a plate over to me and I begin to place the prepared ratatouille onto the plate, drizzling it over with sauce. I can see Benicio eyeing me from the dish station. He grins every time I look up at him, and it’s starting to wear me down just enough to find it a little charming. I smile back and get back to my dish.

  “My Ma made the best ‘touille,” Benicio calls over to me. I smile and nod, not having nearly enough time for conversation. But he tries again.

  “I make something pretty good too,” he says. “Wanna know what it is?”

  “Benicio, the only thing you make is minimum wage,” Mason calls from the door of the kitchen. I can’t help but laugh out loud at that.

  “You’ll regret that,” Benicio mutters as he shakes his head and goes back to the dishes. I look up from my dish as Mason walks over to my station. Normally he waits out at the partition for the dish to be done, but this time he comes up to me directly. I’m already sweating bullets, covered in various sauces and greases. There is a zero percent chance I look anything remotely close to attractive right now. I sort of hope Mason would just have waited at the partition, but I still liked seeing him up close. His jawline was more pronounced the closer you looked at it, anyways.

  “You got the ratatouille done yet?” he asks, leaning over me and my workspace.

  “Yeah,” I say. “Should be done soon.”

  “Get it done quick,” Mason says. “Or else we’re going to have a problem.”

  And I silently wonder if his ‘solution’ will be to kiss me again. Honestly, I wouldn’t mind it, but I’m sure Gambio’ll freak if he sees his Head Chef and his Head of Waitstaff making out in the kitchen. Besides, Mason’s almost too much of a bad boy for me to handle. I wonder if I’ll ever be able to simmer the fire inside of him. He’s certainly not going to do that himself.

  “You’re going to have a problem,” I say. “You can deal with the angry customers out there at the table, and you let me stick to what I know back here, okay?”

  “Nah,” Mason says. “I think you run this plate out. Because I don’t feel like
running it out anymore. I think I’ll go take a smoke break. 16B. Okay?”

  I groan. “Mason, don’t do this. Please.”

  But he’s already out the door. His aloofness really gets to me sometimes, and I regret letting him kiss me in the pantry. He’s such a jerk, I could have said no if I wanted to.

  But I didn’t want to.

  Whatever. I finish the ratatouille, get it onto its plates, and take it over to table 16B where it’s due. The customers aren’t even remotely angry at all, instead, they greet me cheerily as I drop off the ratatouille on four separate plates in front of them. They dive in, and I wonder what Mason was so worried about in the first place.

  I go back into the kitchen were Mason’s waiting for me.

  “You jerk,” I say to him, not actually that angry. “The customers were fine.”

  “Table 17B? No, they’re pretty pissed. You sure you took it to them?”

  My stomach does a flip.

  “You said 16B. You told me yourself.”

  “Did I? I should have mentioned. I wrote the wrong table down. Oh well,” Mason says, heading back out to the front of the restaurant. “We’ll just send another one out. I guess 16B’s getting a meal on the house tonight. No biggie, I guess. Just don’t tell Gambio.”

  And Mason kicks open the double doors, leaving me to prepare an entirely new batch of ratatouille on my own.

  Seriously. If Mason wasn’t such a good kisser I would have strangled him by now.

  Forty minutes later, I have a new dish of ratatouille prepared. Mason stops by the partition, and I tell him the plates for 17B are ready.

  Before Mason can say anything, however, Gambio’s at the partition, too, back from chatting with customers in the lobby. His face is redder than the tomatoes in the ratatouille Mason’s holding.

  “MASON!” he barks, angrier than I could have imagined. My stomach dropped. I knew I’d probably get in trouble too, for distracting Mason, but I don’t really care. It was worth it. Plus, it’s Mason’s turn to get in trouble tonight.

  Benicio hollers an “Oooooohh,” from the dish station, but I don’t mind. Chef Robby certainly minds, however, as he storms over and shoves two full plates of chicken cacciatore into Mason’s hands and shoots Benicio a dirty look.

  “Get your dishes out there,” Gambio hisses at Mason from the door. “Now!” Gambio practically shoves Mason back towards the door, his lead waiter still carrying the plates. Mason shoots a glance back at me and shrugs, sticking his lower lip out comically as he balances the two plates, one on each hand. I’m grinning ear to ear at the whole scene. I just can’t help it.

  Robby shoots me a dirty look, and Julia does too. I get back to the next order card, feeling like I’m floating on air. The rest of the night flies by, and I bang out dish after dish. I’m sure the critics were impressed with everything. Even if Chef Gambio was pissed, I still feel great about tonight. I just hope Mason didn’t get in too much trouble for talking to me.

  Later that evening, I finish my closing duties. I see that Mason isn’t closing late, he is already gone with the rest of the staff. Gambio counts down the cash register, taking in the totals for the evening.

  “Goodnight, Chef,” I say to him as I walk past and head towards the front door. I don’t expect him to say anything back but—

  “Rosa,” he says. “Come here for a second. I want to talk to you.”

  I turn around, wondering what Chef Gambio would say to me. “Yes?”

  “You and Mason fight and talk about this and that,” Gambio says to me. “That’s great. I don’t care if you strangle each other or get married. Just don’t do either while you’re on the clock, or else the both of you will have plenty of time together in the unemployment line.”

  I nodded. “Anything else?” I ask.

  Chef shakes his head. “There’s the door. See you tomorrow,” he says. I leave, feeling a sense of dread coming on. Mason is nowhere to be seen.

  Six

  On my first day off in weeks, I finally take some time off for myself. In the morning I head over to the supermarket to finally restock the barren fridge that had been taking up space in my tiny kitchen. With my earbuds on, I make grocery shopping an easy breeze. Plus, it’s always more fun when you’re shopping for dishes that you want to make on your own for yourself. Once Gambio has me grocery shopping for the Restaurante I know I’ll get sick of it fast. But for now, I’m in my zone. I check out all my groceries, only thirty-five dollars in total, and head back to my place that’s just up the street.

  After I’m back in my apartment, I find myself back in the zone as I work to clean and re-stock my fridge. As I finish stocking my kitchen, I can feel my phone buzzing in the pocket of my hoodie. It’s Dad calling me. I take a deep breath, collect my thoughts, and answer the phone.

  “Hello?”

  “Rosa!” Dad’s deep Italian tones come out so strongly over the phone, I need to lean back just so my eardrums don’t burst. Dad’s loud voice really competes the picture of the man he is—short and stocky, thick black hair and a tan that never seemed to fade. He likes the way Tony Soprano dresses, and even in my father’s semi-older age he always knows how to clean up. He’d always talk in this half-shout volume where you never knew if he was mad about something or just excited. Sometimes I really don’t know how Ma put up with him, but I still love him just the same. He’s my Dad, after all.

  “How are you? How's the Restaurante?”

  “Fine, Dad. It’s fine,” I find myself searching for the right words to say. I don’t know how to explain it all to him. Everything at work was so intense, I didn’t have the strength to re-live it in me just yet. I’m sure he’d understand. “How are you?”

  “Well, Rosa, let me tell you,” he explains. Dad rants about this and that, telling me about someone who stood up at him and gave him a funny look on the subway the other day. His work as a construction project manager yields some interesting stories, to say the least. He’s used to working with his hands, and now he manages the guys who work with their hands. How ironic. Dad also tells me about a store clerk who gave him an extra five dollar bill when giving him his change. Dad swears the clerk was flirting with him.

  After a few minutes, I get him to change the subject. “Have you been to visit Ma lately?”

  “I had some time up there last week,” Dad says. “I took the paper up there to read to her. It’s funny, reading to a grave. Nobody looks at you funny when you’re doing it there in the cemetery, but when you tell your friends later? ‘What were you doing today?’ they ask, and you say, ‘Oh, I was reading the newspaper to my dead wife.’ ‘Shoot,’ they say, ‘You’re nuts.’ Even if they knew your wife and loved her to bits, they’ll still say you’re nuts.”

  “It’s still sweet, Dad,” I say. “And I miss her, too.”

  “Yeah, you and me both. Anyways, kiddo, I probably have to run soon. When should I visit you? I’m going to catch a flight up to your area for work next weekend and I thought—”

  I nearly jump for joy. “Next weekend would be great, Dad,” I beam. He can hear my smile through the phone, I bet. “See you then.”

  “We’ll find you a plot of land,” Dad says. “A plot of land where you can open your Ma’s restaurant. Then I’ll move in with you. It’ll be a blast!”

  I laugh. Dad would never actually move in with me, that much I knew for certain. I knew he liked his privacy, however much he loved and missed my Ma. “You better get ready for the rent here,” I joke. “The city of Deporte isn’t cheap. It’ll cost you an arm and a leg just to stay here for a weekend.”

  Dad and I shoot the breeze some more. He asks me what type of weather he should prepare for in the city. Does it rain often? Do cars wait for pedestrians to cross the street, or do they run red lights for fun? Dad barrages me with a million and one questions about the city that I don’t really know how to answer. Finally, he hears a raccoon outside and hangs up suddenly after saying a quick goodbye. I always think it’s funny how my Dad en
ds conversations. Always something interrupting and giving him cause to leave, unlike Ma who would drag out goodbyes for far too long. Part of me thinks I should have brought up Mason to Dad, asked him what Dad would think of all this. You can’t give your Dad the gory details, but you can always ask him for general advice. But I didn’t. I know that Dad will overthink things, just like I’m doing now. That’s how I know we’re related.

  I make myself a frozen panini that I bought earlier for lunch, heating it up in the microwave as I check my social media feed. Frozen food. Ugh. Blasphemy, I know, but as a chef sometimes you don’t want to put in too much effort for your food. I do find fast food degrading, however. I’ll eat fast food if it’s fast in the oven. You will never catch me in a drive-thru, ever.

  As I eat the panini, I browse through a stack of cookbooks that I’d been piling up on my kitchen table. Half of them are Italian cookbooks. The other half are a variety of cookbooks that my Ma passed down or from thrift stores. Other girls my age spend their time on social media, so I think reading cookbooks in my spare time can’t be that bad, right? I flip through cookbook after cookbook as I eat. Recipe after recipe, I find myself with more inspiration to create more dishes at work. Maybe that’s how I get back on Gambio’s good side. I get out a stack of sticky notes and mark a few pages with recipes to try out later. I make a mental note to find something good for the boss and stack up my cookbooks neatly as I finish the last of the panini.

  My phone buzzes again. Two phone calls in an afternoon, lucky me. This time, it’s Paige, my old roommate from culinary school who would always know how to find a party to go to on a Friday night. I figure that’s what this call’s going to be about.

  “Rosa, you’re not going to believe this!” Paige screams right as I answer the phone. “We’re going out tonight, and guess who’s coming with us?”

  “Who?” I ask reluctantly. I’m worn out from the past few weeks of work and need a night in. But I still entertain the notion, if only just to keep Paige happy. She’s got a short temper, and nothing tees her off more than having to bribe me to come out on a weekend.