Yes, Chef: A Grumpy x Sunshine Kitchen Romance

"What's up?" I ask, after a minute or so of him staring. "Sir?"

Douglas scrapes his hand over his jaw. "Jack, I have to let you go."

"Let me go," I repeat. The words take on meaning slowly through the haze of my headache. "As in..... "

"As in we're moving on from you."

"You're kidding." I wait for Douglas to laugh, say something about razzing me, but he doesn't. He looks as serious as a doctor giving a patient very bad news.

He grimaces. "No."

"But—"

"We'd like you to ride out another few weeks to help the new sous acclimate. And we'll offer severance, of course."

My head throbs as I take a quick mental tally of the three months since Sal's death. I've been late more than I should, but I've only missed one full shift, the day of the funeral; it was easier to get drunk than face what I was missing. I'm not the first or last chef to drink a little on the line. I'm not okay, but I'm functional. Mostly. I've been remembering to take my Adderall. I know I've fucked up, but I'm a good cook. A great cook. Better than Jimmy, or anyone else on this staff. I have a James Beard award underneath my belt, for fuck's sake.

"Jimmy says—"

A red haze seems to descend on my vision. "You're going to believe Jimmy over me? Fucking Jimmy Scazzero?"

"You've been a mess for months!" Douglas finally snaps. "You're late constantly, if you show up for work at all, you smell like the floor of a goddamn bar, you made that server quit—"

"She was as much a server as Chili's is fine dining."

"That doesn't fucking matter!"

My mouth snaps shut. If I was covered in gasoline instead of sweat, Douglas's look would set me on fire.

"Look," he says finally, with immense patience. "I didn't want it to come to this."

Ice slithers down my spine. This is really happening.

"You're talented as hell, Jack. Truly. You have a special touch. But I can't keep you on like this. Not here, and definitely not at Green Street." My face must look like a fish right before its head is chopped off, because he continues, "I know you'll land on your feet. Maybe in the future, once you've had some time to get your life together, we can talk."

I've left restaurants unceremoniously before. There one day, gone the next, hopping ships like a harbor rat. But that was before Douglas. I bought into everything he said about my potential, put my head down and worked hard and kept my mouth shut when it came to personnel like Jimmy. I'm not stupid; I knew I was trying to replace what I lost with Sal with Douglas instead. He couldn't be like a father, but I didn't deserve a father anyway. A mentor would do. The thing is, I thought it was working.

"I know I haven't been handling things well." I swallow past a sudden lump in my throat. "I'll be better, I promise. I'll handle my shit."

"I'm sure you know Sal wouldn't want this for you," Douglas says softly.

"He died," I say, voice raw. Dull knives are more dangerous than sharp ones, and it feels like Douglas just stabbed one into me, old and rusty, and twisted it. "We don't know what he'd want."

"Listen." Douglas squeezes my shoulder. I resist the urge to flinch. "Jack, you're a good kid. This isn't the end. I hate to do this, but it's business, okay? Just business."

"But—"

"Stay for the shift, end things on a good note. We'll talk about severance tomorrow." Another sad, tight smile, and he side-steps out of the office, leaving me alone.

Somehow, I make it to service without throwing up or punching Jimmy in his smug mouth. He must have known that Douglas was about to fire me.

I've been fighting the urge to leave, let him figure out this dinner rush on his own—but I don't want to screw everyone else over. And truthfully, there isn't anywhere to go. I don't spend much time at my apartment. It's just a box that holds secondhand furniture and my collection of cookbooks. I don't have friends so much as coworkers; Hazel is the closest I've been with anyone lately, and still, it's not much deeper than a friendly work connection. The last conversation I had with someone outside of work? It was with Gilbert, the old guy who runs the pretzel cart I like best in the city. A girlfriend? I haven't had a girlfriend since the disaster that was Jessica Danes, and that was three years ago now, when I worked on her father's yacht as their private chef.