Short Stuff Read online

  “I made an awesome drink out of basil because my mother’s garden exploded early this year. Thank you, global warming.” I pour the basil syrup over crushed ice. “Nothing to do with that guy.”

  She takes a sip. “Yum.” She turns to her friends, who are sitting on the edge of the pool. “You guys, try this.”

  That’s how my first lunchtime rush starts. Toby said it would be quiet, people trickling in, getting a hot dog here, fries there. But a whole group comes over. They order rickeys, and Keisha says, “Pics or it didn’t happen!” She takes a group selfie with everyone holding up their green drinks. She posts it on Instagram, invites me to follow her, and says to her friends, “Thirsty, Orca?” That cracks them up. This is great!

  They like the rickeys so much that they ask me what else I have. I sell out of feta and spinach omelets in minutes.

  “Have you got anything else?”

  Nothing, but I think fast. “Come back for a new special every day. But I’m guessing you haven’t tried hot dogs as good as mine.” Those sell out, too, and I thank whatever divine being invented clarified butter.

  “You should be a chef when you graduate!”

  Suh-weet! It’s as if they know who I am from eating my food. “I’m gonna be.” I want to be one of those chefs who creates new flavor combos that people taste then wonder why no one did it before. I’ll go on TV and win contests, like the one on Cookd, start my own restaurant, feed people. This is the beginning.

  Even Basil comes over again, alone, of course. His thick, dark hair is cropped short without a part. It would be black, but all that time in the pool makes it very dark gray instead. His eyes are dark, too, brown, with long lashes. He doesn’t order a rickey—big surprise.

  He looks at the whiteboard again, rolls his eyes, frowns, and growls, “Two cheeseburgers, two hot dogs, and a double order of fries.”

  I ignore him while I prepare his food and resist the urge to spit on it. He takes the tray without a word.

  When the lunch rush dies down, and I’m picking up the plates and napkins from the four tables in front of the counter, I realize what I’ve done suggesting daily specials. How am I going to come up with new specials every day this summer? That’s like seventy-five days, and I only have snack bar equipment: flat-top, deep fryer, and a soft-serve machine. Then there’s the problem of ingredients. Raheem doesn’t understand anything but burgers, dogs, and fries. He’s the first one I need to sell on new stuff. Time for some esculent prestidigitation, I guess.

  I check the clock: 2:00 p.m., three hours to go, and it’s dead. What can I serve after lunch to bring people in? Nothing too filling, so smallish stuff. Snacks, but better than just the bags of chips on the rack.

  “Hey, Willie, I need to talk to you.”

  “Sure, Raheem, what is it?” I hate being called “Willie,” but don’t correct him. This is my chance to negotiate for ingredients.

  “What did you do to piss off the swimming champ?”

  Uh oh. “Um, nothing.”

  “He says you’re using his name on a drink. He’s pissed.”

  “No! I made a drink with basil, not a drink named, ‘Basil.’” He told my boss? What an asshole! “I sold out, two dozen between eleven-thirty and now.”

  “Well, no more basil drinks. Basil Minopoli is training for the Olympics. It’s good for the club that he practices here—prestigious.”

  “Okay, Raheem, no more basil rickeys, promise.”

  “You gotta feed that guy what he wants.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He gets to eat whatever he wants and he wants a ton of food every day. It’s a swimming thing. He basically eats all the summer profits from this snack bar. But the good PR’s worth it.”

  Hmmm. “Sure thing, Raheem.”

  “We gotta keep him happy. Just burgers, dogs, fries. You cook fancier stuff on your own time. Don’t give him any lip either.”

  I wipe down the whiteboard thinking that I’d like to wipe Basil’s face right off his head, starting with his lip.

  Although, thinking about his full lips, I might wipe off the rest of his face and leave his mouth where it is. Oh, and the big, dark eyes, too, long lashes and all.

  * * *

  Basil stands scowling outside the snack bar the next morning when I raise the metal shade. His eyes dart to the whiteboard over my shoulder. I haven’t put up today’s special yet. He relaxes his scowl to a simple frown. What a prince.

  “I want six eggs, scrambled, hash browns, whole wheat toast, and a short stack.”

  Ignoring his omission of the word “please,” I smile. “Sorry,” not sorry, “no eggs. They haven’t come yet.”

  “Seriously? I need the protein. When are they coming?”

  “Dunno. We’re out of hash browns, too. Double up on the toast?”

  “No. Make it fries instead. Do you have cheese fries?”

  “Sorry,” not sorry. “It’ll take half an hour to heat up the fryolater. How about grilled cheese?”

  “Is that all you got?”

  “I could put bacon on it.”

  “Okay. Three and double up on the pancakes.” He juts out his lower lip.

  Yeah, I wouldn’t wipe that off.

  He watches me as I work. I’m itching to put today’s special on the whiteboard, but I hold off.

  He doesn’t thank me when I hand him his tray. He takes it to a table and demolishes everything. Toby’s wrong: He’s not a killer whale: He’s one of those whales that just opens its mouth and sucks everything in. Good thing I didn’t waste today’s special on him.

  Here’s the thing: My mom’s garden did explode with basil—lower case b—and it’s such a great summer flavor that I have to use it. So if Basil wants his protein, I’m going to offer it with his favorite herb. I just won’t name it. I grab the step stool and the markers and write on the whiteboard, “Special Today: Pesto Tuna Melt, a Summer Breeze that’s Genoese.”

  When he’s through eating, Basil tips his tray into the trash bin, then leaves it on top. But there’s still trash on his table, the slob. He heads to the locker room without even looking at me. You’re welcome, Basil. Swim good.

  It’s still quiet, so I step out and pick up his stupid trash: one of those wrappers, paper on the outside, foil on the inside. Strawberry Milkshake Pop-Tart? Gross.

  Back behind the counter, I open the fridge and grin at the eggs in their open crate.

  Basil lifeguards for an hour, so doesn’t see the golden hash browns I dish up. Everyone loves them. When lunch rolls around I sell fifteen pesto tuna melts, saving a couple of scoops of the tuna salad just in case.

  “What’s pesto tuna?” I don’t even need to look up to know it’s him by the total lack of manners, no hello, nothing.

  “Oh, it’s great, very summery. Tuna salad with pesto sauce—”

  “—and pesto sauce is full of—”

  “Do you want one?”

  “Three burgers and three hot dogs. Did you get your fryo-thing hot?”

  “I’m down to one burger and, yes, we’ve got fries.”

  “Okay, one burger, three dogs, fries, and two of your tuna sandwiches.”

  Sweeeeet!

  Basil

  It takes me a few days to realize what Will is doing. Every morning there’s a new special with basil in it on his whiteboard. He stops using my name, but the day after the tuna with pesto he offers a Grilled Cheese Caprese Sandwich—All the Colors of the Italian Flag. The next day it’s a Green Hummus Veggie Pita, and then Garlic Breadsticks with Herb Butter. Yeah, he’s trolling me.

  But why? It’s not as though we had any kind of argument. When he called me an asshole the first day, I just walked away. I know when someone’s trying to start a fight and I’m not taking the bait. I could text Toby—we were sort of friends last year—but I should call Mr. Taplin
first.

  Yesterday, I hit the wall wrong in a turn and bruised my left foot. Koji’s not happy. We have a team meet next week, and my times are all off. This morning I get to the pool at 4:00 a.m. to ice my foot before my solo practice.

  Koji arrives at 4:30.

  “Arm crawl today if that foot’s still a problem.” He tosses me a kickboard to hold between my knees. It’s Koji’s way of giving me a break. I decide to ask him.

  “Any idea why that cook, Will, is mad at me?”

  “Maybe you eat too much.”

  “Real funny. No, seriously. He’s put basil in his special every day this week. I think he’s making fun of me.”

  “You just described a third-grade crush, not a fight. You want me to talk to Raheem? That kid needs to feed you.”

  “No, he’s feeding me, but he’s—”

  “Quit thinking about some cook with big blue eyes. You should be focused on not hitting the goddamn wall like you’re in a kiddy pool.”

  At 4:40, I finish my second Pop-Tart on my way from the locker room to the pool. It’s still dark outside but there’s a light in the snack bar. Will is writing on a clipboard while a huge pot of water simmers on the cooktop. There’s a giant pile of sliced onions and garlic on the counter and some sort of steak. He’s concentrating hard. Something about the look on his face makes me stop at the door.

  “Why are you here so early?” It startles him.

  “I get here early to order supplies and do prep work.”

  “Don’t you just cook what people order?”

  He cocks his head at me as if I’ve just said something stupid.

  “Do you really think I can cook eggs, bacon, hash browns, and pancakes in under a minute? Everything has to be out and ready to go before anyone gets here. I pre-cook the bacon, chop onions and garlic, mix pancake batter. It’s called mise en place. Then, when you place an order, all I do is measure out portions and fry.”

  There’s an angry red mark on the back of his wrist. “That must hurt.”

  He shrugs. I’m about to ask more when Koji calls. 4:46. I’m late again.

  By the end of practice, my foot is killing me. Will opens his window as I limp toward the counter.

  “Need some ice?”

  I slump onto a chair and nod. Will brings a bag, which I press against my ankle. The cold makes me wince. He’s so close I can smell garlic and lemons.

  “Thanks. Did you save some for your wrist?”

  He gives me a smile—almost—before heading back to the kitchen. A few minutes later he comes back with a plate of scrambled eggs, bacon, half a cantaloupe, and a huge pile of hash browns. He has two apple juice bottles under his arm. He puts it all on the table in front of me. For the first time in my life, I inspect the hash browns before I eat them. They have a crisp brown crust and they smell oniony.

  “They’re awesome.”

  “True. Why are you practicing if your foot is hurt?”

  “Something is always hurt. That doesn’t give me an excuse. We have a meet next week.”

  This is the first real conversation we’ve had.

  “What event do you swim?”

  “IM—individual medley. It’s four lengths, with four different strokes: butterfly, back, breast, and free.”

  There’s an awkward silence, but he asked me about swimming, so I ask him about cooking. “What’s the special today?”

  “I’m still deciding.”

  “I saw the steak you had out earlier.”

  “It’s flank steak.”

  “That sounds good.”

  “It’s not on the menu.”

  “How come?”

  “I don’t have the budget to serve that cut of steak to everyone. I come in early so I can practice dishes like that.”

  “You practice cooking?”

  “How else am I going to get better?”

  “How exactly do you practice on a steak?”

  My phone buzzes: Leo Taplin. Shit. I never did call him. I answer the phone to get it over with.

  “Hey, Basil, we’ll be out with a film crew next week to get some practice shots. Wednesday work for you?”

  “Uhhh, there’s a meet on Thursday, so I don’t think—”

  “Perfect. We need tape of you swimming, and warming up, and anything else that you do as part of your routine. We can talk about the Wake-Up America spot. Everyone’s excited to have you on board. We have a new line of suits. Michael Phelps helped design them. Can’t wait to see if you like them.”

  “I can’t—” He’s gone. Shit. But there’s nothing I can do except what he says.

  Will’s still here, watching me. His eyes are more gray than blue this morning. I wish Koji hadn’t mentioned them.

  After practice, the whiteboard says that today’s special is Turkey BLT with Zucchini Fries—no basil. But that’s not what Will feeds me. Instead, he pushes a plate across the counter with the grilled flank steak, white sauce oozing out of it, and a mountain of sweet potato fries next to it.

  “Tell me what it needs.”

  My mouth is already full. He stands there watching while I eat half the steak and most of the fries. I take a swig of water.

  “I think it’s great.”

  “Maybe roasted red pepper in the goat cheese stuffing?”

  “Sure, I guess.”

  “Or mashed potatoes instead of fried sweets?”

  “If you wanted.”

  “It’s not what I want. That’s not how cooking works. It’s what the diner wants. Everybody has their own taste. Some people like orange instead of lemon. Some people hate coconut—the idiots—and you can never, ever convince them to eat it. Some people love junk food.” Usually I follow the schedule, follow Koji’s instructions, follow Submergd’s rules. But Will really wants to know what I like. It’s so unexpected I don’t know how to answer.

  “Maybe a bigger steak?”

  He laughs, and yeah, his eyes turn from gray back to blue.

  “Hey, if you need some certain kind of food after practice, just ask me. I can add stuff to the list. I don’t know what swimmers eat, but—”

  “Can you do something with bananas?”

  “Sure. Why?”

  “The potassium. I like to load up before a meet. It might help my foot also.”

  “What did you do to your foot?”

  “Koji made me do splits without goggles. I mistimed a turn.”

  “Why? Isn’t the point to see where you’re going so you don’t crash into a wall?”

  “No, the point is to know the pool so well that, even if you lose your goggles in a race, it won’t stop you. I know when to turn because I know when to turn, not because I see the marker.”

  “So mise en place, but underwater.”

  Before I can answer, Koji comes up behind me. He’s about to leave for the day. “No more resting that foot; we need to get on it, Basil. See you tonight.”

  Will pulls my empty plate back. “You have a nice day too,” he says to Koji’s back. He catches me stifling a laugh and smirks.

  Will

  Okay, this guy’s a challenge. He eats the steak, but doesn’t taste the sizzle. When they are interviewed on Cookd, the contestants always talk about strategy: understanding what the judges like and how to get them interested. Here at Chez UCSC, I’ve got the crowd—I sell out of my specials and most of the other stuff—but I can’t get the judge. I stopped tweaking him by slipping his namesake herb into everything. He definitely noticed, because his sour puss disappeared with the basil and now he puzzles over the specials every day with a towel over his broad shoulder and water pooling at his long feet. Then he orders everything.

  [To Toby] He’s not a jerk anymore. He just doesn’t notice what I serve.

  [To Will] Yeah. And the problem is?

  [To Toby]
IDK. I’m killing myself trying to get some attention, and he doesn’t care.

  [To Will] Told you—no romantic interest!

  Huh? I respond to the little pink hearts in Toby’s text with a middle finger emoji. But maybe he’s right. What do I care? I guess it’s more than the challenge of getting him to notice my food. There are those lips, after all, and those dark eyes, focused on my burned wrist.

  Basil obviously likes volume. He goes for huge amounts of protein at every meal and doesn’t skimp on the carbs. He likes rich and heavy too. He has no interest in salads, didn’t want the zucchini fries, and turned down the hummus. He inhales his food without pausing between bites. I either need to slow him down or surprise him.

  I try using swimming terms I find online. He orders a “Shrimp Po’Buoy” along with his burgers and dogs but doesn’t notice the spelling. Nor does he slow down to eat it or tell me he likes it—a total waste of the delectable remoulade, if I do say so myself. He doesn’t even order the “PB & J French Toast” I offer, despite the description of “Protein, Fruit, and Carbs, Together at Last!”

  Today, at the end of lunchtime, he comes by as usual, but only asks for a couple of bottles of water.

  “Nothing to eat?”

  “No.”

  “How come?”

  “Some guy is coming by to interview me about swimming.”

  “You’re usually starved right now. I have a Slider Medley today, four different mini-burgers.”

  “Just water,” he snaps.

  Return of the sour puss!

  It turns out the “guy” is two guys and a camera crew. First, they take a bunch of shots of Basil diving into the pool, swimming laps, and doing flip turns. Then they push a table and chairs away from the snack bar counter toward the wall of the club building and plug in some super-bright lights, which they train on Basil. He towels off, looking in my direction. He must be starving, but they aren’t finished.

  Basil may be a swimming champ but he’s no smooth celebrity. He sits as though he’s in the electric chair waiting for someone to throw the switch. The lights glint from his bugged-out eyes. A makeup guy leans over him, but Basil recoils. One of the guys, who must be the Submergd rep, gives him a new tank top to wear—Basil must already have a closet full of that stuff—then one of the camera crew puts a big white makeup bib on it. Basil can hardly hold still. He twists his hands and clenches his jaw. Do they really need makeup? He’s got that olive skin, glowing and flawless.