Esme eyed her warily. “What does she mean, you have to ‘pull yourself together’?”
“I can’t come here anymore. I’m tired when I show up to class the next day. And I can’t do shorthand nearly as fast as the other girls. I’m falling behind.”
Now she had Esme’s attention. “Don’t let me down now, Darby. We’re just getting started here. If you quit, it won’t be nearly as much fun. And Sam would pout, I’m pretty sure of it.”
“That’s just it. I shouldn’t even be thinking about Sam that way. That’s not why I’m in New York.”
“He’s obviously got a crush on you.”
“Do you think so?” She let her mind wander for a second, before biting her lip hard. “No. That’s a dangerous path. I don’t want to marry anyone.”
“Who said anything about marrying? You can enjoy a kiss or two, right?”
Darby remembered the disastrous night in the park. And her kiss with Esme in the booth. One had disgusted her. The other, she wasn’t so sure about.
Esme shrugged. “Fine. Look, I have to go. Help him in the kitchen, or don’t, but make sure you’re ready by the time we have to go on.” She took her hand. “This one time. Promise me?”
“I promise.”
The kitchen staff’s pace had reached a feverish pitch by the time Darby walked in. The busboy was rubbing some powder from a bowl on a pan full of chicken pieces, and Sam stood in front of the burners poaching juicy pink shrimp. Instead of the usual smell of fryer fat, fragrant odors circulated around the small space.
“What’s that?” she asked, pointing to the small bowl beside him.
“Verbena, thyme, and sage.” He held it up to her nose. “Smell.”
The scent reminded her of climbing the hills behind their house in the spring. A moan of pleasure escaped from her lips.
“I’m going to add it to the shrimp, and serve that instead when someone orders boring old shrimp cocktail.”
“Won’t the customers be angry?”
“We’ll see. Hopefully, they’ll be hungry enough to try it without sending it back.”
“What will your father do when he finds out?”
“No idea. Probably fire me.”
She couldn’t tell if he was joking.
Acting on Sam’s orders, she laid out shiny white plates as Sam supervised the modified menu. She prayed she wouldn’t drop anything or say something stupid.
“Here’s what’s on the menu for tonight: Instead of fried chicken, we have a spiced roast chicken with satay sauce. Lamb burgers with cumin and garlic instead of the usual burger, and so on and so on.”
“I hope your experiment goes well,” teased Darby. “Because if not, Esme and I and the rest of the musicians will be facing an angry, hungry crowd tonight.”
“I’ll do my best. Once I heard my father would be out of town, I went straight to Mr. Kalai’s shop. We can always run for it and hide out there until things die down.”
She laughed at his teasing, but she could tell he was worried. Uptown, this type of cuisine might go over, but down in the East Village, late at night, the regulars could be surly, drunk, and quick to rebel.
About a half hour later, the first set of orders had been filled. During the lull, Sam cleaned every surface he could. Even though he was smiling and joking around, Darby could tell his nerves were on fire.
The door to the main floor opened and one of the waiters returned, carrying the burger on the plate. He laid it down carefully on the counter and stepped back.
The burger was practically untouched; only one bite had been taken.
“Table six said he didn’t like this. Wants fries instead.”
Sam rubbed his face with his hand. “Dominic, fire up the fryer.” He picked up the plate and dumped the unwanted burger in the trash.
“Sorry, Sam.” Darby meant it. “These folks aren’t the crowd you should be cooking for. You need to be uptown, in your own restaurant.”
“Right. As soon as I get rich, I’ll take care of that.”
“Everyone in their right mind loves your food; don’t let one customer get to you.”
He smiled. “I won’t. When I was in the war, I started getting requests from the sick soldiers, the really sick ones, for something that reminded them of home. I’d start by asking lots of questions about where they were from, what the soup their mother made tasted like, that kind of thing, and then I’d create a spice blend just for them. Whether they lived in Rhode Island and their families were originally from Portugal, or maybe from Mexico but living in California, I’d work in the kitchen until I had something that clicked. And you should’ve seen the look on their faces. Even if they’d lost a leg, or were blind in one eye, for a split second it was like they were home. I loved doing that. I want to keep doing that.”
“And you will. Just maybe not tonight.”
The kitchen door swung open again. Another waiter, another couple of plates.
But they were empty.
Not a crumb was left on either.
“What did they order?” asked Sam, his voice breathless.
“One chicken and one shrimp. They want more. The chicken wants the shrimp this time and vice versa.”
Sam and Darby stared at each other, then he whooped with laughter and grabbed her, swinging her around. His build was strong and hard and she clung to his neck, their faces inches apart.
“They liked it.”
She let go and stepped backward, off balance. “You’d better get cracking.”
The next hour flew by, with orders pouring in as word spread that the food was different, tastier.
Before she knew it, Esme swooped in, telling her to change.
“We only have twenty minutes. Hurry!”
Annie Ross perched on the green-room couch, drawing on a cigarette and nodding as they dashed behind the screen. She was thin, with a close-cropped hairdo and elfin eyes. Not what Darby expected at all.
“I’m scared,” Darby whispered. Her legs shook as she pulled the dress over her head. She’d been diverted from her stage fright by helping out Sam, but now the fear crushed her. “I’m not sure if I can breathe, never mind sing.”
“Pretend. That’s what they teach us in acting class. Pretend and you’ll believe it soon enough.”
She didn’t trip getting up onto the stage. Darby gave herself a mental pat on the back for that minor accomplishment. Ross looked at the drummer and then launched into the first number. Darby followed Esme’s lead and moved her hips right, then left, then snapped her fingers. Verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, chorus. Song one was done.
As she began to relax, she was able to look out over the audience, her eyes adjusting to the lights. Sam stood in the back, his arms crossed, grinning widely. Starting tomorrow, she’d happily dedicate herself to spelling tests and punctuation drills. But tonight had been worth it, if only to watch Sam’s culinary triumph.
She shook a hip and snapped her fingers and smiled.
Darby meant to head home as soon as their set was over, but by the time the bar cleared out, it was almost four in the morning. The busboy had placed the chairs upside down on all the tables except one, where she, Esme, and Sam sat with several of the musicians and toasted one another.
The air smelled of marijuana and sweat. Darby sat back, enjoying the banter of the musicians as they teased and flirted with Esme. Sam had taken the seat next to her, one foot crossed over a thigh, his hand barely touching the skin below her neck as it rested on the back of her chair. She resisted the urge to shiver every time he moved his thumb ever so slightly over her flesh.
He’d made burgers for the musicians and they devoured them with relish.
“Damn, this is good.” The bass player wiped his mouth with his napkin. “Reminds me of the South.”
“No, this is Chicago-style. I can’t figure out what’s in it, but it’s like what they do there.”
Darby smiled over at Sam. The spices affected each taster differently, as if personalized to reflect his childhood, his mother’s cooking, their favorite meals.