April 1: Write a story set in a restaurant kitchen
….
I was the soup guy. Anything concerning soup in Eddy's Eats concerned me.
My eyes snapped up from the pot of lentil soup on the fire that I was stirring mindlessly when the head cook barged into the kitchen.
Everyone turned their head quickly to face him. The clanging of pots and rushing of tap water stopped but mummurs between the cooking staff ensued.
“Listen up guys!” he screamed to make sure everwhere was quiet before lowering his voice as he continued.
“The owner of Big Bites is here as a guest and obviously we want to make a good impression! Because good review means more customers and more everything!”
We all nodded enthusiastically.
“Before I forget what I want to say, guess what he has ordered?”
He paused and waited for us to guess but no one moved or spoke and so he continued.
“A chicken noodle soup!”
All eyes in the room landed on me and I instantly felt nervous.
Gosh, this was so much responsibility placed on my head. What if it wasn't as good as he expected? Or what if it was too hot or too cold for him? What if he–
“William, you can stop hyperventilating. Everything will be alright I promise,” Matthew, one of my fellow cooks assured me, patting me on the shoulder.
“But what if I–?”
“This is no time for what ifs!” the head cook roared and banged his hand on a table, making me freeze.
He wasn't helping calm my anxiety.
“Listen up. There will be no negative thoughts. This business had been going on for years. Some of you all are old employees and some are new but never since the business was founded has there been any complaint! This restaurant has a good review and it will keep that review you hear me?!”
We all nodded vigorously.
“WILLIAM!”
I stiffened again and looked directly at him. “Yes sir?”
“Today, you will make the best chicken noodle soup you will ever make in your entire life!”
I blinked rapidly. “Uhh that's doesn't…”
He raised an eyebrow at me. “I mean, yes sir! I will!”
“Good! Now get to work! The guy won't sit here and act all snobby and rich for the whole day.”
My eyes widened at his words.
“Those words didn't come out of my mouth by the way,” he whispered before leaving.
Once he was outz everyone's eyes were on me. It suddenly dawned on me that the entire restaurant staff's rating depended on the quality of the soup I cooked this afternoon and my anxiety levels rose a lot higher at the thought.
“Come on, get to work!” Walker said from the crowd of chefs staring expectantly at me.
I had to restrain myself from throwing a piece of food at him.
Walker was my enemy in the kitchen. We never got along and anytime something bad happened in the kitchen or someone got into trouble…it was either or both of us.
I took a deep breath and faced my work space, trying my best to ignore the sound of his annoying voice.
I started the soup successfully. I was halfway through with it and everything was coming out okay. Suddenly, a few other chefs walked over to me.
“Can I help you?” I asked.
“I think the question to be asked here is, can we help you?”
I blinked slowly.
“Um, what?”
“We don't trust you–ow!” someone said from my left and bent to rub his shin.
“We do trust you a lot,” another voice spoke from my right. “but not 100 percent so we're here to help!”
I smiled gratefully, wiping the beads if sweat on my forehead away.
“no, no, it's alright. But thank you! I really appreciate it.”
“You sure?”
I raised my brows at him as he reached out for a spoon and had a taste of the soup.
“Mmm, needs more of something in there,” he said, reached out again. This time reaching for the rosemary.
“Wait hold up, stop!”
I was too slow and he'd already added it in.
I sighed and tasted it myself.
Surprisingly, it actually tasted better now.
“Thank you. But now I think I have it under control. You can now–”
Next thing I know, everyone is adding stuff into the pot of soup and I'm screaming for them to stop but they don't until after a while.
I try to ignore the pounding in my chest as I reached out with shaking hands to taste the soup. I let out a huge breath when I realized it isn't actually bad. The soup actually tastes really good.
I decided to leave it on the fire for a few more minutes when the door bursts open again and the head cook comes in.
“Aren't you done yet?”
“I'm–” I began.
“Done!” I whipped around to see Walker adding a teaspoon of a white, grainy, substance into the boiling pot.
“Walker?!”
“There's no time! The man's losing patience. Just serve now!” the head cook roared.
In a hurry I do that and the waiter comes to get it.
Once he was out of the door, I slumped my shoulders and took a nearby seat.
Still though, I can't shake off the feeling that Walker did something bad to that soup.
But why would he?
If anything bad happens, he suffers it too.
…But could he actually do something that would affect him just because it was going to affect me as well?
I hated that the answer was yes.
It turns out that he actually added sugar to the soup and so long story short, the owner of one of the biggest restaurants in the country hated our restaurant and gave us a really bad review.
And the worst part was that all the blame was on my head. And when I tried to defend myself, no one listened. The other cooks were warned not to make the mistake and I was fired.
I mean, I knew we call each other names and play pranks as well but I didn't know it was this serious.
Ever since that incident, I avoided cooking as much as I could. I looked for other interests and jobs and though I regret quitting, I was too traumatized and embarrassed to think about going back to it again.
