Granted, this was not the first time she's done it, but I must admit there were times when it really got out of hand. Par exemple:
I had been chopping vegetables for the scampi that needed to go out. A world-renowned critic, Absolon, was coming to the restaurant this week, prepared to give us a Michelin star rating, and everything in the meantime had to be perfect. Even though my nerves likened to get the better of me like always, I was ready. With the rat in my hat, anything was possible.
She, however, was never just ready; she was flawless. A true perfectionist. I'd watched her from my post several times before-sautéeing, flipping, tossing, handling ingredients with ease. I stared, with my mouth hanging wide open. I even envied her sometimes.
This night, however, everything went wrong. Everything I did, anyway. The tomatoes were not sliced right; they were too thick, not sliced thickly enough. But I had been following the book this time, memorized the steps to a T. Anyway, it was the rat doing it all, not me. She showed me her method, in the midst of all the chaos, and I was grateful. I replicated her movements and almost got my finger sliced off. I tried to defy the rat in my hat's frantic yanking on my hair and tried to do it her way, and a sweat even broke out on the back of my neck, but in the end, it was useless. The knife landed on my hand this time.
I went to go run it under some cold water as she looked for a rag to wrap it. Skinner poked his head out. "What is all this?" he demanded. "We got customers out there! Vite!"
"Y-Yes, chef! Sorry, chef!"
Skinner's eyes narrowed and he slunk away to his office, probably to pace and agonize over the critic like the rest of us. She came over and tightly wound the cloth around my now-useless hand.
"Sorry," I mumbled.
Don't do it again, she mouthed.