"There has got to be someone more qualified than me. I have no idea what to do with a child, especially one who's lost her mother. I need help understanding how her mind works. I can't get Zoe to eat anything I make. What am I supposed to do, force her to eat?" Kate complains to her therapist.
Kate knows this will be a long and very serious conversation, and she needs to be comfortable. She lies down on her therapist's couch opposite him and lays her head on the pillow, totally relaxed.
"Maybe she only eats what her mother cooked. And now that she's gone, well, you get my understanding… right?" Her therapist suggests.
"My sister never cooked. She was mostly a takeout person. She never had the passion to cook the way I do. At most, she knew how to operate a microwave, and even then, all she did was reheat what were leftovers from a restaurant."
"Well, that's my point. Maybe Zoe needs what was familiar to her. What did you eat when you were a kid?"
"It's not the same."
"What do you mean?"
"My mother was an amazing cook. But I was the only one who appreciated it."
"When your mother passed away, did your father take over cooking duties?"
"Ha! He didn't take over anything. The only time we saw him was when he came home stinking drunk. And even then, all he did was sleep it off."
"So, who took care of the two of you?"
Kate could tell where this was going to go, and she didn't want to go down this path because it only brought up memories of her mother and what she went through with her father.
"Can we not get into this right now?"
"Okay. So what about fish sticks? Kids love them." Her therapist suggested.
Kate pushes up on her elbows to look at her therapist and says,
"Fish sticks?"
"Yeah, you know they're frozen and breaded…"
"I know what fish sticks are. I can't believe I'm paying you for these suggestions! Fishsticks!?"
She stands on the sidewalk next to a school bus, watching all the children come rushing out of the school once the bell rings. It takes a while, and Zoe is almost the last to leave the school. She has an uneasy feeling about her, but when she sees her smile at her, she knows everything will be fine.
"Did you learn anything interesting today?" Kate asks.
"No."
These one-word answers are getting on her nerves, so she asks another question.
"Did you learn anything uninteresting?"
"No," Zoe looks at Kate when she asks the question; in her mind, she thinks that school is not uninteresting.
Kate, not to be deterred, tries a different tact.
"How was your teacher?"
"Bald."
"Well, that's interesting, isn't it?"
They both finished the walk back to the apartment. When they get inside, Zoe hangs up her coat and scarf, and Kate does the same. She puts her book bag in her bedroom so it's there later and she can do her homework.
Kate is going to try something that she regrets. But she never knows. This could be what Zoe needs. After finishing the preparation, she calls Zoe to the dinner table, telling her it's dinner time.
She exits the kitchen with a plate and places it before her niece.
"Tada! Fish sticks and french fries." She says with a flourish as she steps back, waiting while holding her breath. Zoe looks at the plate and then looks at Kate.
Kate turns away and walks back into the kitchen. Maybe the fish sticks were a bad idea, she thinks to herself.
"I thought about this the other day, and I don't know much about you. We're family, and I don't even know your favorite color." Kate says as she busies herself with her dinner.
"Red," comes Zoe's short one-word answer.
"Red. I didn't know that. Red is a great color. I like red too."
Kate finishes preparing her dinner and takes the plate to the table. On the way out of the kitchen, she asks Zoe,
"What's your favorite number?"
Zoe looks at her aunt, wondering why she's acting like this. Once she sits down, she says,
"You don't have to do this."
"Do what?"
"Try so hard."
Just as Kate was going to explain what she meant, then the doorbell rang. She quickly puts down her dinner and runs towards the front door.
"I'm coming."
When she swings open the door, what she sees in front of her is not what she expects. Standing in front of her is a very petite-looking girl. But more than that, it looks like she is dressed like the dead. She wears a black skirt and black shirt, and her eyes have some heavy black mascara. She looks like a raccoon.
"Hi, I'm Charlotte." The girl says as she pulls the headphones from her ears and places them around her neck.
"From the agency?" Kate questions.
"Are you expecting another Charlotte?"
"No." It's all Kate can do to stop staring at the girl's nose ring.
Just then, Zoe walks by and stops in the hallway, looking towards the front door. Kate turns to look at her, and she makes a face and keeps walking.
"So, can I come in or what?" Charlotte asks, still standing out in the hallway.
"Oh sure, I'm so sorry. Come on in."
Kate swings her arm toward the living room and Charlotte enters.
"Can you give me just a minute?" Kate asks as she turns away from the babysitter and heads to Zoe's room. She knew the look that she gave her in the hallway meant something.
Kate sees Zoe sitting on her bed with her legs crossed, looking as determined as ever. She sits down across from her and says what's on her mind.
"I told you I'm not a baby anymore! I don't need a babysitter."
"Zoe, what am I supposed to do? I can't leave you here alone all the time."
"Why not? I'm perfectly fine. I can take care of myself."
"Zoe, the last time I left you alone, you barricaded the door… remember?"
Then, Charlotte walks to the doorway and stands there, watching the two argue back and forth.
"I get paid from when I get here, you know."
"Yeah, I know."
Kate gives Charlotte the once over, sees that she has a book in her hands, and comments on it.
"Oh, I see you brought something to read to Zoe."
"No, this is for my thesis. Rapidly mutating deadly viruses, like Ebola and that sort of thing." Charlotte says.
Kate and Zoe turn to face each other and stare, wondering what they've gotten into.
"Have fun at work," Zoe says.
Kate has an uneasy feeling about leaving Charlotte in charge of Zoe. There's just something about someone who looks so Gothic. Maybe this was a wrong choice, but now it's too late because she needs to go to work, and Charlotte is her only option.
Kate knows she's late. She steps on the sidewalk and has until mid-block before she can walk into the restaurant, So she starts running. As she gets closer, she can see through the window as Paula picks up the phone, knowing she's taking a reservation. She opens the door, and Paula raises her arm to look at her watch. When she's through the door, all she can do is give an apologetic I'm sorry look her way.
Rick and Leah are in the kitchen preparing dinner, listening to Pavarotti. Leah slides a tray of sea bass onto the prep table and asks Rick,
"And how do you want to see bass prepared tonight?"
Rick picks up one of the sea bass from the tray and puts it in front of him, telling it it,
"Tell them they will be served to some very important people."
All Leah can do is laugh at his silliness. Just then, Kate walks past the pair and heads to the secondary preparation table used mainly for the Sous chefs. She puts down her notes for tonight's dinner that she is preparing and turns off the CD player.
"What's the matter, you don't like music?"
"It distracts my staff. And I can't concentrate."
Bernadette walks up to the table that Rick is working at and says,
"You were right, Rick. Pavarotti makes sex so much more pleasurable."
Kate, who was passing behind Rick, heard him say,
"Glad to hear it. Bocelli is good, too, but only for shallow one-night stands."
Bernadette laughs as she walks away. Kate, who had heard the whole exchange, couldn't believe this was happening in her kitchen. She gives Rick a look and then walks away.
It's common practice for everyone serving the meals for dinner to have an early dinner together. Kate sits at the end of the table, away from everyone else, doing the crossword puzzle in pencil.
"Pronto, food, belly, now!" Leah complains when Rick isn't dishing out the food fast enough.
Rick passes her a large helping of pasta in a bowl, and she thanks him profusely.
"Bernadette, you have the Davis party tonight," Paula tells her.
"I think I can handle it." She replies.
"Good Luck!"
Rick plates some more pasta in another bowl and hands it to John.
"Chef, this is for you," John says as he tries handing it to Kate.
"No thanks," Kate says as she waves her hand to John, declining the dish.
"Only a full cook can judge food. When you're hungry, everything tastes better than it is."
"I never eat in the afternoon." Kate takes her eyes off Rick and returns to her crossword puzzle.
Not to be deterred, Rick takes a small helping of pasta, puts it in another bowl, and walks to where Kate sits at the end of the table. He puts the bowl in front of her, leans over, and whispers,
"My grandmother was on her deathbed. She brought this recipe over from the old country, and I made it here for you today.
Rick straightens up, and the table goes quiet as they wait for Kate to say something.
Knowing she won't get any peace to finish the crossword puzzle, she puts it beside her fork. She takes the pencil she was doing the crossword and sticks it in the bun of her hair, takes the fork from the table, and spins around some pasta on the fork. She raises the pasta to her mouth, puts it in, and sucks the ends into her mouth. She looks up at him and says
"Are you happy now?" She gets out around her, chewing the spaghetti.
"Very happy." Rick returns to where he is sitting and prepares a bowl of pasta for himself. Just as he's about to sit, Paula whispers into his ear saying,
"I thought your grandmother lived in Miami?"
"Well, you know… we all thought she wouldn't make it, but then she recovered. It was like a miracle." Rick says as he sits down in front of his pasta bowl.
Kate, who swallowed the spaghetti that Rick made her eat, can't stop looking at him and how he lied to her. Leah can see the anger in her eyes as she stands up. Kate walks away without another word, leaving her crossword puzzle and the remaining pasta where she sat.
Rick, who was kidding, only tells Kate it was a miracle that his grandmother recovered as she walked by, his arms spread wide, laughing as she does. Kate doesn't want to hear any part of it.
Rick walks up to the office after the early dinner is finished. Kate is sitting at her desk reviewing something that looks like an older cookbook. He sees the menu for tonight taped to Kate's shelf. She never has it out in the open; she usually keeps it out in the kitchen area.
Kate can sense him before she sees him. She looks behind her and sees him leaning up against the door jamb. She picks up a knife from her desk, holds the bottom of the menu for tonight, and cuts it in half. She hands him the half she cut off and says,
"You prepare all the dishes on this part of the menu, and I will take care of the rest. This way, we don't have to get in each other's way."
Rick looks over the menu and sees there isn't much for him to do. So he decides to have a little fun with her and says,
"Your list is bigger than mine is. He says as he cracks a smile.
Kate's response is not friendly. The knife she was holding to cut the menu in half starts making its way towards his midsection. The second he backs off, he says,
"Right, right, right. I have some very big items. I got beef, I got fish, I got rabbit. Showtime, folks! Let's go." Rick says as he walks away from Kate's office in a hurry.
Kate starts going over her half of the menu and knows that this won't be that long of a night. That is if Rick can keep up his end of the menu.