Crush du Jour (5 page)

“One,” I began, ticking my points off sequentially on my sauce-sticky fingers, “we are complete and total opposites. No, we’re beyond opposites. Opposites are things that don’t match. We’ve got some kind of weird chemistry where if we were thrown together into a bowl, we’d cause an explosion.”

“That’s where you lose me. ’Cause, see, explosive chemistry? Is usually considered a good sign.”

Hmm. Anna might have had a point there, actually. I was starting to regret agreeing to meet her at the diner. Seth and I could
not
get together, which was a resolution that I needed Anna to help me keep. Because I sure didn’t trust myself to do it on my own.

Seth
was
babelicious. He was crunchy and yummy and covered in sprinkles with a cherry on top. I wanted to devour him—in a totally appropriate, nonsexual way, of course.

“Do you or do you not remember the oath I took at the beginning of the summer?”

“You were going to grow your bangs out,” Anna offered. She pointed to her own forehead. “That inspired me to cut new ones.”

Well, that too. I was having about as much success with my bangs as I was not-crushing on Seth.

“Okay, yeah, the bangs, sure. But also, I swore off boys. Remember? No more crush of the days. Or is it crushes of the day?” I scrunched my face up, puzzling out the sentence.

“Don’t tell me you’re going to get obsessed about grammar now as well.” Anna rolled her eyes.

“I’m serious.” She was starting to exasperate me. “Not about the grammar, or whatever. But—next year we’re seniors. After first semester, our academic fates are totally sealed. This is my last chance to piece together the perfect application. This cooking class needs to run smoothly.” If only I could run my whole summer through a Cuisinart.

Anna nodded. It looked like I was starting to get through to her. “Which means no distractions.”

“Exactly!” I slapped the table enthusiastically, causing Anna’s Slushee cup to tip slightly. Sludgy goodness spilled all over the place.

“I hear what you’re saying, Laine, and you know I want to support you,” she said.

“But?”

“But.” She sighed. “You going a whole
summer with a red-hot romance of the superficial variety? On a scale between one and unlikely?”

I glared at her. Using my history against me was
so
cheap.

“Well, let’s just say that my Slushee has more of a chance of being added to the USDA food pyramid than you do of getting over your Seth-love without even a tasty little fling.”

“Back burner,” I told her, tapping the tabletop authoritatively. “Love is on the back burner. For now.”

“Maybe it shouldn’t be,” she offered. Unlike me, Anna was a serial monogamist. She rarely went more than a few weeks between boyfriends, which meant she was due for a new one any day now.

“Romance is a good thing, you know. Or it can be.”

“So should I ask Seth to dance by the dry-goods pantry?”

“Funny. Look, you keep saying that you don’t want to crush on Seth, and that’s fine, I get that. But what if you actually had an actual relationship? Unlike crushes, relationships can be less distracting and more supportive.”

I raised an eyebrow at her. “If I wanted more support, I’d buy a new sports bra. You’re all the support I need for right now.”

She snorted. “We’ll see.” She waggled a finger at me knowingly. “Just keep in mind, some hotties have a shelf life. If you spend your summer slaving in the kitchen, when you’re finally ready to flirt again … Seth may be off the menu.”

According to Mom, Hype was, in fact, mostly hype, though she still had two more visits to go before she’d write her review. As for my cooking class, we were chopping away fiendishly, but as for actual cooking? Not so much.

I couldn’t believe how much my painstakingly rendered lesson plans were being changed. I’d been so enthusiastic about jazzing up simple basics, but the reality was that the students? Not so much. They weren’t interested in subbing fondue for grilled cheese or prosciutto with melon for bologna sandwiches. They were, well, just kids, when it came down to it. And they may have loved me, but they also loved Seth’s cooking.

It was so strange. We were like those old
commercials for Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups: “Two great tastes that taste great together.” I was the peanut butter; I had the rapport and the experience with kids. Seth was the chocolate; he could barely make eye contact with the kids, but he knew what they liked. And it wasn’t fondue or fancy salami.

Obviously, I knew that we were supposed to cater to the kids on their own level; after all, this class was really about giving them the tools they needed to feed themselves well, safely, and healthily while their parents were at work. But did that really mean we had to resort to things like prepackaged sponge cake and canned fruit salad? I just wanted to inject some imagination or sophistication into these dishes— but no one else was having it.

While I stood in the corner silently fretting, Seth and the rest of the class were draining and rinsing canned beans for a vegetarian three-bean chili. I had lobbied for soy crumbles in the mix, but I’d been outvoted. Apparently, some kids are grossed out by soy. Who knew?

Rinsing beans is a soggier business than most people realize. Droplets of bean juice ran out of the sink and onto the tiled floor.

Seth inched over to my workspace and poked me in the ribs. “Do you think we should put a stop to that?” He jerked his head in the direction of Pete and Barrie, who were the sous-chefs involved in primary bean drainage. Barrie grappled with the electric can opener while Pete struggled to get the faucet sprayer under control. The little hose had been turned to maximum output and was now waving about like the tentacles on an octopus. Pete looked like he was rehearsing the upside-down kiss in
Spider-Man
—his hair was drenched and plastered to his cheeks.

I shrugged. “They’re standing on the paper.” We laid paper out before the class and tossed it in the garbage at the end of the day.

“But we’re the ones who have to clean up the paper, ultimately,” Seth pointed out.

It was annoying when someone so cute could be so reasonable. The last five minutes of every class were dedicated to clean-up time, but it wasn’t the kids’ top skill. That was okay with me, though, because I had a secret: I liked staying behind afterward, tidying up with Seth.

That was cool, wasn’t it? It was a nice, nonromantic way to spend time with him
that didn’t violate any previously established solemn oaths. Meanwhile, he probably thought I was just a big type A who couldn’t leave until every fleck of baking soda was restored to its rightful space in the pantry.

I could live with that.

As much as I enjoyed our housekeeping sessions together, Seth was right: Cleaning up after the students was a huge pain in the butt.

“Remind me again why we didn’t make Barrie and Pete do this,” he huffed while scraping away at a bean that someone had ground into the floor tiles with particular aplomb.

I shuddered. “Honestly? I really don’t trust them to do a thorough job. And we’re the ones on the line if we trash the kitchen,” I said. I
am nothing if not matter-of-fact about my control issues, if a little bit euphemistic about it
, I thought.

“Besides,” I continued, “the nicer we are to them, the bigger the tips from their parents at the end of the summer.” Yeah, it was a paid gig, but as teachers, our base salaries were laughably low. Halliday wasn’t exactly
flush with cash. I was counting on tips from satisfied parentals to supplement my college fund.

Seth looked up from his bean mission. “Tips?”

“Um, yeah. You know, like you get at camp,” I said, wondering if I had somehow lapsed into a different language or something.

I have to admit, the expression on Seth’s face worried me. But then, it was obvious that he hadn’t spent much time around kids. So maybe it made sense that he was a tip virgin.

“Uh, Laine,” he said, sounding a little bit like my mom had when she’d broken the news to me that our cat, Itsy, had run away, “didn’t Nora tell you? The parents aren’t allowed to tip. It’s Halliday policy.”

My stomach dropped. I wanted to faint.

No, wait—I wanted to
scream
.

Not allowed?

Policy?

What sort of lunatic policy was that?

Well, okay, it was obviously the sort of lunatic policy that went toward making sure certain kids didn’t get special treatment. Obviously, I knew that much. But
Nora had clearly forgotten to share this little tidbit of information with me.

I mean, I like to think I would have taken the job anyway. After all, the community center was a great city resource, and it was important that we support it. And the cooking class was something that college admissions boards would eat up (no pun intended), especially since I come from a culinary background. But that didn’t change the fact that a journalist’s salary and student loans only went so far. And I’d really been counting on those tips.

I sighed, forlorn. My money woes were slowly turning me into a glass-half-empty sort of girl.

“I wish someone had told me that
before
I’d decided to blow off working at the swim club for the summer.”

Poor, poor me. And to think, I was missing out on all the adorable lifeguards as well. Swearing off boys suddenly seemed like a terrible idea: Why deprive myself of one of life’s few real joys?

I had made a huge mistake.

Seth tied off the enormous black garbage bag he’d been wrestling with. “You need a job?” he asked with interest.

“‘Need’ is a very subjective word,” I
replied, “but yes, now that you mention it, my bank account could use some subsidizing.”

“Why don’t you come work for me?” Seth offered.

Yeah, more time with the boy I was lusting after—whom I wasn’t supposed to be lusting after. That sounded like a good idea.
Not
. Crushing was one thing, but at this point Seth and I were too close for comfort. Getting involved with him would be stickier than a Cinnabon.

He smiled encouragingly. “The tips are great.”

Well, see, now he had me. But what would working for him entail, especially seeing as how tips were involved? “Say more.”

“It’s just, we might be able to help each other out. Can you wait?”

I frowned. Waiting was not one of my strong suits. I think the patience fairy skipped me back when I was born.

“Um, I think sometimes I can get carried away,” I said apologetically, “and then I get impatient—”

“What?” Seth looked bewildered. “What does getting carried away have to do with being a waitress?”

Oh, he was talking about
waiting
, waiting. Cool. That made a lot more sense.

“That makes more sense,” I said out loud.

“Yeah.” Seth nodded, obviously not understanding my thought process at all. See? Oscar and Felix. Oil and water. Buffy and vampires. We had the bad, explosive kind of chemistry.

If only he wasn’t so freaking cute.

“My dad’s in a bind, and we didn’t know what we were going to do. He’s down one server, and so far, there are no prospects on the horizon—I think because the summer is so busy for restaurants.”

Didn’t I know it. I hadn’t seen my mother since Memorial Day.

“Your dad runs a restaurant?” I was a little bit late to the party, which was affecting my level of comprehension.

Sean laughed. “How do you think I got this gig without any previous teaching experience? My dad owns a restaurant. A new one. You might have heard of it.” With a grunt, he tossed the last garbage bag onto a pile by the front door, for the janitors to pick up later.

A sinking feeling settled in my stomach, like I’d made the mistake of riding the
Ferris wheel after three too many cotton candies. “Um, maybe,” I said weakly, worried about what he’d say next.

“It’s called Hype,” he finished. “We just opened. We’re still waiting for the top reviews to come in.” He glanced at me curiously, as though thinking of something for the first time.

“Hey,” he said easily, “what do
your
parents do?”

Me
: Hey, Mom, are you busy?

Mom
: Sort of, sweetie. We’re on deadline, and the managing editor is literally standing over me, waiting for my piece.

Me
: Really? Um, okay, I’ll make this fast. I mean—what piece are you working on?

Mom: You remember, Hon—that rock-and-roll sushi karaoke joint that I tried to convince you to visit with me.

Me
: Right, that one. Pity I’m not more of a karaoke type. But, uh, you never told me what you thought of Hype.

Mom
: Oh, boy.
Really
not worth mentioning. The service was unimpressive—

Me
: Well, you know, I mean, maybe they’re short staffed or whatever right now.

Mom
: Huh. Maybe. But beyond that, the food was very uneven, mediocre at best. They’re going to have to step it up if they want to compete with the restaurants in this town.