Serena's Choice - Coastal Romance Series (4 page)

“
You mean you want me to stay
here all day, alone with my thoughts, while you go to the diner? My
diner? I don’t think so,” Nonna said. “It’s my diner, and I’m
going with you.”

Serena knew better than to argue
with her grandmother. It was good to see Nonna’s strong-willed
personality surfacing after her terrible loss.

“
Let’s get going then,”
Serena said.

Jimmy and Olive were in the
kitchen when they arrived at the diner. They were good cooks, but not
as good as Adrianna. Not as good as Serena. And not as good as Nonna.
But they were still good. Better than good. They got the job done,
but neither one knew how to run a kitchen. Neither did Adrianna.
Serena realized that Rossetti’s had been suffering ever since she
left for culinary school eight years earlier.

After speaking to Jimmy and
Olive, Serena walked out the back door to the garden area. Basil,
ready for its final harvest of the year, grew in profusion along the
fence to the right. That was good. Basil was necessary to an Italian
diner. The rosemary bushes, planted there by her great grandmother
Camille, grew near the back. They were in good shape. But the rest of
the garden was covered in weeds. Tomatoes, eggplant, zucchini, and
white beans used to grow in the now grown-over plots, providing
frequently used ingredients for the diner. At one time, the diner was
one of the first restaurants in the country growing their own
produce. Serena was disappointed to see the garden mess.

When she walked back into the
kitchen, Nonna was at the big pot making the minestrone, the only
soup the diner served. Her grandmother stirred the soup, then put the
lid on to let it simmer.

Serena walked to the salad area
and began to prepare the simple leaf lettuce salad they served with
the specialty house dressing. She opened the refrigerator for the
dressing and couldn’t find it. She pushed cheeses and olives and
meat sauce around, but could not find the dressing.

“
Where’s the dressing?” she
asked Jimmy, who was closest to the refrigerator.

“
Damn,” he said. “I forgot
to make it. We were so busy yesterday with everything. We ran out and
I forgot to make more.”

“
That’s okay,” Serena said.
She could hardly blame Jimmy. He and Olive had given everything they
had to prepare the celebration food after the funeral. These things
happened in restaurants.

“
I’ll make it,” she told
Jimmy.

“
Thanks,” he said gratefully.

Serena squeezed the juice of
several lemons into a large bowl. She added pinches of dried oregano,
salt, and pepper and began to whisk. She grabbed the bottle of extra
virgin olive oil and drizzled it into the mixture, whisking the whole
time. The dressing thickened, and when it was thick enough, she put
it in a storage bowl.

After she put the bowl in the
refrigerator, Jimmy walked over to her. He looked like he had
something to say.

Serena looked at him expectantly.
Jimmy looked down at the floor. Get on with it, Jimmy. What is it?

“
I know I should be talking to
Elena about this,” he said. “But I think I need to tell you
first.”

“
Yes?” Serena said. Was he
going to tell her the kitchen was a filthy mess? She knew that
already.

“
Olive and I have taken a job
at Antonio’s in Destin,” he said. “We found out the day
Adrianna died and I just haven’t had the heart to bring it up. But
I had to bring it up.”

This was very bad news.
Rossetti’s had already lost Adrianna, and now Olive and Jimmy would
be leaving. That left Nonna as the only cook until they could find
replacements.

Jimmy was looking at her like a
child needing forgiveness. What could Serena say? She herself was
looking for a different work situation.

“
How long?” she asked.

“
Until the end of next week,”
Jimmy said. “I know this leaves you and Elena in a bind, but we
felt that it was time to move on.”

“
I’m not going to lie to you,
Jimmy. This does put us in a bind, especially with everything that’s
happened. But I understand. I think you should tell my grandmother
yourself.”

“
I’ll do that right now,”
he said, walking to the office in the back where Nonna sat at the
desk. Serena didn’t know what Nonna was doing back there, but maybe
she was tending to the complicated financial business of running a
restaurant. She hoped that’s what she was doing.

Serena watched Jimmy through the
window in the office door. She saw Nonna stand up and give Jimmy a
hug. It broke her heart to see that. Her Nonna, losing everything,
but still willing to give Jimmy a hug of good will.

After Jimmy left, Serena walked
back to the office.

“
Jimmy and Olive are leaving,”
Nonna said as soon as she walked in. Serena didn’t tell her that
she already knew that. It was, after all, Nonna’s diner and Jimmy
should have told her first.

“
What are you going to do?”
Serena said instead. She was already starting to think that it might
be time to close the diner, or sell it to a younger person who still
had dreams and didn’t understand how hard it was to run a
restaurant. It just might be time for that.

“
I’m going to replace them,
like I always do. I’ve had many cooks here, cara, as you well know.
I’ll have more. That’s how the restaurant business is.”

“
Do you have any ideas of how
to replace them?”

“
I do. The sheriff has been
telling me his daughter needs a job. She graduated from high school
last May and hasn’t done a thing since. He said she’s a good
cook.”

“
It doesn’t sound like she
has any experience,” Serena said.

“
That’s okay. I’ll teach
her,” Nonna said.

Serena’s heard the text sound
from the phone in her pocket. She pushed the button and was dismayed
to see it was from Daniel.

“
When are you coming back?”
he had texted. “The company only pays for two days bereavement and
you’ve been gone three already.”

Serena wished that she would
never lay eyes on Daniel’s jowly, sweaty face and greasy hair
again.

She texted back. “I’ll be
back soon. I have business to take care of. Guess I’m off the
payroll for now.”

“
What are you doing?” Nonna
asked Serena after she put her phone back in her pocket.

“
That was the chef at
Bridgewater’s wanting to know when I’m coming back. I was texting
him.”

“
I’ve heard about this text
stuff,” Nonna said. “Do you think you can teach me how to do it
on my phone?”

“
Of course. It’s easy.”

“
Easy for you, cara. Maybe not
so easy for me. But I want to learn,” Nonna said decisively. “Let’s
get out to the kitchen. Lunch will be here soon.”

Serena and Nonna worked side by
side with Jimmy and Olive through lunch, then through supper. Nonna
usually only worked lunch, so Serena knew she must be exhausted, and
the evening wasn’t over yet. Rossetti’s stayed open after supper
for drinks and music.

Adrianna had handled dinner and
the after-dinner crowd. Tonight, Serena and Nonna would be relying on
the two bartenders who ran the place after hours. When one of them
came in at eight, Serena realized she didn’t know him—like cooks,
bartenders changed all the time. She was really out of touch with
Rossetti’s.

The tall burly man introduced
himself as Sandy. His grip was strong when she shook his hand. Serena
felt the restaurant was in good hands with Sandy, who looked more
like a bouncer than a bartender. He said Mark, the other bartender,
would be showing up soon.

“
Sandy, I’m going to take
Elena home now. I’ll come back later to check on things. I know my
mother was always here, and I’m not sure how we’re going to
handle everything now.”

“
We’re going to miss
Adrianna,” Sandy said. “She really livened the place up. I think
people came here to see her as much as anything.”

“
Thanks,” Serena said,
grateful again how loved her mother was. She supposed they could drop
the after-dinner schedule, but she knew it made a lot of money for
the diner—more than the food on some weeks. Luna Bay wasn’t that
big of a place, and people liked having a local spot to hang out in
without going to the beach. Serena would have to discuss it all with
her grandmother. There was no way Nonna was going to be able to
handle supper and the late night.

On the drive home, Nonna seemed
agitated.

“
Are you okay, Nonna,” Serena
asked. Her grandmother was gripping the handle on the door, over and
over.

“
Not really,” Nonna said.
“All day I’m thinking how you’ve got to get back to your job
and I don’t know how I’m going to handle everything. I’m not
trying to make you feel guilty, cara. I know you’ve got your own
life. I’m just wondering what’s going to happen to mine without
Adrianna.”

Serena thought for a moment
before speaking. She had to be careful with Nonna. Finally, she said,
“Do you think it might be time to think about selling the diner?”
she said slowly.

“
What?” Nonna said sharply.
“Sell Rossetti’s? The diner has been in this family since 1946.
I’m not going to sell it. It’s all I’ve got to leave you when I
die.”

Serena was sorry that she had
upset her grandmother further. If Adrianna had lived, she would have
inherited Rossetti’s, continuing the tradition of passing it down
from mother to daughter. But she hadn’t lived and now Serena was
the next likely choice. She wasn’t sure she was ready for that. She
had worked hard to build a career after culinary school and now was
trying to find a chef’s position where she could let her Italian
background in cooking flourish.

“
I’m sorry, Nonna, for
bringing that up. I guess I needed to see where your thinking is,”
Serena said softly.

Nonna reached over and took
Serena’s hand and gave it a squeeze.

“
It’s okay, cara,” she
said. “It’s a natural thing to think about.”

Once inside the cottage, Serena
suggested to her grandmother that she get ready for bed. She would
bring her some tea and toast before she went back to the diner.

“
I’m going to take you up on
that, cara. I’m so tired.”

Serena brewed the tea and put it
in the flowered teapot they always used. She made toast and buttered
it and put everything on a tray. Nonna was already in bed when she
got there, propped up on pillows with the TV remote in her hand.

“
Are you sure you’ll be all
right here while I go check on the diner?” Serena asked as she
poured the tea into a cup and added lemon and honey.

Nonna waved her hand at her. “Of
course,” she said. “Don’t worry about me.”

When Serena pulled out of the
driveway and headed back to the diner her mind wandered to Jeff. It
was hard to believe he had left just that morning. It seemed like a
lifetime had passed since then. She still didn’t know what to think
about Jeff’s visit. It was so unexpected. It didn’t fall into the
category of their casual dating.

Sandy and Mark were behind the
bar when Serena walked in. Several customers sat on barstools. Serena
looked around and noticed people sitting at the tables, drinking
their drinks. One couple was dancing on the little space that was
cleared for that.

She walked over to the piano in
the corner. Joe looked up from the keys and jumped up to give her a
big hug. “Hey, Serena,” he said in his smoky voice. “I thought
you might’ve left already.”

“
I’m helping Nonna out for a
few days in the diner,” she said. Just talking to Joe was
comforting to Serena, his voice soothing her grieving mind.

“
That’s nice of you to do,”
he said.

“
I’ll let you get back to
playing. I just wanted to say hi.”

“
You’ll let me know if you
need anything, right?”

“
Of course,” she said giving
him another hug. “Thank you.”

She sat at the bar and let Sandy
make her a martini. The bar was well stocked with liquors and
glasses, which gleamed on shelves. As it got close to ten o’clock,
more customers streamed in and the restaurant was full. The bar was a
moneymaker for the diner, but Serena couldn’t decide how to handle
it in the future.

As she sat, she thought about her
career and what a standstill it was in. She thought about Daniel and
what an ass he was. She decided he was lazy. He had grown up in a
wealthy family who sent him to Europe for culinary school. That must
have taken a lot of hard work on his part, but now he was slacking
off. She didn’t want to keep taking up his slack. She wanted to be
an Italian food chef.

And then it came to her. It had
been there staring her in the face all along but she had refused to
acknowledge it. She was going to be an Italian chef, that much was
certain. At Rossetti’s. Her grandmother needed her now. Rossetti’s
would be her own one day, and she could bring it back to its former
glory. She knew how to run a restaurant, she knew how to deal with
staff and problems in the kitchen. Rossetti’s was her answer. She
had nothing in Atlanta to return to.