Repulsive

Rarely do I remember the first dish I serve to a costumer. In and out, checking in on my restaurant’s condition a few times a month. I gave my hard work and blood the distance you would give your baby boy who grew into an independent young man. A call here and there, a crack of heavy liquor with those who grew around him on the day of his birth, including a few funds to keep them on their feet for when times got rough. But rarely... And I say this with a strong headache... Rarely, do I remember that strange woman he called himself loving and letting underneath our roof.

-“...uncooked steak?” I grab a waitress notepad from out of their hand. Someone who I should have fired weeks ago, but employees were thin at the time and here we are at her beckon call.

“Yes sir... Ms.Grace... She ordered for the steak to be uncooked.”

Who do this woman take me for? -I turn to face the kitchen, lifting the notebook high in the air to get my point across to the stumped cooks. “Which one of you assholes, put our newbie up to this?” What kind of prank is this. “I’m looking at you Mikah! Is this another one of your stupid pranks? -At least have some shred of respect for this restaurant and not play around when we have an important guest tonight!”

A man next to him boiling pasta jab his side in a cackle, “You really done it this time Mikah. Bold too...”

Yes bold... -I make my way to him, knowing that the young man was one for unnecessary pranks on our new recruits. A fly I should have swatted years ago when he made our best chef quit because he decided placing fid eggs in a costumer salad served by the man would be funny.

“Mikah...”

“Come on Damion, I wasn’t the one who wrote that-

“I don’t want to hear any excuses from you today. I had enough. Give me your apron and leave.”

-The apron is slapped to the floor along a scoff of ''I never liked this place anyway.'' A small interruption out the swung open door but becomes silent once in front of eyes of massive enjoyers of my restaurant. He was a problem that I finally got to root out. There shouldn’t be any thought of how he will pay his next bill or some guilt-ridden shit thought like where he will go next. There’s no time for sympathy in a kitchen like mine. No time for failures...

-“What are you all dozing off for! Back to work or that could be one of you next!” I then focus back to the waitress that almost took Mikah’s blame and heat of being fired, walking back over to her, notebook kept to hand. “Ellie... Do me a favor and take over his spot for now. I’ll retake the woman’s order.”

I drop the apron in her open arms. She seems ready enough for the kitchen. “R-Really? Are you sure...”

I gloss over that stutter of hers to save me another headache, pushing on the flat golden plates screwed to the door. “That goes to say you’ll be getting a better pay after tonight.”

-And out to chatter and enjoyment I arrive, ripping that little fiasco of almost serving a costumer raw steak out of the notebook and tossing it into a trash can I speed by, to table... To table eighteen. -Ah there she is. At least this time Mikah got their gender right, so I don’t have to deal with another bomb for tonight. But to be respectful, we should still tread lightly like we do for all our customers. Show that you are a professional among the riffraff you hired.

“Pardon me, but there’s been a misunderstanding in the kitchen, and we have to retake your order.”

They settle the menu on top the table white cloth, between knife and steak fork, ready for use. The second that catches my eyes is their left leg exposed, away from under the table, place over light baby blue covered knee, their black painted nails reaching out to scoop up a left alone wine glass. Taking a few sips of wine, their eye color softly matching their dress eats me up on a sip falling back to cloth once thirst is quenched.

“What kind of problem..?” Their voice... Is softly feminine, speaking in a bizarre melatonin flirt. Black nails start to tap on top of the cloth in a dragged beat. “Was what that kind woman wrote down not clear enough, or did you come out here to question a dish of one of your costumers?”

Well, if what they’re saying is true... Of course I came to question their taste. “I’m sorry...” I press a hand on the table, irritated by the way they see themselves above me. “But what kind of restaurant you been to that serve raw meat?”

I can’t be too mad at them; They did help me finally get rid of a headache. But now a new one forms for this cocky little- “I had the impression, if a woman like me came inside and ordered a steak medium-rare then she’ll get medium-rare.”

-I lean closer over the small lit candle between us. “Yes, that would be true if you came into my restaurant and ordered medium-rare. But you ordered raw. If you want raw meat, why not go to a meat shop like a proper human-being?”

-Her fingers stopped tapping, “If I wanted raw meat from a meat shop, I would’ve just gone to a meat shop. But I came here, because I wanted raw steak here. I don’t see how this isn’t the same as ordering the meal medium-rare.”

I’m surprised... Usually by now, costumers like her would jump out of their seat losing all cool that they have to see the manager of the establishment, and I would get to laugh at their face that I am him and kick them out of my restaurant. However...

“Fine then,” I admit defeat, and I have to tolerate a not so tall order, snapping my finger at a waiter nearby. “Ray, this woman here would like a raw steak. And, while you’re at it, get me a medium done steak.”

He hesitates for a second glancing over to the woman I pull a seat out from across, thinking he heard wrong. But I give him the notepad, and he goes for the run. I know the entire kitchen is going to love this story.

“So...” She picks her glass up a second time, fiddling it in the air as she uncrosses her leg and lean closer to the lit candle, elbow topping the table. “Tell me... Was this all a little ploy to dine with me tonight?”

I fold my hands together propping them underneath my fully grown out goatee. “I could ask you the same thing. -We both know you won’t be eating that steak tonight. But I’m so curious if you would go through with this tough girl act of yours and eat it fully.”

Before I hear a judging “Asshole” I want to note a reminder that she walked into the restaurant dazzled up and had the money to fully pay for any meal. But decided to waste my time by purchasing raw meat.

“I do every month, so there won’t be any difference today.”

.....She’s bluffing.

Sooner or later, the woman’s white grape wine runs out, and our plates are settled to the table, a second roll of utensils giving to me. Her, a raw steak. And me, a medium done that would healthily melt in my stomach and won’t hurt to digest later. Well, that depends on how badly she wants to keep her pride- In a shocking normalcy, the woman cuts through her raw steak cleanly, a piece of its end broken off and put into her mouth.

Well... It was a small piece. Of course, she would test my satisfaction by acting brave and swallow down a less bloody part- But my eyes don’t fool me. Another chunk is broken off, and then another to her mouth in my awing blink. A few costumers that sat beside us blinks twice on the large steak being in half, our queasy waiter barfing in his mouth running to the backrooms on the sight. She takes another bite and only stops to glimpse at me after a hard bloody gulp.

-“Are you not going to eat?”

What the hell is wrong with this woman? -What the hell is wrong with me? I don’t know if I should be disgusted or amazed. So, I do an oddity of myself, “No...” Smoothly slicing off a chunk of my steak, giving myself a mouthful then swallow. “I’m honestly shocked that you’re halfway through.” Kind of upset she hasn’t embarrassed herself by gagging over her plate.

“Well...” Blood squeezes out the next slice, severing a vein that was still fresh inside, blood spewing over plate, dripples off her fork to pure white. “Like I told you; I do this each month.”

And here I thought she was only a pretender out to give me a bad review.... “That’s disgusting...” If I didn’t have the balls to tell her, who else in this restaurant would?

-“It shouldn’t matter to you. It isn’t going in your body, is it?” She gave me a look of if she knew me long enough, that last bloody meat on her fork would have been tossed onto my plate.

A woman with spite, heart a thumping iron of never turning the other cheek to the people who gawk in ewe. Backbone sprinkled over her dashing personality to be more selfishly cold than I could be, smearing blood off of her petty lips... This is the sort of spice I have been waiting to taste for my entire life. Why I waited for so long to present a woman to my mother and was very picky on the meaningless dates my older brother pinned me to.

I slide the chair out, standing on her fork being set aside, not a single drop of red to that baby blue of hers. “How about every month you eat here then?”

A string of burnet pops out of her braided back hair, “Are you trying to keep tabs on me, because if you are I wouldn’t mind an extra face while I eat. Especially one like yours...”

Blood is still vivid around her pale white skin. Faded, but monstrously staying an eyesore to anyone who glance by. Almost having the fangs of a wolf who finished devouring the guts of a poor deer waiting to be feast on.

“Then it’s a deal...” I write my number and place it under my plate for she would have to get up from her spot and grab it if she really wants me. “Whenever you eat here, call me and it’ll be on the house just like today...”

She stands up earlier than I expected, our eyes on equal leveling, “That’s very genuine.”

White grape wine and a stale bloody smell infiltrate my nose, “I do my best to keep all my costumers satisfied.”

As close as we were you would think one of us would have broken and tasted what the other had cleanly, but she keeps her beast tamed and I cleared my throat to remind myself that I am human inside a dinning place. And... That’s how it went for each of those months, for the past three years. Her stomach somehow still well and me on one knee sliding a ring onto her finger she so conveniently held out for me. She remains quite and cold as those nights I fed her raw steak, no blush or a girly jump for joy, just a ferocious animal twitching her eye at what was next on her menu.

-At our wedding, my tie was pulled to her in a silk white wedding dress. Those black roses she clings to crushed against my chest on her lean backwards in my arms. A few loose petals floating to concrete, the crowd glowing up like fireworks. As they boomed with applause, I imagine each of those nights of wanting to kiss her blood smeared lips, summed up into the three-minute refusal of letting her breathe that we have now.

I was in love, and I fell hard for her. Yes, me, a man who thought he could never have time to settle down. Married and moved to a luxury home in California, on the top hills of La with a woman who was more than he asked for.

For a while, my dream of happily ever after with the estrange was an ecstatic reality...