North Of Happy

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When we get to the lake, Emma’s friends have started a bonfire. Embers float up into the night sky, and I swear to god they just keep going up and up until they stick to the night sky. There’s about ten people huddled around the pit, most holding beers. I recognize a couple from the restaurant, servers and bussers who have shed their black shirts and now look younger than I would have guessed. The cook with the tattooed sleeves is here too, his perpetual cigarette tucked between two knuckles. Emma calls out a hello as they approach and then introduces me to the group.

Someone asks where I’m from, and the usual onslaught of follow-up questions ensues. The tattooed cook, Matt, brings up one of those questions I’m shocked I’ve been asked more than once in my life: “Did you ride a donkey to school every day?” He laughs, proud of himself, until I say that, sure, all twenty-five million Mexico City residents ride around on donkeys. The city built a second-story highway just to deal with all the donkey traffic. The group laughs, someone calls Matt a dumbass.

Emma and I both accept beers and then take a seat on a blanket. We rest our backs against the cooler, which is heavy with ice and bottles. Emma gets pulled into a conversation pretty quickly, and I want to just sit back and listen to her, watch the embers float and wait for the island to keep doing impossible things. But a girl sitting to my left ropes me into a conversation. Her name’s Brandy and she very quickly tells me that she’s looking forward to leaving to go to college, all the new experiences that await her. I feel like a dick for not really caring about what she’s saying, for just wanting to be alone with Emma again.

“But this place is great,” I say, struggling to engage.

“For a while. You left Mexico, though. So you were probably kind of sick of it, right? But if I went I’d probably be amazed by everything there.” Brandy narrows her eyes, maybe a little drunk, maybe just a little like Felix, able to slip into earnestness without being self-conscious about it. “It’s beautiful here. I know that. But I’m kind of blind to it now. I can’t wait to get out.”

I don’t get the chance to think too long about what she said, because a few of Emma’s other friends join in on the conversation. They’re curious just because I’m not from here.

They want to know about drug lords, whether Mexicans eat burritos or if that’s just Americans, all the differences between here and there, but only weird surface questions that won’t actually tell them anything. In between their questions, or when Emma moves to throw another log on the fire, tosses someone else a beer, I look at her. I look at this strange place I’m in, the strangers around me, how it feels like I’ve been plopped in the middle of all of it. I find myself thinking: What a world.

Someone asks me what brought me to the island, and I feel a tightness in my chest. I look down at the beer in my hand, peel at the label. Matt barks a laugh at my awkwardness until someone smacks him and tells him to shut up again. Sound gets sucked out of the evening, and all of a sudden it’s just me, feeling like a moron in front of some strangers. I’m afraid I’m about to freak out like in the restaurant again.

Emma breaks the silence with a sigh and then stands up, patting me on the shoulder as she does, rescuing me. “Wanna take a walk?”

I try to contain my smile, nod. I expect Brandy or a few others to follow along, but it’s just me and her walking away from the bonfire. When we’re only a few steps away, the stars, which have been hiding behind the glare of the flames, reemerge overhead. It feels like Emma’s just flicking switches around me, making things beautiful.

“Sorry about my friends,” Emma says. “You were getting pounced.”

We walk along the edge of the lake, tiny waves lapping at our feet, though the lake as a whole seems perfectly still. “I don’t mind. It’s just weird being the center of attention.”

“Usually when people pay attention to me,” Emma says, “I’m certain they’re after something. Like they’re going to ask me for a donation or to sign a petition at any moment.”

“Oh, that reminds me,” I say, pretending to reach into my pocket for a pen. “I have this petition I need six thousand signatures for...”

“Shut up,” Emma says, smacking my arm. We fall quiet, and I can make out the sounds of wildlife in the surrounding trees. Bugs, an owl, the scattering feet of critters in the leaves. “I mean it, though. I can’t meet new people without giving a little side-eye to their intentions.” I don’t ask if I’m an exception. Emma goes on. “It’s gonna sound like such a whiny thing to say, but I’m sure it’s my parents’ fault. You can’t leave a kid so alone that she makes up imaginary friends for herself and not cause some long-lasting trust issues.” She says this jokingly, but I can tell there’s something tugging at her voice.

She kicks at a pebble, and we both watch it bounce toward the lake and then skip across the surface. Like, the entire surface. Hundreds of skips, the ripples visible in the moonlight. I’d say I’m losing my mind but, well, that ship’s probably sailed. At least this insanity is aesthetically pleasing.

“You think parents know?” I ask. “When they’ve messed their kids up in certain ways?”

“Oh, I’ve written several manifestos to my parents about All the Ways They Messed Up.”

I chuckle. I don’t know where she’s taking me, but I don’t want this walk to stop. I want to circle the lake all night. “What’s number one on the list?”

Emma thinks for a second. “Well, my mom never taught me her secret to make the perfect grilled cheese.”

I gasp. “You poor thing.”

“That’s not even a joke. I’m exaggerating a little about her messing me up, of course. I think I turned out okay, mostly.” We’ve made it far enough away from the bonfire so that the voices don’t carry over, and it feels like it’s just the two of us again. Emma’s face is lit up by the moon, tiny replicas in her glasses at certain angles. “But she seriously makes the greatest grilled cheese of all time, and she’s never told me her secret. I can just picture myself in college, during the prime grilled cheese days of my life, each one a slight disappointment.”

“That’s the saddest thing I’ve ever heard.”

The lake has a little bay that dips into the woods, out of sight from the bonfire, and we follow the grassy shore until we’re completely isolated.

“So, have you been planning to come here for a while?” Emma says, stopping at a boulder near the lake. She leans against it, starts to untie her shoes.

“No,” I say, continuing my surprising trend of truth telling in her presence. “I kind of ran away. Bolted from my own high school graduation party.” I look around at where we are, the little nook of lake that has us hidden from the rest of the world. “What are we doing here?”

“I’m showing you more cool island things,” she says, peeling off her socks now. “This is a great night for it too. When the moon’s out, it looks even better.”

“What does?” I ask, following her lead and stepping out of my shoes.

“Plankton.” Emma leans down and rolls up her pant legs until they’re halfway up her calves. Her toenails have traces of purple polish on them, long ago chipped. She tip-toes her way to the edge of the lake, avoiding rocks and twigs. I expect her to dive right in, but she stops before she reaches the water, looks back at me.

It’s really tempting to get caught in that look, so instead I tuck my socks inside my shoes, roll up my pant legs, step up to Emma’s side. It’s a little chilly out, and I expect the lake is colder, but there’s no way I’m not doing whatever the hell Emma has in mind.

“Okay, when I say so, we’re gonna take three superlong strides into the lake. Stomp as much as you can. You’ll get a little wet, but, trust me, it’s worth it.” She moves her glasses again so that they rest atop her head. “Don’t look up, don’t look ahead, don’t look at me, okay? You can only look down at your feet. And really stomp down. Splash as much as possible.”

Emma counts down to three, and as soon as we splash into the water, it comes alive. Millions of white lights sparkle. They radiate out like a shockwave, tiny brilliant explosions like nothing I’ve ever seen. Emma is stomping onward, a path of light in her wake. I follow along, but I go slower, not wanting to take the next step until the last one has subsided, afraid that the magic will run out. It’s like lightning underwater, like microscopic fireflies raging in sync. When the water calms back to darkness, I lean over, run my hand through the water. The lights follow suit, like it’s my skin that’s charged and not the water.

I hear Emma’s stomping and near-maniacal laughter get closer. “What is this?” I ask, my face only a few inches away from the water. I hadn’t even noticed how warm the lake is, how soaked through my jeans are. I swirl my fingers across the surface, enchanted.

“This is nature being ridiculous,” Emma says. “Bioluminescent plankton. Like swimming in fireworks.”

We step back to shore, sit on the muddy banks with our toes dipped into the water. Every now and then one of us will kick out to bring the lake back to life. I think back to how I lost it at the restaurant and it doesn’t feel like something that really happened to me. A dream, maybe, or a story I heard someone else tell.

“Thanks for bringing me here. I needed this,” I say. I raise my foot up from the water, watch electric white droplets cling to my heel. “You were right. This unshatters dreams.”

“I could tell you’d appreciate it.” Emma scoots closer to the lake so she can bend her knees up and still touch the water. She folds her arms around her legs, looking out at the water, a beatific smile on her face. Then she turns her head a little, rests her cheek on her knee to glance at me.

In that one glance, I know I’ve never been here before. I’ve never been in a moment like this one, never wanted a night to stretch out the way I want tonight to stretch out. If this island is as magical as it feels, it’ll stop the flow of hours into a trickle. If I’m here for a reason, it’s not the meal I had at Provecho.

I smile at her and she smiles back, and then I stomp my heel down in the water so that the air around us is lit up by bright droplets. Emma stomps too, hard enough that the splashes soak us both.

When we stop, I look at that spot in the lake where our feet are touching underwater. The particles of white light in the water rearrange. Felix again. Quick urge to kick him away before I think: How many nights like this did he have? How many was he robbed of?

“Hey, you okay?” Emma asks.

I takes my eyes off the lake, not sure how I managed to get pulled away from this. “Yeah,” I say, smiling. “Really don’t want tonight to end.” She lays her hand on mine, and as soon as she does I really do feel okay. Like my time here isn’t going to be all panic attacks and solitary cooking.

For the first time in a long time, I am okay.

CHAPTER 7 (#uda688454-fc94-5f12-a98e-eb95253a8a72)

SALMON WITH ANGEL HAIR PASTA

¾ bottle dry white wine

5 lemons (and zest)

½ cup fresh dill, roughly chopped

1 pint heavy whipping cream

4 8-ounce salmon filets

500 grams angel hair pasta

¼ cup sun-dried tomatoes, julienned

1 4-ounce jar capers

METHOD:

The next morning, I leave the motel at sunrise. When I said good-bye to Emma yesterday, she told me to come by the restaurant early. I’m not sure why, but I didn’t really bother asking.

Fog encroaches again, but it’s tinted pink by the dawn. The whole island looks like cotton candy. I linger in the parking lot awhile, see that couple who walked past me the other day packing up their car. Maybe I should be booking my flight home, but for some reason I don’t want to think about it. Not after last night. Felix didn’t show up again the rest of the night, and though I didn’t sleep long, I slept deeply.

Before I can knock on the front door of the restaurant, Emma pokes her head from around the corner. “Come this way,” she calls.

I follow behind. She’s standing by the back door, keeping it propped open. “I have a surprise for you,” she says with a smile.

“Me too.” I hold out the coffee I bought for her on the way here.

I want a little moment reliving yesterday, some eye contact or a forearm squeeze or something. Emma takes the coffee unceremoniously and urges me inside. The short hallway we walk down is much colder than the temperature outside. It’s quiet, though I can tell there’s someone else here.

“Are you giving me a tour?” I ask, a little giddy at the thought. I’ve never been inside a professional kitchen before, and though I’ve had some exposure on TV, in books I’ve read, it’s a little different than what I’d imagined.

“There’ll be time for that.”

I don’t really know what Emma’s talking about, but I’m distracted by the sights of the kitchen. We pass two huge steel doors that I imagine are home to all the ingredients from my meal yesterday. I strain to see the line, the row of cooks prepping for the day. Felix would have loved to see this. We turn a corner and come upon a door, which Emma immediately knocks on.

“Come in!”

Emma pushes the door open. Inside, at a desk facing the door, is a woman who looks surprisingly like Emma herself. She’s wearing a white chef’s coat, her brown hair up in a bun, bags under her eyes. Golden script on the pocket over her heart reads: Chef Elise. She looks up from a clipboard in front of her, barely taking in my presence before she starts scribbling something. “What are you doing here so early?” she asks, which feels to me like a weird way to talk to your employees.

“Meet our new dishwasher,” Emma says.

Chef stops her scribbling and gives Emma a hard look. I turn to her for an explanation too, but she’s busy staring Chef Elise down. I’m guessing this is some sort of joke. I’m just trying to figure out if it’s at my expense or not.

Chef tosses her clipboard down onto the desk and sighs, looks at me. “Any restaurant experience?”

“I’m sorry, I’m not sure what’s going on here.” I turn to Emma. “You want me to work here?”

“Goddamnit, Emma, what are you bringing this kid in here for?”

Emma rolls her eyes. “You need a dishwasher, don’t you?”

“That’s not the point.”

“Of course it is,” Emma says, throwing her hands up. “You need a dishwasher, Mom. It’s not the world’s—” There’s a loud crash, and when I turn to it Chef Elise’s clipboard is on the floor and I swear I can see her nostrils flaring.

“In here, I’m your boss. You call me Chef like everyone else.”

Jesus. The air in the room feels exactly the way it did when I left home. At least now I know why Emma seemed a little familiar. I’d seen Chef before, on that show. “Whatever,” Emma says. “Dishwashing isn’t the hardest job to learn. You need a dishwasher. He wants a job in restaurants. I’m just helping you out.”

Wait, what? Where the hell did Emma get that notion? I’m so confused, which must show on my expression because when Emma sees it she gives me a little smirk. “The way you talk about cooking. You don’t want to go back home, do you?”

Emma raises her eyebrows, questioning. Chef Elise has a similar look in her eyes, just a little more on the exasperated side. As I’m caught in their stares, wondering what I’m supposed to say to that, I sense another presence in the room. Of course. Felix. I try to subtly look around for him, find him in the dust swirling around in a beam of light.

“I think the girl has a point,” Felix says. Only my brother could find a way to smirk when he’s dust. “Why go back to the same thing? What’s waiting at home for you?” At least he’s in wisdom-nugget mode and not stupid-joke mode.

I think about what I said to Mom before I left. One week. It feels like a joke now. How could I have thought a week would be enough? It’s enough for a meal, maybe.

My thoughts are interrupted by the squeak of Chef’s chair as she rolls over to pick up her clipboard. “Fuck, Emma, look at him. He doesn’t even know where he is.” Great, I’ve been staring at a beam of light and probably moving my lips while I think up a response. Chef’s about to tell me to go away and I don’t know what I’d do with the rest of my day. Go back to my room, try to hold myself together by cooking things Felix and I used to. Go home. Face Dad again.

“Elias!” Chef yells out.

A Latino dude shows up at the door. “Yes, Chef.” He’s in a chef coat too, a towel slung over his shoulder, sweat already on his forehead. He’s right around Felix’s age, maybe in his midtwenties.

“Have we heard from Richie yet?”

“No, Chef. That’s three days.”

Chef looks back at me and then at Emma. The other cook, Elias, goes back to whatever he was doing in the kitchen. Chef leans back in her chair and then goes over to the computer on her desk and clicks a few times. Emma gives me a reassuring smile, or at least that’s what I assume it’s supposed to be. It’s six in the morning and I think I’m in the middle of asking for a job, which was not at all in my morning plans.