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𐔌 . ˚ HUNGRY HEART ┆ jack abbot ₊ ꒱

synopsis. well-timed as always, jack abbot swooped in after you called your sous job quits. except, you accidentally blew his brains with a mulberry gastrique, and now he's handholding you through your journey as the pitt's new CDC. it doesn't help that he looks like aged wagyu personified.

wc. 14.7k+

tags. 18+ mdni, fem reader, big dick big dick, cunnilingus, unprotected piv, praise kink, come eating, overstimulation, he eats it from the back too, he's a big softie who is #Whipped, dissertation on nourishment being love, stressful workplaces, having an ethical dilemma over crushing on your boss then saying fuck it we ball, porn no plot

notes. title from bruce springsteen <3

10 Blade is not a benevolent kitchen.

Work is brutal. Grueling. It gnaws and needles and savors every increasing ounce of misery sitting on your shoulders, just begging to pounce at a wrongly angled knife or a misplaced microgreen.

It’s the third time your CDC has berated you this hour, satiating his unending ego with cruelty toward the sous. This isn’t the first time; it probably wouldn’t be the last, but the next petulant fit won’t be directed at you.

You’d call it “beating a dead horse,” but you feel more like a pile of bleached bones in the desert.

“What the fuck is this,” he demands. Your chest aches, heart about to explode and lungs tight on air. The fork is thrown against the stainless-steel counter, and it bounces onto the spotless floor with a pathetic clatter. “Bullshit. Wasting my time.”

Loose in his careless hand, he shoves the dish into your chest. You scramble to grasp it—you do, thank god, because a broken plate would have the entire kitchen bracing—and he only sneers when the sauce smears on your white coat.

“Get the fuck out of my kitchen!”

Shit.

There’s no point in protesting. Face burning, you stalk to your locker. You tear your backpack out so hard that the force slams the door shut by itself—one of the commis jumps—and stomp toward the exit with a scathing remark on your tongue, but.

The CDC just stands there, contempt glimmering in his narrow, beady eyes as he watches you try to edge around his frame with a sick, shit-eating smirk that tells you he’s getting off on bullying you.

“I quit,” you blurt instead.

You shouldn’t mean it, and your stomach roils with shame after you phonetically cross the ‘t.’

God, you desperately need to keep a stable living, and the sous market is already so saturated that the only job you could get quickly is at some chain or fast-food restaurant where you’d have to follow a boring, corporate-developed recipe.

You’re going back to cooking to live.

“Good,” he spits, but the faint lift of his brows rages at your defiance. “There’s a million other people who’d want your job.”

Your exhale hisses, jaw wired shut and molars aching with how hard you’re biting down.

Because no one wants to catch or press charges, you grit your teeth and go out of your way to avoid checking his side with your elbows as you cross from the harsh, sterile LEDs of the kitchen to the gentle night.

Your face tingles in the cool air, kissing away the irritation scorching your skin. The metal doorframe shudders after a bang, followed by a slew of furious commands and pots being thrown to the floor.

Parking lot gravel and cigarette stubs crunch beneath your sneakers, followed by smooth concrete accompanied by the slow trickle of Pittsburgh nighttime traffic.

There’s a bench right along the restaurant wall; the side is eclipsed in shadows and invisible to your CDC’s scrutiny, who probably expects you to come crawling back like a desperate ex.

But you’re committed. If you quit, so be it. He’s the one who said a million people could take your job, anyway.

The plate is still clutched to your chest, duck breast now frigid and sliding from the original composition, yet thankfully intact.

So, you sit on that hard bench, and shiver, and stare at the smudged swirls of mulberry reduction until you can’t tell the colors from the dusty pinks and purples fading from the sky.

Should have stuck to cherry, you lament, setting the plate to the side and burying your numb face into your colder fingers.

Shoes scrape on gravel.

A voice you don’t recognize says your name as a question, set to sharp wit and gravel tones. “That is you, right? Unless Santos used LinkedIn to trick me.”

You part your fingers and glare up at the unfamiliar man standing over you.

He’s…handsome. In a way you can’t exactly describe with one word. Fairly tall, cropped greying curls that must have been dark brown at some point, silvery stubble, and lines that tell you he might be kind.

His face is somewhat round yet defined where it counts. Looks like he lifts, out of necessity rather than to reach an aesthetic.

Navy-blue bootcuts hug his thighs and fold up over a pair of hiking shoes, one more worn-out than the other. A black tee blends into the quickly settling night, hinting at a solid torso.

Freckles. All over, from the splash right around his hazel, crow-footed eyes, down his tan and wiry neck, to his defined arms that are propped on his hips in a manner you would place between ‘stern’ and ‘adorable.’

“What?” is all the astuteness you can muster.

“I’m looking for a sous, name of—”

“That’s me.”

He claps his palms together with a dry grin. “Great. I’m Abbot.”

You drag your hands to your chin as an inkling of recognition flickers to life. “As in Everblue Abbot and Robinavitch?”

Abbot clicks his tongue, tipping his head to the side in faint humor. “Got it.”

Dumbfounded, you only stare at him and slowly work your jaw back and forth. Everblue was still on your list when it closed. You even tried to replicate their dishes from blurry Instagram photos ten years ago.

“That’s mulberry, isn’t it? Stain’s more vibrant than blackberry.” Abbot nods at the dried gastrique on your chef’s coat, then gestures to the ruined plate beside you. “Do you mind?”

“Take it.” You turn your face, dejected. If your ex-CDC despised it, you don’t want to be around when Abbot from fucking Everblue tastes it. “I was planning to toss it, but that’d be a waste of duck. Just don’t eat it ‘round me.”

Too late.

Whipping your head back up—there's Abbot, licking grease and mulberry sauce off his thumb with a light hum, no doubt chewing on a slice of duck with a look of intrigue that makes your gut lurch.

“Interesting,” he says after he swallows. Abbot sits on the opposite end of the bench, stretching out his right leg with contemplation (and relief?) swirling between his scrunched eyebrows.

Oh god, he’s going to obliterate you in the politest way possible—

“Shahtoot mulberry,” is what he decides on. He chuckles, almost derisively at himself. “Never thought of that.”

You frown. “How’d you know?”

“I’ve worked on a mulberry gastrique for years. You’re only—what, still in culinary?”

With indignation: “Thirty-two—”

“—and already perfected it.”

Stunned silence settles. Your breaths come shallow, blinks quicker because this has to be a fever dream. The owner of fucking Everblue just complimented you.

You scoff, trying to deflect. “That’s subjective.”

He holds up his index finger, “Objection: objective. How did you know?”

You consider him—the relaxed posture, the outstretched leg. Plate balanced on his knee, hazel eyes flickering between the sauce and your troubled face.

“Used to have them growing up,” you admit, reluctant. “Local mechanic’s Vietnamese wife had a courtyard in the back with all these fruits.”

Pink-skinned dragon fruit hanging from thick vines of cacti, and brown-shelled pitted things with translucent, sweet flesh. Mulberry tree in the corner, dark leaves and long berries dangling from the boughs.

The memory brings a small smile to your lips. “After school, I’d go with my friends, and we’d compete to see how many stems we had after ten minutes.”

Blunt teeth scraping the bulbs off the stem, until the green tapered to white, speckled with vibrant burgundy juice. Sticky fingers with big, toothless smiles, and the warm sun reminding you that there was a place where worries didn’t matter.

“That’s good,” he remarks, nodding slowly. “Can I ask you a question?”

You make a dull sound in the back of your throat, “You just did.”

“What’s your dream job?”

The answer should be easy, but you find yourself hesitant. “...Eleven Madison?”

A quiet snort, the slight shake of a head. An expected, basic answer. “What makes a dish popular?”

Gnawing on the lining of your cheek, “It’ll taste good and look pretty.”

“Now, what makes a dish excellent.” His tone, now gravel and earnest, suggests that this is less a question than it is a demand. A test.

“The...” You blink at the plate sitting in his lap and think about the childhood friends you don’t talk to anymore but still hold close. No one has friends later on like the ones you have at twelve.

A good chef masters technique and flavors, your mentor once said. A genius elevates those. A genius takes their life experiences and conveys it via...

Wistfully: “An excellent dish communicates with nourishment.”

Abbot makes a soft, almost pleased sound through his nose, setting the plate back onto the bench. You hear denim shifting, then he’s standing up with a light grunt.

“Care to teach an old dog some new tricks?”

You train your attention on the smooth concrete beneath your shoes instead, heart stammering in your chest. “Is this a poach?”

“Maybe. Or maybe I just wanted to know why you roasted that duck instead of searing it.”

You’re starting to get him; you realize with a stuffed-down chuckle—Abbot is one avoidant bastard. Never meet your heroes.

“Crispy skin, tender meat,” you say, glancing up to meet his eyes. He peers at you with all the sincerity in the world, and that knocks your breath loose. “Who doesn’t love that?”

“Ha,” he scoffs, enjoying the cat-and-mouse. “You’re good.”

“When do I start?”

“Tour is at ten tomorrow. We’re a block south of Allegheny Hospital—you can’t miss it.”

—

The Pitt.

You can’t miss the closest restaurant to the hospital. It’s a small thing—from the front, a painted window sign set into charming raw brick. From the interior (lock code: 1221), the simple yet cluttered dining area runs deep, and the kitchen runs deeper.

You learn a lot during orientation.

The house is split into two rotations. The day shift gets three quarters of the hotline during the sun’s course across the sky for sandwich service. It’s...unorthodox, doing prep and sharing a kitchen with a whirlwind of beef trimmings and clashing characters.

The night shift, meanwhile, sticks to garde manger for mise en place and daily testing in preparation for the dinner service. Later, the tables and chairs are rearranged by the front-of-house staff, shifting and grinding from the charming crookedness of free-for-all seating to the sophisticated fashion of an elevated restaurant. The remaining stoves are reserved for stocks, sauces, and other components in need of heat, so the chefs can taste for consistency.

For now, they’re doing the day shift’s commis work to keep themselves busy.

“So far, dinner service hasn’t opened,” Abbot says. “We’re keeping the place afloat with the sandwich business, which Robby loves because he hates mise—”

A man on the hotline drops a skillet on his foot with a high-pitched whine of pain (you later learn that his name is Dennis) and a woman swears like she’s the one with a bruised toe (Trinity).

Abbot winces, and in the distraction, a man’s voice calls from garde manger: “Hey, Jack, is that our new CDC?”

He hovers his hand over your lower back, guiding you away. “C’mon, Shen, I haven’t broken the news...”

“Oh, shit.”

You learn a lot that day.

A) The day shift sounds like being stuck in the fiery pits of hell with your worst uncle and cousins. B) Michael Robinavitch now makes sandwiches for a living. C) You are not the sous chef because Jack Abbot promoted himself to co-executive chef and night-shift-expo, and there’s a vacancy for the job he was supposed to take.

And D) he had filled the CDC box with your name after one bite of Peking duck drizzled in mulberry gastrique.

—

“I met your old boss once,” he tells you that Sunday.

You’re standing in the otherwise quiet and empty kitchen—peace is a rare commodity in The Pitt, only occurring naturally on weekends—and you’re surrounded by stationary, Pantone color cards, journal entries, and a budget sheet.

The atmosphere should feel sterile and awkward. The kitchen’s fairly new, the tile beneath you still pristine, and the countertops aren’t dented yet. You haven’t been here for a full month yet.

But it isn’t, because Abbot is here. It’s your first time doing R&D-ing a menu, and he’s someone willing to listen and provide sincere feedback.

He’s beside you in an Army green shirt with the collar stretched and laundry-loved, strong and freckled arms occasionally brushing yours as he shifts on his feet.

You’ve noticed he favors the left.

What’s strange is how easy you feel with him. Abbot has this natural, almost magnetic charisma, one that makes you susceptible but still willing to push. Comfortable, with room to test the limits.

You pencil a wide arc on your sketch paper, following the silhouette of a dish you’ve memorized from your dreams. “Hmm?”

He shoots you a sidelong eye, stubble gone sterling under the fluorescent lights. “Total asshole. It was at a convention and—Jesus, the ego of this guy...”

Your laugh comes out stumbling and shy and all too real. You use a colored pencil to shade in the details of roe sitting in an oyster shell.

“You’d think he was a surgeon with how stuck-up he was,” Abbot grins, the side of his mouth crooking just a little, and it lands into your quickly growing file of things you find fascinating.

“Sounds about right.”

“You’re tough,” he says, scanning the budget sheet like he’d rather do nothing else. “I knew you’d fit right in with the night crawlers.”

“With the wild and the weird?” You stop drawing, trailing your fingers over the crude crags of the shell, looping along the spine of salmon sashimi curling around a bed of urchin meat, circling the smooth pearls of ikura.

“Says the weirdest and the wildest.” He leans over and studies the sketch. He wears no cologne, but the faint scent of clean sheets and soap and natural musk is enough to make you notice the weirdly endearing flat spot of curls on his head. Side sleeper.

“Brine’s coming on strong, isn’t it?”

“Salmon’s brushed with a tangerine glaze,” you mumble, jotting down the scent and taste notes on the side. “Hopefully, it’ll layer with the uni nicely.”

“Deepen but not cheapen,” he quips, nodding as a shadow of dry amusement passes his face.

“Do we...have the money for this?” you ask, distracting yourself to sidestep the sudden thought of him cracking a quick joke to make you laugh.

Crunching numbers usually does the job.

“Yeah,” Abbot says. Clearing his throat, he pins the sheet onto the counter with a hand splayed at the corner. He runs his index finger down the paper until he reaches the dollar figure at the bottom—his nails are trimmed down and clean, digits long...and thick...

“Uh, that’s what we’re working with, after the lease and utilities and tax and Robby’s insane demand for bougie Choice-grade beef—”

You stop him before he can lose himself to the laundry list of expenses. A grin of sheer disbelief manifests on your face. “Still, Robby’s the goddamn patron saint of profit.”

“Low prices and a baker better than Primanti's.” Abbot’s throaty hum is caught between a suppressed laugh and the same surprise you’re feeling. “Capitalism, baby.”

—

Fire courses one, three, five. Assemble two and four in garde manger. Leave dessert to the chef de pastries, who are twiddling their thumbs because your brain has bleached itself of ideas.

Developing a tasting menu is grueling. Two months in, you still haven’t translated your tangerine glaze from paper to plate, and Robby—despite hating prep work—is clearly miffed that his cooks are starting to get comfortable with offloading onto the night shift.

“Cooking’s not my problem,” Dana, the head of FoH, had said as she leaned against the back wall with a cig clutched between her fingers. “But these guys gotta do this shit themselves. I know for a fact that Ellis won’t stand slicing hoagies for much longer.”

Course one starts delicately: steamed, silken eggs in a ramekin. As a commis, you made this after long shifts, when your fingers cramped out of exhaustion from peeling and picking greens.

You fold in the foie gras Parker had seared for you earlier; the buttery scent bleeds into the air, which already smells like tender beef and caramelized onion. From the cooktop, Robby cranes his head to catch a glimpse.

Then comes the fresh enoki mushrooms you diced this morning, minuscule white squares that release a subtle, sweet aroma.

The fat of the duck's liver will melt with the smooth custard of the egg for subtle richness, and the mushrooms gently illuminate both the sweet and earthy undertones to round out the mouthfeel.

You think about the flickering light in your old Hanoi flat, back your mentor pulled a favor so you could stage at a Michelin-star. Orange rays spilled over the worn tiles of the countertop and made the beaten eggs in your bowl glow like the sunset. You used to throw in whatever protein you had on hand, whether it be leftover chicken or even sardines.

Steam it for eight exact minutes. Beside you on the hotline, Dennis scrambles another order of onion and Portobello mushroom in his pan, then adds a dash of red wine to reduce and caramelize, releasing another wave of umami into the kitchen. Did Robby teach him that?

A toss of chives and fried shallots, then a splash of low-sodium soy. The sauce doesn't ripple when you tweeze a final spindly garnish atop the custard.

"That's beautiful, chef," Abbot remarks once you set the dish on the table. His right hand is curled around a blue ballpoint pen and resting on a closed, leather-bound notebook.

You survey the front of the house—tables set at odd angles, empty chairs pulled out, scraps of sandwich paper on the hardwood floors.

Abbot looks both right at home and slightly out of place, sitting just outside of the double doors at the only table still aligned to the dinner floorplan. His dark tee is just casual enough to still exude seriousness, but the playful little grin on his scruffy face scrambles your signals.

The light from outside is bright for a Pittsburgh autumn, and it feels like the sun itself is eating in this simple sandwich diner and blessing Abbot with a diffused, sterling halo around his handsome salt-and-pepper hair.

“Thank you, chef.”

He flashes you a warm, encouraging wiggle of his brows, and just thinking about it nearly makes your hands slip in the kitchen.

Course two: translucent, longitudinal slices of geoduck siphon, rolled so tight that the final shape resembles a cruffin. Julienned cucumber and red pepper burst from the center like stamen, and you painstakingly pipette a dotted ring of Balsamic vinegar where the flower meets the plate.

It smells clean, slightly floral. The aroma isn’t so overpowering like the foie gras, or the duck you currently have warming up the roaster, but you know that the refreshing temperature and smooth texture will hold its own.

“Sick,” comes a low croak from Trinity, who flicks her eyes over your knife in a manner too nonchalant to be uninterested. “Is that Japanese?”

“Nabbed it from a flea market,” you say, using a small quenelle spoon to shape and place a dollop of puréed fermented black bean, pungent enough to clear the sinuses. Then, you smear it downwards, tangent to the geoduck roll. “I liked the grip, then I checked the blade.”

“Smooth.” She leans against the counter, arms crossed. “Would you say that was fate or luck—?”

“Where is my au jus?” Langdon’s frustration is hurtled halfway across the kitchen.

She grimaces. “Shit.”

Delivery goes without a hitch. Abbot hardly spares a glance when you set the plate down, too fixated on his notes, but something in your chest swells so rapidly at the sight of the empty ramekin—practically licked clean and sparkling—beside him.

Still, that makes your breaths tremble with anxious vibrations. The way he’s sticking his tongue out in concentration also doesn’t help.

Course three. Your blade breaks down the Peking-roasted duck easily. The hot, crispy skin separates to reveal fat dribbling from the dark meat and greasing your fingers until the vents are full of savory, smoky spice and star anise.

You clench your jaw, a reminder to not get lost in the heavenly smell. Butcher the wings and other bony parts for stock, shred the unused meat for Shen to use in his family meal, which won’t be served until you’ve run through the five courses for Abbot.

The duck settles as you pull a steamer basket off the stove. The stack of flour pancakes inside is hot enough to make your experienced fingers wince—you swear you had burned away all the nerves by now.

You separate each papery layer and fan them out a half-moon plate, then dip a basting brush into another pan, which is simmering with tart mulberry gastrique. Glaze each piece of duck with two layers of reduced sauce, then pair one slice to one pancake. Blue microgreens and a wafer-like garnish for presentation.

Out the double doors, and before Abbot.

He glances up from his notes like he’s been expecting you, grin cocked in a way you’re starting to know so well—he's already got a quip locked and loaded.

“Masterful knife skills, chef,” he says, pointing at the blank slab of ceramic that used to present your geoduck flower. “I think the OR is calling you.”

You chuckle, equal parts bashful and entertaining his joke. “Unfortunately, Doctor, the only thing calling is the hotline, because Dennis is watching my tangerine glaze.”

Abbot flicks his eyes to the ceiling, all playful. “Oh, shame. And that poor kid...”

“He can keep a lid on it, chef.”

You push through the double doors again, and the heat presses all around you like a pressure cooker. Trinity has thankfully kept a sliver of the plating counter clear for you, and she’s flitting between wrapping sandwiches and maintaining Langdon’s cursed au jus while Dennis sautés another heap of onions and Portobello.

Robby shouts out orders of two French dip, four Italian, six cheesesteaks—all day and Samira is...wafting your tangerine glaze with a contemplative furrow to her brow instead of kneading the salt bread she’s been assigned to.

“Shit, is it burning—”

“A splash of ginger syrup,” she blurts, already darting back to her station to re-dust the counter with flour. “Maybe a teaspoon!”

You fan the scent of the glaze toward your nose—she’s right. The tangerine has the zest and the rind’s slightly bitter bite, but it’s been missing the same sweetness and tang Samira identified.

Ginger syrup.

You twist the knob until the blue flames in the burner leap and exchange your saucepan for a small pot. While you bring a cup of water to a boil, you peel a stalk of ginger with the edge of a spoon, then divide it into centimeter-wide slices.

The water roils; you bring it down to a simmer, when the bubbling calms, and the flames hover just below the grate. An equal part of sugar is spooned and stirred until the graininess dissolves. Simmer ginger for twenty minutes…

No, he would be irked, wouldn’t he? You’ve been taking your sweet time with the menu, but everyone knows that Robby can’t keep The Pitt afloat forever.

Even though Abbot’s been telling you to take it easy, you know that he’s itching to open. Slow service is no service.

So, you improvise. Course 3.5, as you’ll call it.

A loaf of ciabatta fresh out of the oven, radiating with steaming warmth and Samira’s love. The golden crust crackles beneath the serrated knife you grab from the magnetic strip.

White truffle oil—savory, delicate, a thread of sweetness—brushed over the soft, white insides. Toast it against a sizzling skillet with the crust side facing the smoky ventilation hood. Arrange on a dark, stone slab of a plate. Sprinkle the seared side with freshly minced basil leaves and dried, crumpled thyme.

Then there are the frozen, shell-less escargots you know are hidden behind the slabs of beef shoulder in the walk-in. Robby microwaves them to eat during his breaks like a fucking weirdo.

(Seriously, he’s a Michelin-starred chef! Are the fumes of red wine reduction and Langdon’s au jus getting to his brain and convincing him that eating reheated escargot meat atop untoasted sourdough is okay? Unclear.)

You steal a few caps of Portobello, halved, and sauté them with the icy chunks of escargot in Dennis’ quick fashion. Steam hisses and curls from the pan, flames stretching from cobalt to orange.

A genius elevates. A genius sees their life and conveys it through nourishment.

You think of Samira’s kind hands speckled with flour, the way she always helps with the patience of a saint and a gentle smile. Dennis’ nervous grins, the bags under his eyes, the way he carries himself with a burgeoning sense of confidence. Even Robby, with his sharp commands and imposing figure in the culinary world, despite his strange eating habits (sure, he’s a genius, but untoasted sourdough is just not cool).

Then there’s Abbot.

Playful smirk, calloused fingers Abbot. Thick arms crossed and neck corded, five o’clock moonlight clinging to his jaw. A dark quip perpetually loaded on his tongue. Abbot, who—last week—pored over your sketches and scrubbed his mouth with those steady, calm hands and quietly guided you through timing for each course.

This is for him to taste the soul of the day shift cooks, condensed into Samira’s ciabatta, Robby’s escargot, Dennis’ Portobello. Victoria and Mel live in the mellow, earthy tones of the white truffle oil, Trinity in the seared flat of the bread.

(And Langdon...well, he’s just come back, so you suppose he could be the herbs. There as a humble, grounding reminder that life comes from the earth, like how he obsessively nags Trinity to keep an eye on the au jus.)

Your hands don’t shake when you painstakingly spread the Portobello and escargot to form a circle around the toast. There’s no embellishing garnish or ceremony to this—there isn’t supposed to be.

It’s just raw truth and grueling heat.

You look up to see Dana leaning over the opposite side of the plating counter. She offers a dry little smile and scoops the stone slab into her hands.

Two breaths are all you’ll afford. Onto course four.

Your heart is kicking your sternum as you grab the pot of tangerine reduction you set aside. Pour the ginger syrup into it, stir gently as the white wisps dance above the metal lip.

Slightly dilute the sauce with water, but only when you notice that the edges are beginning to darken.

You pull it off the heat. By heavenly smell alone, you know that Samira has sent you a gift of a ginger-tangerine glaze, but you still dip a tasting spoon into the still-bubbling pot.

First contact scorches, then almost makes your eyes roll back into your head. Ripe mandarins bloom sweetly in your mouth, each fruit pierced by a sharp needle of ginger and wrapped in a thin crepe of tartness.

Jack will love it, you think as you call out a string of behind and corner to the walk-in.

You bought a two-pound block of sashimi-grade salmon from the local sushi marketplace to save money—you still don’t know if this’ll work, and despite Abbot’s countless reassurances about the budget, you can’t shake off that deeply-ingrained conscience about money.

“I’ll pay for it,” was the gravelly mumble, fingers landing gently on your shoulder as you weighed the fillets by hand.

You did not shiver and certainly didn’t flush. At least, that’s what you recall from the past weekend; you mainly focused on the warmth he radiated and freckles dappling his neck. You’ve been…a little spacey as of late.

You ended up splitting the bill, which wasn’t balanced. Abbot had acquiesced to pay for the salmon with a strangely characteristic frown that brought a fluttering to your chest, and you lightened your wallet considerably for a single tray of gonads and ikura.

The three are sitting innocently beside each other on the metal shelf. You try not to think about how Abbot’s hands could easily engulf the trays, how the flesh would give so readily beneath his steady, competent hands.

Your cheeks burn as soon as the door to the walk-in cracks open, letting a sliver of white light into the backlit-blue space. Back into the fray, this time with the ghost of your executive chef’s rough fingers trailing down your spine.

(Fuck. You tell yourself that it’s because you haven’t been laid in a while. Which is true because your hours run late, and you don’t exactly have the energy for romancing in a sea of petulant manchildren.

But Jack stirs your stomach in ways unfamiliar to you. It’s how he’s so earnest. Broad and brimming with unspoken guilt and the need to carry on. Gently leaves his mark on you and everyone around him.)

Just uni is plain. Any other high-end restaurant can slap a gonad onto a plate, splash some coulis, and attach an exorbitant price tag.

This is The Pitt. You have to keep up and be inventive and match the pace of a house that serves sandwiches by the day and polished plates by the night.

You pivot to garde manger. Its three counters are pushed together to form a U-shaped space, and two are crammed shoulder-to-shoulder with teary chefs and their piles of onions.

“Behind,” you say, tapping Shen on the shoulder so you can reach for a deli quart. He sniffles, brows pinched as he fights the burn in his eyes.

You scrape the pliant, golden urchin roe into the plastic container with a grimace for your poor wallet, then pick up the handheld blender with reluctance. Here goes nothing.

Within seconds, the gonads dissolve into a cream, and all your money has gone down, down, down into the churning whirlpool. The consistency quickly becomes sufficient—smooth enough to not need straining, yet still thick to maintain substance—so you funnel the puree into the espuma siphon and scrape every inch of your tools so nothing’s wasted.

You hadn’t practiced your aim that much during your tenure as 10 Blade’s sous, but hopefully you have enough experience from your culinary mentee days to perform this like second nature.

You load the cold metal cartridge of nitrous oxide into the holder, then twist the cap until you feel the tension release with a quiet hiss. You shake the siphon vigorously, so the gas and puree become a uniform, homogenous solution.

‘Cooking is art, baking is science’ is bullshit. Have you ever seen a complex molecule? —is what your mentor would say, leaning back against the stainless-steel counter with her arms crossed and hawk-like glint in her sharp eyes— Chemistry is art disguised as science, and cooking requires both, all the same. Maillard, protein denaturation, pH...oh, make sure the reduction doesn’t become too diluted, because it too is a solution with a molarity value.

This seafood dish is scientific. Exact. Innovative. Surgical, but not sterile. No, this has character, just like how the works of Da Vinci married science and art.

You grab a shallow bowl and pipe the uni espuma into the center, letting the dollop build upon itself till the circumference can comfortably notch within the shell size you’ve eyeballed in your mind, which should (in theory) be approximately the size of your palm.

Really, everything about this course is theory, just like how Einstein theorized about the relativity of time and how medieval healers mythicized the existence of the vena amoris in the ring finger.

Which proved to be anatomically wrong. But you won’t be wrong.

Parker keeps a spare set of knives beneath the counter—you flick the clasp, and the leather unfurls with a satisfying snap. You smooth your fingers around the understated, wooden hilt of the sheathed yanagi-ba, which is a long and thin blade for cutting boneless fish.

The salmon block is cold beneath your fingers, and the blade’s edge slices the flesh in one fell stroke. That’s all you need.

You grab a pair of tweezers, which every chef should have hung from the fabric of their apron pockets, and hold your breath as you arrange the sashimi around the golden bed of thick foam.

It stays. Thank goodness.

Dip your basting brush into the glaze, coat the sunset-pink meat with it. Crack open the plastic tray of cured salmon eggs, spoon out the brine-rich, vibrant pearls of orange. They make their nest in the espuma dollop without a hitch, closing out the dish you’ve dreaded making for a long time.

Hopefully, Abbot will agree that a little improvisation never hurts, lest he pretends to be a guest with texture sensitivity or an allergy. If so, you suppose you’ll just have to find a rock to die under.

“Hands—” Princess swoops in with a breeze of jasmine eau de toilette and swiftly marches through the double doors with the bowl clutched in her hands “—please. Uh, okay.”

Final course.

Tacky sweat now pools at your nape, slowly dripping into the collar of your shirt and making your apron rub against the juncture of your neck in an odd way. You’re in and out of the walk-in, hauling the pot of stock you asked Shen to prepare yesterday to the hotline.

Lotus roots knock against the sides of the pot, along with knobs of pale ginger and crimson goji berries. You flick the burner on high, the familiar series of clicking and gas combusting reassuring your mind.

This must be what the flow state is like.

The Pitt renders into background noise like fat dripping out of the creases of an animal. It’s just your hands flying as they dispatch slippery shrimp heads and shells, pulling out the dark veins, mincing the cold, crisp meat.

Far-away, you hear yourself calling out for ground lamb—it’s on the second shelf, next to the beef—while dicing chives, and blinking to find it already before you.

Mash the lamb and shrimp together, toss in an approximation of white pepper and garlic salt. Corner, need the—yeah, thanks.

Rinse a shiitake in the cold, drumming sink. Behind, sorry Cassie! Tear out the stipe with a utility knife, because it doesn’t have to be pretty.

It has to be humble.

It has to let the mundane, expected chaos of life seep in. You pack the mixture of lamb and shrimp into the concave underside of the mushroom cap, each press reminding you of the way your flatmate in Hanoi would fold wontons like it was easier than breathing.

Stick it in a steamer basket, fit it over the lotus-root stock roiling in the pot. Three minutes on the magnetized timer stuck to the ventilation hood.

You spend it brewing jasmine tea with the water heated to an exact 170 degrees, in a pot you didn’t know was here with leaves you stuck into your backpack this morning.

You rinse the dish with the tea—ritual purification. The warmed bowl fits between your two palms like a compliment. You only swipe a towel along the exterior, which squeaks with how good the dish crew has scrubbed them.

The delicate floral notes of the jasmine will lash onto the rich, full mouthfeel of the lamb and shrimp-stuffed shiitake cap, which you’re now lowering into the bowl. You then ladle the stock over it and use a pair of chopsticks to place a final slice of lotus root over the round mouth of the bowl.

No garnish. The simplicity speaks for itself.

One metal soup spoon, the edges thin and sharp enough to cut the gummy texture of the mushroom. Place the bowl on a saucer, arrange the spoon to lay tangentially.

Step out of the double doors with the whirlwind of a month clutched in your fingers, into the light and the cool, air-conditioned front of the house. Pivot on your heels to find Jack Abbot already watching you with a strange look on his face—half pensive and all mysterious—and a quiet smile.

The dishes have been cleared from the table. It’s just him, honest and grounding, and his little black notebook.

“What’s your dream job?” he asks as you set down the plate, and you’re reminded of a yellow streetlight and a cold bench outside a scorned kitchen.

“The Pitt.” No hesitation now.

You’ve found your place in a galley kitchen, one where the scent of rich, expensive sauces kisses the practical tang of a stovetop griddle and lingers in the grout. No amount of baking soda paste on a toothbrush can scrape you out now.

He takes a single sip from the broth, pauses with his head cocked just to the left, and sets the spoon face-down on the saucer. With this odd, pensive curl playing on his lips, Jack clicks his pen—the quiet sound deafens the thundering of your heart—and scribbles a couple of words.

Then he shuts the notebook, places it on the table, slides toward you, letting his touch linger on the leather cover until you reach for it. “Good, chef.”

—

Course 1 – steamed eggs. Clever use of foie gras & enoki. Pleasant silky texture, good balance of salt & umami & subtle sweet/earthiness. Notes of “home,” “routine,” “comfort.” Coming home bone-tired & need reassurance that she’s hanging on.

Course 2 – geoduck. Cucumber & red pepper lend freshness, Balsamic & black bean amazing Sheer beauty, delicate presentation. Like waking up in summer with the fan still on & sun on arms, cold spring water.

Course 3 – roast duck. Exceptional mulberry gastrique. Honey-sweet, delicate tartness, salty, fatty enough to melt w/ enough substance to fill. Refined & elevated. Prodigious. Nostalgic, berry juice sticky on fingers, stained teeth, heart waiting at home.

Course 4 – ciabatta, escargot, Portobello. Welcome surprise. Rich, soft, buttery, crunchy symphony (?) all at once. Very Pitt-esque, chaos tamed. White truffle oil masterful reminder of night shift. Must keep in menu.

Course 5 – uni, salmon. Methodical yet artful. Improvised espuma, very thoughtful. Unmistakable ginger in tangerine glaze—Mohan? Undertone of stinging warmth. Top layers of sweetness, rich brine, airy yet custard-like texture. Foil to steamed eggs.

Course 6 – shiitake, lamb-shrimp paste, lotus root stock. Broke my heart.

Dessert - TBD

—

“I roomed with another commis in Hanoi—Chau,” you tell him, thumb pressed into the inward concave of the spoon, fisted fingers supporting the back. “Her name meant pearl—that's where I got the oyster idea from.”

In your hand is a small Oliver loquat, droplets beading on the slightly fuzzy skin. Jack mirrors your hands, but his loquat looks so much tinier in his thick, steady fingers.

He hums in interest, shifting his weight ever-so-slightly so that it rests mostly on his left leg, and that makes the firm, heavy swell of his bicep brush yours, which sets off a whole rack of misfired signals in your mutinous brain and traitorous belly.

You would tell yourself that it’s just the dark, nearly threadbare cotton of his laundry-loved shirt stretching over his sturdy figure like an open secret, but you’d be lying. You think that you’ve liked him from the very first day.

The stem has already been picked off, leaving a little ring of protruding skin around the top, which is convenient for peeling. Mother Nature’s plan, and the whole works. You slip the edge of your spoon beneath it, using your thumb to hold the skin so it doesn’t slip, and drag the soft, ochre peel all the way down.

“You don’t get your nails all dirty like this,” you say, repeating the soothing, familiar motions until the flesh is bare before you. “She always had cute manicures with art and everything. Always wore gloves too—she liked that they made her feel confident.”

Your flat is dimly lit but still homely; the various lamps you’ve turned on lend a certain je sais ne quoi to the open floor, like the sense of sweet clementines and your partner’s comfortable body heat.

Abbot listens intently while curls of yellow skin flutter into the sink. You’ve barely started the heaping bowl of them, which you will press when the prep is done to figure out a dessert that will lean on the succulent, slightly tangy flavors.

You had invited him over to help with R&D. So far, you’ve collectively thought of jam, ice cream, sorbet, panna cotta...and have exchanged a rough total of twenty quick glances, three quiet giggles, and two full-length culinary tales with each other as you washed each individual fruit.

You turn the fruit so that the calyx points up, then dig the tip of the spoon beneath it. The pale amber mesocarp parts for the metal, and with a small twist, the shriveled remnants of the blossom pop away from the seeds.

Feeling his gaze turn heavy—you've become rather adept at detecting his moods, whether it be intuition or just a subtle shift in the air—you tilt your head to meet his eyes, which are as you predicted: lowered, soft, an unnamed yet known thing swimming deep inside those hazel pools.

He sucks in a hushed breath beside you, the rhythm unchanging save for when you blink expectantly at him. It just—sharpens in a way, like he’s suddenly caught himself doing something he shouldn’t.

(Jack Abbot supposedly doesn’t do favorites.

“I’m not playing buddy with you,” he told you himself after the run-through. It was hard to believe; his half-cocked grin glowed with satisfaction. “We just have a naturally harmonious relationship because we’re supposed to work well together.”

“I believe you.”

“But I will admit that you are an excellent chef, and it is an honor to be the one who formally invited you to the night shift.” A pause, then a half-sardonic, disgruntled mumble of, “God knows Robby would’ve messed you up...”

“Heard, chef.”

His grin had widened, but this time the amusement was stark on his face. Your jaw had feathered trying to suppress the urge to match him. You also didn’t know if you were imagining the tinge at the tips of his tan, freckled ears.)

For a man you know hides himself behind his knife-sharp observational skills and level-headedness, his shell is starting to become awfully soft around you.

A sudden rush of confidence washes over you. Prickles at your neck, itches that sweet spot in your brain that always feels gratified when things are set in motion.

The naked loquat, slick and cold in your grip, trembles as you hold it up to his lips. Pink plush gives in so readily, almost helpless to your urging. And you don’t pull back.

He captures your gaze through his eyelashes, the lines branching from his eyes all mellow, brows furrowed like he can’t decide between forgiving himself for the indulgence or abstaining to punish himself for letting something so tense get so far—between an EC and CDC, no less.

But he’s made it very clear that there is virtually no power imbalance between your positions. You’re fully in charge of food stock, menu choices, staff. The only thing he really manages is the expo table—only there to maintain an ever-watchful eye.

Jack is a line cook, through and through, and a co-executive in name only because Robby would supposedly get all up in everybody’s asses if he oversaw night service.

You stay, steady and grounding—you're allowed to want, is what your silent motions scream—until the end of the pulp slides into the warmth, until his teeth scrape your nails so softly and hesitantly, until those hazel pools lighten with acceptance and the unabashed want you knew was there and were seeking for all this time.

He doesn’t look away. You suppose he’s always had a staring problem, anyways.

Sill, you feel like your sternum is cracking wide open and spilling hot viscera all over your skin.

Your fingers fall softly, like feathers fluttering to the ground. He chews the sweet, tangy pulp off the seeds till they clack together in his mouth.

Still, he considers them, working his jaw, lean muscles in his neck shifting as he soaks in the flavor.

“You…you’re supposed to spit them out,” you say, quiet words harsh on the already-tense mood.

Jack—when did he become Jack, you wonder—fixes you with an unapologetic twitch tugging at the corner of his scruffy mouth, putting you in the kind of headspin that makes you want to fly to the dark side of Jupiter and live out your days alone.

He turns around to your cabinets, intuitively selects a door to open, and pulls out a bowl to discard the seeds in. Knowing his way around your very unfamiliar kitchen should not be as attractive as it is, but you’re a chef.

“Are you gonna keep staring, or—?”

“Right,” you jump, flicking on the water to rinse your fingers, then reaching for another loquat to work on. You slow as your touch grazes the fuzzy skin, spoon trembling in your knuckle-paling grip. “Just use the edge to dig out the seeds too, it doesn’t have to be neat since we’re processing—Jack?”

He doesn’t move.

Just…gazes at you with this strange blend of admiration and fondness and soft, unexplained warmth puddling in his hazel irises. They’re flecked with the same shade as microgreens, the kind that would normally drive you crazy if you had three seconds to plate and your old CDC breathing down your neck.

But this isn’t 10 Blade. This is just Jack Abbot, the man you’ve become familiar with in just a few months, as if you’ve known him your whole life. As if you’ve been looking for him, for all that time.

“Nothing,” Jack says, but the way his controlled breath stammers a little makes your heart rabbit against your lungs.

You must look skeptical, because his mouth thins and flattens dramatically, and he dryly admits, “I’m endeared.”

It should be accompanied by an eye roll, but he’s holding back on the usual avoidant theatrics. The sincerity almost burns at your waterline, and you duck your head down to sharpen your attention to the task in front of you.

“Really?” Your mouth crinkles in an effort to hide a smug smile. “By me, out of my chef coat, in…”

You make a pointed, cursory gesture to your very comfortable clothes— “grey sweats and a swap-meet chemistry shirt that says, ‘I wear this periodically.’”

“Yes.” Without hesitation. With the slight, enamoring crinkle of his crow’s feet and the faintest play of a smirk on his lips.

You swallow, stunned.

You swear his razor-sharp gaze follows the line of your throat as it shifts, then tries to dart back up to your eyes, only to be caught like a rabbit in the brambles of your lips.

You’re suddenly aware of how close he’s been standing—practically joined at the hip, the defined swells of his arms fitting against the curves of yours—and how hot his skin runs.

Eyes flicker down to the slight pout of Jack’s bottom lip. You study the softened creases of his smile lines, rough silver stubble around them. The air feels too thick to breathe.

“I think we should make that our uniform,” Jack murmurs, voice dipping into gravel as he finally lets that roguishly charming smirk out. “What do you think?”

You suck in a tight breath, now fighting the unreasonable, sharp need sparking, stirring in your core. “I…think you should do what you want to do, chef.”

You’re about to rip your attention away to inwardly chastise yourself for falling for this ridiculously witty, stupidly competent, magnetic (and every synonym in any language, really) silver fox of your executive chef (an ethical dilemma you’ve long since given up on).

You’re about to quash down the rising tide of feelings that play your heartstrings like a fiddle. You want to compress them into a tofu block and dice them and maybe stick them in a blender with garlic and durian, so Jack Abbot can’t identify the slush by taste alone.

Then, you catch it. The quicksilver, dark smudge of desire darting across the enamoring wrinkle in his brow.

“Then can I kiss you?”

In any other situation, you’d perhaps clutch your chest at how smooth he slid his approach into the conversation.

But your flat is dim in the clementine lamplight, and the quiet, crackling air between your lips smells like the sweetness of loquat. Your heart is melting into a pulp. For once, you aren’t afraid of letting someone in.

You can have him.

It must be you who moves first. For a man so assured and grounded in the whirlwind of The Pitt, Jack falters for a second too long, worry and self-doubt apparent in the scrunched set of his growing frown.

The gap closes with a final, shivering breath and a mountain of relief crashing down on both of you. A strained sound from the back of Jack’s throat escapes, then peters into a deep rumble of satisfaction as he sinks into the kiss.

His lips are soft. Sticky, sweet, with a hint of the loquat’s tang caught in the areas where his skin is just this side of chapped, and god, the realness lands.

The spoon in your hand falls into the sink with a dull clatter. Negligible compared to how Jack smoothly maneuvers you so that your lower back presses into the cold edge of your counter, corralling you so tightly that you fear your heart will light up in flames.

Mouths slide together, finding a rhythm between bashful giggles when noses press to cheeks at odd angles and whispered apologies lost to the pounding of your hearts. A broad, callused hand sears along the curve of your waist, and he slips his hot tongue across the line of your bottom lip before breaking for air.

You miss it immediately, traitorous stomach flipping on its head. You suddenly want the imprint of his hands on your hips, arousal beginning to tug at the crux of your legs.

“Thought about this so many times,” he groans, palm meeting your side again with a firm squeeze, right knee sliding just below where your cunt begs for friction. “Wanted you from the very first day.”

You make a sound, low and shuddering and nakedly sweet in a way you didn’t expect from yourself. Jack looks so fucking pleased and high on his own horse when you paw at the dark cotton of his shirt, leaving behind smears of damp fingerprints, and you know then that you’ll stop at nothing.

He must know—he's becoming attuned to you now, in the way only chefs and co-dependent partners can be. One look, a glint he catches in the glass of your half-mast eyes when you tip your head just so.

He kisses you again, sweet and longing. Savors the flavor of your lips, draws his thumbs in soothing circles. Inches his thigh closer, until he swallows your shallow gasps and takes that as permission to slip his hands beneath the back of your shirt.

“You’re so soft,” Jack murmurs with all the admiration and gentle, yet fierce yearning in the world pouring from the faint quiver of his lips. He pecks the corner of your mouth. “Can I lay you down, sweetheart?”

Your ribs crack wide open; you can only afford to nod in fear of spilling out and driving him away.

“Words, please?”

How could you resist? You’re helpless to the call, tilting your head forward to nose at the hollow of his collarbone; he tilts his head back, exposing the column of his throat—patchouli, green tobacco leaves, cozy aftershave—so thoughtlessly.

You feel intoxicated. Physically, mentally, chemically.

Fighting back a groan of desperation: “Want you to touch me, please.”

The world spins. One breath, Jack’s stealing a messy kiss, smearing spit all over your swollen, nipped-at lips. The next, you’re stumbling backwards, sinking into the cool, plush cushions of your couch as his steady hands pull your hips flush to the bulge in his jeans.

You moan, quietly, for real this time, squirming beneath the close, solid press of his body in search of more friction. The soft gasp leaves you in one fell sigh—Jack…

I am touching you, he rasps, voice so gruff and delicate that you’re sent into tachycardia. He strokes the tip of his nose along the line of your clavicle, inhaling shakily as deft, experienced fingers begin to drift under your shirt.

“Not like that” —nudging his hands lower, until the rough palms graze the softness of your sweatpants— “like that.”

“Fuck, you’re killin’ me,” he groans, thick lashes fluttering against your prickling goosebumps. “Are you sure?”

You card your fingers through the feather-soft feel of his grey curls, patches of which still hold that dark, wiry copper it used to be. You guide him to raise his head, and he peers down at you with wide, searching eyes, and you realize that he would be satisfied with anything you gave him.

He could stand in the corner and come with the lingering taste of your mouth if prompted. You could stay here, dry humping like a pair of goddamn teenagers, and he would think he’s the happiest man in the world.

“Yeah,” you say, though it cracks in the middle, for the admission is so tender that it could be a bruise. “I want you.”

He’s silent for a single, disbelieving heartbeat. Two throbs, blood rushing from atrium to ventricle, valves fluttering open then snapping shut, then from ventricle to bloodstream.

By the next cycle, he’s onto you again, crushing his lips to yours like a man parched, starved, trying to quench whatever need that gnaws on his bones.

“You’ve no idea,” he grunts out between kisses, “what you do to me.”

You fumble with his belt, years of meticulous training in immaculate knife skills and plating thrown out the window as hot arousal pools in the gusset of your cotton underwear.

(Shit, you think offhandedly, should’ve worn the cute lace ones.)

Jack rucks your stupid shirt up, stopping just beneath your breasts, and lays a scorching path of kisses and nips down the length of your belly. You arch toward him—push and pull; he pins you back down.

Then he rises, lips all pinkened and swollen, flushed from his cheekbones to his fucking neck (good grief). Pulls off that cotton shirt with a mind-numbing stretch of his corded, unbelievable arms.

“Sorry,” he pants, scruff catching in the orange lamplight and making constellations shine on his skin, “can you give me a second?”

You manage a dazed yeah, shutting your eyes for a reprieve. Belt buckles clink, leather rasps against denim. Then comes the sound of a stifled, relieved hiss, and a quiet thud on your carpet.

You crack an eye open to see half a metal calf plus a foot resting against your coffee table. Oh. So that’s why he favors the left.

“Does that…change anything?” he asks, fingers hovering beside your knee. It’s said with such undisguised intimacy that it kisses the border of inaudibility.

“No,” you say, certain. You shift your knee so that the cusp fits over his knuckles, which are crosshatched with little scars from mishaps. Your hands match, in a way. “Just wish you’d told me, so you didn’t have to stand on my tile. It’s hell for flat feet.”

He chuckles, all breathy, wondrous, and endlessly endeared.

The cords of muscle in his shoulders ripple when he lowers himself back down, divots phasing in and out of his smooth skin as he kisses your tummy once again, eyelids fluttering shut with every press of his wanting mouth.

Warm, deft fingers slip beneath your waistband. He helps you shimmy out of your sweatpants and underwear, making this little face where the right corner of his mouth twists in mirth at the sight of the plain cotton.

(Inwardly, you preen. Maybe not wearing lace panties was a good thing then.)

The clothes form a neat pile of indeterminate shadows on the carpet. You can’t tell where his garments end and where yours begin, but the thought dissolves when Jack rubs his palms over the bare skin of your ass (you can feel the callouses just beneath his index finger from years of cooking).

You shiver, caught between the air-conditioned atmosphere of your flat and the body heat rolling off his bare chest.

He takes your right hand. Exhales tremble—both your lips are parted in anticipation as he guides your middle and fourth finger into the cavern of his mouth with a throaty groan.

You feel it in your bones, vibrations jumping between the IP joints and traveling up your arm as frisson. Stubble scrubs against your palm. Instinctively, you apply pressure to the roughness of his tongue, and the muscle dips suddenly as he sucks on your digits for a singular moment that feels simultaneously too long and short.

He releases you with a soft, wet pop—a thread of spit, starspun in the warm light, trails between your fingers and his reddened lips. Whispers like a secret he isn’t supposed to tell: Can you touch yourself?

Oh god. You’ve died and you’ve somehow done enough good in your life to reach the pearly gates.

A whimper escapes your lips. You’ve found yourself so helpless to the way his dazed eyes gleam and plead with those blown-out pupils, and you’re giving in to his request so readily, thoughtlessly.

Fuck, you’re beautiful. The praises dive into one ear and nestle in your hazy brain, feeding the fire growing in your too-empty, fluttering cunt. Keep doin’ it just like that, okay?

You nod, head spinning at the dull sparks elicited from your slick fingers circling your own clit.

Rough, scorch. Jack’s nose bumps into your languid knuckles, scruff prickling your inner thighs as he licks a long, firm stripe from your pussy to your stammering fingers.

Head knocking back, hips jumping in surprise. You loose a harsh, startled moan into the otherwise still air, and the bastard has the gall to smirk against your folds before he dips his tongue into your sex with a wanton moan.

“Oh, fuck,” you hiss, ribs rattling with the force of the pleasured synapses firing in your brain.

He shudders from between your legs, mouth pulling slick, filthy sounds from your cunt as he presses deeper, closer. Salt-and-pepper curls smart over your knuckles.

Then comes the tentative, gentle stroke of two thick, coarse fingerpads.

They swipe through the wet. Join his tongue in their ministrations.

Slide right into the seam of your pussy, making room for himself in the pulsing walls and fitting so snugly, like your body doesn’t want to let him go.

The groan he lets out vibrates you to the bone, nudging you closer to the ledge. “‘S tight.”

You roll your clit with the newfound fuel for urgency, gasping when Jack laves over your wet, frantic digits, when his fingers set a quick, efficient pace against a spot that makes your eyes roll back—

When his free hand, warm and grounding, grasps the curve of your hip and squeezes just so, reminding you to come back to Earth as your senses narrow to the pinpoint of stimulation in anticipation.

“Jack,” you mewl, almost a prayer as your rhythm stutters, as everything builds too high, as Jack’s damned tongue flicks over your stalling fingers—presses the searing, harsh flat of it flush to your clit, shit—

That’s it, he coaxes, curling into that spongy, sensitive spot. The gentle motion makes the filthiest squelch as he bullies his fingers deeper into your still-cumming pussy. Such a good girl.

You whimper, breathless and basking in your orgasm-addled haze—‘m so sensitive.

Your ears ring. Your limbs are heavy. There’s a distinct notion that you’ve never come harder. The praises spilling from him swim around you:

Tasted so sweet. Did so well. Looked so pretty, sweet girl.

“Mm, Jack?” you croak.

He’s moved his attention from your cunt to your neck and jaw, worshipping your skin with slow, loving kisses. “Yeah?”

The hand you used to touch yourself tugs at his waistband, and the other combs his curls, which are gradually becoming curlier with the humidity of exertion.

Pulling him in, you melt into the cushions as he kisses you back. He tastes like you, lips and tongue and teeth and all.

Despite the bodily urge to let the heaviness take over, you manage to pop the button of his jeans and unzip him. You swallow his gravel-grit moan at the release in pressure, desire once again flickering in your empty core.

“Again?” he mumbles, lips curving into a teasing smile against yours.

You smooth your hand over his defined chest, caressing just to the left of his sternum with leisure. “Want to make you feel good, too.”

“I’m clean,” he says, lifting himself up to peer down at you, concern and curiosity swirling in his face. “But we don’t have a condom.”

“Me too,” you sigh, eyes tracing the gentle set of his eyes, the crooked line of his mouth. “Can’t exactly predict this.”

He hums, the barest tilt of amusement dawning on his face again. “Sorry.”

Not sorry. The stupidly endearing twitch of his short, silver whiskers tells you so.

“You could always pull out.”

Jack pauses, eyes frozen, a purse dawning on his lips. The idea clearly appeals to him, because the heartbeat beneath your palm picks up, and his pupils dilate until you can only see a thin sliver of hazel. “Are you sure?”

“You’re a chef.” A teasing smile plays on your mouth now, and his attention flickers down to it—rapt and automatic, always responding to your needs. Another coil of affection and desire unspools and tangles itself around your stomach.

You take the opportunity to reach around and shuck off your own shirt, the collar of which is dampening with perspiration. His gaze falls, following how the shadows of your body morph as you stretch back onto the couch, leaving you in just your bra.

“You’ve got the timing down.”

“Trust me that much?” he wonders, but his hand is already urging at your side until you roll over, prone beneath him.

A rustle, a shift of weight on the cushions, and he returns to you by sliding soft, threadbare cotton beneath your hips—his shirt. The thing in your chest writhes at the attentiveness, squeezing around your heart.

“Yeah, I do,” you respond, sweet and soft and devastatingly true.

You sense his fussing around behind you pause, and his breath catches, if only for a moment.

“‘S a pain to clean couches,” he mutters after that lapse, voice thick as if he’s chastising himself. A brief, silent chuckle shakes you.

It’s kind of adorable.

“Surprise dish, chef?” you ask, fluttering your lashes over your shoulder.

He braces himself against the back of the couch as he shimmies out of his jeans, curses under his breath a little with impatience biting the edges of his words. “Mm, you can say that.”

Broad hands cusp your thighs to press them together. You can feel the mixture of your arousal and previous orgasm dripping from your sex, tacky; Jack clambers over you, biceps bulging in your peripheral as he slowly spreads his weight over your back.

His bare chest, flush to your spine, is a furnace. You feel the warmth in your bone marrow, the security within the cage of his arms, which are braced on either side of your head.

An insistent, scorching hardness presses to your ass, precum dribbling onto the curve of your lower back as Jack scrabbles for the self-control to not rut against you then and there.

“This okay?” he asks. The question rumbles through you, providing the love needed for that safe, sated feeling in your chest to bloom again.

You nod, inhale shivering, “Yeah.”

Jack’s register scoops into the gravelly range: “Good.”

A chaste kiss to your cheek, one imprinted with the faint grin on his face. Another over your mouth—though the angle is awkward and his nose gets smushed into your face, you can’t help the small, giddy laugh that escapes you.

All the while, he lifts his hips, skates feather-light trails of singeing fingertips down your spine—you prickle, feel your pussy getting impossibly wetter—until his hand is sandwiched between your bodies, until he stuffs a throaty whimper next to your ear as he guides his cock into your fluttering hole.

First contact is caught between choking on air and whimpering. The head hitches, smooth glans and hot skin meeting home, stretching you open.

As he slides deeper, the sound he makes hisses between his clenched teeth. Your exhale shudders, petering into a quiet whine.

He works himself in with shallow, thoughtful little thrusts designed to help you adjust. You feel so full from the pleasant ache throbbing in your cunt and going straight to your brain.

Then his hips meet the globes of your ass. The hand that guided flies to your thigh, and he releases a strained, heady moan that tangles with your quiet exhale of satisfaction.

Fuck, he feels so good in you. It’s all slick walls and pulsing veins, the hefty drag of the head as he rocks deep into your cunt like he’s trying to carve a space for himself in your stomach.

(You wouldn’t mind. With the nature of your job, you’d keep him well-fed and warm.)

“‘S like she can’t let me go,” Jack mumbles, day-old stubble rasping at your earlobe. That damn half-cocky, rumbling voice makes another cocktail of pure need shoot straight for your swollen, neglected clit.

Bastard knows he has that effect on you, all too well. Thick fingers wedge themselves between your pelvis and the covered cushion, wriggling until he can touch the heat of your cunt, cupping where your soaked seam spreads for his fat girth with another tight gasp of arousal.

You’ve been pliant. You’ve been more patient than a saint. But Jack’s savoring the velvet suction around his cock, and despite your typical reservations against devouring too quickly, you need him to move.

Tipping your hips up, you find a new angle that makes his fingers slip up to your pulsing pearl of nerves and his cock prod so deep that your eyes roll back with a breathy keen falling from your lips.

He tsks but finally takes the hint and begins to thrust harder while teasing your clit with slow, reverent rolls between his skillful fingers, interspersed with light, sharp swats to just feel the way your walls tense and jump around him.

You manage shallow sips of breath between every time his cock teases your g-spot. Pulsing veins drag along the ridges inside your cunt and fill you up so good that you fear feeling hollow after this.

It’s a call and response, one the both of you are helpless to.

You moan when Jack crowds right up against your cervix, so deep that you feel the throb in your chest, and he reacts. Adjusts. Makes you involuntarily clench around him again, like he’s memorizing the way your pussy sucks him in.

And he twitches whenever that happens, a mindless flutter of pressure and new heat pouring into you in waves. You arch back, desperate to sate the sharp arousal pinching in your core, desperate to have him plunge so deep that he steals your breath.

His comforting, heady scent mixed with the faint musk of sweat envelops you as he drives you closer to the brink. Your head spins, nervous system stuffed to the brim with the friction between your legs, your gut quickly winding with each raw gasp falling from your lips.

Leisurely, softhearted kisses travel from your jaw to your shoulder. Jack mumbles sweet nothings of so pretty and you’re doing so good into your skin, labored breaths splintering for breathy groans.

“C’mon, baby,” he whispers, hitching your clit between two fingers and rubbing that nub with his calloused touch, “know you got another one for me. Wanna feel you come around me.”

His name falls from your mouth in wet pants, voice strained beneath the weight of your impending orgasm, head turned to press your forehead to the cushion. “Close, Jack.”

“That’s it.” Jack rocks into you with newfound urgency, fingers skating flinty over your slippery clit, cock driving the obscenest of squelches from your pussy, which are immediately muffled by the press of his hips against your raw ass. “Eaaasy, I’ve got you, honey—fuck, you’re so pretty like this, so good—”

Stuffing your pitched moan into the couch, you rut backwards like chasing an orgasm on his cock has been your life’s mission all along. Stubble scrapes your shoulder, soothed by hot, broken breaths.

You turn your head, fitful, mouth hanging open as you tumble toward the edge, as Jack looks straight into your dazed eyes with his pretty hazels reduced to slim rings, as he sinks his teeth into your fucking shoulder with a possessive shadow flickering over his face.

Oh—

You cum again with a loud, choked whine, caught between an exhale and a sob. Ecstasy tremors through your body; your legs quiver, eyelids squeeze shut, ass pressing flush to his pelvis as you contract hard and coast on the waves of pleasure.

His cock throbs, and in the smudgy haze, you register the faint, yet distinct sensation of his heavy balls tightening where they’re pushed against your thigh before he’s pulling out with a grumbled string of curses and painting your ass with hot, spurting ropes.

“Shit, fuck,” he snarls, hands jumping to your waist with a mind-numbing grip. You’ve never heard music like the sound of your name escaping Jack Abbot’s kiss-bitten lips with a gritted moan. “God…”

Fingers loosen from the newly-made dimples in your flesh, smoothing down the twitch in your thighs—the insides are sticky with your slick and cum, and his spit and pre—and stopping at your knees.

“Thank you, baby,” comes the unsteady, gentle murmur. Jack assuages the ache beginning to burn in your muscles, slowly lowering you back down until your mound has met the shirt-covered cushion.

Jack brushes kisses along your temple. “You were so beautiful.”

A long, slow meet of your lips, all languid movements and casual, heatless swipes of tongue. His lips curl up in a way that makes your racing heart skip more beats than it should. “So good.”

Pulls away, caressing your flushed cheek with fondness shining in his eyes. Continues blazing a path down, devoting himself to your sweaty, still-heaving body.

Shoulder, “The greatest chef I could ask for—”

Mid-back. He dips his tongue into the divot of a line running down your spine, whispering, “—and the sweetest girl—”

The crest of your hip, “—with the most heavenly sounds—”

The flat of his tongue glides searing over the curve of your ass, right through the mess of cum still warm on your tacky skin.

He groans at the taste of it mixed with the salt of your sweat, laps and scoops and swallows until your core tingles with arousal once more, until you can’t feel the splatter of his seed on your ass—only his tongue and teeth.

Your breathing picks up again, pulse rushing as he reaches his fill of cleaning you up and blazes another path of kisses to your fluttering, wet core.

You squirm as his exhales hit the slick still shining on your folds. Jack can’t have that, not when he’s still developing your flavor profile.

Familiar, steady hands plant on either one of your thighs. Thumbs spread your cheeks open, your empty pussy and swollen clit eager for more stimulation, even if tears will swell in your eyes.

You’re not ready to let go of him just yet. This isn’t a matter of how much you can bear taking. This is about how much he can give.

“Please…” you whisper, words pitched and so quiet that you fear they’ll be inaudible. His name has become a comforting prayer, a syllabic synonym for reliability.

Jump, and he’ll catch.

“I’ve got you, baby,” he rumbles, scruff scratching your sensitive inner thighs as he pecks your seam. “I’ll always have you.”

Love is at the tip of your tongue as he drinks from your needy cunt once again.

—

“Here.” Bubblegum pink flashes in the air, and you catch it out of sheer instinct. Pepto-Bismol—man’s best friend.

Most, if not all, chefs that partake in service have stomach issues because of high-octane moments like your old CDC blowing a full gasket if someone shucked two lentils below his quota. Multiply that by one and a half turns per six days a week, and antacid producers are forever guaranteed a profit margin.

You shoot a tight grin of gratitude to Jack, who only dips his thumb and index finger into his mouth to moisten so he can flip through today’s guest list.

Opening night. You smear your hands down the front of your white coat for the fifth time this hour.

You’re pacing around the front of the house, which has been closed during the day shift so you could fortify yourself for tonight. Jack’s been parked at his usual table by the double doors to mentally rehearse timing for the turn-and-a-half.

The late noon light is awfully poetic on his solemn, concentrated expression. The illuminated windows stretch across the swept floor until the rays slant over his face, highlighting the structure of his jaw, the plush shape of his lips.

His stubble glows half-golden, and you think back—with a quick burst of heat in your cheeks—to how it felt scraping between your sensitive legs.

“Just drink it now so you don’t shit mid-service,” Jack says, droll and unaware of your sudden turn of thought. His attention flits from the pages to your uneasy face, indecision clear in the lines by his mouth.

You haven’t…talked about the other night. Not in depth, anyway.

It’s apparent that you find each other attractive. Obviously, he licked his own cum off your ass and then licked you, but further conversation has been stunted by restaurant prep.

You still spend your working hours in close, comfortable contact, and he squeezes your waist instead of calling corner, and you cheekily peck his lips if you walk into the freezer at the same time.

So things aren’t awkward, per se, but things have certainly been left unsaid that you both are trying to say now.

He puts the packet down, tucks his highlighter behind his ear, which makes your stomach settle for a split moment to feel how endearing that habit has become.

“C’mon, chef, don’t give yourself an ulcer,” comes the quip, straddling the line between lighthearted and serious. “God knows the Pitt doesn’t need another Robby.”

You huff out a light laugh, twisting off the cap. “One swig or two?”

“How confident do you feel?” Slowly, Jack rises and slinks toward where you’re wearing a path into the floor.

You meet him with your other hand squeezing the firm muscles behind his elbow, fingers slotting perfectly into the divot of the joint, eyes trained on the bottle in your grip. “Like…three and a half?”

“Alright, that’s a little too much,” he chuckles dryly, shifting so he can fondly snake an arm around your shoulders. “One is fine, because you’re gonna kill it.”

“Ye of little faith,” you murmur in fake offense. You still raise the lip to your mouth and take a swig, wincing at the thick goop of wintergreen and chalk sliding into your troublesome system.

“Oh, the lady doth protest,” he fires back, that teasing grin lighting his face.

Rolling your eyes, exasperated amusement pulls at the corners of your lips. You twist the cap back onto the PB bottle and set it on a nearby table, the plastic soundless against the sun-warmed wood.

You’re about to turn back to the cold bath of LEDs in the kitchen, shrugging away Jack’s arm, when he hooks two fingers into the pocket of your chef’s coat and tugs you back to him.

You must be magnetic. When returning to him (like the tide), the edges of his expression tilt upward; fondness softens and glimmers in his eyes, which dart down to your lips, and a faint tinge of a blush colors his freckled cheeks.

A swallow works through your throat.

“Need something?” you ask, keeping your voice level, though it’s too casual to mean nothing.

“Hm” —he studies the far wall, mouth pursing as if he’s hiding a laugh— “maybe a good luck kiss?”

Of course.

Craning, you press your lips to his scruffy jaw, the action quick and clean. His skin thrums beneath your touch with heat and excitement, and when you pull away, he’s got this look on his face—all dazed smiles and unfocused eyes.

You cough lightly, which makes his broad shoulders twitch like he’s just caught himself falling asleep on the job.

Jack’s faint smile grows until a full-blown smirk sits on his face, and he crosses his arms in the way he knows drives you crazy. “You’re gonna kill it here.”

—

Zero turns runs smoothly.

Under the heavy, watchful observance of Jack, the night shift neatly hits the efficiency and teamwork goals you’ve set for yourselves during the pre-service meeting.

Garde manger’s geoduck petals are thinner than yours, which allows the crisp flesh to absorb the surrounding flavors easily. They’re doing most of the plating, like rolling up the buds of translucent slices and painstakingly decorating the ceramics with sauce, but you’re stationed at the central counter to oversee presentation.

That was your biggest mistake.

Somewhere in the midst of the first-and-a-half turns, you’re craving a menu change and a second swig of Pepto. The hot dishes have suddenly piled up. The colds are following close behind, and now you’re certain that you’ll spend this weekend simplifying the aesthetics.

And Jack—ridiculously competent, brutally experienced Jack—keeps the energy high, to the point where you dread the next ‘yes, chef.’

Ten plates are waiting for your approval, the nearest one emitting the faintest curls of white when the guest should be taking a steaming, scorching first bite. You hate re-firing; you finger the edge of the counter as irritation simmers in your gut at the sudden pile-up of dishes.

You took it too easy, and now you have so much to do with so little time to do it. Fuck.

Glancing at Jack, cool and composed and level from his perch at the expo station, you worry your cheek between your molars. Maybe you aren’t cut out for this. Maybe…

Maybe he made a mistake.

“Duck for table five, fired!” Parker calls, bent over her own dish and lining up the pieces with the pancakes.

When she finishes, she slides the plate to join the procession line already waiting for presentation. Your pulse ticks up again, spiraling thoughts slamming the pedal to the metal.

Nazely chirps, “Need help with plating for pastry.”

Your breaths feel like they drag against your throat, but your hands and forceps hold fast to steadiness, even as you become aware of the droplets of sweat racing down your nape.

“Four uni, two geoduck all day,” Shen says, setting glazed porcelain onto the stainless steel counter with a dull thunk.

You grip your tweezers tighter—the dull hilt digs into your palm, hard enough to bruise—

You glance back to the expo table. Jack’s already watching you with those characteristic 11s between his brows.

You should feel guilty for being caught red-handed in your slapstick act of incompetency. But the hazel doesn’t have any fire behind it—just concern, breath-halting and real.

He scans the chart one last time. Steps off the platform. Your stomach turns with something fierce and sour.

“Ellis, fire two egg, two duck, four escargot toast—all day,” he commands, his firm voice carrying through the controlled chaos of the kitchen. “You’re doing great.”

Fingers make quick work of his coat sleeves, which are folded with brutal, practiced efficiency to his elbows. He strides to take his place beside you, still surveying but reaching for the tweezers hanging out of his pocket.

“Nazely, just a quenelle of yuzu sorbet will do. Three loquat brûlée egg tarts, please.”

Yes, chef.

“Shen, keep that pace.”

Thank you, chef.

“Chef,” he murmurs, leaning into your side. “I’ll do hot, alright?”

“Who’s calling expo?” You keep your tone level, but slight tremors still shine through.

You drop a final microgreen onto your current plate and push it to the side. “Hands, please.”

“That’s for twenty,” Jack adds, not looking up from his task. Earnesty bleeds into his voice, just this side of intimate. “I’m here for you, chef.”

God, it lands.

You push out a shuddering exhale, one that peters into a smooth stream of air by the end. The discomfort and doubt wriggling in your gut ebbs away at the gradual diffusion of his cologne and body heat beside you.

Somehow, he remembers. Somehow, he’s here to be your guiding light.

You work in partial silence, hands flying between deli quarts of plucked greens and miscellaneous decorations, tweezers making indistinct clipping sounds with every move. Warm hands brush yours when you both reach for the same container of meticulously chopped cilantro.

If that immediately bathes you head-to-toe with boiling heat, he doesn’t comment. Or maybe he noticed that you’ve been a little distracted by how commanding he is in the kitchen, and he’s choosing not to say anything.

(Perhaps the downward turn of tonight’s service is really the work of Jack Abbot. Really, the sight of his arms clad in that white coat is obscene.)

Between reminders of ‘every second counts’ and ‘hands for table four, fire two escargot and the last uni,’ you can feel the pass of his gaze over your countenance of concentration. And when you glance up, the faint weight disappears as soon as it comes, but you never miss the feathering in his scruffy jaw, nor the miniscule, upward twitch of the lips you kissed hours ago.

Jack breaks the silence first, voice low and smooth. “Three more tables left, chef.”

The relief unspools in your stomach. Without thought, your frown splinters into a soft smile.

You’re both out of the woods.

—

“Chef.”

A startled shiver possesses your body, and you leap off the back wall of the restaurant. The night is freezing compared to the scorching tempers still lingering in the empty kitchen, but Jack looks at home in the dimness with his black tee melting into the darkness.

He stands to your side, facing you with his hands behind his back. There’s a faint line running down between the muscles of his half-hidden forearms, the one that—anatomically—appears when the fingers are flexed.

“Shit,” you mumble, squeezing your eyes shut to still your heart and ignoring the sharp pang lancing through your stomach. “Maybe let the door squeak so I don’t have a heart attack.”

“Sorry,” he says, though it hardly sounds like remorse. Jack holds out one of his hands, and you almost chuckle. Almost. “Just thought you’d want this after…that.”

The bottle of Pepto-Bismol, just a swing shy of full, is glaringly bright. Still, you wrap your fingers around it—grazing his skin in the process, and you don’t fight the way your heart skips—and tilt your head toward the steps by the back door.

Chalk coats your tongue, followed by the strange, warm-cool burn of artificial wintergreen flavoring. As you twist the cap back on, you plop beside him, exhaustion catching up to your body and knocking half the air out of your lungs.

“Some first service,” you murmur, shutting your eyes and listening to the crickets, the rustle of a nearby tree, the faint rush of nighttime Pittsburgh traffic.

“You did good,” he says, just as quiet, but not half as uncertain as you are. You feel soft, warm lips pressing to your temple, then the weight of his arm around your shoulders, driving away some of the chill beginning to bleed into the air. “Here.”

Smooth plastic nudges at your aching hands.

You look down—it's a tupperware container, one of those rectangular ones you’d often find at Chinese restaurants so you can take the stir-fried noodles to-go. The clear lid is translucent with thick steam, and the body of it is comfortingly warm.

“Leftovers?” Blearily, you blink again at the tupperware, then to Jack.

Jack shakes his head, peering at you with pure sincerity pooling in his hazel eyes. “Made it before service. I was waiting because I knew you’d be tired or hungry after.”

Though the weight is foreign in your palms, the heat is oddly familiar. “Did you...use Robby’s escargot microwave?”

He snickers, oddly pleased with himself. “Maybe.”

“You’re terrible,” you say wryly. There’s no bite behind it; instead, you find your voice rather affectionate and tender.

The lid separates with a crack, and wisps of steam curl from a generous helping of rice, water spinach, and—fuck, that’s the scent prime aged wagyu. The rich, plump slices of meat polarize the image of a humble meal in a takeout box.

Despite the sudden alarm, your mouth can’t help but to salivate.

“That’s the same wagyu we used to make at Everblue, just ten days more aged,” he says, producing a fork out of thin air and sticking it into the pile of warm rice. “I remember you telling Santos that you wanted to try it.”

(Is it possible for a heart to break in a moment of joy?)

You swallow the flood of saliva and the burning in your eyes, picking up the fork and shoveling a heap of rice onto your fork. “It looks good.”

A firm thumb circles your arm, tracing the curve of your shoulder and then arcing over the dip where your humerus begins. His chest swells with a sharp intake of air, but pauses for a heartbeat.

“I actually” —Jack cuts himself off when you swivel your head up to look at him, fork halfway lifted to your open mouth. “I wanted to know if we could see each other,” he finishes quickly, words blurring together.

“Like—huh, wow,” you start, panting at the absurd temperature of the rice, as if he grabbed it straight out of the pot, “I mean, I’d tell you to buy me dinner first, but...”

Gracelessly, you stab a piece of wagyu as your stomach reacts to the first taste of nourishment and reminds you that post-service always leaves you ravenous. The aged meat melts on your tongue in smoke and fat and salted butter, and you groan at the pure euphoria exploding in your mouth.

“I s’pose I’ve already done that,” comes his wry mutter, nose crinkling at the realization before an amused smile breaks on his face.

You go warm behind your ribs at the endearing sight, at the way he knocks his head back a little boyishly. Your cheeks warm too, stinging in the chilly air, and you’re reminded of that night—months ago—outside 10 Blade.

“Thank you, Jack,” you blurt, devoting all your attention to the rectangular block of a balanced meal in your lap. “For giving me a chance.”

“Don’t,” he responds, the shadow of a frown passing over his handsome features. You want to kiss the wrinkle between his brow and trace his crow’s feet. “That was all you.”

“Convince me,” you quip, a teasing grin dawning on your face.

“Mm, I have some ideas. Candlelight dinner, maybe at your old restaurant so your boss can see you thriving...”

Giggling, you bump your shoulder into his, but it only makes the arm around you snake tighter, until you’re snug against his side.

“Maybe we’ll go back to my place this time, and talk some shit,” he continues. Jack’s voice deepens conspiratorially, scooping into the gravelly range, “And because we skipped dessert at 10 Blade, we’ll have it on my countertop.”

The innuendo isn’t lost on you. Warmth curls in your belly like the low flicker of a burner’s blue flame.

He meets your eyes, bright and curious and heart-stoppingly eager, and you think you’d make anything for this man. “How’s that sound?”

You laugh, sweet and flattered. “It sounds like three Michelin stars, chef.”

notes. part of my much ado about luv event. please lmk if u enjoyed, i'd eat up feedback like jack abbot eating it up from the back <33

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