Young John
When John had loaded the new cook’s belongings into the car he’d managed a quick gander at the portfolio filled with pages labelled ‘Signature Dishes’, the photographs glued two-to-a-page and slipped behind plastic. Although some were too fancy for a country farmstay establishment, it was clear that she could cook far better than coke-snorting Quentin.
No wonder Mum offered this chick the job.
John turned the car in the direction of Ivy-May, a road he knew so well he could afford the odd glance at the woman in the passenger seat, both hands clawing the plastic folder resting on slim legs. Her bag – a battered suitcase bound with an old leather belt – had been small but bulging, tempting John to ask if she was prepared for the dust and humidity of Queensland’s tropical mid-north. Today’s all-black garb might work well in city kitchens and for interviews, but she’d melt at Ivy-May if she was covered up like that.
When she caught him staring at her legs, he asked, ‘You really cooked all those dishes in that folder?’
‘Of course!’
‘Wish I could do stuff like that. Have you always wanted to be a cook?’
‘It’s genetic.’ She smiled. ‘An Italian dad makes me born to cook.’
‘He must be proud.’
First she nodded, then her smile faded and she looked out of the side window. ‘He would be if he was still alive.’
‘Oh, Jeez, trust me to put my foot in it. Was his passing recent?’
While she didn’t answer straight away, the small shudder accompanying her sigh spoke volumes. ‘I wish I knew the exact date. My mother never told me. I found out he’d died in an accident not long after I left home. Long story.’ She kept her expression to a thin smile. ‘I have a few of those, but I prefer to talk about food and cooking, if that’s okay with you.’
‘My favourite topics – after breeding.’
‘Breeding?’
He’d made her laugh and the sound was low and sensual, nothing like the high-pitched giggles that exploded from the mouths of some girls he’d known.
‘I’m talking about cattle.’
‘Ah, right.’
He’d wanted to impress the hot-looking chick with the teasing eyes. Instead he was acting like he’d never had a girl in his car before. Maybe that was it. Ava Marchette wasn’t a girl. She was all woman – the kind that made a man lower the driver’s window to let the wind cool his face. John dangled one arm over the dusty paintwork of the old ute, his fingers tapping out a beat on the metal.
‘We’re milking bulls on Ivy-May this week. You can watch.’
‘You milk bulls?’
‘For sperm. Those with strong swimmers all heading in the right direction are the prize animals in the paddock. Too much information?’
‘No, not at all. I love learning new things. Life out here is going to be very different.’
‘I was hoping you’d make the cut. Only because you’re a lot better-looking than Quentin,’ he added. ‘I did enjoy picking his brains about cooking, though. I also had to cover for him in the kitchen some nights. Did I mention I love to cook? Always have.’
‘I loved playing around in the kitchen so much when I was young that while my friends had their noses in romance novels and dreaming of handsome hunks carrying them off into the sunset I was drooling over recipe books. That probably makes me sound a little pathetic.’ She chuckled and leaned back into the head rest.
‘What if you met some guy who could do both – carry you off and cook up a storm?’
‘First he’d have to prove it, of course.’
‘That he loved you?’
‘No, that he could cook.’
‘And what would he need to cook?’ John asked, eyes on the road.
‘Panna cotta.’
‘What?’
‘It’s Italian and means cooked cream, but,’ she shrugged, ‘I’ve yet to find a panna cotta that tastes anything close to Marco Marchette’s, so… ’
‘You don’t look like you’ve eaten too many of them.’
There was a pause while she stared at him. ‘How old are you, John?’
‘Twenty.’
‘Twenty?’
‘But I’ll be twenty-one soon enough,’ he added.
‘Given twenty-one generally comes after twenty, I suppose I have to believe you.’
‘How old are you, Eva?’ he asked.
‘Older.’
Ava did not add that by his age she’d been kicked out of home and worked in numerous commercial kitchens, sometimes juggling three different casual jobs each week to make enough money to live on.
Life at Candlebark Creek would be quite different from the work-hard, party-hard, pot-smoking hospitality crowd in the city. Although she’d sat on the periphery, a quiet observer, and never took drugs, she had been known to occasionally wake up the next morning hung-over and in an unfamiliar bed. But work was her priority now, a plane ticket to London her goal. Not only would a cook’s job with food and board allow her to save faster, a relaxed life in a small country town might see her emerge from a decade of spiralling worry and maybe even let her unwind a little. Or could she, with John Tate around? Clearly an intense and confident young man, passionate about life, he was also funny and sweet. He made Ava laugh and for the first time in ages helped her forget how alone she was in the world. All that made John a beguiling blend of man and boy – one she’d need to be wary of, if she was to stay on the right side of Marjorie Tate and keep her job.
The car continued to rumble along, the vibrations loosening the pins in the bun at the back of her head. Ava secured them and settled back into the car seat feeling the safest she’d felt in ages. Yes, she could get used to the quiet country life.
For a while, Ava, only for a while.