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“I… forgot,” I say. “Go ahead.”
Ignacio’s eyes glide over my features, snagging on the area of my mouth for a split second while he bites his top lip. I basically turn into matzoh ball soup with just that one look.
“You need to get to work now,” he says, putting back on that gruff disposition. I could be wrong, but I think underneath that crusty exterior of his, there’s a creamy center. And I’m determined to get to it. He will likely resist, but I’m anything but a quitter.
“Okey dokey, boss.” I open the door, shooting him finger guns. “Can’t wait to meet your grandma.”
“Not gonna happen.”
I close the door behind me and wave at the guys in the kitchen. Every single one of them is looking at me funny. The dishwasher is wagging his brows and flashing a grin so wide I can see the space in his back teeth.
I jump right into the lunch rush, hoping to get a moment to talk to Bernadette about community college. I’m thinking of taking some classes. But every time she passes me, she gives me a little wink. At one point in the day, I run into the kitchen for a brand new bottle of Tapatio for a picky customer and Ignacio’s there in the dry storage area—so he pulls the box of hot sauce from the shelf for me and offers to carry it to the server station. The cooks whistle and hoot as we walk back to the front of house together, and Ignacio barks something at them in Spanish, which makes them shut up real quick.
Finally, at the end of the rush, I have time to chat with Bernadette while we do our side work. I’m so inspired by her going back to school at twenty-seven and want to get some advice. I ask her how it’s going, and she tells me about her math classes. Plural. Now I regret asking because… math. Snore.
She grins and offers me a sideways glance.
“So… when were you going to tell me about you and my cousin?”
“Your… cousin?”
“Nacho.”
“Right. I just forgot he was your cousin for a minute there.” And that little detail about dating, apparently. Kissing maybe, but that’s confidential, or at least I’d thought.
“It’s fine. We don’t look related.”
“Must be your fabulous nose ring and sparkling personality,” I say.
She bursts into peels of laughter. “He is a grumpy old man, isn’t he? But love is blind, am I right?”
I nod dramatically, with my eyes big and round. What is she even going on about?
“I had no idea he even had a girlfriend.”
“I’m sorry. What?” Girlfriend?
She elbows me and drops her voice to a whisper. “It’s okay. My grandma told me.”
Of course she did. Now I really want to meet this grandma of theirs.
“What exactly did she tell you?” I ask. I know how meddling grandmothers can be. Mine was a real Yente.
“We didn’t talk about it for long,” she says. “She only mentioned how relieved she was that Ignacio has a serious girlfriend after all these years.”
Whoa there. That’s a lot of stuff to pack on. My imagined involvement with Ignacio went from kissing to dating to serious girlfriend faster than latkes and applesauce disappear at Hanukkah dinner.
I hear a throat clearing behind us and there’s Ignacio, looking stern as ever. He jerks his head and walks into the back, clearly expecting me to just follow him without uttering a word.
“I guess that’s my cue,” I say with a shrug. I can’t say I’m thrilled to be summoned like this, but I’m insanely curious now.
I trail ten steps behind Ignacio only to end up, once again, in his office. I close the door as I step inside, slightly apprehensive about the whole no-making-out rule, especially since I’ve been upgraded to serious girlfriend.
Ignacio clears his throat and signals me to sit down in the seat opposite his desk. He remains standing, though, leaning his hip on the desk. He studies me for a full thirty seconds before uttering a word.
Then, with casual indifference, he says, “There’s been a small misunderstanding.”
And, kind of annoyed, but mostly amused, I say, “Small misunderstanding? I think it’s a doozy.”
