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Layla
After letting my tardiness sink in for a moment, Axel walked between the rows of working stations, smiling and nodding at the various students.
“Who can tell me what the name of this class is?” he let out, glancing dismissively at me.
A heavy set girl with short blond curls and a bright smile raised her hand. “This is the Professionalism and Etiquette of the Culinary Chef class.”
“Exactly...” He looked at her expectantly.
“Margot,” she offered. “Margot Van de Leer.”
“Thank you, Margot,” Axel said as he walked on, his hands clasped behind his back. “What would some of you say are the worst sins of a chef?”
“Not knowing what he’s doing,” a student offered.
“Not trusting his team of sous-chefs,” another one said.
Axel came to stand right in front of me, his hard gaze saying it all. “My first job was working at one of my father’s highly refined and well liked restaurants,” he said. “My job started at nine o’clock in the morning.” He turned away and looked at the class. “My father counted on me. Don’t think for a minute that because I was his son that he let me off easy. No. On the contrary. I had to prove that I very much deserved to be there.”
Attentive to his every word, the students all followed him with their eyes.
“What time do you think I arrived at that restaurant every morning?” he went on.
“Nine o’clock,” one said, as if it was the obvious answer.
“No.”
“Eight-forty-five,” another tried.
“No.”
“Eight-thirty,” Margot offered.
“No.”
“Eight o’clock,” a tall, thin older woman said.
“That’s right,” Axel said. “My job started at nine, but I was there every single morning at eight. Why? Well, there were certain things that I wanted to ensure were done, in their place, cleaned, prepped, whatever the case may be, before I actually started working. But the other reason...” Again, he brought his accusatory gaze back to me. “The few times... and I do stress that they were few indeed... that I arrived at five, or ten or even fifteen past eight, I knew that there was no risk of my being late to actually tend to my duties. In other words, this assured that I would never, ever be late.”
