Chapter Text
It takes three shaky attempts to slip the key in the lock, Ed muttering under his breath the whole time, cursing the stupid fucking git who first figured out how to turn corn into bourbon and decided it was a good idea. His head throbs, and it’s sweet relief to finally get out of the blisteringly oversaturated sunlight and into the dark, cool restaurant, quiet and hopefully fucking empty. He’d greeted the dawn with a projectile spew of whatever he’d shoved in his face at 3AM, so at least he started the day early, has time to grab a little hair of the dog and maybe a quick nap on the floor of his office before another day of the world’s most boring shit show begins.
He ducks behind the bar, and shouldn’t be so fucking surprised to find Jack collapsed on the floor back there, definitely not so surprised that he leaps and shrieks at a pitch he’ll never admit to, but he’s not exactly in the best of sorts.
Jack groans like he’s being disturbed from blissful beauty sleep and not a rum-induced coma. He’s still got a bottle of house liquor in one hand, another tipped empty on the floor beside him.
“What the fuck, man,” Ed says. “Iz is gonna fuckin kill you if he catches you like this again.”
“Too late,” Jack croaks, blinking at Ed and rubbing his eye. “Already dead. So dead he didn’t even notice me.”
Ed sighs deep before he catches the nightmare implication.
“He’s here already?”
“Waiting for you like some creepy fuckin gremlin that’s mad you won’t text him back.” Jack sits up just enough to bring the bottle up to his lips, manages to get about half the swig actually into his mouth. “Don’t tell Mom on me, kay?”
Fuck. Fucking fuck. Ed would rather go out back, climb into the dumpster, and set himself on fire than encounter his festering wound of a sous chef right this head-splitting moment. But it’ll be worse to put it off—Izzy gets spicier the longer Ed lets him sit. Better to singe now than deal with scorched earth later.
Sure enough, Izzy’s waiting in the dingy office, standing behind Ed’s desk, staring at Ed’s chair like he’s debating taking a seat in it. Ed hates that fucking chair, one of way too many suggestions Izzy’s worn him down on over the years, and yet somehow swapping out the cozy armchair at his desk with this horrible armless swivel-y thing (okay, Ed does like swiveling in it, but that’s beside the point) feels like one of the worst.
Ed clears his throat, and Izzy starts, spins, and whatever he finds when he looks at Ed makes his face twist like he’s just eaten a rotten clam.
“The fuck have you been,” Izzy says, voice low, anger cold and raw.
“Good morning to you too, Iz,” Ed says. He trudges behind the desk and pointedly drags the stupid chair away from Izzy, collapses into it. “Dunno if you know this or not, but we have a whole day where nobody comes to the restaurant, we lock the doors on purpose and no one is allowed in, and, get this, it’s so we all have one single day where nobody has to fucking work.”
Izzy makes his way back around to the front of the desk, leans over it on his fists.
“Told you ten times, Ed. Spanish Jackie is coming on Thursday. You’re not fucking ready. You haven’t cooked anything innovative in months. Years, if I’m being really fucking honest. I’ve massaged this team and covered your ass more times than I can fucking count because it was an honor to cook for Blackbeard, but I won’t let you sink this place and my reputation along with it. I fucking can’t, Edward.”
Ed slumps in his chair, regrets being born.
“Fuck Spanish Jackie,” he mumbles.
“ Excuse me?” Izzy hisses.
“I said, fuck Spanish Jackie,” Ed reiterates with force. “You wanna do honest, Iz? I honestly don’t care.” He throws his hands in the air. “I don’t care about the Michelin stars, I don’t care about James Beard, I don’t wanna do fucking television. I’m fucking sick of plating herbs with tweezers so that some giant bag of dicks who thinks he has some elite fucking palette can post 15 pictures to Instagram before complaining about one flake sea salt too many. I hate this food, it’s so fucking boring. I hate cooking for people who don’t even seem to like to fucking eat. I want to make food that makes real people fucking feel something .”
His heart pounds, skin hot and itching with Izzy crawling beneath it.
Izzy’s jaw clenches tight. “Yeah, well that fucking boring food for bags of dicks pays all our bills, so unless you want the restaurant to fucking close for good because Spanish Jackie tells everyone Blackbeard is a shell of its former glory, you better figure something the fuck out for Thursday.”
Ed’s eyes go wide. A surge of relief flows through him at the very idea.
“Close the restaurant for good,” he says. “Now, there’s a thought.”
“Fuck you,” Izzy spits. “I’m not ending my career over this shit. Get it the fuck together.”
He storms out, slamming the door behind him, the crack of it ricocheting painfully in Ed’s skull.
Ed takes several deep breaths, trying to feel anything but seething, dehydrated misery. He glances up at the old sign hanging above the door, paint chipped and faded but still bright. Blackbeard’s Bar and Grill and Other Delicacies and Delights and Fishing Equipment . Had been an absolute bitch to get it all on the sign, but that was back when Ed didn’t know shit from fuck except that he wanted to cook delicious food. Back when there was more petty crime (maybe the occasional felony) than food sales keeping the lights on. Back when people wandered in out of pure curiosity and then came back with their friends because they loved what they’d discovered. Back when it didn’t matter that his body was one big screaming ache and he only slept four hours a night and kept going through a stunning rotating cocktail of uppers and downers and an almost-definitely-not-quite-careful-enough-about-it drinking problem, didn’t matter at all, because they were feeding people, and not just feeding them anything, but food that made them love to eat, made them love the food the way Ed did.
Then they started to get noticed, like, really noticed. They’d all smelled the money miles away. Izzy loves to take all the credit, and sometimes Ed just fucking lets him, because then Ed gets to briefly pretend it wasn’t mostly his smart business choices that were also sneak-attack terrible life decisions. It was fun, for a while, to be young and talented and creative, and they knew they were doing something unique when half the restaurants up and down the coast started to imitate them in one way or another.
The change happened gradually, like the slow boil of live crustaceans—an increase in the ticket price here, a shrinking of the portion size there. Blackbeard’s Bar and Grill and Other Delicacies and Delights and Fishing Equipment became Blackbeard’s Bar and Grill , and then finally became just Blackbeard , the year right before Ed won the Beard for Best New Chef, because Izzy thought the name needed to be more fine dining, and Ed thought that was stupid until he realized that was somehow what they’d become. Fine dining. Food people ate just to say that they did, made special not by the taste or care in preparation or the company shared, but by the insane price and inability to get a reservation.
Ed sighs deep again, thuds his head on the heavy wooden desk. Izzy’s definitely just got his nuts in a twist about Spanish Jackie—she’s one of the top food critics in the country, and one of the only ones who doesn’t consistently slobber over every aspect of Blackbeard just because everyone else does, but even on Ed’s worst day, he’s still one of the best fucking chefs alive and everybody knows it. It’s like he doesn’t even have to fucking cook anymore, could just serve cardboard cutouts and everyone would call it innovative. But Izzy’s right about one thing, which is that having negative fucks to give about what Jackie thinks isn’t great for business when they’re catering to an audience who loves to build an idol up just to tear them down for the masturbatory delights of feeling superior to someone you once glorified.
Fuck. Maybe he really should just pack it all in, let the restaurant close for good.
Like every day, today is a bad day to quit smoking, so Ed finds the pack stashed in his desk and forces himself out onto the little back patio courtyard in a less than optimistic attempt to stop the screaming in his head. As soon as he’s outside, he regrets it, because he’s not alone.
Fang’s sitting on the little bench, hunched over a paper bowl, shoveling something into his mouth. Ed sighs, contemplates going out front where there will be people but probably not the threat of small talk, but he’d have to go back through the restaurant and risk encountering Izzy again, so instead he just sits on the bench beside Fang and prays he’s just as hungover and won’t attempt to converse.
But before Ed can light up, he takes notice of whatever Fang is eating. Specifically the smell, sharp and inviting, sweet and acidic with notes of funk and brine, a combination almost offensive but somehow at the last second transforms into enticing. Ed tucks his cigarette behind his ear.
“Hey man, what’s that,” he asks.
Fang looks up at him, eyes wide and mouth full.
“Ceviche from this new food truck. Called The Revenge . Horrible name. Like calling your food truck Food Poisoning . But, damn.” He takes another big bite. “It’s pretty fucking good.”
The scent is overpowering Ed in the best possible way, like, two seconds ago his nausea would have sent a weaker man into the fetal position, and now he’s suddenly salivating for whatever the fuck is in that bowl.
“Let me try a bite?” Ed asks.
For a second, Fang looks downright possessive of the little bowl, but then he relaxes.
“Yeah, course, boss.” Passes it over.
Ed pokes around at the raw fish, not exactly the most precise or elegant cut but plenty even, and what appears to be a truly random assortment of other ingredients mixed in.
“The fuck is even in this?”
“Nothing that makes sense,” Fang says. “Scallop, with, like, cranberry and kalamata olive and some kind of key lime fish sauce vinaigrette.”
Ed frowns at Fang, then back down at the little bowl. He gets a bit of everything on the plastic spoon and lifts it to his mouth.
His first thought as it hits his tongue is that Fang definitely forgot to mention chilis on his list of ingredients, followed quickly by a second thought of what the ever-loving goddamn fucking dickfuck fuck did he just put in his mouth. It shouldn’t work. This should be an impossible flavor combination, should be the final kick in Ed’s gut to empty out any lingering remains of last night. Instead, it’s a fascinating interplay of sour and bitter and brine that leaves him chasing the flashing notes of sweetness around his mouth. It’s almost definitely one of the best things he’s ever eaten.
Ed takes another bite and groans like he’s getting his dick sucked.
“I know, right?” Fang says. “Whole place sorta looked like a catastrophe operation, but the food, man, the fucking food.”
Ed takes a third and fourth bite. It’s fucking delicious, and surprising, and has a weird sort of sense of humor about it in the way that food can sometimes. As Ed eats it, it’s like the sunlight goes from infinite tiny photon knives stabbing at his skull to a warm and gentle illumination. The birds begin to sing instead of scream. The chaos of his rioting anxiety doesn’t exactly calm, but a peace comes over him about the riot. Like, he doesn’t have to be afraid of his own fear. Because scallop and cranberry and kalamata olive and key lime and fish sauce and chilis and vinegar have somehow come together to have a harmonious orgy in his mouth.
“Oi, come on, that’s my breakfast,” Fang says.
Ed’s nearly eaten the entire thing.
“Fuck, sorry man. I’ll make you some eggs.” He regretfully passes back the last few bites.
It takes him several moments of breathing and blinking in the warm summer air to realize that his hangover has completely vanished.
“So, uh, where the fuck is this food truck at?” Ed asks.