Chapter 10

Three days later and the lecture was still on his mind Saturday morning. As he cracked eggs and browned hashbrowns on the grill, his mind ran over the people who worked the morning shift with him. Denny’s had a lot of turnover. Most people he’d met here didn’t give a shit about the job—they just wanted a paycheck.

Loralee Pachinko, was an exception.

Matthew had noticed her during his third month at Denny’s. While other servers drifted through their shifts in a fog of boredom or resentment, Loralee moved with purpose. She was rail-thin with tattoos sleeved on both arms, her blond hair with its different color streaks often escaping from whatever attempt she’d made to contain it that day. Her Queens’ accent was thick, her vocabulary colorful and her cheerful laugh could cut through the din of the busiest breakfast rush.

“Order up!” Matthew called, sliding two plates onto the pass. A Western omelet and a Grand Slam.

Loralee appeared immediately, checking the ticket against the food with an attention to detail that set her apart from most of the staff.

“Western’s missing the cheese,” she said, not accusatory, but matter-of-fact.

Matthew glanced at the plate, then at the ticket. She was right. In the chaos of the morning rush, he’d missed a modification.

“Thanks. Give me thirty seconds,” he said, already reaching for the shredded cheddar.

Unlike some servers who would have sighed dramatically or made a show of their inconvenience, Loralee just nodded and waited, using the time to refill coffee mugs for the customers seated at the counter.

Later, during a rare lull, she lingered by the pickup window. “You’re different from the other cooks,” she observed, leaning against the counter. “You care if it’s right.”

Matthew, wiping down his station, shrugged. “It’s the job.”

“Nah,” she replied, shaking her head. “The job is flipping eggs and collecting a paycheck. You’re doing something else.”

Before he could respond, the door chimed with new customers, and she was off again, menus in hand, greeting them with genuine warmth.

It was Darnell who filled him in during their overlapping shift change. “Loralee’s got a story,” he said, removing his apron. “Clean two years now. Was living in a shelter when Loretta hired her. Got her GED last month.”

Matthew nodded, absorbing this information without comment as he tied on his own apron.

“Hardest worker here,” Darnell continued. “Wants to move up to cooking, but Loretta hasn’t had time to train her properly. Been too short-staffed.” He fixed Matthew with a pointed look. “Shame, really. Girl’s got potential.”

The message was clear enough, but Matthew hesitated. Chef Girard’s directive to help fellow students was one thing—they shared similar goals and educational backgrounds. Taking on a project like Loralee felt complicated.

Yet that night, when Loralee poked her head into the kitchen after her shift and asked if she could watch him work for a few minutes before catching her bus, Matthew found himself nodding.

“What do you want to know?” he asked as she perched on a stool in the corner of the kitchen.

“Everything,” she replied without hesitation. “But maybe start with how you flip an egg without breaking the yolk. I keep fucking that up.”

For the next fifteen minutes, Matthew demonstrated the technique, explaining the importance of the correct pan temperature, the slight wrist motion, and the timing. Loralee watched with an intensity that reminded him of his own focus at ICE, asking questions that revealed genuine curiosity rather than casual interest. He suggested she buy a cheap saute pan and fill it with a few marbles to practice.

“Good idea. Bus comes in ten minutes, gotta go. Maybe, same time tomorrow?” Her eyes hopeful.

He found himself agreeing before he’d fully processed the commitment. Something about her determination resonated—her clarity of purpose, despite the circumstances that had shaped her path. He suddenly realized that she was him not that many years ago.

What began as a casual fifteen-minute lesson after her shift gradually expanded. Matthew arriving thirty minutes early and staying thirty minutes late whenever their schedules aligned, teaching her the fundamentals of short-order cooking—how to manage multiple orders simultaneously, especially timing so different components of a dish could finish together, how to adjust cooking methods for consistency during a rush.

Loralee proved to be a quick study, her street-honed adaptability translating well to the high-pressure environment of a busy diner kitchen. What she lacked in formal knowledge she made up for in work ethic and pragmatic problem-solving.

“You ever gonna tell me where you learned all this?” she asked one morning, practicing the proper way to crack an egg with one hand. “Darnell says you’re in fancy chef school, but you don’t act like those stuck-up culinary students who sometimes come in for late-night food.”

Matthew, who had been demonstrating how to maintain the flat-top grill, considered his answer. “I’m at ICE,” he confirmed. “But I learned most of the basics before that. Working in different restaurants, a shelter kitchen.”

“A shelter?” Her eyebrows lifted in surprise. “Like, homeless shelter?”

“St. Vincent’s in Chicago.”

She nodded slowly, reassessing him with this new information. “So that’s why you don’t treat me like I’m stupid when I ask questions. You’ve seen how life gets complicated.”

It was perhaps the most personal exchange they’d had, a momentary acknowledgment by two street smart graduates. Matthew didn’t elaborate further, but let the connection exist without comment.

Their informal training sessions gained further structure as Matthew began applying techniques from his ICE education. He created knife drills to improve her speed and accuracy. Occasionally smuggled in spices and herbs from the farmer’s market to expand her palate and nose beyond the limited Denny’s pantry.

“Try this,” he said one morning, offering her a small slice of an unusual apple variety. “What do you taste?”

Loralee closed her eyes, concentrating. “Sweet, but not too sweet. Kind of ... I don’t know, like honey? And something else.”

“Anise,” Matthew supplied. “A hint of licorice.”

She nodded excitedly. “Yes! That’s it. How do you learn to taste like that?”

“Same as you will. Someone helped me. Then it was practice and paying attention.” He handed her another slice, this time from a different variety. “The more ingredients you experience consciously, the better your cooking becomes. It’s not just about following recipes. It’s about understanding what each component contributes.”

It was his repeating Chef Girard’s lesson about the paint-by-numbers painting that finally made sense about their ultimate goal.

Loretta noticed the effort Loralee was putting in and gradually allowed her to cover simple cooking tasks during slow periods. The first time Loralee successfully handled the grill station alone for a full hour—preparing eggs, pancakes, and simple sandwiches without assistance—her face glowed with a pride that no drug had ever provided.

“You shoulda seen her,” Loretta told Matthew when he arrived for his shift. “Like she’d been doing it for years. Even handled a ticket mix-up without losing her cool.”