[Vanilla]
It felt like a mouthful of iron. Hot, molten liquid sticking to my teeth, coating every inch of my tongue and nearly slipping down my throat before I bolted upright and emptied the contents of whatever had accumulated in my mouth on what I soon realized was a human hand that was not mine.
"Was not expecting that to happen." I turned—a throbbing in my head—to the owner of the hand, registering a white coat and a general face I could not identify. "And no, I don't think you should be moving around in violent jerks, boy. You're lucky it's just a couple of cuts and abrasions. Except your tongue of course."
My attention snapped towards her at the word. My tongue? I swallowed, tasting something vaguely bitter and an overwhelming stench of metal but nothing else. I couldn't feel it. I couldn't tell if I was moving my tongue or if anything in that muscle was functioning. At once, I panicked.
"Wha—" A rude, heavy sting prevented me from going any further and the woman in the white coat handed me a paper cup that was half full.
"Gargle and spit."
I did; taking the cup and filling my mouth with as much water as possible to rid of the iron dulling my sense of taste. As soon as I saw the colour of the water I'd spat out, I knew my face was paler than whatever was inside that cup. "Wha... t's..."
At once, I struggled to request for something to eat. The words were difficult to make out but with maximum effort and patience, coupled with careful enunciation and slower speech, I managed to voice the thought on my mind.
"You know, I doubt it's the occasion for you to be worried about your sense of taste but Alfred did boast about his nephew having the most mod-like taste buds, so," the nurse rolled her eyes. "I understand you want to give your tongue a test but don't rush it. It's not like you can taste anything now—the muscle's on an anaesthetic jab."
I let my jaw hang open. Something fell out.
She picked it up with her gloved hand and placed it back into my mouth. "Fine, fine, I'll give you something to eat." In a matter of seconds, I was handed a pain killer and another cup of water. Good god. What's happening? I can't seem to... did I fall? And how did I—
"You're awake!" Another voice, loud and electrified, burst through the doors of the room, shaking everything inside. I felt a brief drilling in my temples. "Sorry. The doctor said to get some documents you might need from the administration office, so. Oh! Oh and you're not going to believe me or this or anything I'm going to say for the next couple of minutes but hear. Me. Out."
While Xu proceeded to launch into a blow-by-blow account of her adventure while I had been asleep or knocked out in the land of agony and pain, I slowly began to take in my surroundings. Naturally, I observed and conjectured about this being the school's infirmary and the lady in the coat being the school doctor and had been about to make the most ridiculous conclusion regarding Xu's superhuman strength—she must have dragged me all the way here from the race track—when this girl began talking about some equestrian fool whose name she could not remember but who apparently knew mine.
"...knew that but thank god he did because I honestly couldn't fish it out no matter how much I tried but all thanks to him, I mean," bursts of excitement, "he did get you all the way here without demanding any form of, like, compensation or anything and by the way," Xu did not hesitate to drop a casual remark along the way, "I'm beginning to think that you're actually popular or something. I suspected it from the start, you know. Can't fool me, really. I mean, your hair stands out from being so light-coloured and all and like, people don't usually know someone else's full name even if they are friends so he probably either really likes you or you're just that famous."
It took me a long while to actually understand the full implications of what Xu had meant and whatever she was trying to get at. Yet, a small part of the story remained lacking. No one in this school—a school I'd only just enrolled at—would know my entire name. Well. No one except...
I groaned; either in pain or in a trepid realization that had come to mind at once. "He's not the guy we saw riding just now, is he? The number three...?"
She lit up at once. "The good-looking one? YEAH, totally! Yeah, that's... that's him—you're really good at this aren't you. Wait. But how did you know?"
"Oh my god."
Xu would not stop. "He gave you his phone number and told you to call him!" I looked up and promptly squinted in her direction. The nurse handed me a pair of glasses that resembled my own but was in such a dismal state that I could barely recognize it as my own. Thank goodness I'd brought along a spare in my bag.
"Hey," Xu waved a hand before my eyes. "Did you hear what I just said? The guy gave you his number. You should call him."
"What?" More squinting. In such situations, I sometimes wished ears could, too, have the ability to squint like eyes did.
"Uh... what?" She stared back, eyes blank. "What? Did I get that wrong? I was wide awake when he told me all this and you were out on that bed, cold, so. I'd definitely listen to me."
Leroy? Give me his number??? Good heavens in the—
"No, um. Xu," I let slip a nervous laugh, clutching the side of my head that hurt. "You see. Leroy... wouldn't do that. Not to me, he wouldn't. Not to me, at least." He wouldn't. Not after what happened back then. Years ago, but surely, he'd still remember it?
"Why not?" She pressed on, confused. The school doctor had, by now, excused herself and left the room for some reason, leaving us to ourselves. "Maybe he likes your nose."
"A nose is a very odd thing to like, Xu," I pointed out. "And I can't believe you didn't know my name all this time! You should have said something."
"Well, I tend to forget names very easily, so..." she swallowed upon hearing my words. "Sorry."
At once, I felt something sink inside and hurried to correct myself. "No—um. Don't be. That's not what I meant, and... I should stop calling you by your last name too."
She raised her gaze then, returning mine with a curious expression of her own.
"Oh! Oh uh... you don't have to, I mean, it's apparently a thing in this school to call everyone by their last name or something," she laughed, sheepish. "I think it's a chef thing. Is it? I don't actually know. Okay but that aside, I'm Xu Si Yin. Just in case you forgot whatever it is... oh and you can call me Sylvia if you find that hard to pronounce."
The nurse returned with yet another cup of water, placing it on the bedside table before drawing the curtains and going back to her desk.
"Si Yin. Is that right?" I checked with her bringing the cup to my lips and bracing for the sting. Keeping the body hydrated after anaesthesia was critical and I couldn't afford to get any weaker than I was already.
"You have oddly accurate pronunciation skills," Si Yin pointed out. "And please re-introduce yourself because I have a pen ready and I'm writing it on my palm so that I can recite it all the way home."
I laughed. "I have a better idea. We could exchange numbers, right? That way, you'll never forget—or, well, if you do, then at least you have somewhere you can refer to. Oh, and it's... Vanilla, by the way. Vanilla Julian White."
"Please don't laugh," I added almost immediately after, already feeling the tips of my ears burn at the mere utterance of my embarrassing name. Never met my mother, but already questioning her sense and logic for fifteen years straight.
Si Yin snapped her fingers as though she was experiencing her very own eureka moment. "Rrriiighhhtt! That's your first name. I remember having the shock of my life when I heard the guy say your full name like it was some crazy-ass dessert! I mean, he's not wrong 'cuz maybe he'd love to eat you up, but—no, that's inappropriate, Si Yin, shut up now—what was I talking about?"
My mind jumped from 'shock of her life' to 'crazy-ass dessert' to 'eat me up' and a general consensus of inappropriate comments when I arrived at the conclusion that none of what she had said was supposed to have been said aloud. Clearing my throat and praying that the heat on my face had somehow dissipated, I went on to ask if I could save my number on her phone.
"Yes please. Thanks for reminding me," Si Yin fished out what I observed was the latest smartphone model, released approximately three days ago. "Take it."
I was in the middle of searching for the 'contacts' square when she went on to wave something around our general space. A slip of paper.
"Okay, so. What do we do about the number?" She fiddled with it, un-crumpling it to reveal a chicken-scrawl-string of numbers before folding it once, twice, three times in her hand and then opening it again and stuffing it in her pocket. "The guy told me to give it to you so I'm assuming he wants some sort of, uh, reward. Is that what you call it?"
Naturally, I did not know how to respond to this.
"W-well. Um. You could thank him for helping me."
Si Yin raised a brow. "You do that," she sat herself on the edge of the bed and nodded at her phone, which I happened to be holding onto. In an odd movement, she turned to face the wall as though I was about to undress. "I'm not doing it. Oh, and I saved his number the moment he left 'cuz I was worried I'd forget what the piece of paper was for, so yeah."
I blinked, scrolling through her recently-added contacts.
"I'm... assuming he's 'boy with horse that carried other boy with glasses all the way to infirmary because they are in love'...?"
"Obviously," she scoffed at the wall, as though I had posed a stupid question. "Who else can he be?"
==================
I would never have imagined the extent of excruciating, tongue-biting, lip-chewing pain that I gradually began to experience as the effects of the anaesthetic jab wore off. The absence of a solution or any way of venting the sharp ringing in my ears drilling into the back of my head made the walk home almost unbearable. How I eventually managed; clinging onto every possible form of support like an aged old man, tripping over air like an alcoholic and stumbling into metal poles like my godfather.
The taste of iron in my mouth was increasingly apparent without the numbing sensation and every swallow was, for some reason, a pain. Naturally, my first instinct upon arriving back at the apartment was to check my tongue in the mirror. After all, a simple analysis and weighing of factors pointed towards the importance of having an acute sense of taste in a culinary school over an oversized brain like mine. Though losing one or the other was really not my intention, I certainly did not wish to experience my next four years of school with dulled taste buds.
I flipped on the light switch and stumbled my way to the bathroom where I witnessed an unsightly wound in the middle of my tongue and prayed to the god of rolling pins. And for this to happen on the first day of school! I sighed, dragging myself to the pantry and searching the cupboards for a painkiller. But how did I... I clearly remember being pushed. O-or was that an accident? I can't seem to—
The searing pain I felt upon washing the pill down my throat proved the dismissal of dinner. There was simply no way I could stomach anything (or get a single morsel of food past my tongue) at this rate.
Yet, the image of a steaming bowl of Miss Julie's chicken soup surfaced at the back of my mind; accompanied by the sting of onions, cutting through the salted broth but soft and silky upon simmering with the light sweetness of carrots, fresh and earthen—was that my phone?
I took another gulp of water, forcing it past the tongue and down my throat. Upon checking the caller ID however, I felt an immense reluctance to pick up the call.
"Um. Uncle Al?" Talking was exercising the tongue unnecessarily; more so when I needed to conserve every ounce of energy I could. "Is everything okay?"
"What do you mean 'is everything okay?' Vanille! I told you to give us a call every day after school," was what Alfred went with, completely unrestrained. "We have been waiting for an hour. Don't forget the school sends us a copy of your timetable, boy."
"But I just got home," protested me, sinking into the couch beside my bed. Inside however, I was relieved; I had been bracing myself for an explosion of concern over the injury—that or Uncle Al expressing regret over his decision to send me abroad alone and maybe even going as far as to cancel my school contract or hop on a flight to where I was now.
"Well yes but what is this we hear about a fall? Samantha told us all about it." Samantha? Was he referring to the school nurse? "Any minute now I'd like to express regret over my decision to send you to culinary school. If you can't take care of yourself, I'm cancelling your school contract or hopping on a flight to wherever you are if you continue to... to leave us in the dark!"
Apparently, both turned out to be the case. He didn't just stop there—the next couple of minutes featured Uncle Al going on about him and Miss Julie being uncertain about leaving me alone abroad when I've already gotten myself into 'such a state' on my first day while I sought options to reassure him in the fewest words possible, not wishing to aggravate the wound on my tongue. Oh. That was a long thought.
"Um, Uncle Al. Can I send you a text instead? My tongue hurts when I talk. Miss Julie wouldn't be too happy if she hears about this. If she doesn't scold you, I'm sure Chip will."
====================
Despite the awful ringing in my head and a burning itch on my tongue, I somehow managed to drag an exhausted body out of bed and onto a crowded train headed for school—a brilliant start to my first official day of class.
Fortunately, the skies were a tad more forgiving this time round, staying clear and incessantly blue without a single hint of clouding. So apparently, the weather here in September ranged from freezing needles of rain to scorching rays of heat and left nothing in between.
"Vanilla," Si Yin had waved me over as I was approaching the building where our first class on the timetable was located. "Thank god you're here. I can't find the place at all—this thing is huge and the map is so not representative of by the way how's your tongue?"
I pointed at the entrance behind her. "You're standing in front of it, Si Yin. And my head hurts but I'm generally alright. My tongue is very itchy though." Almost at once, I felt the unreasonable urge to ask if she'd received a text reply from Leroy but held myself back with a stern warning. No no. Not the time; not now. Not never, actually—
"You have your painkillers?"
I nodded, stating that I'd already taken a pill in the morning and because I didn't quite know how to continue the conversation, went with the most generic response to a casual 'how are you' between strangers. "How about you?"
"Pretty good actually. I got home and filled up the club application form like you said to and also, had my breakfast and medication this morning. I even had time to meditate, which is kinda rare I guess," she shrugged it off, leaving me inadvertently surprised.
Meditation. That's a very good practice and I know Miss Julie picked up the habit quite recently from her yoga friends, but wouldn't that mean waking up at five or six in the morning since school was about an hour away? Unless she's found herself an apartment that's like a ten-minute bus ride away but...
We entered the seminar room on the second floor together, filling in the remaining seats that were mostly at the front. Already, there were school officials accompanied by a man in chef's whites waiting patiently for all the seats to be filled. Turns out, the first of our three lessons for the day featured a small-scale ceremony of knife sets and chef's whites being presented to each and every individual. The clapping never seemed to stop.
"I'd like everyone to check if you've received the following items: a plan chef's jacket, four pairs of checked pants, two neckerchiefs, three aprons, three side towels and a temporary toque. All good? Alright, now make sure you receive the following for your table service uniform. Two pairs of black pants, three white shirts, one black vest, one black tie.
"Don't forget to check the size of everything you receive. They should match the sizing information that all of you have submitted beforehand on the registration portal. Culinary arts majors and baking & pastry arts majors will be fitted later in the day for your personally embroidered school chef's jacket. The one you have with you now is temporary and needs to be returned next week. Any questions? If not, changing rooms are down the hall to your left."
*
"Hey," I felt an elbow in my side and turned to face the source of my discomfort. "Are you the one who rolled down the stands and nearly died?"
We were in the middle of class—our first class of the day to be exact: Food Safety and Sanitation, a compulsory practical module for freshmen—and the safety instructor was giving the class a run-down of the basic procedures we had to get ourselves familiarised with by the next lesson. Which was in two days.
"Do I look like I'm on the brink of death?" was all I said to direct my classmate's attention elsewhere, hoping my ears weren't red from embarrassment. "I think you're mistaken." Not a lie, I managed to convince myself. I most certainly did not roll down the stands. Nor was I in any way close to dying, so.
"—course code S-S-triple-zero-one, click on the assignment tab and you'll see a drop-down of your timed quiz. Remember to complete it before the next lesson or it's a zero for you. Also, this course is a first-time-practical only. Which means that every semester after this, you'll have to complete the online course for constant revision but don't worry, it's the only module that has this sort of thing so don't look like you're about to die. Sanitation is important."
Though I wasn't finding it immensely hard to block out unnecessary whispers and gossip in the background, directing my entire attention to the instructions given out wasn't exactly all that easy either. I found that the buzz had somehow crept its way inside my head and settled there. Closing the doors to voices outside would shut them out but leave me alone with something else; unpleasant and uncertain.
And they didn't seem to be stopping anytime soon.
Theory foundation classes were a two-hour period each, starting with Product Knowledge and then Foundation in Communications, which were both final examination modules that weighed more than half of the grade percentage apart from various other coursework that thankfully required no groupings.
Si Yin, who had a natural inclination towards practical classes over lectures and seminars, had struggled to keep her eyes open in the latter module. After all, while it was easy to understand why we needed to study the attributes of various produce and where they came from, it was a longer stretch to be writing about communication models and reading from a five-hundred-page textbook.
In fact, it was easy to forget that professional chefs in the industry, too, had learned bits and pieces of business and relations or the basics of communications when they clearly seem to have forgotten the content of this entire module once they actually start their career.
"Oh, a text," Si Yin said to herself, something I realized she did quite often around me, whipping out her phone from the pocket of her blazer.
An odd tingling sensation willed the tips of my fingers to move but I held them in place, resisting the urge to peer over her shoulder. "Who is it from?"
We were in the middle of transferring from one class to another, searching for our homeroom class somewhere along the long stretch of rooms on the third floor of the main building.
"My sister," she grinned, typing up a response while I experienced the strangest form of disappointment that should really not have been felt.
It was a thought that I'd entertained since the day before; perhaps even the moment I'd sent the text over Si Yin's phone and now... thoroughly regretting my involvement. Either way, the school was huge—worlds apart from the kindergarten we used to attend. I would probably never see him again.
"Oh yeah," Si Yin turned to me after putting away her phone. "I've got this weird fitting thing going on after homeroom, but I was going to accompany you to see the nurse again just in case, you know, things happen or anything. Follow-up visits are scary. Yeah and so do you mind waiting for me before we go together? Or, uh, will you be okay going by yourself?"
"The fitting session for your chef's jacket," I recalled from this morning, reassuring her that it was more important than coming with me. "It's nothing too hard to handle on my own, so. I'll go by myself. You don't have to worry about me, really."
"But you totally rolled down the stairs and nearly died," she whispered, and I laughed, finally realizing where and how the rumours going about had gotten to such an extent.
"Good god, no I did not. And I hope you haven't been going around telling people I was rescued by some knight in shining armour either."
"I did say prince on a horse. That was black and not white," Si Yin shrugged, laughing. "Okay but honestly though, that was a joke. I didn't say anything about your fall. It's really not something I'd talk about and... I really think someone pushed you from behind."
I turned to her all of a sudden, stopping in my tracks.
"You saw them?"
"No, but... I didn't," she bit her lip. "But you were standing right next to me! Obviously, you're not going to end up anywhere near where you were if you were walking on your own. I mean, we were several feet away form the edge of the tier! You couldn't have slipped."
I ended up raising this to the school doctor after she gave the wound on my tongue a check and typed several pointers into her computer. Her response had been to frown and stare at the screen before turning to me slowly. "You're just like Alfred aren't you? Making enemies on your first day of school."
"W-what," I protested at once. "I wasn't trying to offend anyone, Miss, um. Miss...?"
"Samantha's fine."
"Miss Samantha. I doubt anyone would be offended by an opinion as insignificant as mine. Either way," I cleared my throat then, receiving a plastic box of four painkillers as soon as I opted to continue. "Do I eat this now? And—are you trying to distract me?"
"No no, of course not," she said in an obviously sarcastic manner. "Say that's really the case. Someone really did push you," she parted the side of my hair to check the abrasion that was thankfully not that visible from afar. "It might have been an accident... or it could be like what your friend described. I don't know.
"But I'll give this a chance and raise it to security. See if they have any footage from surveillance cameras around," she reassured before applying a thin layer of medical cream to the wound. "You, on the other hand, will be dealing with an itchy tongue. Why? Because it's healing. Whatever you do, don't stick a fork in and try to scratch it—trust me, kids do the weirdest things when they're desperate. Just pop an ice cube in your mouth and roll it about if you really can't stand the itch."
=====================
While I certainly could not believe I'd spent the past two days thinking about a text reply from someone who, quite apparently, wouldn't want anything to do with myself, the odd burning itch on my tongue that accompanied such a thought throughout the period could not get any worse than it already was. Reaching in and scratching the itch away wasn't exactly a solution either.
Perhaps it was having my mind occupied by an uncharacteristic thought, but I could already feel a weight on my shoulders at the end of the second day, tapping out of the turnstile and inadvertently looking up to see a red sky. The air tasted of bitter gourd, furthering the restless itch on my tongue.
I was reminded of the need for something cold. While placing ice cubes on my tongue and rolling them about in my mouth was a solution I'd tried out the day before, I couldn't help but long for flavour profiles beyond 'bland' and 'plain' after two-and-a-half-days' worth of pumpkin porridge and pumpkin soup and... pumpkin porridge.
That would all have been fine except for the fact that I had to wait for whatever I was having to cool (to room temperature, mind you) before sending it into my mouth. Anything above lukewarm was torturous.
"I was going to try their ice-cream waffle next week." Two girls dressed in the school's uniform with a single badge pinned to the collars of their blazers passed my right. "Then we'll just share a sundae for now? I can't wait till next week, Abby." "Fine." I soon found them walking directly in front of me, spilling expectations and ratings of what I assumed was the ice-cream parlour they were headed for.
Surprised that a pair of students from the culinary course were interested in sweets, I couldn't resist the urge to tag along just to catch a glimpse of the place they were raving about. Instincts of a critic; that, and of a poor teen with a broken tongue in need of cold comfort. I mean, why not?
A minute away from the station down the street, they (plus myself) came upon a two-storey ice-cream parlour along the sidewalk between a florist and a cram school. I glanced at the signboard. That name's going to run into copyright issues, was my first thought. Nevertheless, select words on the dual-sided menu written in chalk caught my attention. Apparently, a cup of complimentary iced café latte would be provided for all eat-in customers as long as they ordered something on the menu. That, and free wi-fi.
Perfect! I hadn't gotten to write all week. Plus, additional content to review if they happened to have a unique ice-cream flavour or at least something on the menu that would make them standout...a house specialty, perhaps. I'd have to look out for that. And a second floor—I hope there are seats.
I waited for the girls in front of me to finish snapping pictures of the store's exterior before going in after them, stunned to find the entire ground floor packed with customers. More than half were clad in school uniform and the majority of that, our school uniform. I had, unintentionally, discovered the school's secret hideout or favourite after-school-getaway and it was packed.
Though I had to admit, whoever did the interior designing had an eye for colours and textures. Right behind the counter was the parlour's name spelt out in stand-out black letters popping out of a wooden feature wall, back-lit by warm lights that made the parlour strangely cosy despite the blasts of cold air from above. To my right and left, blackboards spanning the entire length of the walls, scribbles and doodles of customers in all sorts of coloured chalk. Definitely youth-friendly.
"Sorry, um, e-excuse me," I slipped past a group of girls standing before the entrance with their phones whipped out of their pockets and pointed at the counter—which was tending to a line of customers that snaked back and forth. Twice.
Thankfully, the stairs to the second floor were a distance from the counter and I managed to wriggle my way out of the crowd and up the stairs. Halfway up and catching a glimpse of the empty tables and chairs from where I was standing, I stopped just in time. Did they close the second floor? Did I miss a sign downstairs? It simply didn't make any sense for everyone to be gathered downstairs, standing around shoulder to shoulder when there was an entire floor of empty seats.
I was about to make my way back downstairs when someone in a staff apron emerged from behind a curtain to what I assumed was their resting or locker lounge. Excusing myself, I asked if I could sit at any one of these empty tables, explaining that the floor below was packed.
"Of course," she laughed. "Most of our customers have been preferring the seats on the ground floor ever since we hired this student from your school last year. The second floor's become a place to leave their belongings," she nodded at several bookbags scattered around the place—on chairs, leaning against walls, some even placed under tables. "Honestly not the safest decision but, we have cameras up here anyway, so."
I rejoiced quietly, thanking her for her time before heading to the window seat at the furthest corner; finding the soft light that filtered through particularly endearing. The view of the street below was impressively lit by the redness of the setting sun and the general mood just felt perfect for writing. Eager to seal this moment in words, I began furiously typing on my phone whilst descending the stairs to join the queue.
Step one; describe everything. Eyeball customer demographics, drawing possible associations to the interior design and possible additional facilities of the store such as water dispensers, air-conditioning, internet connection; assessing the menu by its variety and originality; quality of service; plating, and most importantly—taste. These were the basic aspects that made up a customer's experience of any F&B outlet. Add the score, and then...
Hm. Not bad. I compared it to my previous record, scrolling through posts from the month before and smiling at the comment section filled by Chip's emojis and words of encouragement. Would he go here? I mean, crowded places always seem to take at least a couple of points off customer experience but with the second floor empty, I guess that's not the problem here.
I looked around. Clearly, students from our school had made the trip two stations away for a reason. After all, second-years and above were entitled to school-based accommodation and access to fancy on-campus restaurants and cafes, unlike first-years. There was no need to go out of their way for good food and it simply didn't make sense to live off-campus when student accommodation had been made so affordable. Yet...
The line was being cleared at a speed faster than I'd thought it would be. Quickly adding that to my review as part of the customer experience, I scanned through the ice-cream flavours on display before reading the special mix orders on the blackboard above the feature wall. Customized waffle bowls appeared to be the norm.
"So... it's our first time here and we don't really know what to get," said one of the customers before me when she got to ordering. Her friends around her nodded and one of them had her phone camera pointed at what I assumed was the staff behind the counter. "What would you recommend for a virgin-experience? Should we get the house special?"
This is convenient. I was going to ask the same question but now that I could simply hear the staff's response—
"I don't have a specific recommendation," the voice was strangely familiar. "But you can tell if a parlour's good from their vanilla."
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A/N: Hello beans! Hope you enjoyed another chpater of Vanilla's adventures :> there isn't going to be an update next week because I'm in Indonesia filming something for my school project but I'm not completely decided just yet. If you want to follow me on updates, do follow me on Instagram at hisangelchip :') I try to post schedule updates from time to time so that you know when to look out for a new chapter.
-Cuppie