Page 153 of Neap & Spring

He’s at his desk, going through invoices. He looks up when I knock, and resignation crosses his face, like he knew I was coming.

“Derek.” I keep my voice level and professional, even though my heart is beating out of my chest. “I need to talk to you about the butternut dish.”

“It’s a great addition to the menu,” he says, already defensive. “Chef Voss really elevated the concept.”

“It was my concept.” I step into the office, closing the door behind me. “I described that exact dish to him three weeks ago. The caramelization technique, the acid finish, the Hudson Valley squash. The exact same plating! I walked him through all of it.”

Derek sets down his pen deliberately. “Cross-pollination in a creative kitchen is normal, Vivienne. Ideas get absorbed. Inspiration can come from anywhere.”

“This isn’t inspiration. This is theft.”

The word lands heavy between us. The silence that follows is even heavier.

Derek’s expression hardens. “Be very careful how you talk about Chef Voss.”

“I am being careful. I came to you quietly. I’m keeping my voice down, I’m trying to handle this professionally.”

“There’s nothing to handle.” He stands up, and even though I’m standing too, he’s taller, taking up more space. “You had a conversation with the head chef, the owner of this establishment, about menu development. He took your input under advisement. That’s literally your job. You don’t get ownership over concepts just because you mentioned them first.”

“I didn’t just mention it, Derek. I gave him the entire dish.”

“And he developed it into something menu-worthy.” Derek crosses his arms. “That’s what he does. That’s what makes him Stellan Voss. You think you’re the first cook to contribute to a dish that went out under his name? That’s how kitchens work at this level.”

“That’s not how it works and you know it.”

“What I know,” Derek says, his voice dropping into something colder, “is that you have a choice to make. You can be the kind of cook who understands how a collaborative kitchen functions and build a career here, or you can be the kind who gets pretentious about credit and doesn’t last six months. Which one are you going to be?”

I stare at him. This man who hired me and told me I had a lot of potential. But also looked away when Stellan stood too close. He looked away when Stellan called me sweetheart and when Stellan questioned my training in front of everyone. When he made comments about women cooking with their feelings and when he told me I was pretty when I concentrated.

Who’s looking away now.

“Excuse me?” I manage to squeak out.

“If you want to make something of yourself, if you want to actually be here and learn from one of the best chefs in the country, then you’ll let this go and take the lesson here. Which is that good ideas get used, and the person with the platform gets the credit, and you move on.” He sits back down and picks up his pen. “But if you can’t do that and you’re going to make this into something it’s not, then maybe this kitchen isn’t the right fit.”

The dismissal is clear.

I stand there for another second, my hands clenched at my sides, my face hot, my whole body vibrating with anger and shame.

Then I leave.

I go back to my station and I prep my ingredients and I work the rest of the shift in silence. When service ends, I go home and sit on my kitchen floor and eat cereal from the box in the dark.

I think about calling Callum.

He’ll tell me to quit. He’ll tell me this place isn’t worth it and that no kitchen is worth this. And he’ll be right, probably. But quitting means admitting I failed. Quitting means giving up the best line on my resume. Quitting means Stellan Voss wins.

So, I put the phone down.

And, I don’t call.

The private event is in November.

Forty covers. Invitation only for food press and industry names. The kind of people who write things that follow your career your whole life. Everyone in the kitchen knows what this night is, and nobody says so, which makes the knowing louder and the pressure more extreme. We’ve prepped for two days. I’ve been running sauce all week, and Stellan hasn’t commented on my work in six days, which is as close to invisibility as I can get in this kitchen. That’s all I want anymore.

I arrive on the night of the event determined to be flawless and invisible and to give him nothing to comment on.

For the first two hours, service runs like a well-oiled machine. The kitchen is the best version of itself. Every station is moving in sync, tickets are flowing through the pass the way tickets flow when every person on the line is doing exactly what they’re supposed to do. I’m in the rhythm I love. It makes the outside world disappear and six hours feel like forty minutes, and I think, This is it. This is why I’m doing this. This is what cooking is supposed to feel like.