withthepilot (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
withthepilot) wrote2010-01-11 06:55 pm
withthepilot) wrote2010-01-11 06:55 pm
Entry tags:
Fic: Kitchen Consequential (3/18)
Title: Kitchen Consequential (3/18)
Rating: PG-13
Word count: 2,035
Pairings/Characters: Chekov/Sulu
Disclaimer: Do not own or claim to own.
Warnings: AU set in New York City, 2009, with flashbacks to five years prior. Many references to the ST: XI canon.
Summary: All paths lead to the kitchen for the staff members of Enterprise, the newest critical darling on the New York restaurant scene. It's here that they come together as a team and find out just where they belong. Chapter 3: Pavel returns to his Queens neighborhood for a celebratory evening before his first day and ends up crossing paths with a handsome stranger.
For a comprehensive list of series pairings, links to prior chapters and author notes, please visit the master post.
Pavel takes the train back into Queens, absolutely thrumming with excitement. He daydreams throughout the entire ride of bursting through the front door of his mother's hair salon and scooping her into his arms for a big hug. He remains controlled, however, getting off at his stop in Rego Park and walking briskly past various Russian immigrant storefronts to Utopia, greeted as usual by its pink, teal and white awning with the purple lettering. When he walks in, his mother is chattering away with her coworkers and friends, wielding her trusty curling iron as she gives someone a Medusa-like mane. When he's spotted, the conversation comes to an abrupt halt. His mother looks up, gesturing with the iron and speaking to him in Russian.
"Well, Pasha? How did it go?"
"Ah, Mama..." he starts, trying to look dejected as he makes his way down the stairs of the entrance. He knows he can't keep it up for long, though; he's far too thrilled. He shakes his head and laughs brightly, lifting his arms. "The job is mine!"
The salon nearly caves in on itself with shrieks of excitement, and Pavel's mother drops her curling iron right on the tiled floor, rushing over to embrace him tightly. She kisses both his cheeks and pets his curls, the ones that naturally spring to life after every morning shower without any special hair products or heating supplies.
"Oh, Pasha, I am so proud of you! You hear that, everyone?" She turns to the rest of the room and lifts her arms, as if she's gunning for applause. "My brilliant Pavel is going to be a chef at Enterprise! The best restaurant in all of New York! What more could a mother ask for than that, I tell you!"
Pavel blushes furiously as he endures what seems to be a factory line of Russian salon girls, all waiting to kiss his cheek and ruffle his hair. He feels much more disheveled when they're all through with him than he was when he first entered. As soon as the kisses are done, the flurry of inane questions begins.
"Pavel, can you get me a reservation at Enterprise for Valentine's Day?"
"Pavel, what is the toilet paper like in the restroom? Is it soft like dove feathers?"
"Pavel, do you think that handsome chef—Kirk, is it?—is single? I read about him in New York magazine and he's just dreamy!"
"I...I don't know," Pavel says, shaking his head in bewilderment. He sits in one of the salon chairs, eyes wide as he peers up at the shampoo girls, manicurists, and other hairstylists, all crowded around them. Eventually, his mother shoos them all away, brandishing the broom she uses to clean up the piles of hair on the floor. Sabina, the youngest shampoo girl, screams in terror and runs away—she's somehow deathly afraid of discarded hair touching her skin, even though she touches the hair on people's heads every day. Pavel can't help but giggle into his fist.
"Harpies! Leave him alone; he hasn't even begun the job yet!" His mother leans down and kisses his forehead, whispering to him. "Pasha, I'm very, very proud of you. You're my greatest gift. You know this, yes?"
"Yes, Mama," he answers dutifully. He beams up at her, pleased to have her warmth and approval. He couldn't admit it to anyone, but it means more to him than any friendly nickname from any infamous executive chef.
"Ah, Marta, you'll ruin the boy," his father says, coming out from the back room. He's got a rolled-up newspaper tucked under his arm and Pavel has to assume he was using the bathroom this whole time. He rolls his eyes fondly and wrinkles his nose when Andrei pats his head, which makes his father laugh and pat his shoulder as well. "What's all the fuss about?"
"Pavel did very well at his interview today and he's going to be a chef at that famous Enterprise restaurant!" Marta exclaims.
"No kidding?" Andrei leans down to plant one last kiss on Pavel's cheek, nodding firmly. "You showed those restaurant snobs what you could do, didn't you? Good for you."
"Papa, I am one of those restaurant snobs now," Pavel replies, grinning.
"Never! Bite your tongue. You're the saint of the kitchen." Andrei goes to the front desk and sits down with a heavy sigh, picking up a pencil and the same yellow legal pad with which he always does his bookkeeping. "Marta, where is my calculator?" he asks, already busy with his work again.
"Wherever you left it last, idiot. How would I know?"
Marta rolls her eyes and starts sweeping the fallen hair along the floor, ignoring Andrei's answering grunt. Pavel sighs and pulls out his phone to text his friends to tell them the good news, maybe gather everyone together for some kind of celebration after dinner. None of them are old enough to drink, but that never stops them from getting drunk. Pavel smiles at each buzz of his phone, answering texts as quickly as he receives them, his thumbs flying over the keypad. He glances up occasionally at the Russian music videos on the flat-screen TV that his mother insisted they buy to attract younger customers. The music is loud and terrible, really obnoxious stuff, but his friends always seem to enjoy the dancing girls in their revealing clothes. Pavel prefers his little iPod, filled with classical music and hip-hop. There's nothing he loves more in the world than cooking while listening to hip-hop, though no one really knows that.
Pavel helps his parents close down the shop and then heads upstairs with them for dinner. Andrei jokes that the "big, fancy chef" should be cooking for them now, but Marta quiets him with a smack to his shoulder. Pavel finds he's glad for the respite; cooking those cassoulets earlier was the most stressful kitchen experience he's had in ages, even worse than his final exams at the Academy. He tells his parents all about the interview over dinner, from Pike's unexpectedly friendly manner to Kirk's early dismissal, followed by a glimmer of respect. He mentions the strange Scotsman who never properly introduced himself and the man with the odd haircut—Mr. Spock, who he suspects is the restaurant's maitre d', with his sharp suit and mild-mannered speech.
Marta listens to every detail with rapt attention, asking lots of questions and nudging him for more. Andrei just eats slowly and smiles; Pavel's not exactly sure if his father is interested in all this stuff, but he does seem to be proud, and that's good enough for him.
After dinner, he heads to Misha's apartment, where his friends have all agreed to gather in celebration. Misha's a few years older and always manages to get alcohol for special occasions, which seem to take place most every night. Everyone mainly wants to know if there are any hot girls working at Enterprise; Pavel explains more than once that he only met with the men in charge and doesn't really know; as if any five-star chefs would be interested in his immature, under aged friends, anyway. After lots of beer and wine, video games and Iron Chef jokes at his expense, Pavel finds himself stumbling down Queens Boulevard in the very early hours of the morning and making the journey back home, which is always difficult after an evening at Misha's.
Pavel's head is filled with thoughts of how his first day working at Enterprise will be and all the possibilities for success or disaster at every turn. He has no idea how Kirk will treat him, though he hopes it will be with some respect, and he can only imagine what Chef Uhura will be like, the one with whom he's meant to work. Also, he's slightly worried about crossing paths with that grumpy Scotsman again, who might still hound him for his own pot of cassoulet. After today, Pavel will be pleased if he doesn't have to make another cassoulet for a long, long time.
He's so wrapped up in his mental trance that he's barely paying attention to where he's walking. He suddenly bumps shoulders with another man and stumbles, barely keeping himself from falling backwards. "Oh, I am sorry, so—"
"Oh, hey...totally my fault."
Pavel looks up at the man, not anyone he's seen in this neighborhood before. He's slender and Asian and looks more than a bit out of his element as he clutches a messenger bag that reminds Pavel of his own. He's wearing a white dress shirt and an undone bowtie hangs from his collar, as if he's just gotten off a late-night work shift. His hair is mussed in a rather cute way.
It's only after a few moments of staring that Pavel realizes the man has a hand on his shoulder, steadying him. It's probably quite obvious that he's intoxicated. He nods gratefully and hopes he isn't blushing.
"It is not your fault," Pavel says. "I was being clumsy."
"Well, I wasn't watching where I was going, so let's say it's both of our faults." He smiles as he takes his hand back, the skin near the corners of his eyes creasing just slightly. "Actually, I don't even know where I'm going to begin with. I took the wrong train home from work and now I'm lost."
"Wrong train?" Pavel repeats. He bites the inside of his cheek when he realizes he must sound like an idiotic parrot. "Ah...where do you need to go?"
"Well, I live in Astoria. And I usually take the 7 train home from my job, but they had some sort of track emergency, so I walked uptown to catch the N but I got on the R instead and I ended up falling asleep and didn't even realize I was on the completely wrong train until I got to the stop around here. And then I was so disoriented that I just got off and went above ground. Fucking MTA." He exhales, having said all of that in one breath, and Pavel squints, trying to catch up with what he's saying. "Maybe I should just get a cab. Shouldn't really be spending the money, but..."
"Wait, you live in Astoria?" Pavel asks, finally making sense of it all. He smiles and shakes his head. "No need to take a cab; it is easy, really. You get back on the R or V train, headed to Manhattan. And then you take it to Steinway Street and walk. Or take a shorter cab ride."
"Really? Hey, awesome. The R or V to Steinway...great, thanks." The man grins, bright and wide, and to Pavel, it's like the sun. "You know, I've lived here for over two years now, and I still can't figure out the damn trains, most of the time."
"It can be a complicated city, it's true. I used to often mistake Queens Plaza for Queens Center." Pavel laughs when the other man does, and a part of him wonders how he's even managing to banter with someone he finds so insanely attractive. It has to be the alcohol.
"Well...listen, thanks again," he says. "You saved me twenty bucks." He takes a step back and lifts a hand to wave goodbye. "See you around?"
"Yes, sure," Pavel says, even though he won't, because just like that, the handsome man from Astoria is gone, on his way back to the subway entrance, and he never even got his name. He supposes his day has been more excellent than most even without this last item; successfully flirting with a stranger would have gone above and beyond all expectations, and he doesn't want to be greedy.
Still, when Pavel goes to bed that night, he calms his nerves about what the next day at Enterprise will bring by closing his eyes and recalling the appearance of the attractive man on the street: the wrinkled seams of his shirt; the gentle curve of his jaw; the reflection of the boulevard's streetlamps in his molten brown eyes as he gazed in every direction, as if there were a special place—a special person—he was meant to find.
Previous: Chapter 2 || Next: Chapter 4
Rating: PG-13
Word count: 2,035
Pairings/Characters: Chekov/Sulu
Disclaimer: Do not own or claim to own.
Warnings: AU set in New York City, 2009, with flashbacks to five years prior. Many references to the ST: XI canon.
Summary: All paths lead to the kitchen for the staff members of Enterprise, the newest critical darling on the New York restaurant scene. It's here that they come together as a team and find out just where they belong. Chapter 3: Pavel returns to his Queens neighborhood for a celebratory evening before his first day and ends up crossing paths with a handsome stranger.
For a comprehensive list of series pairings, links to prior chapters and author notes, please visit the master post.
Pavel takes the train back into Queens, absolutely thrumming with excitement. He daydreams throughout the entire ride of bursting through the front door of his mother's hair salon and scooping her into his arms for a big hug. He remains controlled, however, getting off at his stop in Rego Park and walking briskly past various Russian immigrant storefronts to Utopia, greeted as usual by its pink, teal and white awning with the purple lettering. When he walks in, his mother is chattering away with her coworkers and friends, wielding her trusty curling iron as she gives someone a Medusa-like mane. When he's spotted, the conversation comes to an abrupt halt. His mother looks up, gesturing with the iron and speaking to him in Russian.
"Well, Pasha? How did it go?"
"Ah, Mama..." he starts, trying to look dejected as he makes his way down the stairs of the entrance. He knows he can't keep it up for long, though; he's far too thrilled. He shakes his head and laughs brightly, lifting his arms. "The job is mine!"
The salon nearly caves in on itself with shrieks of excitement, and Pavel's mother drops her curling iron right on the tiled floor, rushing over to embrace him tightly. She kisses both his cheeks and pets his curls, the ones that naturally spring to life after every morning shower without any special hair products or heating supplies.
"Oh, Pasha, I am so proud of you! You hear that, everyone?" She turns to the rest of the room and lifts her arms, as if she's gunning for applause. "My brilliant Pavel is going to be a chef at Enterprise! The best restaurant in all of New York! What more could a mother ask for than that, I tell you!"
Pavel blushes furiously as he endures what seems to be a factory line of Russian salon girls, all waiting to kiss his cheek and ruffle his hair. He feels much more disheveled when they're all through with him than he was when he first entered. As soon as the kisses are done, the flurry of inane questions begins.
"Pavel, can you get me a reservation at Enterprise for Valentine's Day?"
"Pavel, what is the toilet paper like in the restroom? Is it soft like dove feathers?"
"Pavel, do you think that handsome chef—Kirk, is it?—is single? I read about him in New York magazine and he's just dreamy!"
"I...I don't know," Pavel says, shaking his head in bewilderment. He sits in one of the salon chairs, eyes wide as he peers up at the shampoo girls, manicurists, and other hairstylists, all crowded around them. Eventually, his mother shoos them all away, brandishing the broom she uses to clean up the piles of hair on the floor. Sabina, the youngest shampoo girl, screams in terror and runs away—she's somehow deathly afraid of discarded hair touching her skin, even though she touches the hair on people's heads every day. Pavel can't help but giggle into his fist.
"Harpies! Leave him alone; he hasn't even begun the job yet!" His mother leans down and kisses his forehead, whispering to him. "Pasha, I'm very, very proud of you. You're my greatest gift. You know this, yes?"
"Yes, Mama," he answers dutifully. He beams up at her, pleased to have her warmth and approval. He couldn't admit it to anyone, but it means more to him than any friendly nickname from any infamous executive chef.
"Ah, Marta, you'll ruin the boy," his father says, coming out from the back room. He's got a rolled-up newspaper tucked under his arm and Pavel has to assume he was using the bathroom this whole time. He rolls his eyes fondly and wrinkles his nose when Andrei pats his head, which makes his father laugh and pat his shoulder as well. "What's all the fuss about?"
"Pavel did very well at his interview today and he's going to be a chef at that famous Enterprise restaurant!" Marta exclaims.
"No kidding?" Andrei leans down to plant one last kiss on Pavel's cheek, nodding firmly. "You showed those restaurant snobs what you could do, didn't you? Good for you."
"Papa, I am one of those restaurant snobs now," Pavel replies, grinning.
"Never! Bite your tongue. You're the saint of the kitchen." Andrei goes to the front desk and sits down with a heavy sigh, picking up a pencil and the same yellow legal pad with which he always does his bookkeeping. "Marta, where is my calculator?" he asks, already busy with his work again.
"Wherever you left it last, idiot. How would I know?"
Marta rolls her eyes and starts sweeping the fallen hair along the floor, ignoring Andrei's answering grunt. Pavel sighs and pulls out his phone to text his friends to tell them the good news, maybe gather everyone together for some kind of celebration after dinner. None of them are old enough to drink, but that never stops them from getting drunk. Pavel smiles at each buzz of his phone, answering texts as quickly as he receives them, his thumbs flying over the keypad. He glances up occasionally at the Russian music videos on the flat-screen TV that his mother insisted they buy to attract younger customers. The music is loud and terrible, really obnoxious stuff, but his friends always seem to enjoy the dancing girls in their revealing clothes. Pavel prefers his little iPod, filled with classical music and hip-hop. There's nothing he loves more in the world than cooking while listening to hip-hop, though no one really knows that.
Pavel helps his parents close down the shop and then heads upstairs with them for dinner. Andrei jokes that the "big, fancy chef" should be cooking for them now, but Marta quiets him with a smack to his shoulder. Pavel finds he's glad for the respite; cooking those cassoulets earlier was the most stressful kitchen experience he's had in ages, even worse than his final exams at the Academy. He tells his parents all about the interview over dinner, from Pike's unexpectedly friendly manner to Kirk's early dismissal, followed by a glimmer of respect. He mentions the strange Scotsman who never properly introduced himself and the man with the odd haircut—Mr. Spock, who he suspects is the restaurant's maitre d', with his sharp suit and mild-mannered speech.
Marta listens to every detail with rapt attention, asking lots of questions and nudging him for more. Andrei just eats slowly and smiles; Pavel's not exactly sure if his father is interested in all this stuff, but he does seem to be proud, and that's good enough for him.
After dinner, he heads to Misha's apartment, where his friends have all agreed to gather in celebration. Misha's a few years older and always manages to get alcohol for special occasions, which seem to take place most every night. Everyone mainly wants to know if there are any hot girls working at Enterprise; Pavel explains more than once that he only met with the men in charge and doesn't really know; as if any five-star chefs would be interested in his immature, under aged friends, anyway. After lots of beer and wine, video games and Iron Chef jokes at his expense, Pavel finds himself stumbling down Queens Boulevard in the very early hours of the morning and making the journey back home, which is always difficult after an evening at Misha's.
Pavel's head is filled with thoughts of how his first day working at Enterprise will be and all the possibilities for success or disaster at every turn. He has no idea how Kirk will treat him, though he hopes it will be with some respect, and he can only imagine what Chef Uhura will be like, the one with whom he's meant to work. Also, he's slightly worried about crossing paths with that grumpy Scotsman again, who might still hound him for his own pot of cassoulet. After today, Pavel will be pleased if he doesn't have to make another cassoulet for a long, long time.
He's so wrapped up in his mental trance that he's barely paying attention to where he's walking. He suddenly bumps shoulders with another man and stumbles, barely keeping himself from falling backwards. "Oh, I am sorry, so—"
"Oh, hey...totally my fault."
Pavel looks up at the man, not anyone he's seen in this neighborhood before. He's slender and Asian and looks more than a bit out of his element as he clutches a messenger bag that reminds Pavel of his own. He's wearing a white dress shirt and an undone bowtie hangs from his collar, as if he's just gotten off a late-night work shift. His hair is mussed in a rather cute way.
It's only after a few moments of staring that Pavel realizes the man has a hand on his shoulder, steadying him. It's probably quite obvious that he's intoxicated. He nods gratefully and hopes he isn't blushing.
"It is not your fault," Pavel says. "I was being clumsy."
"Well, I wasn't watching where I was going, so let's say it's both of our faults." He smiles as he takes his hand back, the skin near the corners of his eyes creasing just slightly. "Actually, I don't even know where I'm going to begin with. I took the wrong train home from work and now I'm lost."
"Wrong train?" Pavel repeats. He bites the inside of his cheek when he realizes he must sound like an idiotic parrot. "Ah...where do you need to go?"
"Well, I live in Astoria. And I usually take the 7 train home from my job, but they had some sort of track emergency, so I walked uptown to catch the N but I got on the R instead and I ended up falling asleep and didn't even realize I was on the completely wrong train until I got to the stop around here. And then I was so disoriented that I just got off and went above ground. Fucking MTA." He exhales, having said all of that in one breath, and Pavel squints, trying to catch up with what he's saying. "Maybe I should just get a cab. Shouldn't really be spending the money, but..."
"Wait, you live in Astoria?" Pavel asks, finally making sense of it all. He smiles and shakes his head. "No need to take a cab; it is easy, really. You get back on the R or V train, headed to Manhattan. And then you take it to Steinway Street and walk. Or take a shorter cab ride."
"Really? Hey, awesome. The R or V to Steinway...great, thanks." The man grins, bright and wide, and to Pavel, it's like the sun. "You know, I've lived here for over two years now, and I still can't figure out the damn trains, most of the time."
"It can be a complicated city, it's true. I used to often mistake Queens Plaza for Queens Center." Pavel laughs when the other man does, and a part of him wonders how he's even managing to banter with someone he finds so insanely attractive. It has to be the alcohol.
"Well...listen, thanks again," he says. "You saved me twenty bucks." He takes a step back and lifts a hand to wave goodbye. "See you around?"
"Yes, sure," Pavel says, even though he won't, because just like that, the handsome man from Astoria is gone, on his way back to the subway entrance, and he never even got his name. He supposes his day has been more excellent than most even without this last item; successfully flirting with a stranger would have gone above and beyond all expectations, and he doesn't want to be greedy.
Still, when Pavel goes to bed that night, he calms his nerves about what the next day at Enterprise will bring by closing his eyes and recalling the appearance of the attractive man on the street: the wrinkled seams of his shirt; the gentle curve of his jaw; the reflection of the boulevard's streetlamps in his molten brown eyes as he gazed in every direction, as if there were a special place—a special person—he was meant to find.
Previous: Chapter 2 || Next: Chapter 4