Need You for Always (Heroes of St. Helena)
Marina Adair
To all of the men and women who put their lives in harm’s way to protect our freedoms.
You are the real heroes.
You need to get laid,” Emerson Blake explained to the line of uniformed soldiers funneling off the party bus and into the St. Helena VFW dance hall.
She’d always had a thing for a man in uniform. It was something about the way they perpetually looked ready—for anything—that had her happy spots singing.
But there was no singing to be had, not today anyway, because these men and these uniforms smelled like mothballs. And the lei in question? That had more to do with the bundle of flowered necklaces in her hand than belting out a hearty “Oh My” anthem. Not to mention her body hadn’t so much as hummed in months and she had no idea why.
Okay, so she had a pretty good idea why, but that would be fodder for thought for another rainy day. This rainy day was to be spent catering to the few hundred seniors who had come out in support of the Veterans of Foreign Wars monthly wartime mixer.
With an open bar, live band, and Copacabana theme, the turnout was bigger than Emerson had anticipated, or prepped for. Heroes from every one of the past five wars were present, which meant that every single silver-haired lady over sixty was there, ready to be seen and heard. Including Mother Nature herself, who sent Emerson a you can suck it reminder from the universe in the form of an icy blast of wind that blew into the dance hall—and up Emerson’s grass skirt.
“Have you been lei’d?” she asked the first man in line.
“Not since I was stationed at Pearl Harbor,” retired gunnery sergeant Carl Dabney said, waggling a bushy brow. “So don’t try to give me one of them no-salt-allowed yellow leis. I want a pink one.”
“If I give you a pink one, you’ll go home in an ambulance,” Emerson said, handing him a yellow one. The old man refused to take it.
“If I can’t have any salt, what kind of message is that sending to the ladies standing at the salsa bar?”
“That you have high blood pressure?”
“That I’m a pansy, hashtag real men wear pink!” Carl was in his early nineties, carried a cane and a gun at all times, and was a regular customer at Emerson’s food cart in town. He’d also, according to Emerson’s little medical printout, compliments of Valley Vintage Senior Community, survived three wars, two triple bypasses, and a stroke—which made him far from a pansy. It also meant he was stubborn enough to beat death.
Too bad for him, death didn’t have anything on Emerson.
“Yellow means low sodium,” she explained, and Carl snorted as though he could take on sodium and the entire periodic table without even dropping his cane. “I can always give you a white one.”
He looked the white lei over carefully. “What does that one get me?”
“Low sodium, low fat, and if I see you with alcohol anywhere near your person, silver star or not, I get to kick you out. No refund.”
He wasn’t sold. And wasn’t that just great. With three years of the finest culinary training Paris had to offer and five generations of family recipes in her arsenal, Emerson should have been well on her way to cementing herself as a serious contender in the world of Greek cuisine. Yet here she was, still in her small hometown of St. Helena, California, the entire fate of her career—and her reputation—hinging on her ability to corral disgruntled seniors while wearing a pair of coconut shells.
Because when your mother’s ALS goes nuclear five months before graduation and you forgo finishing culinary school to take care of her, shells are bound to happen. Not that she regretted one second of it, but after her mother’s death nearly two years ago, the rebound had been brutal—on everyone. Unable to ignore what her family needed, Emerson had given up her dream of finishing school to help with the aftermath, to be there for her sister, Violet, who had only been four at the time, and her father, who had lost his best friend.
Emerson had become the family glue, and she was okay with that—most days. But today she needed things to go her way.
Not that catering the VFW’s monthly mixer was the most glamorous job Emerson would have asked for. In fact, she hadn’t asked for it at all, but they’d been desperate for a caterer who wouldn’t mind getting into costume, and Emerson wanted to take her business to the next level.
Eighteen months ago, after realizing the only position open in wine country for a chef lacking the right pedigree was a line cook, Emerson had taken the money her mother had left her and bought a food cart and food license. It gave her the chance to cook the kind of cuisine she was passionate about, authentic Greek street food, and gave her the illusion she was in control of her own life.
Which she so wasn’t.
Illusions could be dangerous, and Emerson knew that better than most. But even though she’d accepted that life didn’t always play fair and dreams died, every day for everyone, she was determined to keep this one alive. Determined to make her mother proud—make their dream of a Greek streatery fleet a reality and in turn make her mark in the culinary world.
So the Pita Peddler was a cart and not quite the pimped-out food truck they had dreamed of. So what? It was a start. A small one, but a start nonetheless.
Food doesn’t have to be pretentious to be delectable, it just has to have heart. That had been her mom’s motto. One that Emerson tried to embrace. She had delectable down, but she wasn’t sure she had enough faith left in love to nail the last part. But she was trying.