Pour Yourself a Glass of Sea Monkeys
By my third day of kitchen patrol, I realized dish-washing duty would’ve been a better definition. After lunch, I went behind the serving counter and loaded Hobart—the ginormous dishwasher the size of an elephant. To keep my clothes dry, I wore a bright-yellow apron that was rubbery and heavy.
I was almost done loading the last rack when Ms. Jacqueline came into the kitchen and filled her arms with various ingredients to haul down to her kitchen.
“Ms. Chloe, before you go to your duties at the barn, would you mind please bringing zat five-gallon tub of chocolate frosting that’s in zee walk-in refrigerator? My hands are full, and we will need it for zee cakes we are making today.”
I nodded. “Sure. I’m almost done here.”
“C’est excellent! Be careful; it is very heavy. You might want to use zee dolly to roll it down. By zee way, I am looking forward greatly to our lesson on Friday.”
I smiled. “Me too!” I would gladly cart twenty tubs of chocolate frosting down Mess Hall Hill for Ms. Jacqueline if she wanted me to.
By the time I finished, all the other kitchen helpers had gone to their afternoon electives. Despite the fact I had been surrounded by water for the last hour, I was dying of thirst. I grabbed a clean glass and walked to the counter near the cook’s office. Earlier, I had noticed she kept a pitcher of water there. I poured myself a full glass and gulped it down. It tasted funny, but I was hot and sweaty and didn’t care.
The steam from Hobart had turned my hair into a frizzy style I thought could only be achieved if I stuck a fork into an electric socket. A mirror hung on the wall above the counter, and my reflection could’ve turned Medusa to stone. I gathered my hair up into a ponytail and was securing it with a hair tie when Nathan walked in.
“Hey,” he said. “You look hot.”
Act cool.
“Ha-ha,” I said.
He winked. “How was KP duty?”
“Well, I get a lot of time to myself and an hour-long steam facial each day. What more could a girl ask for?”
“For what it’s worth, I think Victoria had a face full of ketchup coming the other night. If you hadn’t squirted her, I sure would have. She’s a creep.”
Be still my heart. “Thanks, but I didn’t mean to squirt the ketchup on her—at first. I just didn’t realize how angry I was getting, and then”—I shrugged my shoulders—“I couldn’t stop squeezing it.”
He chuckled.
“What are you doing here, anyway?” I asked. “Aren’t you supposed to be in the science lab, working on your experiment?”
“I had to get away from Sebastian. Everywhere I go, I hear him shouting at shrubbery. Besides, I needed to check on my sea monkeys.” He gestured toward the back.
“Your sea monkeys are here in the kitchen? Isn’t that against some food safety rule?”
“They’re not in the actual kitchen. Cook said I could keep the ones who are being fed hard-boiled eggs near her office. Since the fridge in the science lab is broken, I have to keep their food up here. I just bring my clipboard and make notes.”
“Oh. So what have you discovered so far? Do they grow faster with the yeast or the eggs?”
“It’s still kinda hard to tell,” he said, looking down at his notes. “They’re so small, and I haven’t compared them side by side yet. Wanna see them?”
“Sure!”
I followed him to the back of the kitchen, near Cook’s office. He stopped at the counter and bent over to take a look at an all-too-familiar-looking pitcher.
I swallowed. Beads of sweat broke out on my forehead. “Nathan?” I burped. “I think I just drank your sea monkeys.”