Work Text:
“-and you better treat her right or I swear, Carm, not even Richie will be able to find your body.”
Sydney’s step falters when she hears Tina’s voice. She stares at the clock; usually, everyone except her and Carmen would have cleared out by now. She prepares herself for yet another potential argument to defuse—any conversation where Tina calls Carmen by his actual name isn't a pretty one. Not Sydney's ideal way to end the day, but if working under Carmen has taught her anything, it’s to expect the unexpected.
“Um.” She stops and sees Tina crowding a slightly terrified-looking Carmen against the counter. "Am I- am I interrupting something?"
Tina immediately backs off and a smile erupts on her face. "Chef! No, not at all. I was just giving Jeff here a little pep talk. You know, to give him something to think about on his way home."
By the alarmed look on Carmen's face, Sydney knows better than to question her.
"Yeah, uh- okay. Nice to know. Are you- were you just about to leave, Tina?"
"Sí. I don't think there's anything else left to say. Is there?"
Carmen shakes his head, some of his unruly locks falling to his forehead. Sydney suppresses the urge to push them back for him. "Absolutely. We're good, chef. We'll finish cleaning from here. Thanks, Tina."
Tina gives him one more appraising glance before grabbing her belongings and walking out the door.
Sydney waits all but two seconds after the door is closed before she opens her mouth.
"Did Tina just-"
"God, not you too-"
"I'm just asking-"
"T did enough of that already-"
"Because it looked like to me-"
"Please don't say it-"
"Like she just gave you a shovel talk."
Carmen stares down at his hands and says nothing.
Sydney tries to swallow the lump in her throat at the verification and attempts to sound light-hearted. "She give you a tough time?"
“Don’t even get me started,” Carmen groans lightheartedly.
“She must be a real catch for Tina to defend her honor like that, huh?”
Carmen gives her a strange look. Sydney bites her tongue before she says anything about the look he always gives her, the stare that dives deep into her soul and sends shivers down her spine.
It might just be the hopeless romantic in her, but she thinks she's the only one he looks at like that. Someone probably would've said something if Carmen was caught staring at Richie like that, anyway.
"Yeah. Yeah, she is."
It takes a second for Sydney to remember what he's affirming. She looks down. Raw, bitter jealousy envelopes her in a suffocating cocoon.
Because she's apparently a fan of torturing herself instead of dropping the conversation, she asks, "Do I know her?"
Carmen looks surprised like he didn't expect her to actually broach the subject. Or maybe he's alarmed that she might find out and tell whoever the lucky woman is. The bitter feeling increases tenfold.
"Uh, yeah. You do, actually. Very well."
"Oh." Sydney might have to sit down soon.
There's a brief silence that she hates.
Then: "Can I- would you kinda sorta be open to maybe telling me who it is?"
Sydney wants to slap herself. Maybe smack that mouth of hers out of her face, so that she doesn't have to make situations more awkward than they already are.
Carmen lets out a huff that might be a poor imitation of a laugh. "Fuck. Uh, you're putting me in a tough situation here, Sydney." He laughs again and Sydney can't help feeling like there's some inside joke she's not in on.
“Oh, that’s- that’s fine. Yeah, no, don’t worry. It was my bad asking anyway, shouldn’t have overstepped. Just, like, forget I ever asked in the first place.”
Carmen fiddles with his hands. “Sorry, Syd.”
“No, no. Don’t apologize. It’s fine, I get it. Boundaries and all,” she rushes to explain, even though it leaves an unsavory taste on her tongue. “Um, can I be nosy one more time?”
“Depends. Shoot.”
“Do any of the other chefs know who it is?”
She sees the tips of Carmen’s ears turn red. What the fuck?
“Like- how many?” she can’t help asking.
Carmen doesn’t answer, just keeps wiping down the counter for the fifth time.
Sydney gapes. “Like. Like Richie, too?” When he remains silent, she nearly gasps. “Fak?” Carmen scrubs the counter like it’s personally offended him. “Carmen.”
“It wasn’t intentional. It’s not like I fuckin’- announced it to the kitchen or anything. They just- found out.” He runs his hand through his hair.
"Huh." She bites her lip. She tries not to take it personally that everyone is up to speed on Carmen's love life except her. It's no big deal, she tells herself. Compartmentalize. Or something like that.
"Yeah," is all Carmen says, like he hasn't just dropped a fucking bombshell on her.
Because she can’t help herself, because she can't seem to keep her mouth shut, she says, “Good luck with her.”
He gives her a rueful smile. “Thanks, chef.”
And Sydney forces herself to go about cleaning their stations, even though she’s dying inside to pry the name from Carmy’s lips. Maybe even get the person’s address to give a shovel talk of her own.
They clean in silence for a while, the clanging of pots and pans and running water filling the kitchen. Calm moments like these help her clean her head and wash off the paint from her palette for whatever chaos is bound to find the restaurant the next day.
Except she can’t help the overhanging cloud in her head screaming that Carmen is pining for someone that everyone in the kitchen except for her seems to know about. She can't help glancing over at him only to jolt in shock.
Carmen is already staring at her with one of his looks, dirty sponge long forgotten. His eyes are almost glazed over like he's lost in thought. His gaze is gentle and nearly holds Sydney in a smooth caress, touching her so softly and with a tenderness she's never seen before.
She clears her throat and he's broken out of his trance in an instant. He turns away scrubbing again, but not before Sydney sees the blush creeping up his neck again. He's blushing because of her.
It's like a lightning bolt strikes her chest in realization. Hope, trepidation, and sheer nerves punch her gut all at once. She tries to keep her anticipating in check. Dozens of questions threaten to spill out, but many of them are variations of, "Am I the one? Was I the one Tina was so protective of? Was I the one Richie and Fak and Marcus and everyone else might have been teasing you about for who knows how long?" and she knows she has to speak up.
"Hey, Carm?"
"Y-yeah?"
Sydney walks up to him. Her heart is hammering in her chest. She can do this. Probably. Maybe. She has to.
When Carmen doesn't hear her speak, he turns to her. "Syd?"
Sydney heaves in a deep breath and looks down before speaking. "I know this can, like, ruin basically everything and I just wanna apologize in advance but also I don't wanna like, die before telling you this and wow, saying that out loud actually sounded really dramatic but I just wanted to say that I really like you? Romantically?"
For an agonizing amount of time, Carmen says nothing. Sydney adamantly refuses to look at his face, lest she very embarrassingly bursts into tears. She waits with bated breath, clenching her hands into fists.
Then Carmen shuffles and says with a detached tone, "Heard, chef."
And Sydney's heart comes crashing down. His voice, normally overflowing with emotion, any emotion, is a blank slate. Him right now is how he speaks to people like shithead customers or nobodies he never bats an eye towards. Never her.
She takes a step back, because even if Carmen didn't feel the same way she never thought that he would blatantly refuse to acknowledge her feelings. This is Carmen she's facing, for fuck's sake. There's no way Carmen, of all people, would be this cruel. He would never do that to her.
Except he is now.
She wants to scream. She remembers her fists and thinks about throwing a punch at his beautiful face, maybe. Anything that could wash away the bile that's starting to build within her.
But he's still her business partner. And business partners don't beat the shit out of each other without good reason, she tells herself. So she takes another step back and tries to form words to dampen the damage. Maybe she can pass it off as a joke. Or maybe she can just sprint out of the restaurant and let tomorrow Sydney take care of the carnage.
No. She misunderstood, or maybe there was never anything to misunderstand in the first place. Either way, she has to fix this. Or at least piece together whatever scraps she manages to salvage.
"I- I don't- I didn't-" she starts, desperate to stop fumbling her words.
And Carmen's mask of indifference washes away. "I'm shitting you, Sydney. I like you a lot too. Romantically."
Sydney blinks once, twice, three times before the blood comes rushing back to her head. "What?"
"I was just- it was supposed to be a rib. Like the first time when you joked that me telling you about my Al-Anon meetings was too personal."
Her stomach lurches. "What the fuck, Carm?"
Carmen's expression spirals into guilt. "But I mean, it was a shitty joke. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that. I'm sorry, Syd."
All at once, she can't stop the tears from flowing. She squats down, the strength leaving her legs. She feels Carmen's warmth following her down to her level.
"Fuck, I didn't think- I really shouldn't have said that. It wasn't appropriate, it was fucking shitty timing and- I'm really fucking sorry, Syd. I should’ve known better," Carmen says again, voice leaking with remorse.
Sydney's head reels at the onslaught of information. She sobs, emotions processing way too slowly for her liking. Instead, the incessant carelessness from earlier stabs her repeatedly. The hollow voice echoes through her head, crushing her from the inside out.
"God, fuck, Sydney. I fucked up. I'm really fucking sorry, I swear I didn't think it would be this bad. That was such a shitty thing to do, I'm sorry."
Carmen's repeated apologies go through one ear and out the other. Sydney cries for who knows how long, Carmen rubbing comforting circles on her back and murmuring devastated pleas that soon his depression starts getting to her.
When her tears reduce to sniffles, the first thing she does is punch Carmen's chest. It's infuriatingly firm and does things to her heart that definitely shouldn't be appropriate considering she's extremely pissed off at him right now. "That was beyond fucked up, Carmy."
"I know," he says, dejected, rubbing her shoulder with the arm wrapped around her. Sometime during her crying session, Carmen brought her into a side embrace with her knees hugged to her chest, the two of them sitting on the kitchen floor.
Sydney picks at her nails for a while, her scattered sniffles soon disappearing altogether. "So, I'm the one, huh?"
He gives her a lopsided smile. "Yeah."
"What a fucking way to find out."
"What a way."
There's a brief pause before Carmen purses his lips and says, "I'm sorry again, by the way. I shouldn't have done that."
Sydney shoves him lightly. "I swear to god, Carmy, if you say sorry one more time I'm gonna kiss the shit out of you."
Carmen raises an eyebrow. "Is that a challenge?"
Sydney laughs. "You better fucking not, because I'll kiss you either-"
"-I'm sorry."
Sydney laughs again. It comes out freely, the knowledge that Carmen likes her back crashing down and filling her with a floaty, dreamlike giddiness.
"You fucking dick," she says, and leans in to kiss him.
It's hard to kiss when both parties are smiling so much, she finds. There's more teeth than lips, but she doesn't care either way. Carmen cradles her face and she melts just a little, craving more each second. It's better than the satisfaction of a successful day of service. It's better than finding a five-star review from a critic in a magazine. It's better than the feeling of perfecting a new menu dish. It's the best. Kissing Carmen, decidedly, is something she has to do all the time.
When they break apart for air, Carmen rests his forehead on hers and stares. His smile is soft and Sydney can't help returning his sentiment. He presses a soft kiss to her crown and she thinks all the anxiety from the moment she saw Tina threatening Carmen washes away.
He intertwines their hands like it's the easiest thing in the world and the two stay that way, sitting on their floor and giggling about nothing and everything. When she sees Carmen staring at her with that intense look in his eyes again, she feels just a little bit stupid that she never caught on.
After a while, Sydney can't help breaking the silence by saying, "I should tell Tina what happened today," with a poorly concealed vengeance.
Carmen's face blanches. It’s kind of hilarious. "Don't you fucking dare."
"'Oh, Sydney! You have to tell me how Jeff got his head out of his ass!'" Sydney says in a voice she hopes replicates Tina's, "'Oh yeah, Tina, it all started when Carmy made me cry-'"
"I fuckin' said sorry like ten times-"
"Gotcha! That's another kiss!" The two of them giggle as she grabs his face with her hands freely and leans in for another kiss, too excited to remember they haven't mopped up the dirty floor yet.