PREVIEW: This Is Who I Am

This Is Who I Am will be available from The Bliss Shop on 25 June 2025.

The audio (by Abby Craden) will follow in the autumn.

Here’s a preview. Enjoy!

This Is Who I Am
© Harper Bliss

CHAPTER ONE
CASS

“Not again,” I mutter under my breath as I try to stop the inevitable. It’s like trying to stop the tide outside. A hot flash doesn’t wait for an opportune moment. Or as my late mother always said: “Menopause is nature’s way of letting you know you’re not the boss of anything—especially your own body.”

I move away from the stove and shout for Kelly. She doesn’t need me to say anything. She’s used to it by now.

“Step out for a moment, Boss,” she says. “I’ll take over.”

“Thanks,” I manage to say as a heat wave crashes over me from the inside, drenching me, instantly, in a layer of sweat. I stumble out of the back door of the restaurant but, as I make my way outside, bump my hip against the edge of a shelf in the pantry.

“Fucking fuck.” Another bruise. Another way for my crumbling body to let me down.

I pull my chef’s whites away from my chest to let some of the cool ocean breeze waft over my skin—not that it helps.

I know it’s not true—highly irrational even—but for a few seconds I let myself believe that this particularly nasty and highly inconvenient flash is caused by Sarah’s presence in the restaurant. That she somehow controls my menopausal fate, which is bullshit—it’s just why she left me.

I try to control my breathing and repeat the mantra Suzy taught me. It’s just for now and now is already over.

Although always annoying and embarrassing and making me feel that my life as I always knew it is well and truly over, it’s also true that my hot flashes recede as swiftly and abruptly as they arrive. But the long minutes that they last are plenty to ruin a perfectly good evening.

I remove my chef’s hat and wave it in my face, trying to produce airflow. Why do I still have an open kitchen? I will find a way to close it off from the dining room for as long as menopause lasts. Not only is it highly unappetizing for customers to see me like this, but it’s also humiliating—despite what Suzy says. She keeps repeating that I’m a woman in her fifties and this is completely normal and natural. That it’s only our patriarchal society which has ingrained in me that this automatically renders me disgusting and over-the-hill. Someone who needs to hide in the shadows, especially when overcome by another fucking hot flash.

The patriarchy be damned, but right now I feel more like a sweaty mess than the owner and acclaimed head chef of Savor. The two don’t go together. It’s impossible to swagger into the kitchen feeling like this. Like I’m someone else—a far lesser version of who I used to be.

The heat drains from my body. It’s a chilly spring evening in Clearwater Bay with a crisp wind coming off the Pacific. I’ll get cold if I don’t make my way inside again soon. I don my hat, take another breath, and pretend I’m a chef in complete control of her kitchen.

My hip stings and my ego is a little bruised as well—I’m not sure if I’m ready for the jibes that will surely follow from my staff. While humor might soften the awkwardness for others, I can’t find the funny side of this yet.

“Are you good?” Kelly, my trusty sous-chef, asks.

“Yeah,” I say, which is a lie and the truth at the same time. I’m good for now; good to finish tonight’s service, but I’m not good in general.

I resume my place behind the stove and try not to look into the dining room. Sarah and I broke up three years ago. I’m over it—have been for a long time. But it’s what she stands for. It’s how she reminds me of all the things I’m not or couldn’t be for her.

We’re civil enough—her dining here with her new wife proves that—but we’ll never be those lesbian exes who become best friends. I never actually banned her, but it was an unspoken rule that, after we broke up, she would no longer frequent my business. It went without saying. It was the only respectful outcome. But time does heal most wounds and if not heal, at least makes them easier to live with. I can live with it—with all the things I’m not.

“Did you see?” Kelly whispers in my ear. “She’s here again, scribbling away in her notebook.”

“It’s Friday evening, so yeah.” My gaze is drawn to the Black woman sitting alone at a table by the window. She couldn’t look more serious, more studious if she tried. She never looks like she’s here to have a good time, although she keeps coming back, so she must enjoy my food.

“What the hell is she writing?” Kelly muses. “My money is still on her being a restaurant critic.”

“A critic who comes back every Friday night for three weeks in a row?” I shake my head. “That’s just too weird.”

“Or maybe things just change.”

“Coming through,” a gruff voice warns us from behind. It’s Johnny, my pastry chef. He looks like a boxer who goes a few rounds every week, but he makes the most delicate desserts I’ve ever tasted.

“Soufflé for table fifteen,” he says.

“Shall I ring it?” Kelly asks.

“You know what?” I examine the soufflé. It looks perfect but it can’t stay on the pass for too long. “I’ll bring it over myself. Look that possible critic straight in the eye.”

“Ooh. Go, Boss,” Kelly coos. “Investigate the hell out of the sitch.”

I make my way into the dining room. The sound of forks against plates creates a familiar symphony, the kind that used to make me feel invincible.

As usual, heads turn. Up to a few years ago, I actually enjoyed the sensation of parading through the front of house, gorging on the admiring gaze from the people eating my food, but my body isn’t the same anymore. As my hips have grown in size, my self-esteem has shrunk accordingly. But still, despite the grueling hot flash, and my ex having a romantic dinner with her wife in front of my eyes, I grab the plate with the soufflé and saunter over to the stranger with the notepad.

CHAPTER TWO
ESTELLE

“Here you go.” A perky female voice pulls me from my calculations. “Our Black Forest soufflé. Enjoy.” The aroma of dark chocolate and cherry drifts up, making my mouth water even as my mind tries to cling to the half-formed equation I’d been working on.

I glance up and look into the face of Savor’s one and only head chef.

“What a treat,” I say. “A gorgeous dessert and a chat with the chef.” I keep coming back to this restaurant, securing a booking for the next week as soon as I get home after another delicious meal.

“I hope the food was to your liking?” The chef’s smile seems forced, a hint of unease beneath it. Her professional mask is perfect, polished by years of practice, but I recognize armor when I see it.

“It was divine, as usual. I’m a big fan.” I give her my warmest, widest smile.

“Excellent.” She seems to relax a little. Her glance skitters to my notebook. “I don’t mean to intrude, but I’m curious. Are you new to town? Just visiting?”

Very curious, indeed. “Not new-new,” I say, deliberately cryptic. “I grew up here, but that was a long time ago.”

The chef narrows her eyes, as though she’s searching her memory and might find an image of me buried deep down somewhere.

“Some of my staff have money on whether you’re a restaurant critic, what with all the note-taking between dishes.”

Ah. The chef can also be quite direct—that’s more my language.

“God no. Your food is beyond critique.” I tap a fingertip against my notebook. “I’m just working on something that has me totally transfixed. I’m sorry if that comes across as rude. This pencil is like a natural extension of my hand.”

“Not at all.” The chef flashes me a genuine smile now. “You just had us a little worried.”

“Absolutely nothing to worry about.” I mirror her smile. “I’ll be back next Friday simply because I can’t get enough of your food, Miss…”

“It’s Cass and thank you. I’ll put your name down then. For seven next Friday?”

“That would be wonderful. The sea bass tonight was out of this world.” Now that I’ve profusely complimented her food, Cass seems to have grown a few inches. Her blond bob peeks out from under her hat and her blue eyes have something commanding but also intriguingly vulnerable about them.

“Thank you again. I’m so glad you enjoyed it.” Cass shifts her weight around, as though she’s unsure of what to do or say next. “You should really eat that soufflé before it sinks.”

“Right.” For a minute there, I completely forgot about my dessert.

“I’ll let you get to it. Enjoy and see you soon.” The smile she shoots me next reaches all the way to her eyes, lending her face a softness that throws me a little. I watch her head back into the open kitchen, but then intently focus on the dish in front of me instead of trying to figure out whether there was a vibe between us. Pity that sort of thing can’t be calculated with a mathematical equation—I’d be all over that if it could.

The soufflé is light as a cloud and just the right amount of tart with a mere hint of sweetness, just the way I like it. At the bottom, there’s a surprising crunch of dried cherries and I’m delighted yet again. Each bite is a dangerous indulgence, reminding me how easily pleasure can become a habit.

No wonder I keep coming back here. Did they really think I was a restaurant critic? Is that the energy I exude? I chuckle at how ludicrous that is. Then I glance into the kitchen. Cass is gesturing to a colleague, showing them something or explaining some culinary detail, but I’m too far away to hear.

Though my connections in town have dwindled, the few remaining can expect a thorough questioning about Chef Cass from Savor. I heave a small sigh.

No, no, no, Estelle, I admonish myself. Don’t go there. Don’t do it. Save yourself the trouble. But for someone who’s fucked up every single relationship she’s ever had, I’m desperately romantic and part of me has never given up hope—the rebellious, stubborn part of me simply can’t.

At almost fifty, I should have learned my lesson—and I have. Besides, there’s nothing wrong with admiring a chef’s cuisine, another woman’s superlative creativity. It’s got nothing to do with romance. Silly me.

Because I don’t feel like going back to my dad’s empty house, I focus on my notebook again. I’ve long stopped caring how this makes me look. If anything, it provides a kind of shield. I always seem busy and hard at work. The pencil scratches against the paper with a familiar rhythm, like a metronome keeping time with my thoughts.

My dad left this particular problem for me on his deathbed and it feels as though I can’t leave town before I’ve solved it. My father was the smartest man I’d ever met—and I’ve met some men in my day who were utterly convinced they were the cleverest specimen mathematics had ever seen—and his problems have always been the hardest to solve.

I’m not sure yet whether I’m happy that his challenge is keeping me here. I’m not that keen to go home. There’s literally nothing waiting for me there. My house in Berkeley is just as empty as my dad’s house here. And at least being here doesn’t remind me of how spectacularly I failed at a job my father, once again, made look easy.

I sink into the problem, forgetting the world around me—forgetting I’m in one of the best restaurants this area has ever seen—and for another delicious half hour, it’s just me and math. Exactly how I like it.

<<End of preview>>

This Is Who I Am will be available from The Bliss Shop on 25 June 2025.