3 Changes In Time

Inside a small family diner, a young man could be seen that looked to be in his late teens, standing at around 6'2 with a rather fit physique. He was currently flashing between tables at a blistering pace, trays carried in both hands disappearing just as fast as they seemed to appear.

However, what was most interesting about this scene was how he interacted with the customers, a perpetual smile hanging on his face as he laughed and chatted with them as if they were old friends, his presence seeming to bring the mood of the entire diner up.

This young man was none other than Adam Black; it had been around four years since Adam had been taken in by the Old Man, and since then a lot had changed while just as much remained the same.

Adam's hobbies hadn't changed much, he still spent the majority of his time within the kitchen or studying.

However, where before he was a clearly bright young boy with a stunted education, he was now someone that could be regarded as incredibly well-educated.

Due to a strong distrust toward people, Adam hadn't been comfortable going to school for the first couple years after being adopted by the Old Man. As a result, Adam ended up being homeschooled, teaching himself much of what he now knew.

And while this distrust of people had slowly gone away with his tenure within the diner, Adam had found comfort in learning at his own pace, choosing not to attend a regular school and instead continue his self-study.

This did not slow his speed of learning however; on the contrary, Adam had picked up new concepts at an unbelievable rate and had quickly caught up to other children his age, eventually even surpassing them.

Now, he had just finished his high-school level education and was taking a small break before he planned to move on to college-level courses. He had also picked up some of his old hobbies once more, finding himself interested in brain teasers and logic puzzles - even going so far as to pick up chess.

While these were all things Adam started doing, he could not escape from what he considered his one true calling - cooking! Even to this day, with all the new hobbies he had picked up, Adam could still be found within the kitchen for almost half the day every single day.

Whenever the Old Man would peer in to check on him, he would always find the now young man to be deep in thought. It soon became a habit of his to study different styles of dishes, starting with things from Nevada before eventually expanding to all of America.

He quickly became fascinated with finding new dishes, exploring unique cultures to different regions of America. While he hoped to one day explore cuisines outside of the U.S., he wished to have a very solid basis of American dishes first leaving him with only the basics of dishes from other countries.

Oftentimes, Adam would spend days on end cooped up within the kitchen, moving around in a blur of motion as if in a frenzied state.

These bursts of mania wouldn't typically last long; however, whenever they occurred, customers could be assured that when he finally came out, a new dish would be added to the menu.

One such example of this and the one that had become a favorite of the frequent customers to the diner was an inspired dish he made reminiscent of a tamale with some differences. Those being that he used lamb instead of beef or pork, used dried ground cherries in place of the more traditional vegetables, and used the same plants husk to make his dough rather than the traditional corn husk.

This meal was inspired by his surroundings, taking inspiration from a Native American dish and combining it with foods that were local to Nevada.

In truth, this meal mainly came about as he wanted a more easily accessible alternative to the tamales, growing a large part of the ingredients used in the dish himself.

What he didn't expect was how well the flavors of this alternative dish would combine, the earthy flavor of the lamb pairing nicely with the citrusy and more sweet flavor of the vegetables and husk.

As a result, this dish became a sort-of-original for the restaurant and inspired Adam to make many more dishes. While a large amount of these ended in failure, every attempt only seemed to spur on his love for cooking.

Aside from this, Adam had slowly gotten closer and closer to the Old Man until he eventually began to view him as a sort-of grandfather figure. In turn, the Old Man began to treat him like a grandson as well, slowly nagging him for his unhealthy habits and his antisocial proclivities.

As a result, Adam found himself often forced out of the kitchen and being a server. This caused him to grow close to the regulars to their restaurant, slowly helping him to gain a bit more faith in other people and to lose some of the antisocial nature he had.

While he still had a rather reclusive personality, he found himself acting a lot more comfortable around strangers, his true personality starting to become more apparent.

That all led up to the current events, where Adam could be seen interacting with the customers in a rather light-hearted and jovial tone, showing none of the hardships he had gone through not that long ago, even if he still felt the effects of them.

Another thing that changed with Adam's age was his body, going from a malnourished kid to a rather fit young man, someone who could actually be viewed as rather handsome.

As the figure of Adam came to a stop from his previous blistering pace, some platters before him that he reached down to pick up, his eyebrows raised in surprise. The cause of his surprise was the arm that was currently stopping his own from grabbing the treys; as he glanced toward who this arm belonged to, it was actually the Old Man.

Giving the Old Man a questioning glance, a subtle smile appeared on the Old Man's face as he answered the unasked question, "Why don't you let me take over from here. Go get some rest while I handle the diner. I plan to have an old friend over for dinner later that I'd like for you to meet." The Old Man said, glancing up at Adam with a rather gentle gaze.

As he heard the words of the Old Man, Adam could barely conceal the look of astonishment that flitted across his features. In all the time he had known the Old Man, he had never once met somebody he considered a friend.

He had once gotten curious about this, asking the Old Man; in reply, the Old Man told him about how he actually had moved back to Nevada only recently, actually spending a majority of his life in Japan.

So, for him to now hear that a friend of the Old Man's was coming over, it was no wonder that Adam felt a bit shocked by this sudden turn of events.

Tilting his head to the side in confusion for but a moment, Adam eventually gave the Old Man a nod, his confusion still evident in his gaze. Slowly, his rather tall figure turned around before lumbering up the stairs, heading to his room to rest.

As he watched Adam walk away, a slow serene smile appeared on the Old Man's face as he thought to himself, 'Young Adam, as I've watched you age and grow as a person, I've come to view you as family. I've also witnessed every one of those fugued states you enter, locking yourself away in the kitchen. I believe that talent you have for cooking goes beyond the norm, something I'm reluctant to see snuffed out with you stuck here.' As he finished his sentence, a subtle flash appeared in the Old Man's warm brown gaze.

Adam was currently within his room, looking down at an object in his hand. This object had a rather weird look to it, it was a square shape that looked to be a combination of multiple much smaller squares arranged in 4x4 on each side with a mixture of red, yellow, white, green, and orange colors.

This object was none other than a Rubik's Cube, Adam's latest obsession when it came to puzzles. Whenever he wasn't cooking, he would constantly be fidgeting with this specific toy.

At first, Adam took a very long time to figure out how to solve them. After the first couple times however, Adam quickly began to pick up the patterns within the cube, his speed at solving them only speeding up.

Now, he only really used the Rubik's Cube to see how fast he could pick up patterns, mixing a cube up before blindfolding himself and mixing it again, creating a pattern he couldn't expect before trying to solve it as quickly as possible.

Currently, as he was sitting in his room, he was mindlessly flicking the Rubik's Cube with his finger, solving it as he let his mind wander. "Well, I know that pineapple breaks down meat faster due to the protease, and I know eggs also have large clumps of proteins as well. So, I wonder if I could use pineapple juice sort of like butter while cooking an egg, using it to make a unique omelette?" As he thought to here, Adam's mind continued to wander as his mutterings continued, the Rubik's Cube in his hand being solved before re-scrambled multiple times.

"Damn, I can't even work on these ideas seeing as I'm stuck here in my room. Might as well do something useful with my time then." Adam muttered, his eyes moving over as he pulled out a laptop, placing it before him and opening it up.

The second he logged in and opened google, a couple tabs popped up. These tabs were one for Chess.com, as well as a simple Google Doc sheet. The first thing he did, was to move over to the Google Doc sheet.

The screen popped up, showing a list; as he read through them, Adam could feel a sense of pride well up within him. Just like a lot of famous chefs, Adam liked to keep a list of all recipes he made, even the ones that didn't turn out all that great.

However, unlike with previous chefs, Adam was born into a generation where those notes could be collected online. That was exactly what this list was, as well as the reason Adam took his laptop practically everywhere with him.

After opening the tab, Adam scrolled down all the way to the bottom page, his eyes briefly flickering to the side where it showed the words 38/38. While this may seem like a lot, this was actually only 38 recipes as each recipe had its own page where he wrote a description of them, how to cook them, as well as what he was experimenting with and his thoughts on the dish.

However, even though there were only 38 recipes, Adam cherished each and every one of them as they represented his skill and knowledge gain over the past four years.

After looking over each recipe fondly, Adam focused on the bottom page, scrolling down until he started the next page. Then, he started to write, creating some basic notes for the ideas he had previously created.

While he hadn't actually been able to make a recipe, he still wanted to take notes in order to not lose track of his thoughts.

After jotting everything down, Adam's attention finally shifted from cooking and recipes, now clicking over and pulling up the second tab, the one for Chess.com.

Pulling this tab up, Adam clicked on the 'Play' tab before finally opening it up to the game, clicking the online play tab. As he glanced up, Adam could see his rating, the numbers '2492' appearing.

While these numbers would appear innocuous to people outside of the chess community, anybody who was more than a casual enjoyer of chess would know what this rating meant - Adam is a International Master.

Eyes moving away from his rating, Adam focused on the game, watching as his opponent moved before reacting to it, the game starting with some very basic openings.

Getting fully into the game, Adam slowly felt a smirk grow on his face, the board becoming more in his control as the game continued, his opponent eventually resigning after realizing they had a very low chance of winning.

Quickly, Adam loaded in before starting up his next match, this one proving much more challenging and almost ending in a stalemate, with Adam barely pulling off a win toward the end.

This process of moving from match-to-match continued until he was suddenly snapped out of his thoughts as a voice appeared, "Adam! Come downstairs, we have a guest." The voice of the Old Man floated up, snapping Adam from his thoughts as he slowly looked up, closing his laptop before heading downstairs.