Food Whore

by Jessica Tom

Pascal whispered in my ear, “No one parties like restaurant ­people. These ­people leave the restaurant two, three in the morning. Wake up at six, then are back at it.”

  He walked in ahead of me, like a king. Soon, the shadows showed themselves.

  “Congrats on the review, P,” a girl said, kissing him on the cheek. She was graceful and polished and probably a hostess at a very fine restaurant. “You deserve it.” They locked eyes in a way that told a story, like they had shared some part of their lives. She, too, had a faint French accent. I cleared my throat and tightened my grip on Pascal’s hand.

  A short Mexican guy with a strong, sturdy build barreled up to Pascal, pulled him down, and placed a firm kiss on both cheeks. “Congratulations, señor!” he said. “A home run!” He held up his hand and Pascal gave him a big, hard high-­five. “Too hard, señor!” the man joked. “Four stars and you’re too strong now!”

  Then a whole posse of young guys stood up from a banquette. Most of them appeared to be around Pascal’s age and had a similar, if even more ravenous, look about them. They were clearly chefs, but didn’t have four stars. They patted him on the back, they punched him in the arm. One guy crossed his arms the whole time and looked like he would have killed Pascal if that would have given him a better shot at four stars. The chefs passed Pascal around, and he grabbed a shot from one guy, then turned around and grabbed another drink from someone else.

  I heard little of what they said because they quickly whisked him away. I had no way of inserting myself into their group.

  For a brief second, Pascal checked on me and the chefs all looked at me for an even briefer second before deciding they didn’t know who I was. It was the usual restaurant once-­over. ­People sized up your weight in the world and applied the corresponding level of attention. In another restaurant, with other company, I might have commanded more respect. But with Pascal, I disappeared.

  Pascal could have invited me over, introduced me—­he had said he loved me—­but instead, he stayed with his friends and left me standing in my skimpy Hervé Léger. I tried to distract myself with my phone and looking through Pascal’s old texts. He had been so persistent with me, so cute and loving. But now I felt abandoned. I reasoned that this was a big night and he had spent all of it with me so far. It was okay if he had some friend-­time.

  But I had invested so much in him and put him above everyone else. I wished I could have said I was comfortable with our “relationship,” but I wasn’t.

  Then I heard a familiar wave of laughter, and when I looked over, my heart lifted. There sat my friends from Madison Park Tavern.

  “Hey, look who made it out to 113. I thought you’d never say hi to us,” Chad said.

  “She’s too busy schmoozing with Monsieur Pascal Fox,” Angel said.

  Henri and a ­couple of other waiters laughed.

  I saw Carey in the back of a curved banquette, her knees pulled up and her feet on the seat. Angel and Chad passed me a drink, something fizzy with a lemon.

  “I had no idea that you were such a climber,” Chad said. The word climber didn’t sound very nice, but I was so happy to see them, I didn’t let it bother me.

  “Yeah, well. We’ve been hanging out a little.”

  Chad was biting the ear of another server from Madison Park Tavern, a cute Brazilian girl named Romina I hadn’t gotten to know that well. Angel had his hand on the thigh of a pretty woman sitting next to him. I figured she was from the restaurant, too, but I didn’t know for sure. Everyone was paired with someone, except Carey.

  So this was what they did at Room 113. It seemed like it could have been fun. Drinking after a long night at work, complaining about Jake, talking about the new dishes and restaurant gossip.

  Carey peered at me from her seat, looking rather queenly and content. Carey and I never hung out outside of work, but I thought, why didn’t we? She patted for me to sit down next to her and I figured out why she looked so uncharacteristically mellow: she reeked of weed. I looked back at Pascal, trying to catch his eye, but he was busy talking to another chef.

  “Don’t worry about it,” Carey said. “He’s fine without you. Pascal’s in the ‘cool kid’ chef clique.”

  I stayed quiet. Lately, in my mixed-­up life, I had forgotten what ­people knew and what I could tell them. Writing seminar papers, sure. Writing reviews, no. Eating at Heedless with Melinda, yes. Tasting menu with Michael Saltz at Le Brittane, no.

  But Pascal . . . what was Pascal? He fell into a confusing middle space. Was he part of my normal, regular-­girl life? Or was he somehow related to the fancy restaurant and Michael Saltz side? The questions seemed too big to untangle right then and there with Carey looking at me, her face open and friendly.

  “So you’re in love with a chef, too?” she asked as her straw lazily grazed her lips.

  I had the impulse to buy a stronger drink. Carey’s phone buzzed on the table and she picked it up, then quickly put it down.

  “Join the club,” she said.

  “I guess we’re just starting to date,” I said. “But, yeah, I have feelings for him.”

  “A date? You’ve been on a real date?”

  “Well, he doesn’t have a lot of time. But we get together.” Date was too strong a word, even get together could’ve been an exaggeration. I’d been telling the truth when I said I loved him, but it was so different from how it had been with Elliott.

  Elliott had said it first. We were returning from a Halloween party and he was dressed as a lumberjack (a jack made of wood), and I was dressed as the game Sorry! (my body was the board and my head the bubble with the die). We’d eaten some late-­night pizza with our friends, the room a cacophonous crowd of monsters and kings and characters from TV shows. Elliott and I had paid for our slices and beer and left around three in the morning. We were laughing and walking-­while-­hugging because it had gotten cold and we weren’t wearing jackets. When we crossed the gates of Old Campus, some jerk in a Jason mask popped out to scare us and we both shrieked. The guy ran away—­probably to terrorize other tired, drunk students—­as we clutched each other, first frightened, then hysterically laughing. Elliot had held me close, and my heart had flown into the stratosphere, half with residual alarm, half with the expectation that he would say something important. He took my cold hand in his and said exactly what I was thinking at that moment: “I love you.”

  We eventually got to his room and he showed me his “59 Reasons Elliott Loves Tia” list. He had been keeping the list for himself, but now he wanted me to know all the ways big and small that he loved me.

  I was starting to realize that I hadn’t said “I love you” to Pascal because I actually loved him, at least not in the way I loved Elliott. Back then, he and I had just stated the reality.

  With Pascal, the words had a different purpose.

  “Don’t tell me,” Carey continued. “He’s always tired and stressed and thinking about the next night’s dinner. You’re always clutching your phone, waiting for him to text, always after midnight.”

  Chad and Romina had moved into some dark corner. Angel ran his fingers through his girl’s hair, undoing her low-­slung bun.

  I understood her implication, but Pascal and I were different. We’d had a connection, and now it was a matter of letting it blossom.

  “I wish we weren’t so incestuous,” Carey said. She chomped on a dinner roll she must have taken from Madison Park Tavern. “But—­well, you know—­I guess I can’t help being in love with Matthew, just like you can’t help being in love with Pascal. Is this, like, a thing?”

  “I mean . . . I hope?” I more than hoped. I wanted this to be a relationship among friends and equals and partners. But now I had given him the review and then professed my love. At this point, I had no more ammunition besides just being me.

  And I feared that wouldn’t be enough.

  But Carey was on her own w
avelength. She just wanted to talk about Matthew.

  “I thought things were going to work out between us. I understand his hours and his passion. That’s why I love him so much,” she went on.

  It surprised me how she said “love” so deeply and painfully. She believed in love so much it broke my heart to hear her talk about it not being reciprocated.

  “Then the review came out with only two stars! Matthew changed. He became obsessed. That sunchoke thing, his new dishes—­I mean, they’re great. He’s really finding himself. But at the same time, I thought I was becoming important to him. Ever since we got that two-­star, it’s like I fell off the face of the earth. That’s when I realized it was always about the restaurant and building his reputation. It was never about me.” She sighed and made a forlorn slurping noise with her straw.

  I pinched the bridge of my nose. Great. It was bad enough that Chef Darling had been put on probation after the New York Times review, but it had also had quieter, equally damaging effects. Carey loved two things: the restaurant and Chef Darling. And I had screwed up both of them.

  “I bet that’s not true,” I tried. “Matthew had to . . . realign his priorities temporarily. The review is one sudden thing. Things might get better? To where they used to be?”

  “And where’s that? Me pining for him at staff meetings? Wishing he’d take off the chef’s jacket and spend time with me? I never in a million years wanted to fall in love with a chef. I went to Stanford and spent two years in supposedly the best Food Studies master’s program in the country. By the time I graduated I thought I’d be working on strategy with Gary Oscars, but instead I’m some pathetic boy-­crazy backserver, not even a waitress!”

  “But Jake likes you, Carey. He’s always seen something great in you.” Even though Carey was scattered, I think Jake liked the intelligent eccentricity Carey brought to the restaurant. I know I did.

  “Jake? Jake’s practically gone, Tia. Fall is our peak season, and we’re thirty-­five percent down in covers. Gary put Jake on probation right after that review. He’s walking on eggshells. Matthew is, too, but he’s taking the balls-­to-­the-­wall approach with all his new dishes. I’m not sure about Jake. He’s too good to pander to Gary Oscars, but Jake and his wife have the twins to worry about . . .”

  “Really? I didn’t even know Jake was married.”

  Carey looked at me without judgment, just high and sweet and factual. “Yeah, with two girls. They’re toddlers now, but they were preemies, and they still have some lingering health problems.”

  “I didn’t know,” I wheezed, saddened that I could be—­yet again—­so dense. The restaurant was changing right under my nose and I hadn’t even been paying attention.

  “Well, you want to know more dirt? Angel is quitting to become a full-­time poet. And Chad already has another job at Bank Lodge. He’ll be the bar manager. ”

  “Wow. And you?”

  Carey reclined into the cushion of the banquette. In the darkness, she looked prettier and more self-­possessed than I remembered her. Her low-­key misery, in some weird way, suited her.

  “I’m attached to Matthew.”

  It was hard to see happy, smart Carey so dejected. But at least she recognized her own delusion. I began to feel uneasy.

  “I should go back,” I said. “Pascal is waiting.” Carey and I looked back at him as he made a swift, slicing motion to some other younger, tattooed guys who nodded with their eyes wide open, basking in the glow of New York’s newest four-­star chef.

  “Okay, well, it was cool seeing you out,” Carey said. “But I have one more question.” She looked at me with concern. “Why did Gary summon you to his office that one time?”

  “Gary hates me,” I said. And this wasn’t even a lie.

  “Oh, I see. I’ll see you later, then.” She lurched forward and hugged me with all her weight. Then she moved her head as if coming out of a long slumber, and brought her face so close to mine, our noses touched. I thought she would kiss me or something, but instead she turned her head and whispered with her lips inside my ear because that was the only way a whisper could be heard at Room 113. “I heard you talking to Michael Saltz that night in the basement,” Carey said. “But I didn’t tell Jake.”

  I pushed out of her arms. “Why?”

  She sighed and all of a sudden became like an older sister, because she used a voice that was calm and knowing and made me want to listen to her. “You know that new staff rubric? Do you know what CTD stands for?”

  I shook my head. I had no idea, but I remembered that Carey always had the highest score.

  “It means ‘connect the dots.’ Jake’s mantra and what I happen to be good at. First, I realized my algorithm was wrong. I should have known we would be reviewed in September. I wish I had been working in coat check that night so I could have ID’d Michael Saltz at the door. The night had been so busy that I didn’t have time to look at the non-­PX tables until late. I had a weird feeling about that guy, though, and went searching for him when I had a free second. I didn’t even think to suspect he was Michael Saltz until I saw him with you. You were all fired up, like you were on a mission. Like you were fulfilling your purpose. No offense, but I didn’t think Michael would listen to your thoughts on the menu. But he did. I stood there and saw him take it all in. There he was, the most important food critic in the world, listening to you. You were lucky to have that.”

  So Carey had known the whole time. Not the whole truth of it, but some. And to my surprise, the world didn’t end. “What do you mean? Have what?”

  “That moment of greatness,” she said with a little smile. “It’s crazy he paid so much attention to you.”

  Suddenly I got excited that we had this connection. It was barely anything, but at least that shadowy part of my life had gotten an inch of light. I thought about telling her everything about Michael Saltz. Unlike Melinda, she’d try to understand. I was sure she’d relate. I could tell her about Pascal and maybe mollify her worries about Matthew. Tell her that sometimes these types of guys need space and that’s why you fall for them in the first place. If Matthew and Pascal were always available, would we still love them? Probably not.

  She seemed to be giving me an out, a safe place to relieve myself of this double life.

  But I couldn’t. I had a promise to keep to Michael Saltz and he had a promise to keep to me. But more than that, I knew Carey, with her Wiki and algorithms, might see something I didn’t want to see. Michael Saltz wasn’t a regular piston, launching me into something with a minor push. With him, the rules changed. I had changed.

  Instead, I backed away and said good-­bye with embarrassed bowing and waving and rushed to the bathroom. I worked on plumping the volume of my hair using a circular motion the stylist had taught me. I reapplied my makeup and stared at my reflection for one beat, two, three. I didn’t look like myself anymore. And that was fine by me.

  A FEW MINUTES later, I joined Pascal and his friends in a semiprivate back room. Around last call, they begged him to relocate to another after-­hours place. They shook him and threatened to steal his leather jacket, and Pascal laughed, which only encouraged them. I suppose they had switched from weed to coke and I think he thought about joining them, until a guy who wasn’t in Pascal’s group but who was also probably high out of his mind came up behind me and spun me around.

  “Hey—­don’t I know you? I know you! I know you!”

  He waved his hands in the air and with his red nose, he looked like a crazy druggie coming in from the street. Pascal’s face sobered up and his stance stiffened.

  “I don’t think so . . .” I said, clinging to Pascal.

  Pascal put his arm around me as more of the chefs crowded around us.

  “You don’t remember me, do you?” Then he stood up straight, took off his knit beanie, and brushed his hair back. “You know I used about five hundred dollars’
worth of truffles on you and Saltz that night. But we only got three stars.”

  For a moment he controlled his maniacal eyes and gave me a flirtatious wink. The same twinkle he had given me at Tellicherry. Felix, our server.

  His eyes blazed to Pascal. “But Chef Fox, you clearly knew what you were doing,” he hissed. “She wanted more than truffles, didn’t she? So congratulations on the four-­star. You deserve it for fucking the slut first.”

  A girl next to Felix spoke up. “Hey, don’t talk to her like that, asshole.”

  Felix laughed and I squeezed Pascal’s arm, scared.

  “Pascal, everyone knows your restaurant is shit. But I have to give you props. Why bother improving your dishes when you can get this?” He gestured to me, and not in the elegant way of fine dining, but with a vulgar flinging. Then he gave me an ugly look and turned away.

  My mind was just trying to catch up.

  Pascal took me by the shoulders and shoved me through the main room, toward the door. ­People still came up to him, trying to congratulate or recongratulate him in their now totally drugged and drunk states. But Pascal kept pushing me forward, bulldozing through his oncoming fans until we were through the front door and out on the street. We walked quickly toward his apartment, but my bare legs were freezing and I couldn’t keep up in my heels. He kept walking, practically dragging me.

  It took me a while to figure out what Felix had said. I wasn’t in that mind-­set.

  Felix somehow knew that I was responsible for Tellicherry’s three-­star review. He knew that he’d been serving Michael Saltz and me. And he also knew Pascal and I were somehow involved and that . . . what?

  We got back to Pascal’s apartment and neither of us said anything for a while. I looked up at him, for some reassurance. Something like, “Felix is a cokehead and everyone knows it.” Or, “Baby, I love you, that guy is out of his mind.”

  I made room for him on the couch, but he didn’t sit. He paced along his kitchen counter, wringing his hands.

  And then I connected the dots.