Three hours later, I’m wondering why I even bothered to come out tonight. Trevor’s been in a snit all evening long. I’ve been reduced to sitting in the corner with a beer, trying to pretend that he isn’t looking down the shirt of the size-two blonde as she bends over the pool table to make her shot.
The brunette standing next to me has been openly flirting with Trevor, though she knows we are together. I’m not the jealous kind, but even so, I’m getting a little irritated. Come on, I think. Have some class.
Of course, Trevor isn’t exactly discouraging her flirting. That’s the kind of special guy that he is.
“What do you think this is?” Even her voice is whiny. There’s a few of Trevor’s teammates within hearing distance, but she’s looking straight at me. Shit, she’s talking to me. I have to make conversation?
She’s holding her finger out to me. For a second, I think she's making a rude gesture, then I realize she's saying something about a wound. “Something bit me when I went camping a month ago,” she pouts. “Look, it’s still swollen.”
It’s barely swollen. Apart from everything else, she’s a hypochondriac. Absolutely fucking lovely.
I know I'm being cranky and anti-social, yet I can't stop myself. A devil-may-care attitude grips me. Flirt with my boyfriend right in front of me? Honey, you don’t know what’s going to hit you.
“Oh my god,” I yelp, bending over her finger and pasting a serious expression on my face. “Did you go to the hospital?”
“No,” she shakes her head. “My sister,” she gestures to the blonde whose rack Trevor’s still ogling, “told me it was nothing.”
I make a tut-tut sound, allowing urgency to infuse my voice. “I’m a professor of anthropology. When I trekked in the jungles of Indonesia, a spider bit our guide. His wound looked exactly like this.”
I am a professor of anthropology, and I have trekked in the jungles of Indonesia multiple times. But I assure you that I know absolutely nothing about infectious diseases. Brunette Barbie, who clearly doesn’t know what anthropologists do, has no idea that I’m making up the story of the guide’s finger.
“He had the same kind of swelling,” I continue, my voice hushed. “Same red color. Nothing happened for a few weeks…” I swallow a sob. “Then…”
“What happened?” Her voice is shrill, her eyes are wide with fear. I’ve got her.
“The eggs were incubating. One day, they all hatched.” I clench my eyes shut, and my voice is very low. “That poor man. He had three children.”
Her face pales, and she lets out an ear-splitting shriek, which causes her sister to miss her shot at the table.
Ladies and gentlemen, my work here is done.
Once the blonde misses her shot, I watch my boyfriend strut up to the table. The cocky swagger is earned - Trevor is an exceptional pool player. The American PoolPlayer League ranks all their players by skill, and Trevor is a seven, which is the highest level.
They don’t rank douchebaginess, but if they did, Trevor would be a seven there too.
I wince at that churlish thought. I’m being unusually crabby tonight. But everything is irritating me - the way Trevor’s opponent is flirting with him, the way he’s responding, the way the bartender has served all the thin, pretty girls, while ignoring the fact that I’ve been standing at the bar for the last five minutes, waiting for a beer.
The sad truth is - I don’t really care how many women my boyfriend checks out. I don’t even mind if he’s sleeping around - that’ll give me the push I need to break up with him. Our relationship has been on life-support for a long time now, but I’m too embarrassed to pull the plug.
‘Why are you with him?’ my friend Gabby asked me once. She’s made no effort to conceal that she doesn’t like him.
I don’t know, I wanted to reply. Maybe because I’m the chubby girl and I get friend-zoned by guys. When Trevor, a good-looking and successful guy showed interest in me, I was flattered and swept off my feet. At the six month mark of our relationship, I even hoped I was in love with him. When he suggested moving in together, I’d been so thrilled that I’d held my tongue when he picked an apartment that I could not afford. I wanted the fairy tale.
Five months later, I’ve come to the unpleasant realization that fairy tales are for children. As uncomfortable as the truth can sometimes be, hiding from it won’t solve anything. Trevor doesn’t love me. The reason he’s dating me is because I can open some doors for him in Manhattan’s cultural scene. Trevor’s a social climber, and it’s prestigious to date a professor at NYU.
And I’m dating him because I’m too passive to end it, which is pitiful.
Something my dad told me when I was ten comes to mind. We’d been on a hike that had felt never-ending, and I had been tired and cold and miserable. “Can we go home yet?” I’d whined.
My father had crouched down so he was level with my face, and he’d looked into my eyes. “Look Bailey,” he’d gestured to the path, which curved round a corner. “Don’t you want to know what lies ahead? If you stay right here, how will you find out?”
And though the ten-year old me hadn’t thought very much of my dad’s reasoning, the adult version can appreciate those words. Life might not be a fairy tale, and true love might not exist. But I’ll never know if I stay with Trevor. I’ll never find out what lies ahead.
Once Trevor finishes his game, his teammates beckon me over. They’ve won handily tonight, and consequently, everyone’s in a good mood. “Bailey,” one of them, a guy called Peter says, his expression jovial, “why don’t you play a game with Trevor?”
Oh, dear god no.
I’ve tried to play a few times, but I’m dreadful. I have terrible hand-eye coordination. Trevor always looms over me, making me nervous. My overly-generous boobs graze the table, and I'm very self-conscious about them. One time, my breasts had knocked a ball out of the way. You would have thought I had tortured a puppy from the way Trevor reacted to that.
Trevor looks just as unhappy as I feel. “Bailey can’t really play,” he says. “I’ve tried teaching her, but she’s hopeless.”
At that, my temper, normally held well in check, flares, and I straighten my back. I know he’ll beat me. But I’d be damned if he’s going to talk me out of playing.
“Come on, man,” another one of his teammates says. He’s looking at me with pity in his eyes. “Don’t be a jerk.”
Trevor flushes. He’s generally pretty careful to treat me well in public. “Of course, honey,” he says, gritting his teeth.
I select a pool stick from the rack on the wall, knowing without even asking that Trevor isn’t going to offer me one of the cues in his case. “Do you want to break?” I ask him.
“No,” he says. There’s an unpleasant curl to his lips. “Why don’t you show us what you can do?”
I hate breaking. I can never hit the cue ball fast enough and with enough accuracy. The hallmark of a successful break is a satisfactory scattering of the balls all over the table. Me, I consider it a win if my cue ball even makes contact with the racked balls.
It feels like the entire bar is watching me. I don’t want to bend over the table - the black t-shirt I’m wearing will show too much cleavage if I do so. Trevor called my breasts cow-like once in the heat of an argument, and I’ve never forgotten those hurtful words.
I try to hold myself so I’m standing straight and I take the shot, but even before I make contact, I know I’ve failed. My cue stick careens out of control and barely grazes the white ball, which rolls a foot down the table and stops, humiliatingly, before it even hits the balls in the center.
My face is fiery. Trevor mutters a curse before he stalks forward. “You are supposed to bend over,” he says. He lines up his shot. “Like this.”
Thwack. He hits the rack of balls dead on. Three balls roll into pockets and Trevor walks around to make his next shot.
“I’ve taught you how to break.” He doesn’t look at me, and he’s careful to pitch his voice low so I�
��m the only one who can hear the corrosive words. The solid green ball rolls into the side pocket. “But this isn’t book learning, is it? You can’t study your way to success.” The four slides into a pocket, followed by the three. He lifts his head up and chalks his cue tip. “Face it, Bailey. You huddle in academia because you can’t cut it in the real world.”
Everyone’s looking at us. Why wouldn’t they? My boyfriend’s running the table. All I wanted to do was come out and have a nice evening. Instead, this has turned into another ‘Let’s humiliate Bailey’ exercise.
The warning bells swell to a choir. I’ve had enough. Before he can preen and take the shot at the eight ball, I set my beer down on the table. “It looks like you have things under control,” I say quietly. “I’m going home.”
Not supportive of my career? Check. Being a jerk to my friends? Double-check. Looking down the boobs of every available chick? Triple-check. Humiliating me in front of his friends? The final straw.
It’s time to pack my bags.
It takes Trevor two hours to come back home, by which time I’ve packed one suitcase with my essentials. I don’t own much stuff - at heart, I’m a traveler, and it shows in my rather meager possessions. As tempting and movie-like as it would be to march out of Trevor’s apartment clutching my Kitchen-Aid stand mixer in one hand and pulling a suitcase with the other, I can come back for the rest of my stuff on a different day.
The ending of our relationship shouldn’t have come as a surprise to Trevor, but he looks shocked when he sees me dressed to leave. “You’re joking,” he says flatly.
I frown. He doesn’t love me. If anything, he acts irritated with me most of the time, as if I’m a troublesome child that needs to be managed, not a grown woman. He’s probably just upset because I’m breaking up with him, not the other way round.
I’m a little sad that it’s over, but mostly, I’m relieved. “It’s time, Trevor,” I say softly. “Neither of us have been happy in this relationship, and we both deserve more.” I pause. “I’m going to Piper’s place tonight, and I’ll come back for the rest of my stuff in a week.” I take a deep breath. “I hope we can still be friends.”
“Friends?” His voice is icy, sending shivers down the back of my neck. “You’ll be begging me to take you back in no time. You stupid bitch. Have you seen yourself in the mirror?” He shakes his head. “Pathetic and fat.”
There’s an ugly glass vase that sits on a side table in the tiny foyer of our apartment. It belonged to Trevor’s grandmother, and is something of a family heirloom. I’ve always hated where it’s located - I’m terrified that I’ll knock it off and it’ll break.
Right now, it’s everything I can do to keep myself from throwing it at his head.
“Goodbye, Trevor.” Forget about being friends, you jerk. I never want to see you again.
There’s a scene in Kill Bill that has always stuck with me. It’s almost at the end of the second movie. Beatrice has finally found Bill in a remote Mexican village and is in the process of confronting him. Bill’s attempting to interrogate her and in the process, he talks about superheroes. Specifically, the myth of Superman.
I’m enough of a geek that I can quote the exact phrase, though the precise wording isn’t important. The gist of it is that there are superheroes and their alter egos. Bruce Wayne puts on a costume to become Batman. Peter Parker becomes Spider Man. Superman however, is the exception to the rule, because Clark Kent doesn’t become Superman. No, Superman is always a superhero. Clark Kent is his disguise. His way of mingling with us mortals.
I first saw Kill Bill back in my graduate school days, when I still felt like Superman. Then, I was publishing papers and making an impact in my field. I was set to finish my PhD in record time, and I was being recruited by universities from around the world. I’d come off a difficult field assignment, living in Siberia for a year. I had felt invincible.
The girl who had been Superman would have never put up with Trevor’s insults and cruelty, but for the last year, I’ve been stuck in Clark Kent mode. I’ve forgotten how to be amazing.
It’s time for that to end.
2
Sebastian
Tell me what you eat and I will tell you what you are.
Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin
Neither of my two New York restaurants are open for lunch during the week, so it’s not often that I see my staff during the day. This sunny Friday morning in May is the exception.
We are gathered in the bar area of Seb New York, tense and waiting. All eyes are on my cell phone, which rests on top of the polished mahogany bar. Bottles of champagne dot the counter, but no one pops the cork yet. We aren’t a superstitious bunch, but to open the bottle before we receive the call? We won’t tempt fate that way.
The Michelin staff calls at noon on Friday. Five minutes to go.
Seb New York has one Michelin star, an honor shared by only twenty-three other restaurants in New York. In a few minutes, we’ll find out if we’ve earned the coveted second star. If we have? Then, I can write my own ticket. Not bad for a kid from Mississippi who didn’t even finish high school.
I look around the room. Helen, my sous-chef at Seb New York, is pacing back and forth. Ben, the sous-chef of my second restaurant, Seb II is watching her, absently chewing on a nail. The expression on his face is a mixture of anticipation and envy. Seb New York gets all the accolades, and Seb II is the new kid on the block. Ben’s an ambitious chef, and I’m sure he’d love to be in Helen’s place right now.
Next to me, Juliette’s playing with her phone. She’s the outsider in this gathering. The rest of us cook together, night after night. There’s a rhythm that comes with that, and a shared sense of camaraderie that can be exclusionary.
Juliette, on the other hand, doesn’t belong in the kitchen. She’s cheerfully confessed that she can’t even make toast without burning it. She doesn’t need to. She’s my business manager, smart, ambitious and driven. I hired her six months ago, and already, she’s got me my own show on the Food Network and arranged a book deal with a top New York publisher.
There’s only one person missing. Daniel Hartman, my partner in both restaurants, and my best friend. He’s in Kansas City today on an unavoidable business trip. It feels odd to face this moment without him. Daniel has been my biggest supporter throughout my career. If it wasn’t for him, I’d probably still be cooking in the diner I worked in when I first moved to New York.
The phone rings and silence falls over the room. I take a deep breath and answer. “Sebastian Ardalan?” the disembodied voice on the other end of the line asks.
“Yes.” Helen crosses her fingers, and my restaurant manager Katya is chewing on her nails.
“Congratulations, Chef Ardalan,” the voice continues. “I’m happy to inform you that we’ve decided to award Seb New York a second Michelin star.”
Yes! I give the room a thumbs-up and everyone erupts in cheers. Without waiting for me to hang up, Helen pops the cork open on one of the champagne bottles. The staff are cheering, laughing and congratulating each other. Juliette jumps up and down in excitement, dancing a duet with one of the line cooks. I utter some words of thanks and hang up, grinning at the scenes of celebration in the room. Everyone in this room has toiled for this moment, and they deserve every bit of attention they’ll get when the word gets out about the second star.
My phone beeps. It’s a text message from Daniel. ‘Congratulations.’
I laugh out aloud. I have no idea how Daniel already knows. I likely never will. If I ask, he’ll merely look mysterious and tell me it’s his job to know. I’ll never be able to tell if it is a lucky guess, or if he does have a source at Michelin.
That’s okay. The second star is mine. All the work has been worth it. The long hours, the personal sacrifices… it’s all paid off in this moment. If only my parents could see…
I smother that thought. My parents never cared. I was too much of a dreamer for them. Too interested in women’s work, as m
y father put it once. My teachers thought I’d end up broke and washed up, worse than useless. All my life, failure has been expected of me, and I had lived up to that potential, until the day I ran away from home, hoping for a fresh start.
Juliette ropes me into her dance, and I shake my head to wipe away thoughts of the past. Helen hands me a flute of champagne. “We thought about emptying a bottle over your head, Chef,” she grins. “But Colin wouldn’t let us.”
Colin, the wine sommelier, sniffs disapprovingly. “It’s Krug Grande Cuvée,” he says with a grimace. “It’s bloody expensive.”
I laugh. Juliette’s distracted by her phone again. I drink my champagne and circulate the room, shaking hands and exchanging high-fives. I’m chatting with Katya about the spike in reservations that’s going to result when the news becomes public knowledge when Juliette finds me again. “Sebastian,” she says, pulling me aside. “I’m already getting texts and emails. Now is the time to talk to investors who are pushing for a nationwide franchise. Think about it. A Sebastian Ardalan restaurant in every city in the country.”
We’ve talked before about this idea, but it’s remained the stuff of dreams. But with a second star? The world’s my oyster.
It’s tempting to want what Juliette’s offering. My restaurant makes a respectable amount of money, but the income from a nationwide franchise would dwarf what I make now. More than that, I want all the people who expected me to fail to see me succeed beyond their wildest dreams. The high school counselors who thought I’d amount to nothing. The teachers that called me stupid. Everyone in my small town, who sneered at me - I want them to see the restaurants and know, they were wrong.
My emotions run too close to the surface. My parents, the people whose approval I wanted the most, are dead. Yet I still crave fame, and I’m too swayed by past hurts and injustices.
Ménage in Manhattan: The Complete 5-Book Ménage Romance Collection Page 2