by MJ Post
“Not talking to me?” Eloise asked.
Toby stopped, turned to face her. “About what? I had a frank professional conversation with you, and you used that to be a shit-stirrer.”
“Toby, I’m looking out for both of us. Give me a little credit here. Everyone on the show has some future in culinary, but I think you and I have the best future. We can rise together, if you trust me to plan a good strategy. I know you said no, but think about it again.”
“And what the fuck strategy was it to go around telling people I said you’re good-looking? So what? It’s TV, lots of people are. You made me look like a teenager, Eloise. I’m a grown-up. I…”
“You don’t even know what I said,” Eloise answered. “So step off a moment. What were you told, and who told you? Was it the Korean girl? Poor thing, she’s out of her mind with stress. She had such a frowny face, she was like a circus clown with a frown painted on. I didn’t misquote you, Toby.”
“Eloise, this isn’t high school. I don’t…”
“I know it isn’t. That’s why…”
“Let me finish. I’m not in high school, and I’m not going crazy over the head cheerleader anymore. Heard?”
Eloise looked at him long and hard. “I’m not a head cheerleader because I’m blond, Toby. Don’t be a dick.”
“Heard?” Toby repeated.
“Heard.”
Toby felt himself swaying with drunkenness as he took the three steps toward the dorm hallway. He lost his balance and hit the wall.
“Did you have a good dinner?” Eloise called.
Leaning against the wall, but without turning around, Toby said. “Yeah. I saw the Empire State Building, all lit up, and, you know what? All I wanted to do was to come back here and see the Korean girl.”
“Uh huh.” Eloise sipped her tea. “Okay. See you when you sober up.”
Toby made his way down the hallway. Both dorm rooms were dark, with the doors shut. He realized his whole conversation with Eloise, in the common room, had potentially been recorded by the cameras there. That wasn’t good, but he hadn’t been dishonest in any way. He stood there, not sure what to do. Knocking on the women’s door was a dumb idea: even drunk, he knew that. But the urge to see Kacie was strong.
Standing there, he noticed for the first time the particular architecture of the hallway. At the very end, past the dorm doors, there was a sharp turn where the hallway intersected with an emergency exit door. He stood in the five-foot gap between the corner and the door, and looked down the hallway the way he had come, and realized that the hallway camera couldn’t possibly see anything going on in that gap.
He slid down the wall and sat on the floor, raised his knees and leaned forward on them, cupping his knees and lowering his head. If someone came out…
He fell asleep. Someone shook him awake after whatever time, and he looked up at the concerned face of Alia Kamara. With no headscarf, and her hair natural and short, she hardly looked like the same woman he had met a few days before.
“You’re okay?” Alia asked.
“I’m drunk,” Toby told her. “Wait, I’ll stand up.” He rolled to the side and was able to get himself up. Alia held his arm to steady him. “Sorry,” he told her. “Got you mixed up in my bullshit, right?”
“No, I don’t mind,” Alia said.
“I mean, you talked to Kacie, right?”
“We talked for a few minutes. She calmed down on her own once she’d thought it through. She’s a strong woman.”
“Still mad at me?”
“Women have the right to be mad,” Alia said. “You can’t make us stop. It’s part of how we cope with problems.”
“She hates me,” Toby said.
“Allahu alam, but I don’t think so. Toby, you have to go to bed.”
“I can’t let Eloise fuck it up.”
“Toby, go in and go to bed. It will make more sense tomorrow.”
He realized she was right. Alia gave him a little tug away from the wall, then a gentle shove in the back toward the door.
“Louie said he’s converting to Islam,” Toby told her.
“That will be good for him,” said Alia.
MADAME QUEEN’S CHEF SHOWDOWN
DAY 5
Winner: Eloise
Strike Two: Maryann
Strike One: Buster, Eloise, Kacie, Louie, Vegas
No strikes yet: Toby, Alia
Chapter Twenty-Two
Matelote
Kacie was not unfamiliar with the roiling torrent of jealous feelings in the body — but it had long been part of her past. The sexy boys in high school had been either arrogant flirtatious jerks, or nice guys who were totally owned by their girlfriends, and after years of feeling bad, she had managed to make her peace with being alone, with defining herself as a single woman by nature, for whom career was the ideal lover. She could never have predicted that, six days after arriving at a TV studio in a scenario that could make her a success, she would be sobbing and biting her pillow late at night because of a man.
Alia had spent some private time with her, sitting on the bed together, whispering in each other’s ears to stymie the microphone in the women’s dorm camera.
Alia: “Toby asked me to talk to you.”
Kacie: “Thanks, that was nice, but… I guess I don’t need it.”
Alia: “Well, you seem pretty upset.”
Kacie: “Yeah, I’m upset. I just don’t know. I never had a guy say he liked me before.”
Alia: “That’s crazy. Really?”
Kacie: “Yeah. How do you know you can trust a guy?”
Alia: “Well, really, you can’t. I’ve made a lot of mistakes with men. But I just keep trying. The right one is worth the pain you go through to find him.”
Kacie: “Are you saying Toby is the right one for me?”
Alia: “I don’t know, but I think you should trust your instincts. How do you feel about him?”
Kacie: “I don’t know if I should say. You aren’t going to tell him, right?”
Alia: “That’s up to you.”
Kacie: “Don’t tell him.”
Alia: “You should, though.”
Kacie: “I should, but it’s really hard.”
Alia: “But you know how you feel, right?”
Kacie: “I know how I feel, and I know how I should feel, and they aren’t the same.”
Alia: “Yeah, I know what that’s like. Well, you don’t have to tell me.”
Kacie: “No, that’s okay. It would be a relief to tell you. He’s… Shit, he’s perfect for me. I could die for him. I mean… Do you feel that way about Louie?”
Alia: “I envy you. No, I really like Louie, but he’s a nice guy, and it’s hard for me to get excited by nice guys. But I’m giving it a chance. I really want to fall in love with him. I want to find a person who is a good life’s companion and can be trusted, but I want to have that thrill, too. So far in my life, only the bad boys give me that thrill, but they aren’t good for anything else.”
Kacie: “I hate bad boys. All they ever did was shit on me. Is Toby a bad boy? Cause he looks like one.”
Alia: “I could be wrong, but I don’t think so.”
Kacie: “But what is he doing with Eloise?”
Alia: “He’s pretty mad at her. He doesn’t want her to mess things up with you.”
Kacie cried at that point.
Kacie: “How could anyone ever like me that much?”
Alia: “Allah provides.”
∞∞∞
In her tearful, fitful sleep, Kacie heard people coming and going late at night. Alia went out, was gone for a long time, came back and prayed before going to bed. Eloise came in even later, put on her bedside lamp and wrote in her notebook. Kacie put a pillow over her face.
“Sorry,” Eloise said. “Lights off in a few minutes.”
Kacie moved the pillow. “Fine, whatever.”
“Toby got drunk as a skunk,” Eloise said. “I guess he was stressed out.”
&n
bsp; “Okay,” Kacie said. “I’ll talk to him in the morning.”
“You’re a good friend,” Eloise said. “Thanks for your help. Okay, lights out now, I guess.”
She clicked the light off.
∞∞∞
Kacie took extra time to bathe and dress in the morning, found herself putting on the nice silk blouse and long skirt she had brought for fancy dress parties. It was stupid to wear that for breakfast, it was trying to compete with Eloise. ‘Thanks for your help.’ Yeah, like Kacie was going to help smooth the path for her. No fucking way.
She found Toby working in the kitchen. French toast, huckleberry compote, scrambled eggs.
“How are you doing?” he asked her. “Wow, you look great.”
She hugged him. “I’m sorry about last night. I’ve sorted it out. Don’t give up on me, Toby.”
He put down his spatula and hugged her back, rested his chin on her head. “I would never do that,” he said.
“You hung over?”
“A little bit.”
“Don’t eat the French toast. I’ll take care of you. I’ll make you something.”
She rushed to the pantry and gathered some ingredients, returned to the kitchen. “I need a burner.”
“Sure.”
While he finished cooking and serving breakfast, she made him a soup of beef broth, bean sprouts, and ramyun noodles.
“Oh, wow, that smells great,” Toby noted.
“Glad you think so, because you’re eating the whole thing.”
Buster was at the head of the table near the kitchen eating greedily, with egg and compote on his lips.
“Move,” Kacie told him.
“I’m still eating,” he said.
“Go sit over there.”
“Why should I?”
“Do you like having balls?”
“Yeah, I… Right.” He took his plate and his coffee and moved to the empty seat she indicated.
Kacie put the pot on a TKN trivet, set up a soup bowl for Toby and gestured to him. “Sit here.”
“Yes, ma’am,” said Toby.
She ladled ramyun, bean sprouts, and broth into the bowl, set some chopsticks across it. “Eat it all.” She stood over him.
Toby lifted the chopsticks and took his first bite. “I think this is the best soup I have ever had in my life,” he said.
“Give me some,” said Buster.
Kacie got a much smaller bowl and gave him a serving. He gulped it down.
“Thanks,” he said. “Now I know how to make it, too.”
“If we had more time,” Kacie said to Toby, “I’d make you haejangguk. That’s hangover stew. But it takes too long.”
“I think this will work,” Toby said.
Eloise came up the steps. “This French toast breakfast is no good for my calorie count, but just delish,” she said. “How are you, Toby? Feeling better?”
“He’s fine,” Kacie said. “I’m taking care of him.”
“No more histrionics, huh?”
Kacie didn’t know what that meant. She stared at Eloise. Eloise stared back. “Toby, you good?”
“Best soup ever,” Toby said. “Thanks, we’re fine.”
“You should try that soup,” Buster said. “I’m going to make it at lunch time, kick it up a notch. What do you say, want to join me?”
Eloise looked at the soup, then at Kacie, then at Toby. Finally, without looking at Buster, she said, “Sure, sounds great, Chef Wayne. See you, Toby.”
“See you, Eloise,” Kacie said.
Eloise went down into the common room.
“Go chat with her,” Kacie told Buster.
“Yeah, good idea,” he said, and got up.
Toby gestured to Kacie to sit by him. She poured the rest of the soup into his bowl, then obeyed.
“We are good, right?” he asked.
“You don’t need her,” Kacie said.
“I know that.”
“I’ll take care of you. Whatever you need. Except for winning. If we go against each other, I’ll try to beat you. But whatever else, you don’t need Eloise.”
“I don’t want Eloise,” he said.
∞∞∞
There were more staffers in Kitchen One than usual. Kacie recognized two of them, read their name-tags. “Oh, hey. Celeste, Matt.”
“Hi, Chef Lee,” said Celeste.
“Is Chef… Uh…? Is he on today?”
“No,” said Celeste. “Sorry, you’ll just have to wait for the information.”
Madame Queen was late. Shelley gave the crew a thirty-minute break. Kacie went to her station and rearranged her tools. Eloise passed by on the way to her own station, followed by Buster, who was still chatting her up. She stopped a moment. Buster stopped also. “I’ll catch up,” said Eloise. “Give us a moment.”
“Sure,” Buster said. He walked over to Eloise’s station and stood.
“Do we have a disconnect here?” Eloise asked.
“I think you understood me perfectly,” Kacie said.
“What I thought happened,” Eloise said, “is that you threw some immature hissy-fit at Toby and made him get drunk, and then he caught an attitude with me. And so you offered to straighten things out.”
“Okay, so there is a disconnect,” Kacie said. “Sure, I’ll explain. You can stop messing with Toby. I’ll take care of him.”
Eloise raised one eyebrow. “You’re cute.”
“Yeah. I am. So see how cute this is: he’s mine. Fuck off.”
The corners of Eloise’s mouth curled just slightly. “Okay, this conversation is over.”
“Fuck you,” Kacie added.
Eloise chortled. “I won’t lower myself. I just won’t. You’re young. You’ll learn.” She walked to her station, where Buster was waiting, and didn’t talk.
It was still a while before activity started in the studio, beginning with camera setups, and continuing with the arrival of Madame Queen and the show’s first special guest.
“Hammer Chef French - Franck Dampierre!” she announced. “And in tribute to Franck’s appearance as — a royal advisor — your queen has decreed that you must cook a dish of your choice in the traditional French mode. Chef Dampierre must approve your menu prior to your trip to the pantry. You have ten minutes to prepare your proposal for him — and then I will call upon you to describe on-camera what you would like to do.”
Hammer Chef Dampierre was a medium-height balding man in his mid-fifties with brownish-red hair, an aquiline nose, dark yet enthusiastic eyes. His traditional on-camera uniform was a white dress shirt, dark slacks, and a colorful red or green vest. Today it was a green vest. Kacie had watched him cook on TV many times and knew his style better than any other Hammer Chef. She felt she had a good chance to win his approval.
Taking one of the note pads available on the display table, she wrote down a number of recipes she had mastered in culinary school, including the specialties of her French cuisine instructor, Chef Camille Bellegarde.
The eight chefs were assembled onto a new set of marks arranged in front of a large cardboard standup resembling a French kitchen. Franck Dampierre sat in a comfortable chair wearing a tall white chef’s hat, a basket of baguettes and a plate of jam next to him. Cameras were set up to cover both the Hammer Chef and the competitor simultaneously. Multiple boom mikes hung ominously overhead.
“How wonderful to meet you all,” said Chef Dampierre. His French accent, which had been thick at the beginning of his TV career in the 1990s, was barely noticeable. “Since I have heard that you wonderful contestants are cooking dinners for each other, I have proposed to Madame Queen that I take my turn. And, here is a special announcement: today’s winner will be invited to partner with me to prepare a special meal of pieds paquets, soupe au pistou and perhaps, time permitting, I will teach how to bake a gibassier. How does that sound?”
There was a pause for sound-bytes, and all the contestants expressed great enthusiasm for the chance to cook with the Hammer Chef.
&
nbsp; Kacie waited her turn to present. Most of the choices were predictable. Toby was going for a Cajun-influenced ratatouille, Alia for chicken cordon bleu, as favored by her aunt Geraldine. Louie talked about boeuf bourguignon with a Mediterranean influence. Buster blabbed about reading Le Fooding cover to cover and having a picture of Jean-François Bizot in his apartment. Maryann had big plans for her escargot.
“Chef Lee,” Shelley called.
“Good to meet you, Chef Dampierre,” she said, and offered him a handshake. “I’m a fan. I’ve tried a lot of your recipes. Do you know my teacher, Camille Bellegarde?”
He nodded. “Yes, we worked together in Provence for a few months. I envy him the chance to teach; it is quieter than this TV life, I think.”
“Well, sir, if you’ll approve it, I’ll make Chef Bellegarde’s specialty, a matelote, with freshwater eel if I can get it. If not, then perhaps pike or perch?”
“Ah, I love that. Be generous with the mushrooms, generous with the wine.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Yes sir,” Buster mocked.
Kacie ignored him. “Does it sound good?”
“Ah, yes. Definitely approved.”
Chef Dampierre and Madame Queen rode down to the pantry to record some preliminary video; the competitors were told to wait upstairs.
Left to wait, Kacie retreated to her station. She looked up to see Eloise standing nearby.
“Yes?”
“I’m sorry about the quarrel,” Eloise said. “I was condescending to you. It was my fault.”
“Yeah.” Kacie accepted the handshake. “Okay, I’m sorry, too. We’re all pretty stressed out.”
“Toby’s a pretty easy guy to care about,” Eloise added. “He has a kind of puppy-dog quality. I don’t blame you for getting attached to him.”
“Yeah, well, I am.”
“Best of luck with that. Come on in for a hug.”
Kacie accepted the hug but didn’t hold very tightly. She noticed Eloise hadn’t promised to stay away from Toby. There was going to be more trouble, but Eloise was defining her terms: they would be polite about it.
She looked over at Toby. He was writing on his pad, planning his dish. Ratatouille was just a one-pot stew, with no complex preparation methods. It would play to his strength, seasoning; he was capable of making small but meaningful adjustments to flavors as his food was in progress. She felt like going to check on him, but if she did that right after the mess with Eloise, it would look like she was badmouthing Eloise — and she wasn’t that kind of person.