West Coast Love

by Tif Marcelo

  I clear my throat, feigning sportsmanship. “Congratulations, though. Isn’t this what you wanted?” My gaze roots itself on the outline of our RV on the other side of the sparse line of trees. Tara’s red windbreaker is like a beacon; she’s seated at the picnic table. Adrian is taking off for the bathrooms with his toiletry bag in hand.

  “It’s what I wanted from the very beginning.”

  Ouch. Those are different words than what he told me at True North. He’d assured me it was a one-time deal and seemed apologetic that he had to host to begin with.

  He’s clearly going to compete.

  Then, hell, game on.

  “So we should both do our best. Don’t hold back.” Even as I say the words, my stomach drops. This situation transcends awkwardness. It could mean hurt feelings. Mine most especially, because Joel is good. I saw his segment with my own eyes, and he is hands down a natural for this show.

  “You’re in, too?”

  “Well, yeah. I want the next job.” I grin despite myself, competitiveness clawing through my shock. I glance up at him and wonder if his question was sincere or if he’s gauging my level of commitment. “I love to write. But did you think I was going to hand you the opportunity? You did one good segment.” Shocked at my own words, I backtrack. “I didn’t mean . . .”

  He barks out a laugh laced with something more, like he’s laughing at me. “Right. From someone who has yet to eat a full plate of barbecue.”

  “Okay. I think we better head back to camp.” My head starts to pound at the whiplash of these last few hours. “This conversation isn’t going well.” I stand.

  He pulls me back by my wrist. “Shit. Victoria, I’m sorry.”

  Hearing sincere remorse in his voice, I sit back down. “I’m sorry, too. I didn’t mean it. You’re talented, and you’re not a one-hit wonder, unlike some of those nineties singers we’ve talked about. Like Vanilla Ice.”

  “Nice.” He smiles at my reference, the first one of the day. And per usual, it settles my nerves and gives me some comfort that things aren’t spinning out of control. Because this awkwardness is ultimately about us. What happens to us? Will this competition end the little we have?

  “This doesn’t change what we have, and it doesn’t change how I feel about you. How do you feel?” He laces his fingers with mine, places our palms together.

  I size them up. I allow the distraction to let me breathe. “I’m shocked. Still processing. I know I don’t want things to change between us.”

  “We’ll have to keep talking to each other.”

  I lean back and give an exaggerated grin. “Where is my Joel and what did you do to him? You’re asking me to keep in communication?”

  His smile turns sheepish and shy. “Guess I’m starting to listen with you as my wingwoman.”

  I catch the reference to Top Gun. “Um. You’re my wingman. But yes, I agree, we should keep each other abreast of everything. How we feel, especially.” The ring of a phone reaches me, and I look up to see Tara take a call. I heave a breath. “We should go before one of them sees us.”

  We opt to not seal our conversation with a kiss, and with a final nod we grab our bags and walk back along the rest of the trail to the campsite. Tara and Adrian are hovering over the computer at the picnic table.

  “What’s up?” I approach them from behind.

  Adrian’s sporting a wide, mischievous grin. “Take a look at this.”

  Tara presses play on the stilled video. Music begins as the camera pans over to a horde of people at the festival in what I recognize now as Desert Willow. It cuts to a shot of me and my first segment, laughing at something Bo from Benny’s BBQ said. The next scene is of Joel biting into a slider, eyes rolling back in delight. Then, the title flashes on the screen:

  West Coast BBQ in red caps. Below it, He Said, She Said in black italic script.

  It flashes to a picture of me, hands on my hips, giving someone a pointed look with my name in a calligraphy font scrolled below it. It cuts to Joel’s picture with his name in bold caps.

  “Whoa. Is this a real commercial?” I’m glued to the stills being flashed on the screen, ending with a map where stars mark the festival locations.

  “Yep,” Tara says. “Before, we simply had graphics on the website. Now, it’s a full-on video teaser, and we even have it uploaded to our partner websites and cable channel. It’s live now.”

  “What does that mean?”

  Adrian laughs. “It means you’re famous, sweetheart.”

  “That’s fucking cool,” Joel says.

  “No pressure,” I quip.

  “What’s that? Is that fear I hear in your voice?” Joel asks with a playful tone.

  He means it innocently, I know. His teasing should have spurned me to answer back in a funny but pointed way. But instead of a wave of excitement, I get a pit in my belly. I’d taken some comfort that West Coast BBQ would remain a smaller project with low exposure. That gaining widespread exposure was possible, but not guaranteed. That mistakes, though humiliating for me, would largely go unnoticed. But this is serious. Now that it’s going to be aired on their partner food channel on cable TV . . .

  There’s absolutely no way anyone will believe I love barbecue.

  I’ll have to make sure that I kick ass at the last three stops. I swallow my thoughts and clear my throat so I can muster an equally smart-alecky voice. “Yeah, it’s fear. But it’s fear for you; I don’t know how you’ll recover from being upstaged.”

  Both Tara and Adrian cheer my comeback.

  Tara claps her hands to get our attention. “Okay, silly kids, we have to leave in a couple of minutes. We’re just taking the Suburban. It’s only a few miles to the festival site, and I don’t know about you all, but I am hungry. Plus, we’re meeting our new cameraman.”

  While I’m curious to see who’s going to be added to our well-oiled crew, the thought of putting more smoked meat in my body is making my stomach turn. I smile anyway, because no matter how I feel about the food, about Joel, and about what my future might bring, I’m on this road now. And I’ve got to fake it till I make it.

  26

  JOEL

  Tara leads us along a graveled walkway to the press entrance of the Gilroy barbecue festival, and after gaining our press badges asks, “So who has been to the Gilroy Garlic Festival before?” She raises her own hand to cue us, like a kindergarten teacher.

  Each of us has a hand up. As the self-professed garlic capital of the world, Gilroy hosts an annual garlic festival that draws thousands of garlic lovers like myself from all corners of California. My parents made this festival a yearly family trip. I remember smelling garlic from miles away, even with our car windows rolled up, and after a day of eating food infused with garlic, from fries topped with shredded garlic to garlic and pesto pasta to slices of baguette spread with garlic and blue cheese butter, I’d sweat garlic for a week.

  Tara continues, “It’s time to change your opinion of Gilroy because it has the potential to become a barbecue hub as well. Your job, Joel and Victoria, is to hype up this festival, as small as it is. As mentioned before: there will be a new cameraman on board, and I believe he’s already inside scoping out potential locations to shoot. After we have a quick lunch, we’ll get started on the segment.”

  I nod. Victoria glances at me but looks away quickly. I grit my teeth; this opportunity is a double-edged sword.

  I can’t lose this competition.

  I can’t give this chance up. And now with the commercial sure to draw in more of an audience and with Victoria seemingly down to beat me in this game, I can’t look like a dumbass on air.

  Except how will I be able to do this while Victoria and I have this thing? Logic tells me to go balls to the wall with the competition since I might never see her again. There’s no real loss when the relationship couldn’t last to begin with.

  But that’s a lie. I could lose Victoria’s respect and my own self-respect. I could lose the good memories we’ve bottled
up. I could lose her. Her in the future.

  The possibility of she and I together.

  If I win, I hurt her.

  If she wins, she’s gone from my life, off on another adventure.

  If she wins, I’ll have lost a dream job.

  If I win, I get my dream job but lose the girl.

  I’m not naïve. I knew it was going to come to this, that we were going to leave each other soon enough, but I expected it to be organic and natural, something that came with time and distance. This competition changes the vibe of our goodbye. Now we’re going to be fighting for ourselves until the cameras stop rolling.

  But as we enter the main festival area, under a sign that reads, It’s not just about garlic in Gilroy. It’s barbecue, too, I’m distracted . . . by the lack of people.

  Adrian echoes my thoughts, whispering under his breath, “Wow. It’s smaller than Desert Willow.” He takes off his cap and puts it on backward.

  There’s enough room on the walkway for the four of us to walk side by side, and we grab samples without having to get in line. In less than ten minutes we are sitting at picnic tables—which we didn’t have to stalk—eating our meal. The festival has so few vendors that I could probably throw a baseball from the first tent to the last and not hit anyone along the way.

  “This is minuscule. And the crowd is so . . . blah.” Victoria remarks, using a fork and knife to cut into her chicken breast. The same woman who earlier rolled up her pancake is now so dainty with her food. I don’t get it.

  “It doesn’t help it’s a weekday,” I say.

  “And that poor band. They’re . . . bad.”

  We all nod at the sad noises the band is emitting from the stage, like elephants crying for their mothers, with drumbeats that seem to trickle off into nowhere. The entire vibe is bleak. It screams disappointment, despite the fact that the garlic festival a couple of months ago drew a record crowd. Same location, same outreach, same media, and yet, turnout is subpar.

  My expectation is for the barbecue to suck, and from the look on Victoria’s face—she’s wearing a frown that has her forehead folded into creases—it seems like she’s anticipating a similar letdown.

  But when I dig into the pulled pork from Popping Pig, the meat melts in my mouth, and shock and satisfaction shoot through me. The vinegar in the sauce is light, and there is an aftertaste of citrus that trails off into a sweetness that leaves me drooling for more. “Damn. This is good.”

  I look up at the rest of the crew. Tara’s and Adrian’s faces are turned into their food. Victoria’s staring off into the distance, chewing daintily. She’s probably racking up catchphrases for the segment, so I scoop another piece of pulled pork into my mouth and begin to list descriptors in my head as well:

  Taste buds on overload.

  Somebody turned on the lights on this pulled pork.

  Where have you been all my life?

  The light at the end of the Gilroy barbecue tunnel.

  Tara wipes her mouth and tosses her napkin into her empty bowl. “I mean, who knew this place would be so dead but still have some pretty good barbecue?”

  “I know. Even I liked it,” Victoria adds, and we all laugh. She lays a hand on the table to make a point. “No, I mean it. The chicken wasn’t dry, and the rub they used brought out the natural taste of the smoke, which, I have to say, wasn’t overwhelming. But I don’t know how we can create the illusion that the festival is the place to be when it’s so obvious there’s no one here.”

  Tara laces her fingers together. “We can set the camera up in the tent.”

  “Did someone say the magic word?” A guy approaches us in a checkered flannel and ripped jeans, hair combed slick on top with shaved sides. He greets us with a smile and thrusts his hand out to Tara. “I’m Lowell. You must be Tara.”

  “I am.” Tara squints up. “You’re our new camera guy.”

  “That’s me. I’m at your disposal.”

  Tara introduces Adrian and Victoria, and when she gets to me, Lowell says, “You’re the one I’m replacing.”

  I hate how it sounds, but I nod. “Yep.”

  He slaps me a firm handshake. “I’m keen to work with you, hoping you can impart some good tips.”

  His eagerness is disarming, youthful. Casually, I ask, “How long have you been doing this?”

  “This is actually my first gig as a solo cameraperson.”

  I wipe my mouth with my napkin to keep from cursing. My first thought: I can’t be a cohost with Victoria because there’s no way in hell I’m going to let this guy fuck up this gig. My second thought: I’m going to have to trust this guy to film us correctly.

  Being a cameraman isn’t solely a technical job. Sure, one must be proficient with the equipment. But the cameraperson must also anticipate the moving parts within a scene.

  That stuff is something that’s either instinctual or garnered through practice.

  I test him. “How do you think we should shoot this segment? We’ve got a festival that has minimal attendance, and our challenge is to make this place look full.”

  He looks beyond us to the crowd, then rubs his chin. “I say we should involve the crowd, tell them that they have a chance to be on television. We can bring the vendors out so they’re all behind one table, arrange the people so they’re behind them, so it looks busy. We can even set the tables up closer to the band so it’s loud and chaotic.” His eyes dart from me to Tara. “How’s that?”

  Tara looks up at him in contemplation, and when she cuts me a quick look, I nod. It’s a damn good idea. “All right. Let’s get going.” She claps. “Let’s make it our goal to start filming in an hour. That will leave enough time to send it to the LA crew for final edits before the show tonight.”

  We toss our trash in a garbage can and grab the equipment from the Suburban. Tara makes the rounds with the vendors to tell them the plan. I bend down to hoist the camera onto my shoulder when Lowell clears his throat. “Um, not today, you.”

  “Oh, right.” I hand him the camera. Habits. I stand next to Victoria, awkwardness blooming between us. Earlier, we talked about us being okay with this, but now that we’re here, it is definitely not. “Maybe we should discuss our strategy—” I start just as she says, “We need to talk about who goes first.”

  I tear my eyes from her and scan our surroundings. No one seems to be paying us any mind. I lead her a few feet down, back toward the picnic tables.

  Finally sitting across from Victoria, I don’t know where to begin. With her hands on top of the table, I’m tempted to reach out and touch her, to bring us back to twelve hours ago. But business comes first.

  She beats me to the punch. “I think I should start the introduction.”

  “Okayyy.” I draw out the word. “I suppose you can start. Then I can introduce the vendors.”

  “Actually,” she interrupts. “There’s more than one vendor. We can alternate with every vendor.”

  A small sigh escapes my lips. What she’s saying seems fair, but her tone’s aggressive—she’s trying to take the alpha position. But I keep my protests at bay. We need to work together, and the amount of time in front of the camera will shake out. “Fine. After vendor introductions, we start the tasting.”

  “Right. And after that—”

  “Actually, after that, I’d like to talk a little about their equipment or the theory behind their cooking. Believe it or not, it varies from person to person.”

  “Will we even have time for that?”

  “Yeah, why not?”

  “With five vendors—”

  “With the two of us doing the tasting, it won’t take long.”

  It’s now Vic’s turn to sigh. The tension is thick between us, so I wait for what I know is coming—a complaint. But she doesn’t say a word.

  “What is it?” I ask, not able to let it go.

  “It’s nothing.” After a beat, she relents. “You’re just hell-bent on taking over.”

  “I’m not . . .” But her message
settles in the cogs of my brain. I’m eager; this is my time. Yet, I have to respect that this gig was hers alone to begin with. “Sorry.”

  “Just remember that we’re a team, Joel.”

  “I know.” I’m walking on eggshells with what I want to say. Nothing has ever been so unclear to me, because whenever it’s gotten complicated, I’ve always walked away. I can’t with Vic. I don’t want to. “Thank you, for telling me. I want us to be okay through this.”

  She shakes her head. “I thought a lot about our last conversation on the drive here. I mean, what is us anyway? Sex buddies? Friends with benefits?”

  I frown. What is this, an alternate universe? Haven’t we covered this already? “Where is this coming from?”

  “Are you saying there’s more?” Confusion flashes on her face. At my silence—because I’m shocked to shit at where this conversation has ended up—she laughs half-heartedly. “You said for us to be honest in our feelings, and I’m doing that now. Things are changing whether or not we want them to. We started out being ‘simple.’ ” She puts air-quotes around the word simple. “Then we move to being here for each other while on this trip. I was fine with all that. But now? My only real choice is to give you a run for your money, and we can’t do that when we’re sleeping with each other, can we? We both need our current jobs, right? And don’t you want the next one, too?”

  “Yes.”

  “Me, too.”

  A whistle cuts through the air, and we turn to see Tara waving us down. Lowell has the camera on his shoulder.

  “But it doesn’t mean I feel any different from before,” I say.

  “Is that the truth?” she asks me. “You don’t feel any competitiveness or real need to push me out of the running?”

  I hesitate before answering, because I cannot lie and tell her otherwise. Damn.

  “We have all these good intentions and yet . . .” She looks away, toward Tara. She smiles meekly. “We should go. She’s a second from coming this way. Talk later?”

  I nod, not having any other choice, and push my unease down into the pit of my belly.

  When we arrive at the tents, Tara hands us our individual microphones. Five people in their various company shirts mill and chat behind a large table, where plates of samples of their food contain every type of smoked meat imaginable. Around them are random strangers, giddy and excited. The set is damn perfect.