by Chris Negron
“What do you think it could be?” Paige asks. “His big announcement?”
“Has to be something to do with”—I wave my hand at the television screen—“all that.”
All that is the weird way the Super Chef acted the entire episode. When Lucas Taylor headed back to the stage to join the whispered judging, he tripped up the stairs. At one point he even looked like he was limping. Another time, when he raised half a ravioli on his fork before tasting it, his hand kind of shook. Seriously, his left thumb was actually twitching.
“Is he nervous?” Paige asked when she noticed.
The Super Chef never, ever got nervous. He was always way too cool and calm for that. I inhaled. “I’m not sure.”
The next day when we get home from school, we find Mom wearing sweatpants and her pajama top, the red-and-green one with the giant Christmas tree on the front. She’s never gone to work looking like that before. Then she clicks a button on the controller and switches over to the Firestick, actually highlighting the row of new releases and not the free ones we’ve seen a thousand times already.
“Special surprise! Movie night!” She points at the kitchen. “Curtis, how about you make that Mexican popcorn stuff you guys like so much? I bought all the right ingredients.”
Paige squeals. She loves my Mexican spiced popcorn. And the truth is, I haven’t made it in a while. My mind starts listing the ingredients, the recipe auto-recalling into my head.
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
2 teaspoons chili powder
1 teaspoon ground cumin
2 cups . . .
But something’s not right. No way can Mom afford to stay home from work for a movie night. “What about the post office?”
“Jerry gave me the night off,” she says. She kneels and puts her arm around Paige’s shoulders. “You, sweetie, get to pick the movie.”
I peer toward the kitchen. Usually Mom complains that her boss, Jerry, won’t even let her take a full coffee break. Now he’s giving her a whole night off? I want to try to figure it all out, but I spy a grocery bag on the counter and kernels pop around my head. “So you got the cayenne?”
“Think so.”
“And the right kind of chocolate?”
“Curtis, go check. I’m sure everything’s there.”
“Cuuurtis,” Paige whines. “Make me the spicy popcooorn!”
I head for the kitchen, shake the bag out onto the counter. There’s cayenne, score one for Mom, but cardamom instead of cinnamon and the wrong kind of chocolate: just basic 40 percent dark, not the more expensive 75 percent Mexican brand I usually use for this recipe.
On the plus side, there is a bit of cinnamon left over in the cupboard, and if I find some chili flakes or nutmeg, I might be able to make this inferior chocolate sing. I roll up my sleeves and start blending spices.
Twenty minutes later, I’m balancing three bowls of warm, spicy chocolate popcorn as I carefully pace into the living room. Paige picked the latest Pixar, of course. It’s paused on the title screen.
“See? You don’t think I know your recipes, but I do,” Mom says. “Had everything you needed, didn’t you?”
I can’t tell her she totally botched the ingredient list—no chili powder in sight—so instead I just nod and smile as I hand one bowl over to her, then another to Paige.
“Is it good?” I ask, watching them dig in.
Paige stuffs a handful of popcorn into her mouth, her cheeks puffing out like a chipmunk. “Terrible,” she mumbles with a smile.
“Human bites,” Mom scolds.
The movie starts and we fall into it, lost in the story, gathered up on the couch side by side under a heavy blanket. It’s so warm and perfect, I start to nod off. But just as everything begins to go dark, the doorbell rings.
Mom clicks pause. She glances over her shoulder, then, smiling a secret at us, fixes a “shush” finger at the center of her lips. There’s a shuffling in the hall, a loud knock. We slink under the blanket, huddling closer, trying not to giggle.
“Ms. Pith?” I’d recognize Pettynose’s voice anywhere. But what’s he doing here, snooping around? “I see your car’s outside.” Long pause. “On a work night. Are you home?”
I always thought he spied on us, the turd! He’s probably trying to catch me cooking again. So what if Mom’s car is home? That’s none of his business.
Our landlord’s shadow continues to darken the thin sliver of light coming from under the door for another minute or so, then we hear him stomp off.
“Whew,” Mom says, fake-swiping her brow like she was sweating bullets. She pats both our knees. “Did not want to have to talk to that man right now. Tonight’s for just the three of us.”
She reaches for the remote, but I grab it first and hold it away from her, like I’m playing keep-away with Tre in recess. “What’s going on, Mom?”
Mom’s popcorn crunching slows down, then stops completely. “Curtis, I don’t—”
“Why are you really home?”
“I told you, I have the night off. Can’t I spend one evening at home with my kids, watching movies?” She hugs Paige closer. “Am I not allowed to do that?”
“Why are you hiding from Pettynose, then?”
“Mr. Pettynose,” Paige corrects me before Mom has the chance. “I want the movie.”
Mom’s eyes narrow at me. “Let your sister finish her movie.”
I hand back the remote, fold my arms across my chest, and scooch closer to the end of the couch, so there’s a big gap between us. The blanket’s only covering one of my legs now. It gets cold really quickly.
Mom wakes me up when she lifts Paige over one shoulder. My sister hardly moves. She gets that way around bedtime. Out cold, all floppy.
“Brush your teeth,” Mom whispers when she sees me awake. “Then straight to bed. We’ll finish the movie tomorrow.” She carries Paige toward the back of the apartment. We only have one bedroom, which Paige and I share. Mom’s bed is the couch. She lays a sheet over it, wraps a blanket around herself, and tosses and turns there.
When Mom comes back into the living room, though, I still haven’t moved off her couch-bed. “Hey, I thought I told you—”
“Jerry doesn’t give you nights off.”
Mom’s hands drop from her hips to her sides. When she exhales, it’s like all the breath she has in her leaves her body at once. She deflates completely.
She sits on the couch next to me. “Okay, Mr. Smarty Pants. I was going to tell you in the morning. The post office let me go today.”
“You mean . . . fired?”
Mom nods. Her lips are flat and her cheeks a little puffy and pinkish.
I feel myself breathing heavier. “You were late yesterday. Because of that stupid meeting at school. Because of me—”
“No, honey. No. That’s not why. They were going to cut back anyway. There’ve been rumors about it for months. And I was the newest one there. That’s how it works.” Mom reaches back and twists her hair into a ponytail. She sighs. “It’s so hard not to be the newest one, though, when you’re constantly starting over.”
“Is that what you’re going to do? Start over?”
“Of course. I’ll find something.” She wears a smile, but it isn’t her real one.
My head suddenly feels heavy; it droops down, pretty much on its own. Mom puts a finger under my chin to lift my face up again. “Hey, listen. I just wanted one good night with my favorite people before starting to interview again. Sorry to keep secrets. I’ll tell Paige in the morning. Promise. In the meantime, I need your help.”
I gaze up at her.
“We’re going to have to make some cutbacks, and I need you to be brave about it.”
“Okay,” I say slowly. I’m not sure how much more cut back we can get.
She glances at the kitchen. “We’re gonna have to call a timeout on the fancy ingredients.”
“But—”
“Curtis, you know I love to see you cook.” She snorts. “The only
thing I probably love more is eating what you make.” She grins and pats her stomach.
I lock my lips together, refusing to laugh at her joke.
Mom’s smile fades until her expression matches mine. “But right now basic is better. We have to find ways to stretch our funds for a little while.”
“But how am I going to become a chef if I don’t practice?” I ask, panic bubbling up at the base of my throat.
“Honey. You can still practice.”
My mouth drops open by itself. I puff out air loudly. She needs to see how shocked I am, how ridiculous what she just said is. “With what? Ramen noodles and string cheese?”
Mom frowns at me. “It’s not a forever thing, Curtis. You know, lots of people aren’t so lucky to be able to afford fancy ingredients sometimes, never mind all the time.”
I nod like I understand. And I do, partly. I get how money works. And I’m pretty intimate with the difference in price between fresh Chilean sea bass and frozen tilapia filets. Still, if I don’t have the right ingredients, I can’t try the right recipes. My whole career’s being blasted into oblivion, a giant mushroom cloud. Not a regular mushroom, either. More like . . . I don’t know, a lion’s mane or a maitake or something.
“You can do anything you put your mind to,” Mom says, her smile starting to return. “You might just have to be a little more creative.” She tickles my sides, and I squirm away. “Anything. Including . . . going to bed.” She pushes me up to my feet. “Come on. Up, up, up.”
I let her pull me toward my toothbrush, even though what I really want to do is keep arguing. Sprint into the kitchen, make some dough or start a stock or julienne some carrots. But I won’t. I can’t. I owe Mom and Paige that much. After all, I know Mom isn’t telling me the whole truth. It was my fault she lost her job, it had to be.
And now here we are: no money, no job. Our lives, our home even, hanging by the thinnest of threads.
5
The Super Chef stands on the stage of his kitchen arena, a bright spotlight trained on him. His sous chefs have departed. Chef Taylor is alone, the complete focus of the camera’s attention.
“It’s time for a change,” he begins in a serious voice.
“Curtis, I can’t see,” Paige complains behind me. I must be an inch away from the television.
A week has passed since Mom got fired. Sorry, “laid off.” She’s been home every night. Until now, anyway. Her other interviews have all been during the day, but tonight she had a second meeting at a restaurant in town. Paige and I are on our own for the first time since last week’s Super Chef episode.
“Okay,” I say. I step to one side, but with each word the Super Chef utters, I feel myself drifting back to the front of the TV. Tonight’s episode ended a few minutes ago, when Jeff from Chicago bit the dust, leaving only the final three chefs. Then there were a bunch of commercials before the studio finally flashed back into focus and only Lucas Taylor stood before us.
This is it, his big reveal, the one they warned us last week will change the cooking world forever.
Chef Taylor gulps. “This season is nearly over. First, I want to congratulate all of our contestants. They’ve fought hard and cooked their hearts out. And I must say, I’m always so proud of our Super Chef competitors. These incredible cooks who accept the enormous challenge of competing on our show, in front of millions, they put their courage on display, front and center. But not only that. With each innovative dish and new approach they bring to our arena, they also show the world the very essence of food. They shine a stark, unflinching spotlight on the state of cooking today.” He inhales. “I think that’s been the greatest gift to emerge from this show, one I didn’t expect when I started out.”
The Super Chef seems to take a break. His eyes lose a little focus, his breath comes in measured beats. It’s like he’s summoning his own bravery. Finally he continues. “As you know, normally after each season of Super Chef ends, we take a break. We need the time off to return our focus to our restaurants, the rest of our businesses. But this year is different.”
I glance over my shoulder at Paige. The earmuffs are off, and her eyes are wide. She’s just as interested in what the Super Chef is about to say as I am.
“It’s been a few years, hasn’t it?” The Super Chef’s smile at the camera seems sad. “I can’t tell you how much I’ve appreciated everyone’s support all this time. I’ve had a great run.”
“He’s talking like he’s eighty and ready to retire,” Paige says. “How old is he?”
“Forty-seven,” I say without taking my eyes off the screen.
“Most of you know I’m not married. No children.” That’s the first time I’ve heard him say that out loud. It makes me feel so invisible my stomach clenches. At the same time, I’m glad Paige doesn’t know the things I do. I’d hate for her to feel what I’m feeling right now.
“I’ve been thinking a lot about what we have here.” Taylor peers around his arena, the same one he’s used to film his show since season one. “About what the legacy of the Super Chef—all this work, for all these years—should be. And you know . . . it occurred to me that the Super Chef isn’t just a single person. No, the Super Chef has become . . . well, more of an idea, one that should be used not just to demonstrate the present of cooking, but its future as well. If this show has to come to an end—”
The live crowd, previously silent, listening carefully, trying to understand where Taylor was headed with this speech, collectively gasps.
The Super Chef tilts his head, acknowledging their surprise but clearly unwilling to let it deter him. “As all good things do . . . I want our last winner to say more about the bright future of the culinary world than any winner from our previous seasons has. So we’re not taking our customary break. We’re staying right here for—”
Chef Taylor glances to one side, where a big TV screen waits. The Super Chef diamond logo appears in its center, quickly replaced by only the words:
THE SUPER CHEF
Then a big stamp graphic flies in, separating the first two words with a loud, clangy ka-chunk.
The camera returns to Chef Taylor. The pace of his speech picks up with each word. “After this season’s Super Chef champ is crowned next week, a new show will begin. The Last Super Chef will feature a new kind of competitor, never before seen in this arena. Kids. Each of the five contestants on our last season will be a child between the ages of ten and twelve, young enough, open-minded enough, with the right amount of eagerness, to be the ideal candidates to help us move on from Super Chef by showing the world’s kitchens a clear path to cooking’s future. The stark promise the culinary world holds.”
Paige kicks me in the back of the leg. My knee buckles. But I don’t turn around. I can’t. She’s excited. Of course she is. She doesn’t know he’s our father. She’s not blown away by the idea of Lucas Taylor holding this contest in the first place, inviting a bunch of stranger kids to compete while continuing to pretend we don’t exist.
And why? Why does there need to be a final season all of a sudden? Who’s going to show me recipes like the ones I’ve learned from Chef Taylor and his team? Sure, there are other cooking shows, but none hold a candle to this one. There is no chef like the Super Chef.
Taylor continues. “The contest will also have a grand prize, to help the winner reach their dreams, strive for a future of their own. The winner of The Last Super Chef will start with $250,000 in his or her pocket, to do with as they see fit: start a restaurant, begin a fund for their own culinary education, maybe travel the globe. Perhaps the winner of the prize money will want to follow in my footsteps, start off by tasting the wonders of the world’s cuisine. It will be entirely up to them.”
The crowd murmurs when they hear the amount, more than double the winnings of any of the previous adult Super Chef competitions. I suck a breath in. It’s also more money than Mom makes in . . . I don’t know how long. Tons of time. It might be enough to buy an actual house for her and Paige. No m
ore apartments. No more snooping landlords.
This is my chance to pay my mom back for all her sacrifices and hard work. To show both her and Paige there was a reason, some kind of outcome, for all my dedication to cooking these past few years. All the times they had to spend a whole Saturday on a long journey to some special out-of-the-way grocery or wait in a huge line for just the right cut of meat.
Because if there has to be a Last Super Chef—and I can’t see any way to stop it, not from North Sloan—maybe all the competitors don’t have to be stranger kids. No one else can possibly deserve to win more than Chef Taylor’s own son, right? Well, of course it’s right. I deserve that prize. Whether she knows it or not, Paige deserves it. Mom definitely deserves it.
“The Last Super Chef will be a kid who doesn’t just love cooking. They’ll need to live and breathe food.” Chef Taylor inhales again. “Here’s how it’ll work. We’ll be taking video submissions. The video you send in must demonstrate your unique cooking talents and show us why you deserve to be one of our contestants. You can find the full rules at thelastsuperchef.com. Once we have all the videos, we’ll pick five kids to compete in a special shortened season of Super Chef. Only five!” he says, holding up his hand, with his fingers and that twitching thumb spread out. “The competition will last for a few weeks after that, and on Thanksgiving Day, we’ll announce the champion. After our turkey and stuffing and pie, we’ll get to find out who the Last Super Chef will be!”
Taylor waits for the hesitant applause from the live crowd to die down. “We’re looking for kids passionate about cooking, kids who already have the talent to thrive and the drive to survive. Good cooks who want to be great chefs. Our online entry form will go live immediately after the show, and remain open to entries through midnight Saturday.”
“This Saturday?” I yell at the TV. That’s three days from now.
“Do you have what it takes to be the Last Super Chef?” Chef Taylor asks, as if he’s heard my doubt and is challenging it. “Let’s find out!”