All Stirred Up

by Brianne Moore

  “I hope so.” He resumes his seat and picks up his menu. “If you see the waitress on your way out, send her my way, will you?”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Relaunch

  Two weeks pass in a rush: they’re a freight train, and Susan, Gloria, and the rest of the Elliot’s staff are just clinging on for dear life, hoping to avoid a crash.

  They’ve been working all hours, all hands on deck. The dining room is finally in good shape, all of Julia’s special-ordered fixtures and chairs and sofas in their appointed places. Food’s been served up for the waitstaff, who are drilled on every last ingredient by the head waiter. He occasionally stops and shouts to one of them, “What wine goes with this course? Name three, at different price points!” If they can’t answer in under twenty seconds, they sit there with him for hours until they know that wine list and that food better than they know their own parents.

  In the pastry kitchen, Susan churns out miniature cakes, leaves of crisp puff pastry, ice creams, mousses, breads, and dainty biscuits and chocolates. Chris generously sends Rab full time for the last week, and she’s grateful for the help.

  She’s also grateful for the refuge of the kitchen: photographers have actually begun camping out at Moray Place and the restaurant, shouting questions at her as she runs past on her way to work.

  “It’s a bit tacky,” Bernard sighs, looking out at them. But he can’t help but strut down the front stairs every time he leaves the house, pausing to tell the press, “Now, now, my daughter’s entitled to some privacy over her love life, is she not? And as a father, of course, I must protect that privacy, and I would never, ever discuss anything like a forthcoming engagement.”

  “Don’t stop him,” Julia warned when Susan shrieked after hearing what her father said. “You can’t buy the kind of publicity the relaunch will get now.”

  And finally, it’s here: the big night. Susan has just enough time to run home and change (“You need me to do your makeup again?” Julia shouts after her as Susan throws herself back out the door and into a waiting taxi) before she’s back at the restaurant, plating up miniature desserts. In the kitchen, Gloria’s turned up the music and is cranking out amazing dishes, shouting orders, keeping things moving. Rey slides tray after tray of delectable samples from the menu into the dumbwaiter, sending them up to the waitstaff, who hover, ready for the rush.

  “Susan! Come on! Doors are open!” Julia yells, tottering halfway down the staircase on impossibly high heels.

  Susan pipes one last rosette on a tart, wipes her hands, whips off her apron, and clatters upstairs, giving Rab a few last-minute pointers as she goes.

  Elliot’s is mobbed. So jammed full of people already that she can hardly get the kitchen door open to slip out and start mingling. Shoulders and elbows jab her as she passes, and the rising roar of conversation makes it almost impossible to make out what any one person is saying. The bartenders are whipping out drinks, making a show of rattling the cocktail shakers and pouring from a height into perfectly chilled glasses. The waitstaff somehow manages to circulate with their trays, smiling, pointing to the food, enticing everyone to try just a bite. It’s disappearing fast; empty plates and trays go into the dumbwaiter and are returned to the kitchen, and more appear.

  Susan catches sight of her father in the crowd, talking to some expensively dressed people, gesturing to the restaurant and then pointing to Julia and patting her on the shoulder. Julia smiles modestly and shrugs. “Oh, this? No big deal. An easy project, really.”

  Someone grabs Susan’s hand and shakes it, and she turns to smile in the face of one of the judges from the Foodies Festival. He’s saying something to her, but she can’t make it out, so she just smiles and nods and thanks him.

  Have they really invited all these people? It seems like more than she approved for the guest list. She notes the journalists and critics, family and friends, but there are other faces that are familiar but she can’t quite place. And outside …

  Dear God! Susan glances out the front window of the restaurant and blinks in astonishment. If it seems mobbed inside, it’s nothing to the scene outside. A massive crowd has gathered, with photographers sprinkled among them, snapping away at people coming in. There are actually police there, doing crowd control. Every now and again, someone coming in pauses at the door, smiles, poses, and the crowd cheers a little louder. One of them is an actor on a ridiculously popular fantasy TV show. Susan didn’t even know he was in Edinburgh. He definitely wasn’t on the guest list.

  “Did you invite all these extra people?” she asks Julia, pulling her sister aside from a group of young banker types in the “casual” uniform of jeans and bespoke shoes.

  “No,” Julia answers, jerking her arm away. “But be glad they’re here—the press is all over it. Nobody’ll bother with Dan tonight.” With a smug smile and a pat on Susan’s arm, she returns to her admirers.

  Susan glances back out the window just in time to see Philip arrive. The crowd shrieks and pushes against the police holding them back. He smiles, waves, stops to sign autographs and submit to hugs from overzealous fans. He spots her through the window, grins, and gestures for her to join him. Susan shakes her head; the crowd doesn’t want her, and the thought of going out there and making herself a spectacle makes her throat go dry.

  A smarmy voice beside her remarks, “My, my, quite the turnout tonight.” Rufus. Of course. He sidles up to her, arms clasped behind his back, and looks out at Philip and the crowd. “You’ve done a marvelous job, Susan, just excellent.”

  “Thanks,” she says.

  “Don’t you want to go out and join him?” Rufus asks, moving a little closer. Susan crosses her arms and finds herself leaning away from him.

  “No, I’m fine here.”

  “Don’t blame you. I wouldn’t want to be out there either. Not with him, anyway.”

  The way he spits the word “him” makes Susan turn toward him, frowning. “What’d he do to you? Why do you hate him so much?”

  “I told you—he’s not a nice person.”

  “You’ll have to give me more than that.”

  “You know he dumped his last girlfriend for getting fat?”

  Susan snorts. “I find that very hard to believe.”

  “Look it up, then. They were together more than a year, and then she put on weight for a role, and once the film was done, she had trouble taking it back off again. He dumped her four days before the premiere. No warning at all. By text. Some people are such cowards.”

  “I’m not exactly a stick,” Susan points out. “And I happen to know there was more to it than that. You’ll have to do better.”

  He shrugs. “He may have said there was more to it, but then, he would. He lost a bit of ground with fans when the story broke. So being seen about with you might be a way of rehabilitating his image.” He smirks out the window. “Seems to have worked.”

  “I think you’re just trying to create drama,” Susan scoffs, trying not to think of all the times Philip’s put the pair of them on display.

  “Believe what you like, my dear. But he’s a product and needs to sell himself. Angry people won’t buy.”

  Susan rolls her eyes. “You just want a story. You want a big, dramatic breakup so you can blog about it.”

  “I wouldn’t say ‘no’ if that’s what you’re offering.”

  “I’m not.”

  “I’m not surprised. You don’t seem like the dramatic type.” He sighs. “Can’t fault me for trying, right?”

  As she glares at him, Philip pops up beside her and grabs her arm, saying, “Come on! They want to meet you!”

  “What? No, Philip, I—”

  Too late. He’s dragged her out the door to the front of the restaurant. Susan feels him shoving her toward the crowd, yelling, “Isn’t she amazing? Come to her restaurant!”

  She freezes, somehow managing to smile as the crowd roars and people shout things she can’t make out. There are cameras and phones out, snapping pictures
and recording. Philip wraps his arm around her shoulder and gives her a big kiss on the cheek. Girls in the crowd squeal. Susan wants nothing more than to retreat back inside, but Philip’s arm is so tight around her, she can’t move. The noise and the chaos and the crowd and the cameras are everywhere, and she thinks, Oh my God, I’m in hell.

  * * *

  She looks like she’s being tortured, Chris thinks, just managing to make his way through the thicket of people surrounding the entrance to the restaurant. To him, Susan looks pale and overwhelmed, her smile brittle, body tense. He sees Philip throw an arm around her, and she stiffens even more. Get off her, he thinks fiercely. Can’t you see she doesn’t like it? How can you not see it?

  He steps toward her, but a policeman blocks his path.

  “Sorry, sir, but do you have an invitation?” he asks Chris.

  Chris yanks his phone out and scrolls through his emails, searching for the invitation he received a week ago.

  “Hi there!” a chipper voice to his right pipes up. He glances over and finds the journalist who interviewed him on the radio, standing next to him, searching her phone as well. “Didn’t expect to see you here,” she says, holding her invitation up for the policeman to see. “Not after what you said on the show. Have you come back around on Elliot’s?”

  Chris presents his invitation, and he and the journalist are admitted. “Elliot’s is a wonderful restaurant, and I think Miss Napier and the chef will do amazing things here. They already proved it at the Foodies Festival. I have a huge amount of respect for them both. Feel free to quote me and tell everyone you know I said that.”

  “I will,” she smiles, “if you get me a drink.”

  Chris senses the crowd simmering down, and he realizes that Susan and Philip have gone back inside. They’re lost in the tightly packed mass.

  “All right,” he agrees, moving toward the door. Maybe he’ll find Susan on the way to the bar.

  * * *

  Philip is stuck to her like a mollusk. He wraps an arm around her waist and keeps it there, steering her around the room, introducing her to his actor friends, all of whom are very smiley, very enthusiastic, and very firm with their handshakes.

  “Great place! Great place!” they all chorus. “Great food! Great food!” they exclaim, even though she doesn’t see a single one of them eat any of it.

  No matter: other guests wolf it down. The flow of empty plates going back down the dumbwaiter increases. The bartenders shake, shake, shake; the crowd gets noisier, the heat closer. Susan’s face and hands hurt from all the smiling and handshaking. She’s been too busy talking to people to eat anything herself, and she’s starting to feel a little sick. When Philip finally lets go of her for a moment, she takes the opportunity to escape downstairs.

  Gloria and her crew are winding things down; the sweets are going upstairs now. Susan stops by the pastry kitchen first, to thank Rab profusely for all he’s done and reassure him that it looked great. He smiles, seeming extraordinarily relieved.

  Gloria looks up as Susan comes back into the kitchen, and Susan grins.

  “I think we did it!” she says.

  “That’s what I like to hear!” Gloria bellows, beaming, edging around the pass so she can give Susan a hug. “You okay? You look a little peaky.”

  “I just need a minute,” Susan answers. “Are there any more of those potatoes left?”

  “Kept a few back, just in case.” Gloria hands her a plate. “All yours.”

  “Thanks.” Susan retreats to the office and devours half the plate in seconds, enjoying the relative peace. But after only five minutes, Philip appears in the doorway.

  “Here you are! Come on back up—there are some more people for you to meet!”

  “I think I’ve met enough, thanks,” she answers, more sharply than she means to.

  He recoils momentarily, then steps inside, closing the door behind him. “Okay, we’ll just sit here, then.” He settles down on the extra chair.

  Susan sighs and rubs her forehead. She wants to be left alone. “Why did you invite all those extra people?” she asks. It hadn’t taken her long to figure out he was behind it: they were clearly all friends of his.

  “I thought it was a party.” He shrugs. “And you needed something to keep the press’s attention, didn’t you? This did it!” He shakes his head. “I thought this was what you wanted. I mean, isn’t that why you wanted me here?”

  “No,” Susan answers. “I wanted you here because you’re part of my life, and I believe in sharing important events with the people in your life.” She throws back her head, contemplating the ceiling and trying to get her thoughts in order. “They’re so radically different, your life and mine. You like this sort of thing, but I just want to be in a kitchen or arranging things behind the scenes. I’m better that way. I’m not at home in a spotlight.”

  “But you could be!” He reaches out and takes her hand. “You’ll get used to it.”

  “I don’t think so.” She lifts her head and looks at him. He has a resigned expression on his face. He isn’t even going to put up a fight. She wonders if she actually meant anything to him or if what Rufus said was true: that she was just a prop to help him win back fans. “Can I ask you something?”

  “Yeah, sure.”

  “Were you really interested in me? Was this a real thing for you or—I don’t know—filler? Something to do just while you were in town?”

  He leans back and runs a hand through his hair. “Geez, Susan, of course I’m interested. You really think so little of me that you believe I’d use someone like that? Especially Kay Ashley’s favorite niece? Do I seem crazy to you? She’d skin me alive and use the hide for a punching bag.”

  Susan snorts, despite feeling ashamed of herself for having accused him.

  Philip sighs and leans toward her. “I think what you really want to know is how much commitment I was looking for here. And honestly? I don’t really know. I mean, we basically just met, and like you said, I’m only here for the month. It’s hard to know so early whether something’s really worth a major investment, right?”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” she murmurs, her voice catching a little. “I think you know, sometimes. And then it just seems easy. But sometimes we still manage to screw it up.”

  There’s a long pause as he looks away. Then, “Yeah,” he says, and she thinks his voice sounds a little thick too. “Yeah, I think I know what you mean.”

  She knows he’s not talking about her, and she’s fine with that. He looks back at her, and they share an understanding smile.

  “We don’t give men enough credit for having tender feelings,” Susan comments, reaching out and stroking his arm. “We think it’s only women who feel the sting and burn of a broken heart.”

  “We men don’t do ourselves any favors,” he says with a rueful smile and shake of the head. “We’re supposed to be all tough and stoic, so that’s what we are. We tamp it down, take it out on the machines at the gym or throw ourselves into work or whatever. We think emotion is weakness, until some of us get paid to show it, and then we get Academy Awards. Funny world.” He chuckles.

  “Strange world.” Susan shakes her head. “Maybe that’s the blessing and curse of being a woman: we’re allowed—encouraged, even—to feel and express our feelings. We can get them out, but sometimes I think we get stuck in them too. We think about them so much that we just keep turning over and over all the things we did wrong and should have done differently, and how things could be so different and maybe better if we’d just …” She stops, unsure how to continue, as her throat closes and her eyes tingle painfully with tears.

  Philip, his face pursed in an understanding grimace, rises and pulls her into a tight hug. Susan rests her head on his shoulder and draws in a deep, shuddering breath as he rubs her back the way Meg does when one of the boys is upset.

  “I’m sorry he hurt you,” he murmurs.

  “He didn’t,” Susan responds. “I have nobody but myself to blame. And I pr
obably always will.”

  They stand like that for another moment or two, and then Philip steps back and clears his throat.

  “I know it’s cliché, but I hope we can stay friends. Seriously.”

  She can tell he means it, and she’s pleased. “I’d really like that.”

  He leans forward, pecks her on the cheek, and jerks his head toward the door. “I think I’ll head out, if that’s all right? Maybe out the back, so I don’t draw attention by going?”

  “Sure,” says Susan. “I’ll show you.” She opens the office door and jumps when she finds Chris there, poised to knock.

  “Hi,” he says, looking embarrassed. “Sorry, I was being nosy and came down to see the kitchen. Gloria said you were in here. I wanted to congratulate you.”

  “Oh, thanks,” Susan says, trying to pull herself together and wondering how much, if anything, he heard of her conversation with Philip.

  Philip slips out of the office. “I’ll find the way out,” he says. “Take care, Susan. We’ll talk soon.”

  “Good luck with My Fair Lady,” she says.

  “Oh,” he responds with a roll of his eyes and self-deprecating smile, “thanks—I’ll need it!”

  He disappears into the kitchen, and Susan and Chris face each other in silence for a moment.

  “You should probably go up,” he finally says. “Take the kitchen staff; they deserve their moment in the spotlight. You all did great tonight.”

  “Thank you,” she says, trying hard to read his face. Is it her imagination, or does he seem to be having trouble keeping eye contact?

  “I’ll see you up there,” he says. He turns and walks away without another look.

  * * *

  Susan gathers the staff, brings them up to the dining room, and leads the guests in a round of applause. Then there are more handshakes, more smiling, pleased journalists promising write-ups, and guests promising to be back.