Hot Dish

by Brockway, Connie

  “So”—Dan Belker clapped his hands together, signaling the end of their impromptu mourning—”it’s settled. Jenn will head to her hometown at the end of the month, and we’ll send a crew up for a couple days to shoot some footage.”

  “Great! You couldn’t stage the potential photo opportunities this thing’ll generate,” Bob said, rubbing his hands together. “All those adoring faces surrounding her, folks cheering her, wishing her well, proud to call her one of their own … It’ll be a Norman Rockwell print come to life—only with better-looking people.” He looked at Jenn. “Are the people in your town good-looking?”

  Jenn was caught off guard by the unexpected turn of the conversation, mostly the fantasy about Fawn Creekians adoring her, and didn’t have time to frame a politic reply. “No.”

  Bob laughed. “Of course, they are! All Minnesotans are good-looking. Tall, blond Nordic types with fresh faces and strong bodies.”

  He caught Dan’s surprised stare. “It was in the demographics profile.”

  “Not these people,” Jenn burst out. Jesus! If they expected people to be milling around her with homemade signs and banners … Her stomach started making knots. “I’m sorry. That sounds so awful. Of course, I love them all dearly, but in order to be fair to … to AMS, I have to tell you, a few years ago the American Medical Association used the whole town for their obesity focus group.” Which was true.

  Bob stopped laughing and regarded her blankly. “Oh?”

  “Don’t worry,” Dan said confidently. “Even if we only get footage of a bunch of uglies, we always have pine trees and kids skating and church steeples to fall back on.”

  “And snow,” Bob agreed. “Don’t forget the white stuff. If this all works out like I think it’s goin’ to, we might wanta do a Christmas special up there. In fact, instead of just footage for the credits, we should seriously consider doing a spot right there during the festival or whatever it is.”

  From the e-mail the mayor of Fawn Creek had sent her, Jenn knew they were expecting about seven thousand people for the fishing tournament alone. That meant that as well as dozens with the unwitting power to end her career, seven thousand more simply to ignore her. Her head was swimming. She stared helplessly at Nat.

  “I’m afraid you’ll be disappointed,” Nat said, correctly interpreting the desperation in Jenn’s eyes. “It’s really a bland little town. More Home Depot than Norman Rockwell.”

  “Ha-ha!” Dan laughed and turned to Bob. “That reminds me. Have you gotten hold of the artist? Is that a done deal?”

  Artist? What artist? What were they talking about now?

  “Jaax? Not yet,” Bob answered. “I’ve sent his manager some letters but haven’t had much luck getting a response, so this afternoon I’m going to a charity auction that he’s attending. I’ll approach him there and see if I can get him to commit.”

  Bob caught her flabbergasted expression. “Mr. Jaax has been invited to be co-marshal.”

  They were trying to get Steve Jaax to go to Fawn Creek, Minnesota? She started to laugh, then caught herself as she realized no one else was joining her. They didn’t seriously expect an artist of his caliber to co-marshal a tiny town’s celebration, particularly as it wasn’t even his small town, did they?

  “Do you really think he’s right for the show, Dan?” Ron asked, sounding a bit worried. “He has a reputation as being a foulmouthed SOB.”

  Steve Jaax. The memory of him was even more of an ice shock than that of the butter head. Charisma, sex appeal, and absolute conviction about all things—that was what she remembered. And the “electric glide in blue” eyes. He’d never go for it.

  Dan, who’d leaned over the coffee table and begun shoving papers back into their folder in preparation for leaving, paused. “He’s not so bad. I’ve heard him talk about his sculpture and he can be nearly poetic. Just don’t ask him about his first ex-wife, that supermodel. Besides, we can edit.”

  “Will he accept?” Ron prodded.

  “Frankly, I don’t see how he can refuse. Not after all the years he’s spent talking about that damn”—Dan caught Jenn’s eye—”darn butter sculpture. And I don’t see how we cannot take advantage of the potential publicity his appearance with Jenn and her likeness will generate. We’ve already put some feelers out regarding a spot on the Today show, and like I said, the Ripley’s people are interested.”

  He turned to Jenn. “Do you realize that your butter head may be the oldest butter sculpture around?”

  “Yes,” said Jenn, “I think you mentioned that.”

  Jenn waited until she and Nat were alone on the elevator to break down. “This is going to be a disaster!”

  Nat regarded Jenn unsympathetically. “So? You have to go to Fawn Creek for a week or so. Buy long underwear. You’ll survive. Besides, Steve Jaax is yummy in a been-there-done-too-much-of-that sort of way. Pal around with him. You’ll get through it.”

  “Like he’ll really show,” Jenn muttered. She grabbed Nat’s arm. “You don’t get it, Nat. AMS expects me to get a hero’s welcome in Fawn Creek so they can tape it. I’m lucky if more than one person says hi to me when I’m in town.”

  “You’re exaggerating,” Nat said flatly. “You’ve become a diva and you’re exaggerating.”

  “No!” Jenn protested. “Remember when I did that book on Scandinavian farm interiors and you talked me into doing a signing at the Pamida store up there? Do you remember how many books I signed? Three. And my mother bought all of them.”

  Nat’s unsympathetic demeanor relaxed. She patted Jenn’s hand, which was still clinging to her arm. “Jenn. Honey. You are the Midwest Martha. At every appearance, you bring in hundreds of fans. I’ve seen it for myself. You know I’m right.”

  “Not there.” Jenn shivered.

  “Look. You told me yourself that your little town is expecting around seven thousand tourists to show up for this sesquicentennial, right?”

  Jenn nodded cautiously.

  “So then you’re golden,” Nat exclaimed, “because those seven thousand aren’t Fawn Creekers, are they? They’re all people from your end of the state. Your viewers. The same people who come out in droves to see you when you appear at the Mall of America or some store opening. Right? Right.”

  Jenn was feeling better. She’d stopped hyperventilating.

  “They’ll love you and their love will swallow up any lack of love from the Fawn Creekites. How many people live there?”

  “Twenty-eight hundred.”

  “Exactly. A pittance. So just keep cool, and if the AMS crew shows up before the crowds, stay out of their sight. Tell them you’re sick or something and can’t shoot any film until all those loving strangers are in town.”

  Okay. That made sense. People did love her. She was popular. She was bound to have some fans among seven thousand people. God, she loved Nat. She threw her arms around her agent and hugged her but, because Nat was so small, mostly Jenn smothered her head in her bosom.

  “Yeah, yeah,” Nat said, struggling free and whisking her black hair out of her face. “We’re a cute couple. Now get off me. So. Anything else?”

  Jenn shook her head. She felt loads better.

  “Excellent. Go forth and have a great time.” Nat hesitated, scowled, and glanced up at Jenn. “Ah. You don’t … want me to … ah … go with you, do you?”

  The offer did not come willingly from Natalie’s lips, and it was almost too much to resist. The thought of little Gorey creature Nat facing down the sisterhood of the Lutheran church basement kitchen … Delicious. But just because she’d made the offer in the first place, especially when Jenn knew how she felt about anything remotely rural, Jenn couldn’t even bring herself to tease her.

  Nat didn’t deserve that. Nor, come to think of it, did the sisterhood of the Lutheran church basement kitchen.

  “Thanks, Nat, but no,” Jenn said. “Why have you marooned up there in the middle of nowhere for no good reason?”

  There was no mistaking the relief
on Natalie’s face. But she never had been in any danger. No one went to Fawn Creek if Jenn could help it. Nope. The fewer people on whose respect she depended saw her in action in her “hometown,” the better.

  Up there, Jenn Lind didn’t exist. Up there, she was still just Jenn Hallesby.

  Chapter Eight

  4:00 p.m.

  Soho, New York

  “The final piece in lot forty-five donated by Fabulousa is this aluminum statue Medusa Migraine by the renowned American artist Steven Jaax.”

  The crowd seated on the upholstered Louis the Fifteenth armchair reproductions responded with a smattering of light applause.

  “The bidding shall begin at fifty thousand.”

  No one twitched.

  “Fifty thousand.” The auctioneer scanned the audience, his expression of superior confidence thinning. Someone blew their nose. “May I have—Fifty, ma’am! Very good. May I have sixty?”

  “Who bid?” Steve Jaax, seated in the middle back, asked out of the side of his mouth. His hair was uncombed and his eyes a little bloodshot but at least he’d tucked his white dress shirt into the jeans and donned a charcoal gray mohair jacket. The jacket had cost a fortune; the jeans he’d found after a party in his studio.

  Beside him, Verie Meuwissen of VM Galleries and sole dealer of the works of Steven Jaax leaned forward, his Gucci belt dissecting his well-padded tummy. He pushed his rimless glasses up on his nose, peered, and straightened. “Button Lipscomb.”

  “Shit. Why does she want it?”

  “She’s bought a place in Miami. I’ve heard she’s decorating the cabana.”

  “Shit,” Steve repeated.

  “I have fifty—sixty. Thank you. Do I hear sixty-five?”

  “Where do you hear this stuff?” Steve asked.

  “It’s my job, dear boy.”

  “I thought selling art was your job, not interior decorating.”

  “A thin line, you know.”

  Unfortunately, Steve did know. He’d been a lot happier when he didn’t, when he’d simply worked in his studio until he couldn’t hold the tools any longer, emerged for a burger and a few hours of convivial company, and disappeared back inside again.

  Nowadays, he only went to his studio when he had a show pending. The rest of his days were spent in Manhattan or Paris or London or Prague, crawling from party to party. Not that Steve didn’t like celebrity. He loved it. It just was a hard balancing act and one he sometimes, late at night, when one is prone to self-doubts, wasn’t entirely sure he’d gotten the hang of.

  He didn’t like thinking about it; he wouldn’t think about it. He might come to some unfortunate conclusions. Like he was full of bullshit.

  He stood up. “Let’s get a drink,” he said and headed for the bar at the back of the room. Once there, he ordered a vodka gimlet. “What do you want, Verie?”

  “Campari and lime.”

  The bartender began sorting through bottles as Steve morosely regarded the proceedings. Things had pretty much come to a halt. The auctioneer was standing behind his podium with his arms crossed over his tuxedo-clad chest, glaring at the audience.

  Steve felt a little stupid rising to the bait Fabulousa dangled by auctioning off the works of his that the judge had awarded her in their divorce. Of all his ex-wives, Fabulousa was the only one he still felt passionate about, as in passionately disliked her. It was a knee-jerk reaction exacerbated by the fact that she had so completely taken him to the cleaners. He hadn’t seen her in two decades and he should have just kept it that way, but knowing that she was here, selling his history like secondhand ties and that Button Lipscomb was going to buy his statue and use it as a hat rack—ouch!

  He touched his jaw. Damn, he was grinding his teeth.

  “You knew people with more money than taste would be here trying to pick up a deal. It was bound to hurt,” Verie said, correctly interpreting Steve’s hangdog expression. “I really don’t know why you insisted we come in the first place.”

  “I didn’t insist you come. I didn’t even invite you. You just showed up.” Steve leaned against the bar.

  “And a bloody good thing, too. I am here to protect my interests. Why is it exactly that you are here, Steven?”

  “To say good-bye to my children,” Steve said, his sorrow growing more pronounced. “I haven’t seen any of them in twenty years and now God knows where they’ll end up. Button Lipscomb’s cabana or some Soho restaurant’s john, I suppose. I had to come.”

  Verie collected Steve’s cocktail and handed it to him. “You don’t own them. Why this sudden emotional attachment? They aren’t even your best work.”

  But they had been hard work. It didn’t matter that they lacked the polish (glibness) or spontaneity (carelessness) of his current work. They represented the honest (desperate) exploration (shots in the dark) of a hungry (literally hungry) young artist who was just coming into his full talent (brainstorm). Talent. He really had had talent. He’d poured himself into those pieces.

  He accepted the gimlet and downed a quarter of it. “Would you put your dog to sleep without saying goodbye?”

  “Now there’s a rather off-putting comment.”

  “I don’t expect you to understand.”

  “Sixty-five? Sixty-five. Very good!” the auctioneer said approvingly.

  “Who was that?” Steve asked without turning around. “Look.”

  “Why should I be the one peering and peeking about like some ridiculous Peter Sellers character?” Verie complained. “You look.”

  “It wouldn’t be good for my image. Someone might think I care who buys it. Once it’s out of the studio it’s supposed to be dead to me. I was quoted in the Wall Street Journal as saying that. You look.”

  “That is a lot of unmitigated bullshit.”

  “True,” Steve agreed without the least bit of defensive-ness. At least he still knew bullshit from truth. Most of the time. He thought. “But collectors eat bullshit for lunch. You’ve been quoted in the New Yorker as saying that.”

  “Yes, yes.” Verie gave up the argument. “Fine. And I have no idea who the bidder is. Some studly young blond fellow. Odd, I thought I knew all the serious Jaax collectors.”

  “Maybe he’s a new collector?”

  Verie’s flat-eyed glance said it all. Young collectors weren’t able to afford original Jaax’s. Mostly Steve’s work was bought to fill out collections, or for investment purposes, or as a tax write-off.

  Steve tossed back the rest of the gimlet and led the way back to their seats. He flopped down in his chair, his legs stretched out, his thumbs tucked into the pockets of his jeans and his chin resting comfortably on his chest as he gazed ahead through half-closed eyes.

  Verie, glad to have sidestepped the uncomfortable direction the conversation had been taking, sat down more sedately. Steve Jaax still sold well. So did the scribbles Pablo Picasso made on cocktail napkins. It didn’t mean that the intrinsic value was there. Just the celebrity. And, God love him, Steve Jaax was a celebrity. His earlier works were transcendent. His current works were … cocktail napkins. Familiar, immediately identifiable as a Jaax, and rank with celebrity.

  “Seventy. I have seventy thousand.”

  “It’s that little Asian man,” Verie whispered before Steve asked. “The one with all the toy train stores.”

  “Thank God,” Steve muttered, eyes still closed. “Button would stick a plate in Medusa’s hand and use her as a canapé server.”

  “Seventy-five. Thank you, ma’am.”

  “Oops,” Verie said.

  “Button?”

  “Um-hum.”

  Steve’s eyes popped open. “Damn. I like that piece.”

  “No, Steve.” Verie caught Steve’s hand, returning it to the armrest and patting it comfortingly. “You mustn’t.”

  “Do I hear eighty? The bid is seventy-five. Seventy-five, going once …”

  “Why not?” Steve asked.

  Verie glanced down their row at a well-known collector and the
society columnist sitting next to him. Both were staring at Steve. Verie nodded, beamed, and shrugged with just a trace of bemused tolerance, suggesting that though handling a mercurial and temperamental personality like Jaax’s was a full-time and often thankless job, it was one he nonetheless did willingly, a mere handmaiden to the Muse, Erata.

  “Foremost,” he whispered at Steve through a toothy smile, “because this is a charity auction of prominent artists’ works, and it would not look good for you to be the only prominent artist here bidding on his own pieces—”

  “Wouldn’t it look good if I bought Medusa for some ungodly amount of money?” Steve asked. “I think it would. I think I would look like a damn saint, buying my own stuff for charity.”

  “Which brings us to the second reason you cannot bid,” Verie said softly. “You haven’t got that kind of money.”

  Steve pondered this. Damn, but Verie was right. He didn’t have that sort of money. At least not without selling off some of his own collection, which he was not going to do. Ever. “That’s because she took it all.”

  “There have been other wives upon whom you have settled money,” Verie corrected calmly. “It was not all Fabulousa. It was not any of your wives either singly or in combination. You have had a great deal of money. You have spent a great deal of money. And enjoyed the process very much in doing so, I might add.”

  Well, he had a point there. He really did. At least no one could accuse Steve Jaax of being one of those god-awful gloomy sons of bitches who wallowed in artistic anguish.

  “Sold! For seventy-five thousand dollars. Thank you, ma’am!” the auctioneer announced.

  “I’m sorry, Steve,” Verie said sincerely.

  Steve nodded dolefully. “Thank you.”

  “We’ll be taking a short recess. Fifteen minutes. Thank you.”

  Steve got to his feet, his interest in the auction over, and began picking his way over the still-seated people in their row. Verie followed suit, smiling weakly at the woman upon whose Prada-encased toe he trod, wiggling his way past a corpulent sheik who was buying everything selling for less than ten thousand dollars, and surreptitiously slipping his card in Button Lipscomb’s handbag as he edged past her.