The Chef's Passion

by Z. L. Arkadie

  I think about my date with Jeremy last week, but the thought is quickly banished by memories of making love to Randy, who’s one of two chefs in the running to win this episode’s prize. Britta Ho asks Pablo Diaz, the guest chef who’s also owner and executive chef of Al Rojo in Los Angeles, to declare a winner.

  I rip my attention away from the screen. “Nope. I’m still on the old-maid track.”

  “I doubt that. Listen,” she says quickly.

  I sit up straight. “I’m listening.”

  “How would you like to take the bar on Monday?”

  My mouth falls open, and I stare blankly at the TV screen. Randy lost the competition, but the other chef chooses to go for the immunity rather than weaken another contestant. Actually, he sounds just as brash as Randy, declaring he doesn’t need to disadvantage others to win.

  “I don’t know, Nom,” I finally say.

  Why can’t I just say what I really feel?

  “My dad can get you a seat as an emergency test taker.”

  “I didn’t know they did that.”

  “It depends on who’s asking.”

  I sigh forcefully just as Randy and the rest of the cooks run around in a big grocery store, buying ingredients for the dish they are to prepare. I missed the theme of the entrée, but right now, he and a woman are buying beef.

  “Oh, I see,” Naomi says.

  “You see what?” I frown, not at what Naomi said but at the woman who’s looking up at Randy, red faced. She’s batting her eyelashes and everything. The next shot is of this woman, Chef Deanna Blume, in an interview, saying that she’s always thought Randy Cousivan was hot.

  “And I don’t care he’s a bad boy.” She grins sheepishly. “The badder, the better.” Then she looks off to the side. “Is ‘badder’ a word?” She chuckles, all cutesy.

  She’s blond. Does Randy like blonds? My hair is dark auburn. My eyes are sometimes blue and sometimes green. I wonder what color her eyes are.

  “Gina?” Naomi says.

  “What?” I say abruptly, realizing that I haven’t paid attention to a word she’s said.

  “What are you doing right now?”

  “Nothing. Watching TV.”

  “Oh, well, listen—I get it. You don’t love the law, at least not at the moment, but you don’t want to throw your education down the drain, do you?”

  I constrain another sigh. “Nom?”

  After a pause, she says, “Yes?”

  “I don’t want to take the bar, and I don’t want to talk about my nonexistent law career. Is that okay?”

  She grunts. “It’s okay. I just worry about you, that’s all.”

  “I know, but I’m a big girl.”

  “I know that. Okay, I’ll stop nagging and mind my own business.”

  I grunt sarcastically. “At least for now.”

  Naomi chuckles. We both are aware that she can’t help herself when it comes to finding solutions for everyone else’s life, including her own.

  “So are you still working for your Valentine?” I ask.

  She chuckles. “Yes.”

  “How is it going other than a little afternoon broom-closet sex?”

  “Ha, hardly!” Naomi tells me all about how she and Derek are working together. I partially listen to her prattle on about depositions, contracts, and courtrooms. Randy and the other eleven contestants are running around the kitchen like madmen, preparing their entrées. I’m watching intently. There’s a lot of Randy featured on this episode. He’s bantering with the other chefs, smirking cockily, and moving about as though he owns the kitchen. He looks so sexy.

  The camera moves to Deanna Blume. She seems to be having a tough time shelling clams, and I’m sort of happy about it. In a talking-head interview, she says that she leaves the shelling to her sous chefs.

  “Gina?” Naomi says.

  “Yes,” I say, snapping my attention back to our conversation.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Nothing. Just watching TV and listening to you.”

  “You’re hardly listening to me. What are you watching?”

  My first inclination is to tell her the truth, but that quickly dissolves. “Some Lifetime movie.”

  “Oh, really? Which one? Is it the woman who shot her husband who had another family with two sister wives?”

  I laugh just as Randy finishes seven dishes. “Something like that.” I wiggle my head. “Anyway, I’m done letting this show distract me from you. It’s been so long since we hung out. Do you want to go for a run tomorrow?”

  “Ah, I can’t tomorrow. How about next Saturday?”

  My mouth is caught open. Randy declares that he’s already done ten minutes before time, and he rushes over to Chef Deanna Blume’s station and starts shelling her clams at a record speed. Then they cut to a talking head of her.

  “Yep…” Deanna grins big. “He shelled my clam. I mean, clams.” She laughs.

  I don’t find it funny at all.

  “Gina!” Naomi calls.

  I jump. “What? Yes?”

  “That must be a very good movie you’re watching.”

  I sigh hard and turn off the TV. “No, it wasn’t good at all. But yeah, sure, I’ll put you on the calendar for next Saturday.”

  “Okay,” she says doubtfully as though she’s wondering if I’ll even remember what I just said.

  “Really, I’m okay. Just a little tired. Long shift at the café.”

  “Okay. Well, how about we talk sometime next week?”

  “I’ll call you on Monday or Tuesday or Wednesday—or maybe Thursday. But not Friday—before then.”

  She chuckles. “Any one of those days will do, or two or three days even, and Friday works for me too.”

  I laugh. We say good-bye, and I turn the TV back on. Britta Ho and Pablo Diaz, along with two other show judges—Daniel Westerly and Leon Masterson—eat Randy’s food. They’re savoring the flavors as if his Mexican-inspired beef carpaccio is a hit. My eyes are glued to the TV as I watch the other dishes come out, including Deanna Blume’s fried-oyster tacos. None of the judges are impressed and are criticizing her for running out of time because she didn’t know how to shell oysters. However, Pablo Diaz does say that he likes the flavors.

  In the containment room with white walls and benches for the contestants to sit and wait for decisions to be made, the cooks are giving Deanna a hard time for requiring help. One of them lays into Randy for making a mockery of the competition. Randy just crosses his legs, sits back calmly, and says, “What are you afraid of? Do you need her to be weak so you can be strong? Oysters or no oysters, outcook her and win on your own merit, bro.”

  The guy is fuming, but Randy is still as cool as a cucumber. All the things I used to hate about Randy I love at this very moment until he winks at Deanna, and then they cut to next shot.

  “Yeah, she’s cute,” Randy says in his talking-head interview. “That definitely helped me make my decision to help, but hell, I’d do the same for Igor. All I—beep—did was shell some—beep—clams.” Then he smiles. “But yeah, okay, she’s cute.”

  Suddenly, my heart takes a nosedive. I guess last Sunday night didn’t mean a damn thing to him. One week later, and he’s winking at “cute” chefs.

  “Jackass,” I shout at the TV and turn it off.

  I don’t need to know who wins. I hope he loses and not Chef Deanna.

  I turn off the lights, take my cup to the kitchen, and then walk to my room. My feet are heavy, and after I climb into bed and pull the blankets over me, my body feels weighted down by grief. I was wrong about Randy. He seems to be enjoying his blossoming romance with Deanna Blume. He probably respects her more than me. They’re both chefs. I would say that they’re both good enough to land a spot on the show, but it’s clear that Deanna’s strong point isn’t her cooking. She’s pretty. She probably made her way through life batting her eyelashes at men. I shake my head. I can’t stand her.

  I flip over onto my side and let my mind find ways
to forget about Randy. I have to focus on cooking. I want to be a better chef than Randy can ever be. After a short battle to keep my thoughts off that guy, my eyelids get heavy. I slowly let my consciousness drift. Tomorrow, I have to do something I love. That’s what I’ll do.

  6

  My internal alarm clock wakes me up at a few minutes after seven in the morning. I went to bed with one thing in mind: shopping for fresh fruits and vegetables this morning. It snowed last night while I was sleeping. Since it’s extra cold out, I put on a pair of stretch pants under my jeans. I also wear my knee-high snow boots with woolen socks and a T-shirt under my light-blue turtleneck sweater. I finish off my outfit with a black wool bomber jacket. It’s probably not cold enough for my skullcap, so I save that for another day.

  On days like this, I credit myself for the decision to add a two-car garage. It’s the smartest choice I ever made, one that competes with enrolling in culinary school. I would be brushing snow and chipping ice off my cars right now if they weren’t safe and dry in my garage.

  For dinner, I want to cook an Italian vegetable hash and buy a good bottle of Italian wine to go with it. I run down the list of ingredients. I think about the spices and seasoning. After I park and make it inside, thoughts of Randy and Deanna haunt me once again. What if they get closer and then are married? It would be the story of the series—two popular chefs meet and end up as husband and wife then open a successful restaurant in LA.

  I keep turning this same narrative over in my mind after I grab a cart and push it to produce. I go straight to my favorite vegetable—eggplant. I feel each one. For some reason, none of them are good enough. Nothing is good enough right now. There’s something I want, but I feel as if it’s way on the other side of the world. I see my hands moving through the eggplants like racehorses. My heart is beating a mile a minute. Randy and Deanna… I shake my head, wondering what I can do to break them up from here.

  My phone rings loudly in my purse, and I jump out of my manic state to answer the call.

  “Hello?” I say, half hoping that it’s Randy even though he’s never called me before. Heck, I don’t even think he has my phone number.

  “How are you, Gina?”

  I roll my eyes. It’s Jeremy. I take a deep breath to relax myself, remembering I have two more dates before my debt is paid. I estimate that the repair will cost at least a thousand dollars, maybe more. I should’ve paid him, but now I’m one date down and only two more to go. I can push through. He’s not a bad guy.

  “I’m fine,” I say. Jeez, that sounded sharp.

  “Good,” he says as if he didn’t notice my tone. “I know this is last minute, but I’m free tonight and wonder if you would like to do something.”

  I throw the eggplant I’m squeezing back onto the pile. I really need to clear my brain and get a grip. No more thoughts of Randy. “Tonight?”

  “Unless you have other plans.”

  Visions of my recipe come to mind. “I plan on making a killer vegetable hash tonight.”

  “That’s right. You’re a chef.”

  I smile. “Yeah,” I say.

  “Well, I would love to taste your food.”

  “Really? You’ll count dinner at my place toward my debt?”

  He chuckles. For some reason, he laughs at a lot of what I say. I didn’t know I was such a comedian. Randy never laughs at anything I say.

  “Absolutely.”

  “Well, okay.” I give him my address and tell him to be at my place at six. I ask if he has any dessert preferences, and he chuckles again as if I said something funny.

  “Whatever you like,” he finally says.

  “Okay,” I sing, sort of put off by the laughing. I’ll make cannolis, but I’ll only bring them out if I feel like prolonging our time together.

  We end the call, and I think about Jeremy. Now I have someone else to help me keep my mind off Randy and his new love interest. It sure does sound as if Jeremy is interested in me. It would be easier if I could reciprocate. Tonight I’ll try. Yes. If Randy can flirt and be open to Little Miss Cute Chef, then I can be open to Hot Prince Harry Lookalike.

  7

  Two and a half hours later, I’m home with my groceries. As usual, I spent a long time selecting my vegetables, fruits, and meats, but it took an extra half hour to select a good bottle of Italian wine. It didn’t used to always be this way. Once I made a commitment to cooking, I started to spend more time doing it. That’s how I am. As soon as I make a commitment, I’m all in.

  I take my vegetables out of the bags, wash them, and then prep them for dinner. I feel so relaxed as I slice and chop. Finally, I have my zucchini, eggplant, artichokes, carrots, cauliflower, red and orange bell peppers, yellow squash, onion, and Italian tomatoes in plastic containers. I glance at the clock and then do a double take. I lost track of time. I’ve been playing with my vegetables for three hours. The good news is that I didn’t think about Randy once while doing it. The bad news is that Jeremy is to show up three hours from now. I’m not excited about the date. He’s not a bad guy, but I don’t think he’s the most truthful person I ever met. All I can remember is the waitress at that restaurant he took me to. He definitely has something going on with her. Whatever… he is only a hot distraction.

  I look outside. It’s still snowing, so Jeremy might cancel our date. I decide to do a quick workout on my treadmill, hop in the shower, and clean up before I cook. While jogging, I quickly lose steam. The harder I breathe, the more my thoughts veer toward the night Randy and I had sex. This is hurting too much. I stop running, turn my treadmill off, and hold onto the rail as I catch my breath. I’m so out of shape. I’m going to have to regain some of my stamina before I go running with Naomi again.

  I regretfully end my shower and put on a comfortable pair of jeans and a red T-shirt. It’s time to cook. I nearly dance all the way to the kitchen to commence making dinner. I’m in the zone, making hash out of the vegetables I prepared earlier. The scents are coming together as I mix in the herbs, spices, and salt. I poach four eggs and put fresh pepper in the grinder. As soon as the table is set, the doorbell rings. I twist my wrist to check the time on my watch. Damn it—he’s on time.

  After a quick inspection of myself, I conclude that my jeans fit nicely and my T-shirt is cute and still clean. I pull the band that’s holding my ponytail and shake out my tresses.

  I take a breath and pull my shoulders back, saying, “Showtime,” and walking over to answer the door.

  Jeremy smells good and looks even better.

  “Can I take your coat?” I ask.

  “Sure.” He takes off his expensive black cashmere coat. Underneath, he’s wearing a silk blue button-front shirt. “Thanks.”

  I take his coat and hang it on the coat tree near the door. “You’re welcome.”

  Jeremy and I are grinning at each other. The tingling sensation on the inside makes me think that my eyes are flirting with him. He’s hot. And for a moment, I imagine him in my bed on top of me.

  He has that flirty look in his eyes. “You look beautiful.”

  “Um, thanks,” I say, knowing I could’ve done a better job in the dressing-up department. “So did you bring your appetite?”

  He shrugs his eyebrows twice. “I definitely brought an appetite,” he says, speaking to my tits again.

  I follow his eyes to my chest. Shit! I forgot to put on a bra, and my nipples are poking my T-shirt. “So how was your day?” I ask to keep him talking, hoping he’ll focus on something else other than my tits.

  “It was good. I was supposed to go to a football game today, but it was cancelled because of the snow.”

  “I don’t see you as someone who plays football, especially in the cold.”

  He grunts and then looks off. “I wasn’t going there to play.”

  I wait for him to finish telling me what he was going there to do, but he doesn't say anything else. So I ask, “Then why were you going there?”

  His gaze meets my face again. “To mee
t someone.”

  “Who?”

  He clears his throat and rolls his shoulders. “Just a colleague.”

  I tilt my head and frown curiously. “A work colleague?”

  “No,” he says as if that’s the end of it.

  I could keep pushing for a satisfying answer because it’s pretty apparent that Jeremy isn’t being forthright. He was cryptic on our date last week too. But I figure I’ll just let it go, or maybe if I get him to the table, he’ll open up there.

  I sigh and rub my hands together. “Okay, then. Let’s eat.”

  “Sure.”

  Jeremy follows me to the dining room. I have a dark snake-wood banquet table for six. It’s nice. My cousin Bobby made it. I paired the table with comfortable high-back scarlet suede chairs.

  I turn to see Jeremy’s response. Most people are impressed, and he doesn’t disappoint. “Wow. This is a really nice setup,” he says.

  I grin because his wide eyes reflect the authenticity of his comment. “Thanks.”

  Jeremy takes a seat in front of a place setting, and I go into the kitchen to plate our dinner. The food is still warm, and the aroma rising from the hash is delectable.

  “Wow, that looks and smells good,” Jeremy says as I put his plate in front of him.

  I’m grinning from ear to ear. There’s something satisfying about a virtual stranger enjoying the look of my food. “Thanks. Would you like a glass of wine?”

  He seems to be searching the plate for more. “Sure, but is there any meat in this?”

  I fill his glass with red wine and then fill mine. “It’s an Italian vegetable hash.”

  He jerks his head back. “Then there’s no meat?”

  I take my seat. “Have you ever had a meatless meal a day in your life?”

  “Actually, no, I haven’t.” All of a sudden, he seems disgusted by what’s in front of him.

  I lift my glass to him. “Well, you’re having one tonight.” What a tool.

  “All right, then,” he says as if I asked him to drink a glass of bathtub water.