Chef Cutegirl: A Sweet Lesbian Romance

by Nicolette Dane

  “So I’ve always wanted to sing on This Saturday,” she said. “Like, break into a funny song in a sketch.”

  “You sing?” I said in surprise.

  “Yeah,” said Corinne, her face growing in excitement. “I love to sing. So my idea is that I’m a waitress at a diner. You know how sometimes at diners they have weird names for specific foods?”

  “Burn one with wax and flop two!” I called out, making a dumb face. Corinne giggled back into the couch and clapped.

  “Exactly!” she said. “That’s totally it!”

  “So you want to sing that?” I asked.

  “Well, okay,” she continued. “So when I give the orders to the cook, I break into song with a couple of other waitresses,” said Corinne, going over the sketch in her head like she’d been thinking of it for a while. “But everybody else thinks it’s super crazy. The diners are freaked out by it. The cook, the manager. People think I’m nuts!”

  “Yeah,” I said, getting excited, seeing her vision. “I could get on board with this.”

  “Really?” she said. Corinne was full of wonder, brilliance emanating from her eyes.

  “Yeah,” I repeated. “We could start out with legitimate diner speak, but it would just devolve into insanity. Poke two in the boob, yank on a bumpkin, and slobber a Satanist!” This really set Corinne off. She was cracking up and it made me furiously happy.

  “Right!” she cried. “Oh God, that sounds like so much fun.”

  “We’ll do it,” I affirmed. “Well, we’ll write it and rehearse it. George has the final say. Stuff gets cut on Saturday all the time. I’ll let him know it’s your sketch, though.”

  “Wow,” said Corinne. I could tell that she was pleased. “I mean, that would just be so awesome.”

  “The singing adds another level of complexity to it,” I said. “But yeah, totally doable. Funny idea and it shouldn’t be a problem.”

  “Thanks Tab,” Corinne said in earnest. Our eyes caught on one another for a moment, gazing in silence, both of us with silly grins on our faces. The moment began to feel awkward to me, like it was a little too exciting, like there was something strange and alluring in the air. I broke from our shared stare and shook my head once.

  “Um,” I murmured, knowing I had to say something to move the conversation along but unsure what exactly that should be after our charged little moment. “Are you, um, single?” I asked, suddenly regretting it. Why would I ask something like that? I mean, I know why I’d ask something like that and you know why I’d ask something like that, but it really didn’t make sense in regards to our conversation about the show. “The reason I ask—“

  “I am,” said Corinne matter-of-factly with a reassuring smile.

  “I mean, I ask because we’re working on the opening monologue for you,” I went on, trying to justify myself with a lie. I had to think fast. “It’ll be, like, the guys in the cast heard you were single and all come up to you with bouquets of flowers to try to win your affection but you turn them all down.” That wasn’t what we had planned for the monologue but it was actually a really good idea. It’s amazing when creativity just comes to you spur of the moment.

  “I like it,” said Corinne.

  “So you’re single?” I asked again, even though she’d already answered. Just to be sure, you know. “I don’t really keep up on the tabloids.”

  “Yes,” she said. “And I try to stay out of the tabloids.”

  “That’s good,” I said. “I can just see them now… ‘Holmstrom Goes Home With This Saturday Cast Member!’” I motioned in the air with my hand like I was calling out a headline.

  “Right,” said Corinne through a laugh. “Couldn’t have that.”

  “You wouldn’t like the guys around here anyway,” I said, waving nonchalantly. “They’re all damaged comedians with mommy issues.”

  “Is that so?” she giggled. “What about you?”

  “Me?” I was surprised that she had turned it on me.

  “Yeah, you,” said Corinne. “Are you a damaged comedian with… daddy issues?”

  “No,” I said. “I probably also have mommy issues like the rest.”

  “You’re cute, Tab,” said Corinne. There was an odd fire burning in her eyes as we looked at each other. I’d seen that kind of fire before. It was desire. I wanted to test my pulse but I was sure that would look undeniably weird. I had promised myself for every New Year’s Resolution over the past who knows how many years that I would make an effort to be less weird.

  “I—“ I said, stammering. “I mean, me? No, I mean… thanks?”

  “I just like… funny women,” admitted Corinne with a sheepish smile. “It’s my weakness.”

  “I, um… if I heard you correctly—“

  “You did,” said Corinne curtly.

  “Okay,” I said, feeling quite nervous now. I took my notebook from my lap, rolling it up, and half waved it across the coffee table at Corinne. “Good. Productive. I think we’re going to have a great show.”

  “I think so, too,” purred Corinne. She was beginning to drip with flirtation. I think that she was so used to getting what she wanted that being assertive had become second nature to her.

  “Nice,” I said, standing up now. Corinne watched me with a smile permanently etched on her face. “I’ll let you know about the sketch. And I’ll let production know you’re ready for a walk through. Cool?”

  “Cool, Tab,” she said.

  “Thanks Corinne,” I said, feeling in a hurry to get out of there. I don’t know why. Just excitement. Nerves. “Gotta get moving!”

  “Goodbye,” I heard Corinne say as I anxiously rushed toward the door and let myself out.

  CLICK HERE TO SEE IT ON AMAZON

  AN EXCERPT FROM: DORMITORY DEAREST

  *

  I NEVER THOUGHT college would be this weird. I mean, I was really excited about it leading up to the big move but I didn’t really know what to expect apart from what you see in movies. None of my close friends, of which I had few, went to the same college as me so it was like I was going off on this new adventure all by myself. Nobody knew me, I could reinvent myself if I wanted, I could be a totally new person and carve out a completely different path if I so chose. But once I got to school, I found that I simply couldn’t help but be me. Geeky, introverted, freaky me.

  Nerdy Natasha. Lucky I ended up in the same small arts dorm with all the other nerdy outcasts and not in one of the huge student ghettos filled with roving bands of bleached bimbos looking for an easy target like me to sink their teeth into. No, as an English major I had been asked by some benevolent cosmic force if I would like to enroll in the residential college for Arts & Letters students and without even knowing much about the program I dutifully accepted. The program was called ALOHA, which stood for Arts & Letters Organized Housing Association, and it was a total lifesaver for a girl like me.

  My dorm was quite small, being one of the oldest dorm buildings on campus, and was only three floors high as opposed to some of those much larger skyscraper dorms that peppered the huge campus of my midwestern farm school. It was like we had our own little sanctuary where we could just be us. All kinds were welcome but it was an overwhelmingly geeky atmosphere. I liked that. But, if I’m being honest, I wasn’t prepared for the level of geekiness. Much different than high school. These students had much more passion. More spunk.

  The beauty about my dorm, Leopold Hall, was that the entire student population within its walls were ALOHA students. It really was like we were on some island. Some island for weirdos. Totally awesome.

  So when I say that I never thought college would be this weird, I mean weird in a good way. Strangely exciting. Different. Filled with possibility and acceptance and with very limited, if any, judgment from peers. We were all just there doing our own thing. English majors and writers like myself, theater students, visual artists, the outcast art crew. It was a terrific amalgam of my university’s creative contingent and it was nothing like I had antic
ipated. Utopia, almost.

  And the things that happened to me, well, I couldn’t have anticipated them either.

  Each floor of Leopold Hall housed a different year of ALOHA students. So the freshmen like me were on the first floor, sophomores on the second, and juniors on the third. The third floor was much smaller than the other two floors and was all single rooms, rather than the doubles that the freshman and sophomores got. And generally that was fine because by the third year many students drifted away from ALOHA. I could see that it was a good program to start out in, to help you get adjusted to college life, but by the time you’re a junior you want to live off campus, spread your wings and all that. The way the years were laid out in the dorm worked out swimmingly. Girls on one side of each floor, boys on the other.

  And my roommate, Whitney, was a blast.

  “You know what’s awesome?” asked Whitney, sitting on the couch under our lofted beds wearing sweatpants and a t-shirt, her dirty blonde hair twisted up tightly into a bun. Whitney was an outgoing theater major and I was happy to have been paired with her.

  “What’s awesome?” I asked, sitting sideways in my desk chair, avoiding working on a paper for my English class.

  “I felt like, in high school, most boys wouldn’t even give me the time of day,” she said, something I found hard to believe considering she was a pretty girl with an affable personality. “But here in ALOHA, all these boys are totally creaming themselves over me.” I couldn’t help but laugh at her.

  “You’re a nut,” I said. Watching Whitney fuss with her hair, I couldn’t help but fuss with my own hair in mimic. While I was a natural redhead, freckled and all, I dyed my hair a more vibrant red because it made me feel fun. Following Whitney’s lead, I pushed my own hair up into a bun and tied it in place with a piece of elastic from around my wrist.

  “What?” she said innocently, stifling a grin.

  “I just don’t believe that you had trouble with boys,” I said. “You’re totally lying to me.”

  “Well…” said Whitney, looking off sheepishly. “Maybe it’s just that I’m getting more attention here at college. It’s skewing my memory.”

  “Exactly,” I said.

  “I think I’m leaning toward Justin,” she mused, almost as though she were talking to herself. “He’s kinda beefy and brooding.”

  “Eh,” I said in an unimpressed tone. “I don’t know.”

  “What do you mean?” said Whitney. “He’s cute. He’s got that James Dean thing going on. Tight white t-shirts,” she said, almost giggling.

  “You’re so damn girly,” I said. Even though I said this is a bit of a derogatory way, I actually loved how girly Whitney was. She kind of balanced me out. And I knew that she knew I didn’t mean anything by it.

  “And you could take some lessons!” retorted Whitney with a snort, crossing her arms. “If you don’t think Justin’s cute, who do you like over on the boys’ side?”

  “The boys’ side?” I asked, feeling a little put on the spot and cornered. “I mean, I don’t know.”

  “There’s a lot of nerds over there,” Whitney admitted. “Can’t tear a couple of those dudes from their computer games. But there are definitely some hotties. You can tell me, Natasha. Who are you sweet on?”

  “Whitney,” I groaned with embarrassment.

  “Tasha,” said Whitney, impatiently awaiting my answer.

  “I don’t know,” I reiterated.

  “Fine,” she said. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”

  “It’s not that I don’t want to,” I said, slightly acquiescing. “It’s that I don’t know. None of them, I think.”

  “What about Michael?” she asked. “He’s an English major, just like you. I like his long hair.”

  “No, I don’t like Michael,” I said. “He’s fine, I mean, he’s a good guy. But I’m not, like, sweet on him.”

  “People are already shacking up,” said Whitney matter-of-factly. “And a lot of the sophomore boys already have girlfriends. You’re gonna miss out, Natasha.” Whitney then had a brightening thought and her face lit up. “I bet you like a boy in one of your classes!”

  “I don’t want to talk about this anymore,” I said, standing up from my desk chair and wandering over to my closet. Opening my closet door up, I fished around inside to find my sleeping clothes. With a slight flutter in my heart, knowing that Whitney’s eyes were on me, I cautiously pushed my jeans down my legs and began to change clothes.

  “The reason I’m pressing you on all this is because I care about you,” said Whitney. “You’re my roommate. We’re in this together.”

  “Thanks,” I said, pulling my jeans off my feet, standing there now in just a t-shirt sporting the university’s logo and my panties. I retrieved some athletic grey worn-in shorts from my closet and quickly pulled them up my legs.

  “And…” said Whitney, continuing, wagging a finger at me. “You know the ALOHA trip to Stratford, Ontario is coming up for the Shakespeare Festival. We’re all staying overnight there and it’s going to be a total fuck fest.”

  “Oh my God! Whitney!” I exclaimed. “I’m not going to just pick some boy so we can screw around during the Shakespeare trip.”

  “I’m just teasing,” she said with a roll of her eyes. “But, you know, it’ll be fun to partner up with a boy on that trip.”

  “It’s not like we’ll be sleeping in the same room with the guys,” I said, turning from the closet and walking back over to her. As I walked, I slipped my hand inside my t-shirt and unhooked my bra, then deftly began maneuvering out of it and eventually pulling it out from my sleeve. “It’ll probably be you and me sleeping in the same hotel room.”

  “And just maybe I’ll slide down the hall to a boy’s room,” said Whitney with a grin. She was not impressed with my annoyed face. “Oh c’mon.”

  “I’m going to bed,” I said, stepping to the wooden ladder connected to our loft. Our beds were both lofted up near the ceiling, giving us a bit more space in the otherwise small dorm room.

  “Wait,” she said. “I’m sorry, Natasha,” Whitney admitted. “I’m just teasing you. You don’t have to like any of the boys on the other side of the hall. I’m just being a gossipy girl.” She frowned softly.

  “That’s okay,” I admitted, putting my foot on the first rung of the ladder.

  “Will you tell me when you do like a boy?” Whitney asked with a pleading tone. I could tell she just cared about me and wanted to be involved in my life. She didn’t have any kind of nefarious plot otherwise. She just liked talking about what she considered to be girly things.

  “Yes,” I said, feeling a softness in my heart for her. She really was a sweet friend. “You’ll be the first to know.”

  *

  But I wasn’t being completely honest with Whitney. It wasn’t that I didn’t like any of the other freshmen boys on the other side of our dorm. It was that I hadn’t really thought romantically about a boy for a long time. The last time I remembered thinking that I liked a boy was probably early on in high school. But it was kind of short lived. I just thought he was interesting and when I told some of my friends that, they interpreted it as though I liked him romantically. And I went along with it, half-pretending I had a crush on him to satisfy the projections of my friends.

  I can admit that I was a bit of a late bloomer. I didn’t really date at all in high school and now that I was in college, feeling a new sense of freedom and excitement, I was ready to expand my horizons and find romance. But the problem was… I just wasn’t interested in the guys.

  Ugh. I feel like I’m being cagey and indecisive here. The truth is, dear reader, that as I aged and the idea of romance slipped into my brain, I always thought of other girls.

  I didn’t know how to say that out loud. Not to my family or friends, not to Whitney, and I sometimes found it difficult to even say it to myself. I know logically that a girl liking other girls isn’t really that big of deal. You see it on television and in movies
all the time now. There’s nothing wrong with being a lesbian. I was just having a difficult time saying it. I can’t explain it. The words wanted to jump out of my mouth, but when I parted my lips they just wouldn’t exit. I was confident that I’d figure it out at college, finally come out of my shell, maybe even shuck this husk of introversion off my shoulders. But I had to wait until the time was right, you know?

  It was midday and there was hustle and bustle around the cafeteria, students filing in and students filing out. I had just returned from my morning English class and before getting lunch, I wanted to stop in at the ALOHA office in the basement of the dorm to chat with them about the upcoming Shakespeare trip. As I wandered through the lobby of Leopold Hall, I ran into Meghan, one of the other freshman girls in the program. We weren’t really all that friendly with each other yet, but we’d talked a couple of times.

  “Hey Tasha,” she said with a smile. Meghan was a music major, cute and kind of goofy. “Are you getting lunch?”

  “In just a few,” I said. “I’m going to go stop into the ALOHA office first.”

  “I’ll save you a spot at the table,” said Meghan. “What are you going to the office for?”

  “Just to talk and pay for my spot,” I said. “Do you know if it’ll be Sacco down there or someone else?” Anna Sacco was the head of ALOHA, a professor at the university, and a very smart lady. She was also a published and respected poet.

  “I don’t know,” mused Meghan. “I imagine Sacco is teaching a class or something. I don’t see her around Leopold very much.”

  “Have you ever stopped into the office?” I asked.

  “Not yet,” she said. “I suppose I still need to pay for my spot for the trip as well!”

  “Okay,” I said. “I’ll meet you in the caf’ in just a few.”

  “Cool!” said Meghan. She grinned and gave me a theatric wave. It made me happy to feel included.

  I walked down the stairwell of the dorm and slinked through the narrow hallway. The walls were stucco and beige, like they hadn’t been redone in my lifetime. I ran my fingers along the bumpy stucco as I made my way toward the end of the hall where I knew the office was. As I neared, I saw that the office door was open and I saw the vagueness of a person sitting behind the desk.