The Last Super Chef

by Chris Negron

  “Which restaurant are we going to?” I ask him, my first effort to keep the conversation on track. Besides, no one had told me yet, and I was curious. I even had a couple cross-my-fingers hopes on where he would take me.

  And hold on. He could hardly wait? But . . . he did wait. For eleven years he’s . . . Food and cooking, Curtis. You even meditated about this. Or stood in a bathroom, closed your eyes, and said a bunch of nonsense toward the mirror over and over again, anyway.

  The cameraman who followed us out of the building settles into the front passenger seat of the limo. It’s Mr. Lumberjack again. He pushes his lens through the window separating the front seat from the back. The red light flares on.

  The live audience must be with us now. The Super Chef slaps the studio grin back onto his face. “We’ll be announcing tonight’s destination in a moment. First, I want to know how you’re feeling, Curtis. How’s the competition been going for you?”

  My nerves jangle. I blink at him a few times to settle them. I should talk about the okonomiyaki. But that’s not where my head goes. For some reason I skip that challenge and start with the creativity one. “I have a lot of experience with canned goods. You know”—I pause for emphasis—“obviously.”

  The Super Chef issues a slow, slightly confused nod back. The limo lurches forward, and we both put our hands out to keep from sliding around in our seats. “So that’s been your favorite challenge so far?”

  Behind me, I feel the camera adjust slightly, swinging from his face to mine. I wonder if Joey’s and Pepper’s meetings started out being filmed in the limo, too. I feel a little bit exposed, like the whole world’s watching me over my shoulder. It’s pretty close to true.

  All I can do is nod back. This trip is rapidly turning into a nodding contest. It’s because my words feel locked up inside me, behind a dam of . . . I don’t know what. But seriously . . . how can he sit there and ask me these obvious questions, like I’m some kid he knows nothing about, who he’s just meeting for the first time?

  “Have you been to New York before?”

  My slow nodding becomes an even slower, just as confused, shake of my head.

  “First time, really? It’s amazing here, don’t you think?” Chef Taylor asks as he gazes out the window at the city lights. “Every kind of food imaginable is always right around the corner.” He twists to face me head on again. “Tell me, do you like Persian?”

  Nearly a year ago I made a killer tabbouleh for the Super Bowl. That’s kind of Persian, maybe more Middle Eastern. Of course Paige told me she preferred regular salsa, that I’d gone a little “too far” in my experimenting. I love her, but that kid can be a real disappointment sometimes. That tabbouleh was one hundred percent the bomb.

  “Sure, guess so.”

  The Super Chef’s grin widens. “Not feeling too talkative tonight? You’re not nervous, I hope.”

  Tell him about the tabbouleh. And that one time you made falafel. Food and cooking.

  But somehow I can’t. It’s like . . . I don’t know . . . all of a sudden I’ve decided he doesn’t have the right to know the real me. To hear about the things I’ve done. Think about it. He had about one million chances to come to North Sloan before, and he did nothing with any of them.

  Besides, are these questions even real? What does he already know? Do he and Mom ever talk? Secret conversations after we’ve gone to bed, like the ones I sometimes overhear her having with her coworkers?

  If they did, if he cared enough to remember what they discussed, he should already know I’ve never been to New York. So did he really ask me that question because he doesn’t know the answer? Or is he just asking things he figures the audience must be itching to hear? Is this even a real conversation?

  The seeping frustration I’ve been feeling for days starts to smolder. The big, famous Super Chef wants to know if I’m nervous? Seriously? The question feels like a trick. Like some kind of lie.

  I squirm in my seat, my insides swirling. A mini-tornado keeps touching down at different spots in my gut. I suddenly want to ask him all my questions. The father ones. Like, why leave in the first place? Why never come back? Why, now that I’m this close, feet away, right in front of you, are you still pretending?

  Whack, whack, whack. I send all three moles back into their dark holes.

  Still, I’m confused. The truce has failed; the battle inside me rages more fiercely than ever. My heart yearns to say all these things, ask these questions, but my brain has outlawed them.

  Be yourself, Curtis. That’s one of the last things Mom said before Skype cut her off. Is this what she meant? Did she predict I’d turn myself around like this?

  I still haven’t answered him, and it’s like I’ve beamed the confusion I’m feeling straight onto his face.

  For a second, the Super Chef’s smile fades.

  For a second, he’s the one who looks panicked. As if he’s the one, not me, who’s losing his grip on the big chance of his life, the whole reason he exists.

  It’s the same moment the brakes of the limo squeal as it comes to an abrupt stop.

  31

  Lavish curtains obscure the main doors and windows of Colbeh’s Café. The valets outside brush them back for us, revealing an ornate set of double doors framed in gold. As we step in, I take in an immense circular bar with a floor-to-ceiling wall of wines behind it. The whole, dimly lit place teems with so many guests there isn’t a single open seat.

  A thin, slouching manager greets us—lots of smiling and clasped hands and bowing. He leads us in and quickly back, cutting a winding path around tables, every one packed with customers. They torque in their chairs and crane their necks to get a glimpse of the celebrity in their midst. Chef Lucas Taylor, the Super Chef, the most famous cook in all the world.

  Finally we arrive at a private room in the very back of the restaurant. “We’re so honored to have you choose Colbeh’s for your special evening,” the manager says to Taylor, bowing again. He pulls back another curtain, revealing a hidden section clearly reserved for VIPs. A round, raised table with a comfortable-looking booth covered in throw pillows sits empty, waiting just for us.

  The Super Chef goes first, somehow not lifting his leg high enough and catching his foot on the edge of the step up. The manager panics, reaching out like he’s going to catch the most famous chef in the world before he tumbles back. Captain Slouch is either picturing a lawsuit or landing his face on the front page of the New York Times. “Hero restaurant manager saves Lucas Taylor’s life.” He sighs relief when the Super Chef catches himself with one hand and lands successfully in his seat without further help.

  When it’s my turn to slide in, the manager repositions the curtain in his grip, as if maybe he hadn’t held it open far enough the first time around. I climb into the booth without a problem.

  Now that I’m sitting again, I feel my shoulders relax a little. I’d become super tense throughout the journey in the limo, and it grew even worse during the march through the crowded restaurant, the camera and all those eyes watching us so closely. Then the bearded guy finds a spot at the edge of the table where he can train his camera on either me or Taylor, as the situation demands, and I remember where I am. What’s at stake.

  I know it’s just one lens, but I sense the millions of eyes behind it. All waiting to see which mistake I’ll make next.

  “Tell me how you fell in love with cooking, Curtis.”

  I always thought the Super Chef’s hair was the same color as mine. His eyes, too. But now that I’m the closest I’ve ever been to him, both seem darker—his hair maybe more brown than my sandy blond. And if his eyes are blue, they’re a dark blue. Almost black. Not really hazel at all.

  Plus, that little spike in the front, the one that’s always matched mine when I’ve watched his show on TV? It’s gone completely. He’s combing it flat now. Have I been seeing it wrong all these years? It doesn’t seem possible. And besides, it’s not what I should be worrying about.

  I sh
ould be concentrating on his question. It’s my chance to turn the discussion back to cooking. To get past some of this anger before I blow this meeting entirely. But I have to pick my words carefully. There’s so much you’re-my-father stuff wrapped up in any answer I can give for how I fell in love with cooking.

  “My mom told me about my father. That . . . how he always loved to cook. How talented he was. Is. I was seven, and I guess . . . I started wanting to cook, too. So I did. I was . . . it didn’t take long to understand I was born for it. Into it.”

  Super smooth, Pith.

  I stare into his eyes, waiting for them to flash recognition of the truths I avoided for both our sakes. But, oh, he’s good, because his expression betrays nothing. And, oh, I’m a coward, because I wanted to say so much more. I was so sure applying to come here was the right thing to do. Mom had no job. We needed that prize money. But now . . .

  A thin waiter with puckered lips arrives and sets a dish of radishes, olives, feta, watercress, and mint down between us. He asks about drinks. Taylor orders something called sharbat for both of us.

  The Super Chef must notice my confusion because he says, “Trust me, you’ll like it. It’s a delicious beverage. And very healthy.”

  The waiter’s about to leave, but the Super Chef stops him and adds some appetizers. Mirza ghasemi, which I know is smoked eggplant with tomato and garlic; dolma; minced beef and rice inside grape leaves; some hummus.

  “All sound good?” he asks me.

  I nod mutely.

  “You have a gorgeous kitchen, by the way,” Taylor says once the waiter departs. “Not that it had anything to do with selecting you for the contest, but it was hard to miss all that fantastic equipment. Is that your family home?”

  That question’s almost about cooking, but I’m wary of a trick. Maybe he’s trying to corner me into some kind of Pettynose confession. I’m definitely not taking the bait. I keep my answer short and simple.

  “No.”

  The Super Chef gazes at me, his smile fading once again as he waits for my answer to extend beyond just that lone word. When all I give him is a matching stare back, he asks, “Is something wrong, Curtis?”

  “What could be wrong?” I ask him. “What could possibly be wrong?”

  Because I’m starting to feel like everything’s wrong. Tonight, and for a long time now. Because winning some money for Mom suddenly seems like a tiny Band-Aid on a really deep knife cut. When what I really need are stitches, a ton of them.

  “I don’t know,” Taylor says, sniffing a little in frustration. “I . . . this is our chance to get to know each other. I think you understand that.”

  The Super Chef continues looking at me with a flat expression. “You do get this meeting is the subjective component of the competition, right? If it doesn’t go well, it will be that much harder for us to select you as the champion.”

  It’s like he’s begging me to bring it up. So, just do it, then. Say, “You’re my father,” and let the conversation spiral from there. But there’s still a part of my brain with a mallet raised in the air, waiting to knock those words down again before they’re able to pop out.

  I inhale. “I thought we would be talking about food. Cooking.”

  “Yes . . . yes, of course.”

  Swallowing hard, I try my best to look friendly. Not the least bit confused. Or frustrated. I can tell by his single raised eyebrow it isn’t working. He knows he isn’t talking to the real me. That me, colorful, alive Curtis—bright Curtis—feels trapped, as if I’m back in my sensory deprivation booth, pounding the glass to get out, all while some black-and-white version of me is getting to talk to my father, botching it entirely.

  Taylor sighs. “I’ve been trying to ask you about cooking, Curtis. All you give me are one-word answers.” He leans back in the booth and inhales before reconjuring his studio smile from somewhere down deep. He pitches forward again. “Let’s start over. How about that? Why’d you choose a soufflé to cook for your entry?”

  Blood starts flowing back to my brain. I didn’t want to talk to him about home, or Pettynose’s kitchen, or Mom. I’ve been holding back from calling him out for being my father but never really being my father.

  But here it is, finally, a question that’s about food and only food. Exactly what I wanted. Isn’t it? Sure, I should want to answer this one. I should want to talk about my soufflé. Even with him. Or maybe especially with him. It’s all still mega confusing.

  All I know is the colorful version of me breaks out of his cage and starts to talk.

  “I wanted to prove I could do something really technical. Something simple but complex. To me, that’s the secret of great cooking. Doing complicated things in a simple way. Making dishes that are actually super hard look like they’re easy.”

  He smiles and leans forward, dropping his chin into his hand. “Tell me more about that.”

  32

  After the waiter returns to drop off the appetizers, the Super Chef puts in a slew of entrée orders, and it doesn’t take long for them to start showing up. Every time a new plate is brought to us, another one is ordered. We can’t possibly eat all the food he requests, but we can at least taste each offering.

  So that’s what we do. A nibble here, a spoonful there. The dip of a radish into this sauce, a swipe of some flatbread through that hummus. As each new dish arrives, we discuss its qualities, tasting, savoring, agreeing, debating. What started as one of the worst nights of my life might be turning into one of the best. I’m sitting here with my father, the Super Chef, and we’re talking food. Maybe it doesn’t matter if we talk about anything else.

  The meal ends, and the manager returns, slouching and bowing with his hands together like he’s praying the food was okay, that the Super Chef said good things about it for the millions of live viewers that might soon become Colbeh’s Café visitors. He leads us out again. The restaurant’s tables have turned over while we were hidden away in back, so a whole new set of onlookers stare and marvel at us as we pass back through the dining room.

  “Curtis, that was a great discussion,” the Super Chef says once the limo begins to guide us back. “Your knowledge is impressive. But . . .” He sighs. “I’m just not sure I know you any better than I did before tonight. Maybe we still have time to fix that. You want to start by telling me a little more about home?”

  Annnd we’re back.

  The joy of talking food with him fades. This time the knot that forms at the back of my neck is pure anger. It’s as if the fact that it went away for a while makes its return that much stronger. I feel a scowl coming on, but I work really hard to keep my face straight.

  But seriously—now he’s concerned about home? Now he wants to hear all about it? Now he wants time to fix things?

  “Home is North Sloan. I’m sure you know.”

  He nods. “I do. Of course. And you live there with your mom and sister.”

  “Paige,” I say. Your daughter, I think. You do remember her name, right? “Yeah. The three of us. Just us three.”

  “Three’s a good number.”

  What’s that mean? “It’s the best number, actually.”

  Chef Taylor twists his squinting face, like trying to extract secrets from me is harder than squeezing the last stubborn drop of juice from an orange. “Your little family seems very close.”

  “We are,” I say. “Close, I mean. We have each other. It’s all we need.”

  He almost looks like he wants to give up. But he still doesn’t, asking a few more questions that continue to draw shortened replies from me. A determination to dance away from his probing jabs at my life drops over my eyes like a curtain. One I can hide behind.

  Because he should have to earn these answers. All those years he should’ve been working harder to know me. One night of curiosity can’t possibly make up for a decade of ignoring me.

  Eventually the fire in my gut flares hotter than ever. I can’t stand it anymore. He’s in mid-question when I interrupt him with “Wh
y there?”

  “Why . . . where?” he asks.

  “Colbeh’s Café. Why there? You could’ve taken me anywhere.”

  “That’s . . . well, that’s true.” He looks toward the roof of the limo. “But remember, it’s not just you I took there tonight.” He gestures at the camera, again honing in on us through the limo window. I’m so used to it, I kind of forgot about it. Forgot this is going out live to every single one of the Super Chef’s precious fans. That Mom and Paige have probably been watching us snipe at each other all night, sitting on the edge of Mom’s bed-couch, exchanging worried looks.

  Huge opportunity for you coming up, Mom said the other day. And my stomach sinks, because I quickly go from worrying I might’ve blown it to knowing I already have. Just as sure as we can’t get back the years we lost, the years I spent fatherless, I can’t take back anything I’ve done or said here tonight, either. All the stubbornness, the short answers.

  Even after my amateur meditating, I still let the wrong daydream win. Too worried about this man paying attention to me finally. Forgetting all about the prize I came here to win, the one my family’s waiting for me to bring home to them.

  I wonder if my sister is thrilled I actually uttered her name. I wonder if she’s mad that I didn’t say more about her, especially with all the prying Taylor’s been doing. But she doesn’t know he’s her father, so she wouldn’t understand my reasons for keeping our life private, for trying to stay focused. Even though, in the end, I’ve failed at that, too. I’m more distracted and confused than ever.

  My sister is bound to be wondering what’s wrong. What if, if she hasn’t already, this televised conversation forces Mom to finally tell her the truth? My throat catches as I picture it, my heart rabbiting with the knowledge I’d be missing it. That I would’ve been the cause of it. I know Paige would want me there with her if—when—she ever found out.