Hello, Sunshine

is hands, stopping me. “I already know what you’re going to say,” he said.

“You do?”

He motioned across the kitchen. “Douglas told me about your little fake TV show,” he said. “When he was trying to get me to replace you with his nephew on trash.”

“He did?”

Chef Z shrugged. “Headline is, I couldn’t care less. Cooking and television are two separate things. And one of them is idiotic.”

“The show was actually just on the internet. Though when it came out that I couldn’t cook, the Food Network did cancel my contract. I was going to host for them.”

“Why do you do that?”

“Do what?”

“Think I care.”

He shook his head, not interested in my part of this conversation, only in his.

“There is no way to make coq au vin in under thirty minutes and also to make it well. That’s why you pay me to make it. Because you should not.”

I smiled at him, feeling buoyed. I wanted to talk to Z about letting me work in food prep. I’d proven to have a good palate and I wanted to learn. I knew it was a long shot, but I couldn’t help but think: Maybe this was where this roundabout road had taken me. I’d cook the kinds of food that I had learned to love at the restaurant—fresh, specific, thoughtful. And I wouldn’t do it as a way to get a new show, a new shot at stardom, but as an end to itself. To actually be a great cook.

Putting the ingredients up front. Take two.

Chef Z was spooning the lardo into a plastic container. “Is there a reason you’re staring at me or is this just the naturally awkward way you make people uncomfortable?” he said.

“I’m just happy to hear that you weren’t irked by what happened.” I paused. “I should say, by what I did.”

I was learning to do it. Take responsibility.

“Fine,” he said. Then he motioned toward the lardo. “Moving on.”

“I was hoping to talk with you about pursuing cooking opportunities here at the restaurant,” I said. “Under your tutelage.”

“I don’t like that word,” he said. “Tutelage. Please don’t use it again.”

I nodded. “Okay.”

“And, also, no.”

53

So when I said put the ingredients on top, I didn’t mean you should throw the baby out with the fucking bathwater.”

Rain and I were sitting on the steps outside the front door, my belly starting to stick out.

“I did that when I was twenty-six, and it didn’t work out.”

“But this new show sounds like it would have been different.”

I thought of what would be required. Social media and live television and Instagram updates sweeping me up, imploring me to let people into my world, into my experience, before I even knew what that experience was adding up to. Maybe I had been burned so badly I was officially a Luddite. I was certainly getting emotional during this pregnancy. But I now understood something about when I wanted to share myself. And why.

My sister shook her head, like I was crazy, though I could see she was also a little impressed.

“I guess it’s a good thing you have job security,” she said sarcastically.

I laughed. “I do have a proposition for you,” I said.