The Art of Love (14 page)

******

We’ve just dealt with a giant glut of orders as everyone seemed to want the specials at once. There is finally a lull so I think to check and see how the servers are handling their blueberry smiles. I just happen to catch Gwenn as she is finishing up at table nine. She’s done the best she can to camouflage her teeth by wearing deep purple lipstick, but she’s the kind of woman who looks good no matter what she wears. Gwenn’s customers are somewhere in their fifties.

“
Can I get you anything else?” Gwenn asks.

The woman is chubby but has obviously gone the extra mile to look glamorous for the evening. “
Sweetie,” she says. “I know I probably should have said something earlier, but this is kind of awkward.” She squints at Gwenn’s mouth. “Is something going on with your teeth?”

Gwenn’s hand flutters to her mouth briefly, an obvious reflex action from being embarrassed. “Oh…” But then she forces her hand down to her side. “
Thank you for noticing,” she says with a tight, wooden smile. “It's part of a promotion Bouche is doing for Kettle One's blueberry infused vodka. Can I offer you both a complimentary blueberry martini?”

The woman is skeptical, eyeballing Gwenn’s smile. She asks, “
Is it going to turn my teeth that color?”

“
No. Of course not.” Gwenn is really fighting to sound natural. “This is just something we did for the promotion.” She waves at her teeth.

The woman does not look convinced. She turns to her husband. “What do you think, honey? Do you want to try a blueberry martini?”

Gwenn is happy to have the woman’s attention turned elsewhere. “So?” She gives the husband a close-lipped smile to conceal her teeth. “What do you think? They’re free.”

“I think…” The man lifts his napkin to his lips. He’s a bit sweaty and has a pinched look on his face. I wonder if he’s having a heart attack or something. Should I call 911? “I think…” he tries again, shifting uncomfortably in his chair. “I think you have to excuse me.” The man tries to get up but instead lets out a fart that’s as loud as a firecracker. The man’s face goes bright red as several diners turn to see what caused the car to backfire.

“Gerald!” The woman is stricken.

“Sorry,” he says, clearing his throat. “Sometimes the big ones bust out.”

The smell has reached Gwenn, and she places her hand to her nose, trying hard to look casual. Several of the customers at the surrounding tables start to snicker, but this causes a few of them to lose control of their butt cheeks, and several more audible sounds of bowel distress ring out through the air. The entire dining room goes dead quiet. It is a fancy restaurant, after all, so no one is quite sure what to do. Finally, one of the older gentlemen attached to one of the offending butts can’t take it anymore and bursts out laughing. His date clutches her napkin to her nose. I hear a male voice with an English accent exclaim, “Oh, that is foul.”

There is more giggling, but that only brings on another chorus of gas.

Gwenn abandons her post, rushing past me into the kitchen without even noticing I’m standing there. “Something's wrong in the dining room!” I hear her say.

The little Dutch boy has pulled his finger out of the damn. It seems half the patrons in Bouche have been holding back cutting the cheese, and none of them can restrain themselves any longer. I hear the rapid fire of an automatic weapon but in fart form. I plunge into the dining room, barely able to restrain myself from clutching my apron over my face, trying to identify the food that is the cause of the distress.

In general, people do not want their fine dining experience to be perfumed by farts. That’s pretty much true for any dining experience, but especially for fine dining. The senior set start signaling for the check almost immediately, most of them with their meals not even half finished. Some diners who have just been seated or only served appetizers don’t even bother with the check. They just make a fast shuffle for the door.

Through the chaos, I put it together that it’s the people who ordered the spare ribs that are creating the blue fog. Further investigation proves the baked beans to be the culprit. I know that beans are the magical fruit, but this is ridiculous.

It only takes about ten minutes for the entire restaurant to clear of customers. The staff is quickly following the patrons, mutinying en masse. At this point, I give up and head outside with everybody else. The stink has even found its way into the lobby of the hotel.

Antoine and Trent are out front shouting at each other. “Antoine did nothing wrong!” the Frenchman is yelling for some reason. I’m not sure he’s been accused of anything, but he’s shouting about it anyway. “Someone is trying to put zee picture around me! They are trying to make zee frame!”

“I can’t believe this,” I say to June, rubbing my eyes and sucking in a lung full of fresh air.

June shakes her head. “I was the one making those beans, and they just went from the can straight to the pot with a few spices,” she tells me. “There’s no way they caused all this unless something went seriously wrong at the factory or someone added something to my recipe when I wasn’t looking.”

I see Kiki standing to one side, not looking all that distressed by the situation. I know she’s behind this, and I’m not about to stand around and let her get away with it. I storm over to her.
“You accused me of going too far? What do you call this little stunt?”

“
Don't try to pin this on me.” I find it suspicious that she’s not at all surprised at being accused and is ready to yell right back. “You're the one that doesn't keep a clean kitchen!”

I am literally about to start pulling her hair out by its brunette roots when someone grabs me by the shoulders and spins me around. It’s Trent, and he’s yelling, “
What the hell should keep me from firing you right now?”

“
Nothing!” I scream. At a certain point, a person has to recognize all is lost even if the finger of blame should actually be pointed in another direction. “Go ahead and fire me,” I tell him.

My career in the food services industry has gone out with a bang.

***Kiki***

Trent fired Sue! I can’t even believe it. He just fired her right there in the street in front of everybody. I almost felt bad for her. She took it well, though; didn’t cry or anything. She just said, “Fine, I’ll clean out my locker,” and then headed into the gas chamber, which was also kind of brave. I’m not going back inside until somebody calls a fumigator.

I don’t know what we’re going to do tomorrow as far as running Bouche, though. I guess Antoine will step in. His nose has been out of joint about Sue being made chef de cuisine anyway, so I’m sure this’ll suit him just fine. But still, I can’t believe Sue is out of here.

Chapter 15

I get home, and I really don’t know what to do with myself. I can’t sit still; I can’t watch TV; I’m too angry to go out or drive anywhere. I notice that my clothes have a lingering stench, so I peel them off in the bathroom and throw them in a garbage bag, which I seal with a couple of twist ties. I decide a shower is in order because it might be my imagination, but the stink seems to also be in my hair. That really only takes about twenty minutes—and that’s with my new loofah and facial regimen. Then I throw my chef’s gear in the washer and scrub my rubber clogs just to be on the safe side. Another ten minutes I’ve managed to soak up, but now I’m at a loss. I put on a pair of silk pajamas and a cotton robe I bought the last time I was in Chinatown. My hair is wet, so I pull it into a knot at the top of my head to keep it out of the way. I’m hungry, but I don’t want anything resembling beans, or ribs for that matter, pretty much for the rest of my life. I decide a big salad is about the only thing I can hold down without my memory of the evening triggering my gag reflex.

I know Kiki did something to the beans. Not her directly, of course, but I know she sent some assassin in to completely ruin me with one dastardly act of sabotage. Yes, I was playing a little dirty myself, but I didn’t arrange for people to get cut and need stitches. I didn’t practically poison anyone. What if whatever was added to the beans did more than just give people gas? Someone could have died.

I’m making a mess of a head of lettuce. My eight-inch chef’s knife is ridiculously dull. I pull out my steel and try to bring up the edge, but it’s reached the point where I just have to take it in to have it professionally done. I hate a dull knife.

I hear my phone ringing in the living room. I charge in and snatch it up. “Hello?” I answer, without bothering to check the caller ID.

“Quitter.”

Not this again. “Elliot?”

“Quitter,” he says in his high-pitched, tantrum voice.

“Are you seriously doing this?” I ask.

“Quitter.” Yes, I guess he is. He’s probably had a few drinks, and this somehow feels like a good idea.

“Listen, Elliot. I don’t know what you’re trying to prove here, but this is a seriously bad time to be calling.”

“Quitter.”

Normally, I’d feel guilty for making some guy feel bad, even if he sorely deserved it. I’d probably try to figure out a way to make him feel better, maybe even offering to meet for coffee or something to talk it over. Perhaps my guilt taking me so far as to getting back together with him for a few miserable weeks, unwittingly providing him the opportunity to then break up with me, hence salvaging his own ego. But I’m not in that kind of mood anymore. In fact, the way Elliot is acting, I don’t think I’ll ever feel guilty about dumping some jerk ever again.

I haven’t said anything for a few seconds, which I guess leaves my ex feeling he should fill in the dead air. “Quitter,” he whispers into the phone.

“Listen, Elliot,” I shout into my cell. “I didn’t quit. Got that?” I’m so mad, my hands are trembling. “I didn’t quit. You were fired!”

I stab at the end call button, hang up on him, and fling my cell phone across the room.

I might have been let go from Bouche. I might be alone and unemployed. But at least I went down fighting. At least I tried to change my nature and actually date a non-loser for once in my life. It’s ended in disaster, but I have to give myself credit for trying.

My stomach growls, and I think of my salad. There, hanging on the wall in front of me, is the Chinese saber that took me so long to pay off. My chef knife may be dull, but I have a better idea on how to chop a salad. I snatch the sword from the wall and head back into the kitchen.

“Fwach!” The blade of the sword zips through the head of lettuce cleaving it in half. Most of the leaves end up on the floor, but I don’t even care. Next I test my steel on a bundle of cilantro. “Zwing!” Green confetti fills the air. I grab a tomato and lob it toward the ceiling. “Splat!” The room is sprayed with red like in a low-budget horror movie. This is great.

I rush to the fridge and fling open the door to see what else I can find. For a moment, I think I hear someone calling my name. I pause to listen, hear nothing, and decide my ears are playing tricks on me. Who’d be looking for the Chicago poisoner, anyway?

There’s a wrinkled old eggplant in the back of the fridge and a cantaloupe. Both seem like ideal targets. I lob the melon skyward, and as I’m bringing down my blade, Dahlia walks into the kitchen. “
You know, you really shouldn't leave your door unlocked,” she tells me just as I take my swing.

“Eeek!” Dahlia shrieks
, throwing her hands in front of her face in a defensive gesture as juice and bits of melon spray across the room.

It was seriously bad timing, and Dahlia’s expensive silk blouse is dripping with cantaloupe carnage. “What the hell?” She looks at me and then down at her spattered blouse. “
This is silk. It has to be dry cleaned.”

“S
orry,” I say, lowering my sword. “I didn't realize you were going to be breaking into my apartment.”

I’ve got Dahlia settled on my couch in a clean T-shirt and sipping a glass of wine. Her blouse is soaking in the sink, but I seriously don’t think it’ll stain. Dahlia looks strange in casual clothing. I bet she’s the kind of woman who dresses up to exercise.

I pour my own glass of pinot grigio and join her on the couch. “
What's going on?” I ask. “I wasn't expecting you to drop by.”

“Obviously,” she says in that droll way she has of speaking. She takes a large sip of wine before adding, “
Okay, I'll admit it. I'm addicted to your little schemes, and I need a fix.” She leans in and looks at me, her eyes bright with expectation. “How goes the campaign?”

I let out a sigh and sink a little down in my seat, as if slicing fruits and vegetables with a sword wasn’t enough of an indication that things aren’t going well. “
Total disaster. In fact...” I figure I might as well fess up while I have a sympathetic ear, “I think I might have just been fired.” The truth is, I’ve definitely been fired, but I don’t think I can say it without bursting into tears.

“
Ooh.” Dahlia’s eyes grow round. She’s intrigued—like she’s watching a steamy daytime soap. “What happened?”

I don’t even know where to begin. I mean seriously, how do you start telling a story like that? Plus, I’m embarrassed to admit to my side of the events, and I’m not sure I want Dahlia knowing what I’ve been up to. It’s one thing to play a little dirty pool; it’s another thing to admit it to a friend.

“Sue?” A male voice calls from the walkway outside, and I am immediately alarmed that Elliot has decided to drive over to call me a quitter to my face. Dahlia obviously didn’t close my front door when she entered because it’s ajar a few inches.

“She’s in here,” Dahlia calls, completely not heeding the fact that the guy could be a temper-tantrum-throwing ex-boyfriend.

“Uh... Hello?” Much to my surprise, it’s Aziz poking his head through the door. “Sue?”

“
Aziz,” I exclaim, jumping to my feet and hurrying over to let him in. I send up a quick thanks that I got the window fixed so he doesn’t have too many questions. “What are you doing here?”

“
I came to see if you were all right,” he says as he enters the room. Even though my back is turned to Dahlia, I can feel her straightening up a little and smoothing out the T-shirt she’s wearing. Yes, he’s handsome enough that even ladies as confident and other-lady oriented as Dahlia feel the need to stop slouching and primp. I don’t know how he walks around the streets. Aziz nods in Dahlia’s direction then looks back at me. “So, are you?”

I flop back on the couch. Yes, Aziz is a gift from the goddesses, but he’s not a gift for me, so I don’t have to get all nervous when I’m around him. “
Aside from being fired? I'm fine.”

Dahlia is giving me an expectant look, so I wave a limp hand in the air to make the introductions. “
Dahlia, this is Aziz. He's the sommelier at Bouche,” I tell her. “Aziz, this is Dahlia. She's my neighbor...”

“And co-conspirator,” Dahlia quickly interjects.

“Nice to meet you.” Dahlia lifts her hand to be shook, but she does it palm down, the way ladies used to do it in social situations. This surprises me for a moment, because I know Dahlia is firmly pro-lesbian, but then I think about some of the gay men I’ve known over the years and how they are perfectly happy flirting with pretty women even though they prefer guys. Why couldn’t the same hold true for lesbians?

Aziz shakes Dahlia's hand, giving a slight bow
of his head, and for a moment I feel like I’m in King Arthur’s court. “How do you do?” he asks with a hint of a smile.

“I do fine.” Dahlia smiles right back at him.

“Have a seat,” I say, not sure if I should break up the flirtation. After all, Aziz is a big boy, and I’m sure he’s got the confidence to withstand a little rejection if he chooses to pursue my sexy neighbor romantically.

Settling himself on a chair, Aziz turns his attentions back to me. “
Did Trent fire you?”

I nod my head once and force out the words, “
Pretty much.” It’s all I can manage without my voice getting shaky.

“
That's not right. It wasn't your fault.” He seems genuinely angry. “I'm almost positive it was corporate espionage.”

“
Or head hostess espionage,” I say, half to myself. “Who can tell? Any way you slice it, I got the old eighty-six.”

“Not necessarily,” he says, his eyes bright and his face shiny. He has the appearance of someone holding back information to build suspense.

Both Dahlia and I key in on it and simultaneously ask, “What do you mean?”

“Well.” Aziz warms to his news. “
Do you know who Michael Toulaine is?”

“Of course,” I say without hesitation.

But Dahlia’s response is, “Not really.”

“
He's the host of
The Specialist
,” I tell her. This earns me a blank look, so I expand with, “He’s this chef that goes around the country doing restaurant reviews based on whatever specials a restaurant is serving that day.” She still doesn’t look that interested, so I add, “He’s pretty popular. He’s on the Eat Food Network.”

“
Okay.” Dahlia takes the information in. “How is this helpful?”

Aziz gives us a smile. Here comes the big reveal. “
He's a friend of mine from college. And he owes me.” His smile gets even brighter. “Big time.”

“
That's wonderful,” Dahlia assures him, “but what does that have to do with our friend Suzie-cakes over here?”

“Because,” he says, widening his eyes at her, “h
e'll do an episode featuring Bouche. I mean, if I ask him to.”

“That’s really great
, Aziz,” I tell him. “But I don't see how it will save my job.”

For some reason, this embarrasses Aziz a little. There’s a hint of pink under his dark skin. “
I'll tell Trent that I'll only set it up if he gives you your job back.”

I am stunned. I am truly astonished. I mean, I knew Aziz and I were friends, but this is definitely above and beyond the call of friendship. “
You'd do that for me?” I gasp.

“
Of course.” Aziz tries to play it off like it’s nothing. “But I can't tell you exactly when Mike's going to show up. It's supposed to be a ‘surprise’ and all that. So you have to make sure the specials are extra great every night.”

“Yes, of course. Not a problem. That’s fine. I can handle it,” I say, way too eager to even sound remotely cool. I can’t believe he is doing this for me. It’s just way too amazing. “
Is there anything he really goes for, food wise?”

Aziz thinks it over. “
He likes the unusual. Something he doesn't see every day. I mean, he’s been doing the show for a long time, so it’s hard for him to get excited about most specials anymore.”

“I can do that,” I say, nodding my head about a hundred times.

“And don't forget about desserts,” he adds. “He reviews those, too, and Mikey’s got a big sweet tooth.”

“
Oh...” My brain flashes to Carlos being held hostage in some darkened apartment by his new girlfriend. But I can’t say anything. This is a huge favor from Aziz, and I don’t want him to regret it. “I can do desserts,” I assure him. “And I super, really appreciate this, Aziz. I mean, I really do.” I realize I sound like one of the sisters from
The Brady Bunch
, but the words are already out of my mouth, so there’s nothing I can do about it. “I owe you one.”

“
Anything for you, Sue.”

Dahlia is looking back and forth between us, and for some reason, this makes Aziz extra pink under the collar.
He gets to his feet and makes for the door. “Well, I’d better get going. It was nice to meet you, Dahlia.” He flashes a quick smile in my direction. “Catch you at work tomorrow, Sue. I’ll talk to Trent first thing.”

I get to my feet and hurry after him. “
See you tomorrow, Aziz. And thanks again!” I call as he heads down the walkway.