Blue Plate Special, page 20
“It is not possible. I have no other pheasants and even if I did, I would not want this done to my food,” Jacques says as he tromps over to the bar and pours himself another Campari. I look at my watch and think about calling Sally. But that would probably hinder things even further.
“All right. Let’s just work with the vegetables, then. I think you might need to replace them with fresh, less cooked ones,” I say to Jacques.
He slams the glass down on the bar. “I do not think you understand that this is the way my food is. I will not ‘replace’ anything.”
“But the food will look awful in the magazine if it’s muted. It has to look brighter because—”
“I have no time for this nonsense,” Jacques says as he takes off his apron. “If you must ‘replace’ something, then you replace me. My sous-chef will show you how to work the stove because you are so foolish that you would probably blow yourself up in trying to make my vegetables look more ‘fresh’ et je ne sais quois. Tu est vraiment un embecile!”
He walks toward the door and grabs his black linen blazer from the rack. “And you tell your boss that I don’t give a fuck about what she wants the bird to look like. I am a chef. I present my food the way it will be in my restaurant because that is my expression—c’est tout! I do not perform dog and cat shows.”
Jacques is nearly out the door. I decide just to let the creep go, keeping the carnage to a minimum. But again, to my extreme chagrin, Stone has other ideas. He nearly knocks over his lamp in navigating his way to the door. He is there in a few seconds and has a hold of Jacques’s arm.
“Just a minute,” Stone says.
“Stone, what are you doing?” I ask, hoping my raised voice will remind him of our earlier conversation. It doesn’t.
“Let go!” Jacques yells.
Stone hangs on tightly enough to make Jacques wince and stop struggling. He pulls Jacques toward him and shifts his stance, which makes Jacques raise his free hand up to his face, as if to protect himself from a punch.
“It’s dog and pony show,” Stone says in a too-calm voice—clearly the hazardous by-product of watching one too many action movies.
“Okay, fine. Dog and pony. Will you please let go of me now?”
“You can’t have a dog and cat show. It makes no sense. It wouldn’t be a show. It would be a fight, which would be neither enjoyable nor entertaining. Do you understand how totally inappropriate it is to say ‘dog and cat show’?”
“Stone, it’s okay. He gets the point,” I say, but it fails to stop the “don’t-fuck-with-me” lecture on idiom.
“Do you understand?” Stone asks.
“Yes,” Jacques says. “Fine. I get it.”
“I’m glad. Now, I think you owe my colleague an apology,” Stone says.
“I’m sorry,” he says automatically. Stone still has a hold of his arm, so Jacques adds, “My sous-chef will work everything out fine for you, okay?”
Stone smiles and lets go. Jacques leaves without shutting the door.
I take a deep breath and find myself sitting down, exhausted from visions of bloodshed.
“Are you all right?” Stone asks.
“No, I am not all right! Jesus!—I can’t believe you did that.”
“I didn’t hurt him.”
“No, but you threatened to.”
“Not really,” he says, like I had imagined the whole thing, which only makes me more strident.
“Okay, so you gave him this bizarre lecture about the proper use of expressions, but the threat was still implicit, especially when you wouldn’t let go of his arm, which, by the way, he could easily call physical abuse in court.”
“He’s not going to sue me. I was just holding him accountable for how rude he was being,” Stone says.
“Great. I hate to think what you do to people who cut you off on the freeway. I mean, wasn’t I the one who was supposed to do all the talking? What happened to that plan?”
The whole event continues to send an electric shock through me. I start disassembling Jacques’s masterpiece, placing the bird parts on a separate plate. Stone pauses for a second, and I’m expecting him to mount another defense. I’m poised for it, ready to strike back. He walks over to me as I fiddle with the plate and don’t look up. Peripherally, I can see him take off his glasses and run his hand over his face and through his hair.
“I’m sorry,” he says. “I have this thing about pompous types.”
“I understand, but it’s not worth trying to set the person straight. I mean, chances are people like Jacques won’t change anyway.”
“I know, but…”
“But what?”
“You’ve been through enough, you know? You didn’t need that idiot in your face. I wanted to call him on it.”
I stop what I’m doing and look up at him. Stone ducks his head and looks away. I am startled into silence, unaware that he had given any thought to my father’s death. He never talked with me about it or asked any questions. Maybe it wasn’t macho pride after all but chivalry run amok that caused him to reproach Jacques. Not that I’m currently a damsel in distress. But I think back to the time before I started seeing Naomi and what a mess I was. And I remember Stone’s quiet kindness—always taking over when I couldn’t deal with the styling, once helping me detach a chunk of dry ice from my hand when I was too dazed to work efficiently. I remember how he held my hand under the warm water until the ice loosened its grip.
I take a deep breath and say, “Look, it’s okay. I’m not as fragile as I seem—I mean I’m stronger than I was a few months ago. So I don’t really need to be defended.”
“I know that now. And I really am sorry—about everything.”
It’s the “everything” that lingers in my heart. After he says it, Stone frowns at the floor and turns to readjust one of the lights, and I wonder if I was too harsh with him. The last thing I wanted was to sound like Sally. I reach my hand toward his arm, almost reflexively, but then drop it back to my side.
“It’s okay,” I tell him. “And thanks.”
He nods. I look away from him, survey the disastrous table, and sigh.
“Do you think Jacques will call Sally?” he asks.
“Maybe. But I’ll make sure she hears our side of the story before she hears it from him.”
“I’m the one who screwed up. Why don’t you let me call her?”
“No, technically it’s my job to update her. I better call. Besides, you’re not on her best side these days.”
“True,” he says.
“And I know how painful that is for you—since you love her so.”
He suppresses a smile.
“I know your poor heart just can’t take any more rejection.”
“How right you are,” he says, seriously enough to make me wonder if we’re still talking about Sally. “I guess we should reshoot while we still have some light left.”
“Definitely.”
Fortunately, the sous-chef is used to being a Jacques apologist. Obsequious to a fault, he smiles constantly and says “please” like a nervous tick, holding out his hand to invite me to the stove whenever I get near him in the kitchen. He cooks new carrots and radicchio and then adds some more squash to the purée. I rearrange the plate so that the bird curves around the edges, almost like a side dish to the vegetables. We get the shot, load up the car, and head out in search of the Bell Rock Inn.
In the car, Stone doesn’t say much. From the corner of my eye, I watch him wipe his camera lenses and change out the used-up rolls of film.
“Do we know where we’ll be shooting tomorrow?” he asks.
“No, but I’ll know after I call Sally. At least, I hope I’ll know.”
Thankfully, we check into the two economy rooms at the Bell Rock Inn without a hitch. I began to fear that everything would go wrong. I find three messages from Sally marked urgent so the first thing I do, after completing some calming deep-breathing exercises, is call her. The news isn’t good.
“We can’t get L’Auberge,” Sally says.
“Why not? That’s the most famous place out here.”
“Exactly. The chef and restaurant were just profiled in Bon Appétit. They’re busy. What do they need us for?”
“Why didn’t we know this before we came out here?”
“Well, we hadn’t received the August issue of Bon Appétit yet. Good God. I give you a little promotion and suddenly you know best.”
“It’s been a rough day, Sally.”
“So I hear. I just got off the phone with Jacques. He wanted to let me know that he would never be working with the magazine again. That, of course, just made my day. Will you please tell me what the hell is going on out there?”
“Well, it’s a long story. What exactly did he say?”
“Something about Stone and dog and pony shows, which made no sense. He kept alternating between French and English. Did Stone do something?”
“Well, yes, but it was totally understandable.”
“I’ll be the judge of that.”
I tell her the whole story—that there would be no feathers and that Jacques now knows a great deal about the proper use of idiomatic expressions. I try to make Jacques the villain and Stone the hero, but it’s a tough sell. Sally is silent for about ten seconds, and then she blows.
“I don’t care how talented Stone is. I don’t care if he’s Richard fucking Avedon. I want him off the shoot.”
“Sally, he’s got a conscience about things, standards. He doesn’t like to see people treated badly.”
“Well, that’s fine if he’s a missionary in India, but you don’t piss off a chef of a four-star restaurant.”
“He did apologize to me. And Jacques was extremely rude and difficult. Plus, the restaurant is falling apart.”
“I don’t care what Jacques or the restaurant was like,” Sally says. “Stone is off the shoot. We don’t have the money to send any other photographers out there, so I guess you’ll have to take the pictures.”
Months ago, when I was vying for his position, I would have shoved Stone aside and jumped at the chance. But now, oddly enough, it’s the last thing I want to do. So I haul out the secret weapon.
“You know, I even wrote down what Jacques said because I was so appalled by it. He said, ‘And you tell your boss that I don’t give a fuck about what she wants the bird to look like.’ And he called Mangia! a ‘stupid little magazine with a circulation of about fifty people.’”
There’s a pause on the line—a good sign.
“He said that?”
“Yes.”
“Those were his exact words?”
“Verbatim.”
“Son of a bitch.”
“Stone just couldn’t stand for someone putting you or the magazine down like that,” I say earnestly.
“All that sweet, gushy talk about how thrilled he was. Son of a bitch.”
“I told him to forget about the cover shot.”
“Damn right. I guess we’re obligated to use him, but I’m going to write a profile that’ll ruin that bastard. You said the restaurant was falling apart.”
“Empty at two o’clock on a Friday,” I say, playing along even though Jacques is already washed up and Sally’s culinary opinion doesn’t hold sway with anyone.
“Well, that’ll make it into the piece—‘easy to get a table for lunch or dinner.’ And we can retell the whole conflict over the food, too—exactly what he said and did. That’ll cook his pheasant.”
“Perfect. So I take it you don’t want Stone off the shoot after all.”
“I guess not. I mean, I can understand his reaction a little better now that I have the whole story. Besides, he knows a lot more about photography than you do.”
Whether Sally intends the remark as an insult or not doesn’t really matter. All I know is there are kinder, more encouraging ways of addressing an employee’s ambitions, but Sally will never be able to find them, let alone believe in me enough to say them. That is the ugly truth, which her false flattery and talk of permanent promotion momentarily obscured. To her, I will never be more than a food stylist, and I can’t change her opinion any more than I could put the pieces of Jacques’s hacked pheasant back together. Her mind is made up. All I can do is take note and move forward.
“So what’s our next assignment?” I ask.
She lets out an exasperated grunt. “I don’t know. I’ve got to call the Enchantment Resort and then Poco Diablo. I hope they’ve heard of us. It’s funny. I really thought we would have more name recognition.”
“So we’re in a holding pattern?”
“Not exactly. We need some scenic shots to throw in—you know, spectacular sunsets, red rock heaven. Oh! And we talked about doing something with the spiritual angle—the vortex thing. So you need to take one of those jeep tours and find some spiritual places.”
“That sounds rather difficult.”
“In L.A., yes. In Sedona, no. They grow shamans on trees out there, for Christ’s sake.”
Stone and I meet downstairs at six o’clock for dinner. We both are exhausted and agree that the Saguaro Café across the street is the easiest and cheapest way to eat. We order chicken fajitas and two beers.
“I’m almost afraid to ask, but what’s the word from L.A.?” he says.
“Jacques ratted on you, and Sally was pissed. But all I needed to do was tell her what Jacques said about her and the magazine, and that got her on our side. But of course the other restaurants have fallen through.”
“So now what do we do?”
“Sally says, and I quote, ‘Take one of those jeeps tours and find some spiritual places.’”
“Just like that?” he says, laughing. “Are we supposed to find enlightenment, too?”
I smile at him and say, “I think that’s optional.”
“Why does she want us to photograph spiritual places? The magazine is hardly New Age.”
“I think she’s just stalling until she finds another chef for us to profile. But after Jacques, it might be better to rest for a day.”
“Well, from now on I promise I’ll keep my mouth shut. As a friend of mine once said, ‘Lots of trains roll into the station, but you don’t have to get on every one.’”
“Good advice.”
Our drinks arrive and we take a few sips in silence.
“So much fuss over a pheasant,” Stone says with a weary sigh.
“That could be the title of my autobiography.”
“You mean the rest of your life is full of this kind of minutiae?” he asks.
“That’s just it. I don’t have a life.”
He smiles, takes another drink of his beer, then sits back and eyes me. “I don’t believe you.”
“Well, it’s true. I go to work. I exercise. I come home and fix dinner. I might read, but I always fall asleep before I can finish an article or chapter in a book.”
He shakes his head slowly. “I sense oversimplification.”
“Okay. There are other things.”
“Such as?”
“I do photography.” I cringe immediately after saying it. Do photography? How stupid sounding—like it’s origami or yoga or some other New Age trend.
“Really? What kinds of things do you shoot?”
“Anything but food,” I say lightly, without thinking.
He shrugs and says, “Food isn’t so bad.”
“Oh, I know. What I mean is that I get tired of working with it and looking at it all day. So I want something different for my own projects.”
“Actually, I know the feeling.”
Our conversation is interrupted by the sizzling platters that arrive along with the standard fajita paraphernalia. I am reminded of what a complicated meal the fajita is. I wasn’t thinking of logistics when I ordered it. I just figured it was best to order indigenous southwestern food. I would like nothing more than simply to pick up my fork and cut delicate bites of something, like fish or quiche—a food that begs me not to handle it. But instead, I am unfolding the tortilla, spreading guacamole and salsa, tucking in hunks of chicken to keep them from falling out. By the time I’ve assembled one, I don’t have much of an appetite.
Stone has gone silent over the meal, and I wonder whether I should tell him what my project is. It seems insignificant now, as though he was only making polite conversation until the food arrived.
We continue to eat in silence until he says, “I don’t normally eat like this, but I was starved.”
He takes a big gulp of beer and then remembers.
“Oh! So tell me about your project.”
I smile and try to look casual, like it’s not a big deal even though I feel a nervous flutter in my stomach.
“It’s a series of photographs about the different ways people create a sense of home throughout the city—different kinds of landscaping, architecture, gatherings. You know, sort of a kaleidoscope of home life from south central to Santa Monica.”
“Huh,” he says.
I wait for him to say something else, but he doesn’t. He tucks a wayward piece of green pepper into his fajita, his second in twenty minutes, and takes another bite. I try not to feel offended, but when he still doesn’t respond after yet another bite, I can’t help but challenge his silence.
“Claire thinks it’s a great idea.”
“It is. But have you ever thought about focusing on just one neighborhood instead of the whole city?”
“But that’s the point. To explore the differences.”
“Right, but my guess is that you could find a lot of variation even in a very small section of L.A.”
“Well, it’s just an idea for now,” I say, trying not to sound as defensive as I feel. “I don’t even know what I’ll do with the photos when I get them assembled.”
“That’s why I mentioned going with one neighborhood—I bet you could get backing from the district’s government, maybe an exhibit in a neighborhood library.”
“It’s a long way off,” I say.
He nods his head and then signals the waitress. He orders a cup of espresso and asks me if I want one.
“No. It keeps me up.”
“It does me too, but I thought about taking some photos of the rocks and desert wildlife after dinner. There’s a full moon tonight. Why don’t you come out and keep me company?”
