Page 13 of Best Served Hot

We don’t have to go to the restaurant and sit together, but I do think we need to be there on the same day. Otherwise, what if the menu changes or a different chef is in the kitchen, meaning the food could theoretically differ? But yes, absolutely, let’s sit at different tables. And ideally face opposite directions so that we literally do not have to lay eyes upon each other. If this is acceptable to you, what restaurant would you like to try? Ladies first, after all.

I will not dignify the rest of your email with a response. I take my job seriously and I recommend you do, too.

Bennett

No more best regards. I folded my hands in my lap, taking a deep breath at his last sentence, trying not to let it pressurize into steam and shoot out my ears. He was a jerk. I already knew that. I wouldn’t be doing this to help him; it would be to help me. It was worth putting up with a jerk’s presence for a little while if it meant a better future for myself. I mean, I did it every day.

What could be fun, though, was saying I wanted to review a dollar pizza joint next. Or a grungy diner. Just to see him squirm.

No, I told myself. You need to do this right. Like how you blurred out his face. Don’t stoop to his level.

So I clicked over to the list of restaurants I wanted to get to in the next few months. My eyes snagged longingly on Wander, a diasporic Jewish restaurant that had just opened in the West Village, headed by my favorite Chef Supreme contestant, Chef Sadie. I’d been dying to try it. Except I hadn’t managed to get a reservation.

Down the list, then. I sent him a few choices, and we hammered it out. I actually signed off my last email: Warmly, Julie.

He didn’t have to know I was declaring only the first three letters.

6

The next week found me at Calabaza, a new tapas place all the way downtown. Calabaza was one of those places where you didn’t need to wear a jacket to get in the door, but you probably wouldn’t feel comfortable wandering in off the streets in your cutoffs and T-shirt. Hopefully, a good middle ground between my followers and Bennett’s readers.

I came straight from work, a little overheated with my blue paisley sundress and white cardigan on top. At least I’d switched out my pinchy work flats for my sneakers, which made me feel like walking on clouds. Well, maybe not clouds. Not unless clouds were littered with literal piles of garbage, like the streets of New York. Sometimes I really loved this city, and sometimes I didn’t, and those times were usually when I was walking past a particularly pungent garbage pile. Or a man pooping on the subway floor.

The inside of the restaurant was a portrait in warm elegance, with rustic wooden furniture and wall art in various shades of sun, but I had eyes only for Bennett. Not in a romantic way, in a know-your-enemy way. I swept the room, glancing into each little nook as the host led me to my table, but he didn’t seem to have arrived yet.

“Hey,” Alice said as I approached, already seated facing the door. “I see you got the outfit memo.” She was also wearing blue paisley, though in a flowy blouse over slacks.

“You didn’t notice the camera I installed over your closet last time I was over? I wanted to make sure we matched all the time,” I said. She rolled her eyes, smirking. “Hey, do you mind switching seats? I want to be able to keep an eye on Bennett.” I’d told him I didn’t want to have to look at him, but when I really thought about it, it seemed worse to have my back to him than my front. Better to be prepared.

She stood, obliging without a word, and let me take her spot. Which was perfect. From here, I had a clear view of the door and the rest of the space. And the tiny golden pumpkin sitting in the middle of our table, a candlewick serving as the stem. Alice said, “We really need a good code word for him. Something that truly expresses what a dick he is. I’m thinking ‘Dick.’ ”

“The main thing I love about you is how subtle you are,” I said, and she snorted. “Hey, thanks for coming again, by the way. I know you’ve been seeing a lot of me lately. Some might even say too much.”

“Who would ever say that?” Alice said sarcastically, and now it was my turn to roll my eyes. “To tell you the truth, I wasn’t that upset about missing tonight’s work happy hour. The guys on my team have really been grating on my nerves lately.” She pursed her lips in a frown. “It’s like now that there are two of us—two women—on the team, they’re feeling threatened and they’re acting out.”

The waiter came by to deliver our menus and give us a spiel about the restaurant. I barely heard him, tensed as I was. When he finally left, I leaned in and said, in a low murmur, “What have they been doing to you?”

Alice held her hands up, palms out. “Nothing!” she said. “They’ve just been kind of annoying lately. And it’s nice, at least, that I have an ally now to face them with.” But her shifty eyes meant that she might not be telling me the whole story. “Maybe you can come with me to work trivia night or something and hang out on my turf.”

I’d definitely do that. “Just tell me when and where.”

“Will do.”

The door opened, and I sat up extra straight as two people entered, the same way I sat when my doctor asked me if I’d been slouching lately. It was Bennett, his narrow face gold in the reflected light, his brown-blond hair styled into a high swoosh over his forehead. And with him? A woman around our age, short and a little chubby, with a pixie cut so glaringly pink it almost distracted from the bright orange lace of her dress. His girlfriend, maybe?

What do you care? I asked myself fiercely.

I don’t care, I answered back, just as fiercely.

He craned his neck to look throughout the restaurant; when those blue-gray eyes settled on me, they narrowed just the tiniest bit. He didn’t smile. He didn’t nod. But then again, I didn’t smile or nod at him, either. We just regarded each other in a chilly fashion, like we were opposing generals preparing to order our troops to war. When he sat, he first pulled out the chair for his companion, who fluffed up her skirts as she sat, then he took the seat facing me, placing his back to the door. Unwise move, I tried to communicate through my eye-beams. If an axe murderer runs through the door, you won’t see him, and your head is going to get chopped off.

He looked away toward his companion, lips breaking in a smile, and he said something I couldn’t hear. The pink-haired girl’s shoulders shook in what I assume was a laugh, and suddenly I felt like a creep for still staring their way. I tore my eyes off them, fixating on the menu before me. I cleared my throat. “Anything on the menu especially calling out to you?”

“I want everything patatas,” Alice said. “Especially when the patatas have been fried or smothered in cheese.”

The Spanish did love their potatoes. But who didn’t love potatoes, whether their country’s or not? I loved all my potatoes equally, whether they were the french fries on my plate or the Tater Tots on Alice’s. Alice could attest. I’d nearly lost a finger to her butter knife more than once. “Got it.”

The excellent thing about tapas was that you could order a million different things to add up to a full dinner, and yes, it was expensive, but you also got to try a lot more than you did in a standard restaurant. So we ordered a ton of food, at least one thing from every section, and when I closed the menu, it was with such a sense of anticipation and excitement that I nearly forgot about my adversary across the room. Which, of course, made me focus on him. He was still laughing with his companion. What could possibly be so funny that they would still be laughing?