Dinner for One (20 page)

Back in his apartment, he puts everything away except for what he needs for the poulet basquaise. He cleans it all and sets up his station just so. He leaves his laptop open on the island so he can glance at it at his convenience. He’s going to make the dish twice. Once to test and once to give. It has to be as close to perfect as he can get it for Bastien.

After pouring olive oil in the pan, he puts the chicken thighs in to brown and gets to peeling, dicing, and cubing the other elements. He leaves each one in a neat little pile, in order of what goes in first. The onions and garlic are next to each other, the red bell peppers and tomatoes taking up the rest of the cutting board. Once the chicken browns, he removes it and drops the onions and garlic in, adds a little wine after a minute, scrubs the pan with his spoon, and then puts everything else in. The chicken goes back in the saucepan, and all he has left to do is wait.

He knows constantly peering at it won’t make it cook faster, but that doesn’t stop him.

FOR A
week Bastien goes without hearing from James. He doesn’t get any more texts, no more phone calls. He doesn’t see James around town or in the restaurant, and he does his best not to think about him. It isn’t easy. He finds himself wondering why James hasn’t texted, hasn’t called. That always leads to arguing with himself because he’s the one who basically told James not to. James is only giving him what he wants.

That doesn’t make it any less frustrating.

His staff has been walking on eggshells around him, even though he’s done his best not to let his attitude seep into the work environment. He’s not cranky. There’s no snapping. After a few days, he caved and asked Henry about it. The response he got was, “You’re like Eeyore. We can practically see the rain cloud following you around.” He tried to smile more, to make jokes, after that. It only lasted for five minutes. He was trying too hard. He knew it. They knew it.

So he attempts to power through. He spends long days at work, and when he’s not working he’s cooking or baking at home. He eats a fair amount of what he makes and promises himself constantly he will go to the gym. When he has the time. Whatever he doesn’t suck down gets donated to the homeless shelter closest to him. He’s pretty sure they’re in love with him at this point.

He’s considering delving into the world of baked goods for pets. He’s seen those gourmet pet food shops, with the fancy pet cupcakes and cookies. He pitches the idea to Jean while they’re sitting in the office Monday morning, looking over orders. Jean’s eyebrows go winging up. “You want to what?” he asks.

“A side business. For pets,” he says. “They’re hugely successful. We could make French dog and cat treats.”

Jean blinks at him. “I know you’re… going through a tough time,” he says hesitantly, “but this is a bit much, no? Maybe you should try to rebound? Go out, pick someone up, move on.”

Bastien scowls. “I’m not interested in that.”

Jean’s sigh is long. “But a pet food business will solve your problems?”

“No,” says Bastien. “I just think it’s a good idea.” He crosses his arms to show he’s serious. Jean doesn’t look impressed. It doesn’t matter that this scheme came from a desire to keep himself preoccupied. What matters is that it’s a good idea. A sound investment. “I’ll run the numbers.”

“You do that,” says Jean, and he ducks his head to keep looking over the paper in front of him.

When he heads home after closing his restaurant, he’s got two thoughts in mind: he’s hungry, and he’s going to find evidence that a gourmet pet food side project is a fantastic idea. If only because he has to prove Jean wrong. He can’t remember what he has to eat at home. He’s made so much it’s all started to blur, and the majority of it is baked goods. He can’t keep living off of muffins and brownies and cakes. He’s debating ordering Chinese as he walks up the stairs to his apartment. He slows down when he sees his door. There’s a red-and-white Tupperware container sitting in front of the door to his apartment.

He comes closer and crouches down to see what it is. Had someone dropped it? It looks a little too deliberately placed for that. It doesn’t come with a note. He picks it up with dawning realization. It’s not all that light. He recognizes the container (he’s dumped enough leftovers into similar ones at James’s) and stands, taking it inside with him.

He sits the container down on the kitchen island and stares. Should he open it? What could possibly be in it? Why didn’t James leave a note? He runs his fingers through his hair, tugging on the strands. None of his questions are going to get answered if he doesn’t open it. Taking a deep breath, bracing himself for who knows what, he opens the lid and is hit with the delicious, fragrant scent of a well-prepared soup. There’s poulet basquaise inside. The first meal he’d made for James. Even though there’s no one around to see, his face still heats.

He’s got options here. He can throw it away. He can pretend he never saw it, stick it back out on his doormat. There’s probably a space in his fridge. The container could fit somewhere, and he could forget about it for now. He could even take it to the homeless shelter like he’s done with so much else. Or he could heat it up and eat it.

His stomach rumbles, reminding him of his hunger and his half-formed takeout Chinese plans. It would be more convenient, certainly quicker, to eat the food that’s already in front of him. Besides, he doesn’t want to be wasteful. It’ll be soggy if he leaves it sitting till the morning. It won’t be fit for anyone to eat then. He tells himself that’s the only reason he’s going to do this.

He grabs a spoon and takes it to the couch. He gets comfortable in one corner and turns on the TV, flicking through the channels and stopping on an episode of
New Girl
. Chloe curls up behind his head, draping her small one on his shoulder and meowing piteously. “I’m not giving you this,” he says halfheartedly. “I have to at least taste it first. You don’t want bad chicken, do you?” She looks at him with judgmental green eyes.

The poulet basquaise tastes as delicious as it smells. The seasoning is just right. The chicken isn’t tough. The tomatoes are fresh and not canned, which pleases the food snob part of Bastien. Chloe’s meowing continues, so he feeds her the occasional chunk of chicken, now that it’s been vetted and deemed suitable. There’s none left over when he’s done. He leaves the container in the sink and goes to bed, feeling full and surprisingly satisfied. He’s going to say it’s all because of the food if asked. It has nothing to do with James cooking for him. Nothing.

The following morning he looks at the container sitting there and gets an idea. He washes it, because he’s a gentleman, and he sticks a note to it. He leaves it on his doormat when he goes to work. The note reads:
The chicken was a little dry.

DESPITE BASTIEN’S
snobbish food sensibilities at times, he’s a sucker for pizza. But so is James, and he might be even more snobbish when it comes to food. Pizza’s one of those things that’s universally loved. He’s watched Bastien mow through pizza like it’s fries. So when he discovers
pissaladière
while browsing on Pinterest for his next recipe, he thinks it’s perfect. It’s essentially a French version of pizza. The only pitfall is that it has anchovies on it.

Bastien hates anchovies. James found out when they were eating at a gourmet sandwich food truck and the chef had put anchovies on Bastien’s sandwich even though they weren’t listed on the menu. The face Bastien made as the flavor hit his tongue was
priceless
. He’d refused to finish the sandwich, even when James offered to eat his anchovies.

“They’ve ruined the integrity of the sandwich,” Bastien had huffed, and James had broken out into peals of laughter and asked him what that even meant.

He can work around the anchovies, though. It’s easy enough to substitute ingredients. He just isn’t sure which ingredient will be the best. The situation calls for some research and from there, experimentation. He googles substitutes, realizes he has none of the ones listed except for olives (which he isn’t going to use since they’re already a topping), and finds himself at a specialty store to pick up capers, nori strips, miso, and shrimp. The shrimp isn’t one of the suggestions, but it sounds more appealing than seaweed—he prefers the taste—so he’s giving it a try anyway. He likes to have options. The recipe already calls for capers but not as one of the toppings, so while he’s a little doubtful of what adding extra capers will do to it, he’s going to give that a go as well.

Since he wants to try four different versions of the pissaladière, and he doesn’t have all day to cook them, he uses every burner he has to prepare the sauce. He sets four pans to simmering with the sauce ingredients, and while those do their thing, he makes the dough for the base. He ends up deviating from the recipe a little there, requiring more flour than it had called for. If anything it’ll be an extrabreaded base. He’s seen Bastien eat bread. That shouldn’t be a problem.

Removing the thyme and bay leaves from the pans when it’s time isn’t as easy as he’d like it to be, and he drips the onion mixture all over his stovetop as it drizzles from them. That’ll be fun to clean later. He sets them aside, drops in the initial amount of capers, and prepares the bases in as close to perfect rectangles as he can get. The mixture in the pans gets smoothed over the dough, and then he lays out his anchovy substitutes with olives put in the center of the shapes he forms with them. It doesn’t look as pretty as the picture, but it’s close.

He does his laundry while he waits and tries not to think about how he’s going to make whichever one tastes best again. There’s a reason he’s a critic and not a chef, even though he’s a damn good cook. Cooking requires a level of patience he isn’t in possession of all the time. He has to be in the mood for it.

When the timer finally goes off and he can take them out of the oven, he cuts a piece from each and waits five minutes to begin the taste testing. He tells himself he has to keep Bastien’s taste buds in mind.

The shrimp is a no-go. He grimaces as he swallows. The extra capers make everything too salty, and he doesn’t know if he put too many on it or what, but it’s like swallowing a spoonful of salt. The miso isn’t right either. It’s more sweet than salty, which isn’t working for the meal. He’s beginning to despair any of these options working.

But the nori is actually good. He hums in surprise as he chews slowly. He’s never been a big fan of seaweed before. He cleans up his mess, sticks the successful experiment in the fridge for later, and makes an entirely new mess when he tries to replicate the nori pissaladière.

After it’s all said and done, he’s got a burn on the side of his hand from where he accidently hit the hot pan and a perfect-looking pissaladière. He lets it cool before he tries to move it into a container.

When he gets to Bastien’s and sees his container from the day before sitting there, his stomach drops. Did Bastien not eat it? As he gets closer he can see an orange sticky note stuck to the top. His stomach goes tight. What if he left a note asking him to stop? His hand shaking, he picks it up.

The chicken was a little dry.

His grin is so wide it makes his cheeks hurt. He gives a relieved, breathless laugh. Bastien is critiquing him. He isn’t only eating the food, he’s playing the game back. That’s better than any response he could have expected.

He leaves the container of pissaladière in front of the door and takes the empty container with him. He keeps the note in his hand and the smile on his face the whole way home. He can
fix
this.

EVERYONE AT
work notices that he’s in a better mood, even though he feels like he’s acting the same. They’re louder around him, more free with their laughter. It relieves a tension he hadn’t even realized he had. None of them ask why he’s suddenly cheerier, and if they did he honestly doesn’t know what he would say. My ex-boyfriend made me really good French soup?

And he’s not tempted to keep stuffing his face. The food smells fantastic, but his stomach still feels full from breakfast. The empty pit that had made itself at home is gone.

Every time he makes the poulet basquaise for the lunch service, he can’t help but smile. He keeps his head ducked so hopefully no one sees him grinning like a loon down at the food. He’s not entirely successful.

Charley nudges him lightly as he walks by. “Did you do something evil to that soup?”

“What? No.”

“You look like an evil genius. Did they send it back and now you’re sending it out with an extra dollop of saliva?”

Bastien makes a horrified face. “Please don’t tell me you’ve been spitting in the dishes of people who send their food back to you.”

“Of course not,” says Charley. “I’m not stupid. I like my job.”

“So I’m stupid and I don’t like my job?”

“Who’s going to fire you? You?”

He’s been sucked into an absurdly pointless argument. He puts his hand out, palm up. “I didn’t spit in the soup. I don’t ever spit in any of the food. Please don’t you ever spit in any of the food. There is
no
spitting in this kitchen.” He’s going to be keeping an eye on Charley in the future. Just in case.

He retreats to the office to eat his dinner and is joined by Jean. Jean takes a large bite from his croissant—Bastien doesn’t tell him he’s supposed to eat dessert after, not before—and stares at him with unblinking eyes.

“What?”

“I’m waiting to hear the gourmet pet food statistics,” says Jean. “I thought for sure you’d come in rattling them off this morning.”

He’d completely forgotten to look them up. James’s gesture had erased all other thoughts from his mind. He can’t admit that to Jean, though. “I was waiting for you to ask,” he says, trying to buy time for what he doesn’t yet know. “Prove that you are interested.”

Jean scoffs. “The only thing I’m interested in is you proving what a dumb idea this is.”

Well he can’t tell Jean he didn’t get around to it, now can he? He’s going to have to make things up. “Well, 79 percent of gourmet dog treat chains are highly successful.” That’s a reasonable sounding number, right? “And the vast majority of the population owns either a cat or a dog. Over 52 percent of those individuals purchase gifts for their animals around holiday times, and even on their birthdays.”