Dinner for One (21 page)

Jean is starting to look horrified and somehow enraptured at the same time. Bastien keeps going.

“Cupcakes and cookies are popular treats, and it’s not so different from baking for people. And all the treats are edible for human consumption as well. It’s a new venture, an extension of our brand and something we could really have fun with.” He taps his fingers on his desk. “The record store next door is moving to a bigger location. Daniel is looking for someone to rent the place from him. We could get it set up right by here, one of us working there and one of us working here, rotating shifts. Hire a small staff—just one or two to start.” It’s an effort to keep from patting himself on the back. For an idea on the fly, it sounds nicely put together.

Jamming the croissant in his mouth, Jean stands and leaves without saying anything.

Bastien shouts after him, voice wavering around his laughter, “Does this mean you’ll think about it?”

Anytime he sees Jean after that, he spouts off random gourmet pet treat statistics and further ideas for what a success the business would be. The staff quickly gets involved, shouting in how they think it’s a fantastic idea and why hadn’t it been thought of before. Jean looks pained, and Bastien hasn’t been this amused in what feels like ages.

He’s so distracted by his teasing that he almost forgets about the container he’d left in front of his door. Will it still be there when he gets home? Will there be a new note and no container? Will there be another container? There are so many possibilities. He manages to not bombard himself with them until he’s walking home, the cool New York night lively around him.

The closer he gets to home, the quieter it gets and the louder his thoughts become. There’s no flashy shop signs or giggling groups of college students on the sidewalk to provide a distraction. His palms are sweaty as he walks up to his floor.

There’s a container sitting there, but he can’t tell if it’s a new one or not. His orange sticky note is gone, though. He hopes that means it’s a new one. There’s no question as to what he’s going to do. He takes it inside, only waiting till he’s just in the door to open it. Inside is pissaladière—at least that’s what he thinks it is. He’s never seen pissaladière like this before. It’s an easy version of pizza that normally has olives, anchovies, and onions on it. This one has the olives and onions, but no anchovies. James remembered Bastien doesn’t like them. He’s replaced the anchovies with nori strips—a kind of seaweed. Bastien has his doubts.

He transfers it to a plate and heats it up, pours himself a glass of wine, gets comfortable on his couch, and pulls up Netflix. Chloe settles behind his head like she had the night before. It takes him longer than it should to pick something to watch, and in the end he goes back to his queue at the beginning and starts up
Jessica Jones
.

His first bite is cautious, his next less so.

Chloe meows at him while he eats it, peeved he isn’t sharing. He pets her with one hand while he eats with the other. The seaweed isn’t actually bad. He’s impressed despite himself. When her meowing doesn’t stop and she starts butting her head against his, he peels off a strip of seaweed and gives it to her. She purrs contentedly. He doesn’t know what it says that both he and his cat are in love with James’s cooking.

Before he goes to bed, he writes out his note and sticks it to the top of the freshly cleaned container. The container goes back into the hall.

The bottom was a little burnt.

HE’S ON
his way out the door, bound for yet another grocery store, and he runs smack into Laurence. A little dance ensues to keep from falling over. James had been moving with good momentum, sick and tired of supermarkets and frustrated that his fridge doesn’t magically fill with everything he needs.

Laurence shoves his hands in his jeans pockets once he’s regained his balance. “Hey,” he says and shifts from foot to foot.

James is surprised this hasn’t happened sooner. “Come on,” he says. “I need to buy some cheese. We can take your car.”

His minivan is parked in the garage next door, sandwiched between an Audi and a Lexus. James climbs into the passenger seat and directs Laurence to the specialty supermarket he’s going to need. It’s not until they’re halfway there that Laurence asks, “Cheese?”

James fiddles with the map on his phone. Its directions are very unclear. “How much do you know?”

“Well….”

He sighs. “I’m making
aligot
for Bastien today. It’s basically fancy mashed potatoes, and I don’t have the cheese the recipe calls for. Or truffle oil.”

“Ah.” His fingers beat a quick rhythm on the steering wheel as they slow to a stop at the light. “Need any help with that?” He clears his throat. “Making it. Not buying the stuff.”

“Sure,” says James, gaze still on his phone. He doesn’t need any help, but he knows his brother and he knows what this is: them both saying, “Hey, we fucked up. Let’s forget it.” They’ve never been good at the whole saying sorry thing.

Shopping and the drive back is way more them. They bicker over if one cheese might be better than the cheeses in the recipe, and then they fight over the radio in the van. When Laurence turns the station to a country one (and he doesn’t even like country, so James knows he’s doing it just to be an ass), James flicks his ear.

“Ow,” whines Laurence. “What’s that for?”

James rolls his eyes and changes the station to a mainstream one.

Laurence switches tactics. “What does it mean that he can’t feel his face?” asks Laurence. “That doesn’t make any sense.”

Getting out of the van is nothing but a relief. James waits till his back is turned to let a small smile stretch his lips. He’s not sure how it works, maybe it’s a weird sibling thing, but despite wanting to maim Laurence, he’s relieved to have him there.

And cooking with him is fun. It’s something he hasn’t done in ages, and everything takes twice as long with a twice as big a mess, but it’s nice in a comforting-routine kind of way. They mash the potatoes themselves, letting them get tender while they soak in a saucepan and then trying to reduce them to mush. Even soft it’s an arm workout. Bits of successfully mashed potato end up getting flicked as they engage in a mini food fight, arguing over who’s doing a better job.

The remaining steps are all simple, and the aligot is by far the easiest thing James has made and probably will make for Bastien. He lets the potatoes cook, and when they’re done he mixes in the cheese and adds the truffle oil. The end result is tasty, and he’s made enough that Bastien can have some of this batch and Laurence can take some home as well.

The two of them retreat to the living room, and after a lengthy debate between
Iron Man
and
Captain America
, they decide to watch the first
Avengers
film. “Because it has both of them in it,” says Laurence. “Look at us compromising.”

He throws a pillow at his head. “You’re such a dork. Mom’s not here.”

“She could be. I can call her.”

He groans. “No. I’m not ready to deal with her yet.” He needs someone else to fuck up before he can see her in person. That way she’ll be distracted. What? He doesn’t handle her disappointment well.

Evening quickly comes around, and James gets ready to drop his dinner off. Laurence wants to come with, follows him through the house nagging him about it, but James firmly vetoes him. This is something he wants to do on his own. His brother doesn’t have a place in it. And he certainly can do without the teasing he’ll get if Bastien leaves another note and he reacts like he did yesterday.

He’s got the note stashed in the drawer of his nightstand for the moment. He’s thinking about putting it on the fridge. It wouldn’t be that weird.

Laurence leaves, reluctantly, and James heads out with his stomach a mess of nerves. There’s a chance he’s gotten his hopes up about there being a note. But if there’s not one, it’ll be fine. That won’t mean anything.

Despite these reassurances, he almost drops to his knees in relief when he sees the bright orange sticky note left for him. He’s positive the shaking in his fingers as he reaches for it is all in his imagination.

The bottom was a little burnt.

His smile stretches across his face; some form of it will probably linger all night. He exchanges the containers and leaves, a warm pleasant feeling making itself at home in his chest.

GETTING UP
that morning, Bastien knows there’s going to be a new dish left on his doorstep when he comes home. He doesn’t know what it’ll be, just that it’ll be something French if James keeps following the theme. The curiosity—the excitement—is going to drive him crazy at work. How is he supposed to concentrate when he knows that essentially there’s a present waiting for him at home?

He spends his entire morning routine, and his walk to work, speculating about what the meal could be. Will it be fondue
savoyarde
? Or maybe
tartiflette
? What about quiche lorraine? There are so many possibilities, and he has no clue how to narrow it down. He feels like he did when he was a child and his dad used to call him from his business trips. “I got you something,” he’d say. “But you don’t get to know what till I come home at the end of the week.” He both loves and hates surprises.

The loving of them mostly comes after he knows what the surprise is.

It takes work to keep himself focused once he’s in the kitchen and flying through prep. Every meal he makes, he thinks,
Did James make me this?

Jean keeps giving him looks while he works, quick glances out of the corner of his eye that Bastien steadfastly ignores. Whenever he catches Jean’s gaze lingering too long, his expression looking too thoughtful, he says, “So how about the pet treats?” Without fail Jean’s face gets pinched and the rest of the staff kick in to push for it. Over half of them have already offered to work part-time at the shop and part-time at the restaurant. Bastien thinks there’s a good chance he might actually end up owning an eatery for animals. He’s gotten surprisingly into the idea, and not just because it’s driving Jean insane.

Henry comes in not long into the dinner rush and flags Bastien down. “You’ve got a table asking for you,” he says. “They wouldn’t say what for.”

He frowns. That can’t be good. He looks to the chicken he has sizzling in his pan, and Jean taps his arm, making a shooing gesture with his hand. “I’ve got this. Go see what they want.” He wipes his hands on a towel and follows Henry to a booth in the back. Two men and two women are arranged on the half-circle bench, a variety of food spread out before them. Henry abandons him there.

“Bonjour,” he says. “How can I help you?” There’s something vaguely familiar about all but one of them. It’s particularly niggling when it comes to the men. He tries not to stare too hard. He can’t put his finger on it. Have they been here before? The two men are identical, and they look especially familiar. It’s going to bother him that he can’t figure it out. He’s pretty sure he’s never met these people before now.

And then the man closest to him starts to talk. Bastien stares, doesn’t catch a word of what he’s saying. He
knows
that voice. They’re all staring at him. Did James send his family to see him? That’s a little less… giving of time. More on the nerve-racking side.

“Did James send you?” he blurts, needing to know and not caring that he’s interrupting. He sincerely hopes the answer is no.

“No,” says one twin.

“We’d appreciate it if you didn’t mention it to him,” says the other one.

The blonde woman chimes in then. “We just wanted to see what all the fuss was about. And since we might not get to meet you through James, we thought why not come out and meet you on our own. It would be a shame for James to be the only one to get to enjoy your cooking.” Her smile is wide and disarming—it’s almost a little scary.

He stares at them, at a loss for words. It’s like someone has shoved him under a microscope. Their gazes are fixed on him. Unabashedly. He shifts nervously. “So did you actually need anything?”

They all shake their heads. “You’re a really good cook,” says the only brunette among them. “We can see why James is so enamored.” He’s going to assume this is Laurence’s wife, Marcy.

“Thank you,” he says stiltedly.

“We’re so sorry,” she says, face pinching up. “We should never have encouraged James to lie. I don’t know what we were thinking.”

“You what?” he asks, all the thoughts in his head coming to a dead stop. Does that mean what he thinks it does?

She blinks wide blue eyes up at him—Bastien is starting to wonder if James likes him because he too has blue eyes, and that’s apparently a requirement to date someone in his family—and says, “You didn’t know?” Her cheeks go bright red. She clears her throat. “We… uh. It was our idea, Laurence and I’s, for him to wait to tell you about his being a critic. We thought you’d hit it off, and then he could tell you, and you’d like him so much it wouldn’t matter. It all seemed very sweet at the time. And the way James talked… you two were hitting it off so well. We really thought it would be something you’d maybe laugh about later on down the road.”

That’s the dumbest thing he’s ever heard, ridiculously naïve and romantic and essentially exactly what his sister had said. He swallows heavily. What is he supposed to do with that information? Is it supposed to make him feel better or worse? If it makes him feel better, does that mean lying’s okay if someone else thinks so? He forces a smile and nods. “All right, then. Nice to meet you.” He can’t keep standing there, or he might say something he’ll regret. It wouldn’t do to ask them in what world they thought lying was a good idea. Politeness forces him to say, “I hope you enjoy your meal.” Once the words have left his mouth, he makes a beeline for the kitchen.

He’d wanted a distraction from what James would be leaving for him, and he’d gotten it. Only problem is, it’s a bigger distraction than his curiosity had been. James had gotten the moronic, absolutely asinine, idea to lie to him from his family. That didn’t excuse his actions. Not in any shape or form. But it still felt like that was shifting something inside Bastien a little further in a direction it had already been moving. It’s harder to be mad when he now knows James
was
well-intentioned, and his family had backed him. Though he should have been smart enough to recognize bad advice when he heard it….