Love and Food (17 page)

Mack pulls out a container and looks inside.  He brings the container up to his nose and takes a long deep breath in through his nose, examining the aroma coming from the container.  Looking at his “special sauce” and smelling it, there isn’t a person alive that would be able to tell that it has been tampered with.  The sauce smells exactly as it should, if it had been prepared normally.  What he has put in the sauce is odorless and colorless.  The diners are in for a real treat. 

His admiration of the sauce is interrupted by Haillee’s entrance into the kitchen.  “Mack, I want you to try your best to send out as many orders as you can at the same time.  I may seem a bit impractical, or crazy even, but I want as many customers as possible to experience the food at the same time.  You know what I mean?”

“I know what you mean and it sounds like a perfect idea,” he says to her with a big smile on his face.

* * * * *

Haillee is sitting in her chair in her office.  The alcohol that she drank hasn’t calmed her nerves in the least.  Orders of food are about to be delivered to customers and she can’t stop herself from freaking out in her mind and biting her bottom lip.  The food is what the customers came to the restaurant for.  Once the plates are on the tables in front of the customers, there is no going back.  It’s go-time. 

Ethan knocks on the door to her office.  She is so glad to see him.  She needs a distraction.  He holds a bouquet of roses and a box of chocolates.  He looks so handsome – more handsome than she has ever seen him. 

“I’m here to celebrate,” he says, handing her the bouquet and setting the chocolates on her desk.  “The crowd out there looks amazing.  Everything seems to be going well.”

She smells the roses.  “These smell amazing.  Thank you,” she says and gives him a kiss on the cheek.

“So, how’s everything going?  Everything is going as planned, right?”

“So far, everything has gone off without a hitch.  Mack has the food ready and plates are going to be going out any second.  There haven’t been any problems that I’m aware with, expect the owner of the restaurant from across the street is in the dining room.”

“You’re kidding me,” Ethan says, taking a seat in the chair across from her.

“I wish I was.  There isn’t a reason that I can come up in my mind, except to taunt me, why he should be here.  The guy makes my skin crawl.  I really can’t stand the sight of him.”

“He probably just wants to check out what you’ve done and see if it’s enough to keep this place.”

“He doesn’t have to show up on reopening night to figure that out, does he?  He should have just stayed across the street where he belongs.”

“You’re probably right, but he’s here and there nothing you can do about it.  I say relax and enjoy the moment.  This is your chance to shine.  Don’t let that screwball ruin it.”

“Thanks for being on my side, Ethan.  It means a lot.”

“Being on your side is very easy.  Being with you is very easy.”

“Are you saying that I’m easy?” she asks, grinning at him.

“Are you?”

“Only with you,” she giggles.  Laughing is just what she needs right now. 

“Come here,” Ethan says.  “Come and sit on my lap.  I want to hold you for a little while, help you calm down a bit.”

“Okay,” she says, quickly moving from behind her desk, onto his lap and into his arms.

“You look really beautiful tonight,” he says, stroking her hair.

“Thank you and thank you for being here with me tonight,” she says and softly kisses his lips.

“I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else,” he says, wrapping her up in his arms and holding her tight.

* * * * *

They spend an hour sitting in the chair and cuddling in her office.  She wouldn’t mind staying like that for a while longer, but she needs to check on how things are going out in the dining room.

“You hungry?” she asks, pulling away from his embrace and standing up.

“I’m starving, actually,” Ethan replies.

“Let’s get Mack to make us each a plate.  I want to taste what everyone is eating,” she says, walking to the door of her office and placing her hand on the knob.

“Sounds good.  I’m sure everything tastes great,” Ethan says, reassuring her.

“You’re probably right, but I just have to know.”

“Okay.  Let’s do it,” Ethan says, adjusting and smoothing his pant legs.

She is about to turn the knob of the office door, when there is a knock.  When she opens the door, Melissa is standing there with a worried look on her face.  Melissa’s face is red and she’s breathless.

“What’s the matter?” she asks the waitress, afraid of the answer.  By the look on Melissa’s face, whatever she’s going to say isn’t going to be good.

“We have a problem,” Melissa quickly blurts out.

“What kind of problem?  Did we run out of food or something?”

“We didn’t run out of food, but there is a problem with a food.”

“What kind of problem?”

“People are getting sick,” Melissa says and looks at her feet.

“What!” she exclaims.  She rushes past Melissa and rushes to the dining room.  Ethan is close behind.  When she gets to the dining room, she is shocked at what she finds.  She watches people leave the restaurant, holding their stomachs with grimaces on their faces.  She watches one customer vomit onto the plate in front of him and the woman with him rub his shoulders.  People pass by her on their way to the bathrooms with pale faces and sweat on their brows.

“What the hell is going on?” she says and rushes into the kitchen.  “Mack, what is going on?  People are getting sick.  Did you notice anything wrong with the food?”

“No.  Everything seemed fine.  People are getting sick?  I have no clue what is going on,” Mack says, a concerned look on his face.

She looks the food over and picks up a plate to smell if it smells strange.  There isn’t anything visible to her eye that looks abnormal and the food on the plate smells fine.  Everything appears to be fine.  She doesn’t understand what’s going on.

“I don’t know what’s going on, but I’m going to get to the bottom of this,” she says, placing the plate back on the counter so hard that the plate breaks.  Mack doesn’t respond.  He just looks at her with a blank stare.

When she returns to the dining room, Marilyn Stance approaches her.  “Dear, I’m sorry to say, but this has turned out to be a complete disaster.  The food that you served has made people sick.  I don’t feel good myself.  In all of the twenty years that I’ve been attending restaurants and reviewing them, I have never come across a situation like this.  You promised me that you wouldn’t let me down and you have.  Unfortunately, I’m going to have to document this in my column.”

“Marilyn, I’m so sorry.  I don’t know what’s happened.”

“I’m sorry too, dear,” Marilyn says, turns and walks away.  She watches the reviewer leave the restaurant and her heart breaks.  Everything that she had planned for has blown up in her face.  She looks over at Ethan and makes eye contact.  He looks stunned and there is pain in his eyes for her.  She turns away and continues to watch the customers, who just an hour again had smiles on their faces, but now those smiles are long gone.  They’ve been replaced with anger and looks of illness.

Her gaze scans the room and falls on Marcos.  As he leaves the restaurant, he turns and looks at her.  He wears his usual smirk, but something is different.  His smirk is a little bigger.  He must really be happy about the outcome of the night.  Something inside of her pushes her to walk to the table where he was seated.  His plate of food hasn’t been touched.  Immediately something inside of her is convinced that he had something to do with what happened.  But, how?  She isn’t sure how at the moment, but she is going to do everything in her power to find out how he was able to sabotage the biggest night of her life.

Chapter 13

Haillee sits on her sofa and listens to Ethan read Marilyn Stance’s review.  She can barely listen to the words, but she forces herself.  She has to know what the woman has said about the restaurant for all eyes to read; even she already has a general idea of what it’s going to say.

“It was the worst night I’ve had in a restaurant in my twenty years of reviewing restaurants and I’ve been to some real dumps.  I couldn’t leave my home for a day and a half because of the food I was served.  I didn’t need a doctor to tell me that I had food poisoning; it was obvious from the constant vomiting and the incessant stomach cramps and pain.  The only nice thing I can say about Au Bleu’s is that it had beautiful décor and lovely wait staff, who were very pleasant and attentive.  Other than that, I wouldn’t recommend ever going to this restaurant – that is if you value your life.  This restaurant isn’t even worthy of one star.  It’s a nightmare and it should be closed immediately,” Ethan says, closing the computer and looking at her.

Marilyn’s review was just the knife in her coffin.  The night of the reopening, the news of what happened traveled fast.  It wasn’t long before the name of her restaurant was a trending topic on Twitter and not in a good way.  Her restaurant and her name were all over foodie websites with detained accounts of what happened in the confines of her restaurant.  It was devastating to read the many personal reviews and thoughts about what happened.

Some people had to go to the hospital on account of the food that was served.  They were diagnosed with food poisoning and had to be treated.  Some of them for days.  People were not only ill from what happened, but appalled.  Customers voiced how disgusted they were with what happened and her name was dragged through the mud on every occasion.  What she found on social media become so troublesome to look at that she had to force herself to stop reading and stop looking at what others had written about her.  Some of the things people said, she still can’t erase from her mind.  Some of the comments she read are permanently ingrained into her mind - verbatim.

“It wasn’t all bad,” Ethan says.  “She said that the wait staff were excellent and the décor was great.”

“I know you’re trying to make me feel better, Ethan, but you’re not helping.”

“Sorry.  I know this is hard for you.  I wish I could make this all go away.  I hate seeing you like this.”

“I know you do, but unfortunately, it’s not possible,” she says, sighing from defeat.

  Since the night of the reopening, not one single person has entered the restaurant.  She doesn’t blame them.  She wouldn’t go to a restaurant that was known to have caused a lot of people to get sick from food poisoning.  She expects the Health Inspector anytime now, but it won’t matter because she is going to have to close the doors to the restaurant for good.  She has run out of options.  There is nothing more she can do.  Her reputation has been completely ruined.  There isn’t a person in the city that will trust the food that comes out of the kitchen.  She done – finished.

“Haillee, what do you think happened?  In all my years on the planet, I have never heard of something of this caliber happening.  It just seems strange to me.  How is it possible that so many people got sick, all at the same time?”

“I think I have an idea,” she says, leaning towards him.

“What are you thinking?”

“I think Marcos had something to do with it.  When he was leaving the restaurant, the way he looked at me was so strange.  I went over to his table and the food on his plate hadn’t even been touched.  I found that very strange.  Who goes to a restaurant, orders food, and then doesn’t eat it?  Deep down in my gut I think that he had something to do with what happened.”

“How is that possible, Haillee?  How would he have access to the food?”

“That’s what I need to find out, but I don’t know about how to go about finding out that information.”

“I’m sure if we put our heads together, we can come up with an idea.”

“I’ve wracked my brain, Ethan.  I don’t know.  It’s not like he’s going to confess to me.  If he had anything to do with what happened, he’s going to probably going to take it to the grave.  There’s no way he’s going to tell anyone what he’s done.”

“You’re probably right.  If I were to put together something as diabolical as what happened at the restaurant, if it was intentional, I wouldn’t tell a soul either.”

“Neither would I.  Not in a million years.  If he did do this to me, I think that he might have won.”

“He may have won this round, but we’re going to win the next.  Just give me some time to think things over.  I’m going to come up with something to find out if Marcos had anything to do with the food poisoning.”

“I wish you the best of luck, but I think I just need to accept that I’ve been defeated.  I think it’s time to pack it in, Ethan.  I can’t see how things are going to get better.”

“Don’t give up, Haillee.  The fat lady hasn’t sung yet.”