~~~~Em~~~~
I'm being lazy at home on a Saturday. It's the one day per week that I'm not either shooting episodes of the show, or proofing recipes and scripts.
Ramen at 9:00 AM is really underrated. As the first truly hot food I've had at home all week, I'm slurping that crap up, with my giant cup of black coffee to wash it down. I may have to stick my head in the freezer after I'm done giving myself this "man facial", but it's totally worth it. My parents will be able to go out to eat this weekend with the large chunk of my pay check I sent home to them.
My frugal grocery supplies stretch the joy that my Mom can indulge in over the next couple of days, and it makes my sodium heavy breakfast like Heaven in my mouth.
The feeling of comfort that comes with the visual image of my Mom all dressed up is cut short when I remember Eric the Doofwad's phone call. Although nothing about my show's line up changed during the four days following his dumb jokes, I can feel something coming.
Suddenly, I'm sweating buckets. The combination of too much hot food and inherent rage are making me boil and I run to the fridge before I erupt ramen noodles like a volcano. Although I'm pretty sure they'd come out my nose, not the top of my head. A ramen tsunami then. The middle compartment of my freezer cocoons my giant melon as I try to gather my thoughts.
It became painfully apparent, when I was about 15, that my parents were struggling financially. Without much apprehension, I did what I had to do. Seven Eleven was hiring, and I worked there all the way through high school. I made manager, and put in over-time until I could both help my parents out with money, and attend culinary school.
I knew once I started school I wouldn't have that monthly cash cushion to give them, but I promised them I'd work my ass off. I was like that scrawny guy from "Ratatouille", without the rat. My niece, Alice, picked it out for me when she found out I was going to become a chef. Hours and hours were spent practicing in my kitchen, and my Mom's back home, so that my big hands could properly perform the dainty culinary deeds required for me to graduate.
And now I'm here. Whole Mouth Foods has been a steady draw for the network since they hired me, and I don't have to worry about my parents anymore.
Eric better not fuck that up.
~~~R~~~
Rose has an uncharacteristic day off on Saturday as well, but she's meticulously creating beauty in her kitchen.
Every piece of French culinary equipment, plus a couple of Asian ones, and a knock off from Giada De Laurentis's line, lay strewn about her kitchen. Even her mess holds a pretty pattern though. She's unconsciously followed the colors of the rainbow, and from afar, her counters repeat "Roy G. Biv" over and over, and over again.
She's cooking for the entire week, so that more of her precious time can be devoted to the studio and her cookbook coming out soon.
She secretly hates it that Rachael Ray already marketed the concept of spending one day cooking for your entire week, because she's got it down pat.
It's that morsel of memory that sets her mind rolling on what Eric called about, and she's fuming immediately. Not many people have grasped the complexity of her food experience, but Eric would have at least been made aware of her degree and when she was hired.
Rose left a world of forced perfection, overflowing with rigid dietary documentation and demonization when she abandoned her pre-destined path. Although she's beholden to the network for aiding her search for who she truly may be, she's also struggling every day. Each morning is a too bright reminder that her family and first love refused to accept her as she was: clever, curvy, ambitious. Royce King, who's ring on her finger had felt like a constant, aching burn, had all but starved Rose of authenticity.
She battles her ghosts, habitually, to throw off the bogus cloak she lived in through the years in a girl's life that decide her image, and decipher what her original purpose on this planet might be.
Rose pauses her inner monologue to be present with herself in this moment. She runs her hands, consciously, over the curves of her hips and pinches the nugget of delicious flesh there.
There are giant ginger-blueberry muffins cooling on her counter, and just for the hell of it, she slips one from its tin cavern and cuts the top off.
I'm only eating tops tonight, she says to herself, devouring what hangs over and doesn't quite fit in.
It was her work as a free lance food writer that first caught Mike's, the man Eric replaced, attention, along with her waist length blond hair and refusal to conform to the Barbie doll prison she'd grown up in. She was a delicious conundrum, with the quirky ability to make even the ugliest sustenance into something delectable and camera ready.
Her cookbook that was coming out in the fall was already breaking pre-sale records for the company. She was sure she wasn't being let go any time soon. She was also sure that "Just Tops" were being added to the volume's line up.
It had taken her until just a couple of months ago to accept food in ways that were healthful and whole. When she'd broken free of Royce's cage she was just bones, and she binged.
She binged out of spite and revenge, and then to make up for lost time, and then because she realized she had no clue how to eat a normal meal.
That was just around the time that the Network found her, and the daily schedule of taping and refining her work helped during the day, but the nights were still a horrific, sticky battle between her and her carb loaded pantry.
Rose pats her legs and Maizy runs to her, snarfing her little nose and covering her face in dog slobber.
"Thank you, Maizy-girl." She says, and squeezes the sweet dog until she squeaks.
"Let's go for a walk, yeah?" Maizy jumps and wiggles and Rose smiles. In walking she can walk away all over again, and not return until her slow, paced steps have tapped a tunnel of light through her anxiety.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ TBC ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A/N: I do have the rest of this story outlined, with an email for the next three chapters headed to Aleighy and Yellowglue in just a minute. I hope to improve my track record on finishing what I've started 3.