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There were five of them left. Three guys and two girls. The only other person from the East Coast was Pierre. He was in his forties and sweating as if he’d been in a sauna for five hours.
Pierre’s arm went across his forehead. “Are you okay?” she asked him. They were cooking side by side and his face was redder than the lobster she was going to drop in the boiling water.
They had grills and open flames they would be using for their heat sources. She was sharing her fire pit with Pierre and since it was just the two of them, had more room.
“Yes,” Pierre said in a thick accent. “Even my kitchen in Florida isn’t this bad.”
“I know,” she said. At least she had air conditioning she could escape to or that took the edge off at home.
She picked up her three lobsters. They were given several choices of seafood and fish to prepare an appetizer, main course and side dish. She’d taken crab for her appetizer and was going to do her version of an elevated crab cake. Scallops would be added to the lobster dish and she was going to do them last in the pan on the grill. She could have taken the easy way out and selected anything other than lobster, but she didn’t take the easy way out of anything.
She moved closer to the large pot, held her lobsters at arm's length, dropped them in and let out a little screech of her own.
“Are you okay?” Pierre asked her quickly turning his head. “Did you burn yourself?”
“No,” she said. She was mortified she’d made that sound but knew it was going to happen. “Just got a thing about dropping them in the water.”
Pierre laughed at her and then wobbled a second, suddenly looking unsteady on his feet. She hurried over to get some of the water in buckets of ice and opened the top to bring him one quickly.
Yep, they were being timed and she didn’t have a minute to spare that couldn’t be on her food, but she wasn’t going to let a competitor go down either.
“Thanks,” he said, reaching for it.
“Finish it,” she said. “We need it.”
She stood there and watched him drink it the same as she would have her own staff. He nodded and thanked her again, then she went back to her meal.
The time was ticking, she pulled her lobsters out when they were ready and she broke them down and then put them back in the shell on ice.
The three chefs from the West Coast were bickering on the other side over space on the grills and the fire pit, but she and Pierre were working well together. She was glad this wasn’t a team competition though because she didn’t think she was always someone to play nice in the sandbox.
“Five minutes left,” one of the judges called.
Her scallops were in the pan and she was plating the rest of her food as she wanted them. She couldn’t wait until this was done and she could take a shower, but they’d been told already they’d go back to the studio for afternoon filming. Which meant two more people would leave today.
She moved away from her plates to get her scallops and two of them looked to be slightly burned on one side. Shit. She didn’t have time to start new ones either. She should have been shifting the pan around on the grill.
She plated as fast as she could and hoped it was good enough because even her plates didn’t look as pristine as she could have wished.
That minute while she got water and stood next to Pierre while he drank would have gone a long way, but it was done at this point and she’d just have to see where the chips fell.
“Bring your appetizers to the table,” the second judge said.
Everyone brought their appetizers up and the only other woman in the competition, Destiny, beat the two guys on her team to the table while giving them dirty looks. There were some fiery looks over that, but Grace kept to herself as best as she could.
She wasn’t here to make friends and she wasn’t looking to be the next TV star like the others either.
In her mind, she just had to represent for her family and she felt she was doing a damn good job at it.
When all the appetizers were tasted, she got more positives on hers than anyone else. Not one negative comment either. That made her feel somewhat safe in her mind.
But when their main dishes were presented she got a few dings for the scallops and her plating. She hoped it wasn’t enough to send her to the bottom two but with only five people left, it was anyone’s guess.
The judges talked and then called the winner as Pierre. She was happy for him. She even congratulated him. He walked back in line after he’d been told all the reasons he’d won and tapped her on the shoulder, leaned down and thanked her for watching out for him.
And it was Grace on the bottom with Tony from the West Coast. The judges asked if they’d do anything differently.
Tony argued he would have gotten to the fire pit faster and played dirtier as some contestants were doing that.
