“He’s doing the show. And he’ll be fine so long as he doesn’t go slamming and sliding on his knee trying to heroically keep women from slicing off their toes at the sight of him.”

Ashna groaned. Inside she was wailing. She fell back on her bed.

Her ex–best friend let out a full-throated guffaw. “I get that he’s hot and all, but girl, keep your panties on!”

“Shut up. The knife slipped. It was an accident.”

“That’s not what the camera saw.”

Ashna jumped up again and started pacing again. “Listen, China. Please please please please, do not make me do this. Please. I cannot get on a set with him after that. Please. Please!” If it sounded like spineless, pathetic begging, that’s exactly what it was.

“Ashna, love,” China said with not a whit of humor left in her voice, “these are literally the best viewership ratings the channel has ever had. I mean ever. Like ten times over, ever. The CEO had me in her office yesterday. They’re doubling what they’re paying you. She just gave me a huge bonus. They will do anything to make sure you don’t try to get out of your contract. After that video going viral”—she made an excited squeaking sound—“the chance of you getting voted off anytime soon has become almost zero. You can actually win this! I’m sure the rest of the chefs aren’t thrilled, but they’d be stupid to not understand that everyone is going to be tuning in to watch. So, win-win for everyone!”

Ashna didn’t care. As China rhapsodized the impending success of her show at the expense of The Video—and Ashna’s self-respect—Ashna made her way down to the kitchen and pulled out her tea jars. She spooned a little tulsi, the slightest pinch of ginger powder, and Darjeeling loose leaf into a strainer cup, drawing strength from the alchemy of those flavors mingling. She’d find another way to save Curried Dreams. Just a few weeks ago the show hadn’t been an option. She would pretend those weeks hadn’t happened. God, how she needed those weeks to not have happened.

“You don’t understand,” Ashna said. If everyone was going to accuse her of trying the same thing over and over and expecting different results, she might as well go with it. “The award is a really big deal to Shobi. She doesn’t want it to look like she has no family to share it with. It’s important to her to show everyone how she has it all.” A blatant lie. Shobi was, in fact, a vocal advocate of women not pressuring themselves to “have it all.”