Marco: I like everyone I meet.

Me: No.

Marco: I want to be famous.

Me: I don’t think so.

Marco: Yes or no.

Me: No. Yes—no. Sorry. It’s no.

Marco: I like horror movies.

Me: Yes.

Marco: Winning isn’t everything.

Me: Yes. Or I mean, it’s not everything.

If I did well or badly, Marco wasn’t telling. His face stayed blank the whole time. He reminded me of those guys in movies who give lie detector tests.

When I came out of the room, Harper and Samara were waiting. Then Harper went in with Marco, and Samara led me across the hall into a large room with a wall of windows.

Behind a glass table shaped like the letter C, Chef JJ sat alone looking out at the city massaging her shaved head. The sun was already melting behind the buildings, and above it, the sky was swirled like rainbow sherbet.

“This is Tristan Levin from Petersville, New York.” Samara put my paperwork on the table and left.

Chef JJ flipped through my packet. And flipped some more. And made a few notes. And flipped back to the beginning.

Was this a test? Was I supposed to just start talking or present my doughnut?

I opened the box and tipped it forward so she could see inside if she looked up. “This is a—”

She put up her white, bony hand like a stop sign. “I see here your mother owns a restaurant. She isn’t, by any chance, Kira Levin?”

“Oh, uh, yeah, she is.” It never crossed my mind that Chef JJ would just make the connection without my saying anything.

A slow smile spread from one side of her mouth to the other. “Kira Levin. How is she?”

“She’s good.”

“Does she ever see Walter?”

“Actually, they run a restaurant together. In Petersville.” This was good, right? We were making small talk. I could do this.

“They run it together? Aw.”

“Uh, yeah.” I really wasn’t sure what to say, but it seemed like a good idea to keep the back-and-forth going.

“I haven’t seen either of them for years. Did your mom tell you they both used to work for me?”

“Uh-huh.”

“And you’re Kira’s son?”

“Uh-huh.” Didn’t we already cover that?

“And you want to be on Can You Cut It?”

“I’ve been cooking since I could walk, and I’ve watched every show. Plus, I have my own doughnut business.”

Another slow smile snaked across her face. “Right, so what do we have here?”

I slid the box across the table. “This is a butterscotch cream doughnut, my original recipe for both the doughnut and the cream.”

Chef JJ peered into the box and sniffed. “When did you make this?”

“This morning.”

She picked up the doughnut and took a small bite, so small she didn’t even hit cream.

I watched her face as she chewed. It didn’t read yuck or yum or even interesting. Just blank like Marco’s. Maybe they practiced together.

She put the doughnut back in the box and closed it.