Women’s asses: hot.

Men’s asses: also hot.

That’s when I knew I needed to accept I wasn’t as straight as I thought I was.

“Your fiancé is producing a new show with Camilla freaking Vargas?”

“Ex-fiancé. But yes. I found out this morning.”

If Paul and I were still together, our friends would be messaging me to scream about the new show. But my phone has been silent. It seems our friendships only extended as long as our relationship did.

Now I’m left in this confusing liminal space where I’m angry with him but I care for him but I don’t want to be with him but I don’t know how to be with a woman or if I want to be with a woman and if I did I wouldn’t even know where to start.

“Hollywood. We have to do this.”

I look up from the hole I’ve been burning into the table with my stare. “Do what?”

She shakes my phone at me. “This. This show. Paul’s show. Why didn’t you mention this before?” She sounds aghast, betrayed.

I laugh awkwardly as I try to grab my phone from her. She drops it back into my hand, warm from her palm. She doesn’t break eye contact, wiggling her eyebrows. “We should apply to be on the show.”

I laugh again, real, warmer this time because that’s silly, ludicrous. But my laughter slowly fades as she takes longer and longer to join me over here, on the just kidding side of the table. “Amy,” I say.

“Think of the publicity if we won.”

That’s exactly what I’m thinking about. The new followers, the rubberneckers who aren’t here for the food, just to say they ate at the same restaurant, maybe sat in the same seat as Camilla. The way they don’t really care if we win or lose, succeed or fail, we’re just entertainment ready for their consumption.

“N-n-no. We couldn’t. We can’t.”

“Why not?” And she sounds genuinely curious, like she can’t think of a hundred different reasons why we should absolutely not apply to Cook for Camilla.

I splutter. “I can’t go on my fiancé’s new TV show. That would be...favoritism. Nepotism.” I throw my hands out. “Whatever.”

“Ex-fiancé,” she corrects.

“Even more reason not to,” I hiss. “He’d think I was trying to get him back or something.”

“Are you kidding?” She’s practically standing out of her seat. “Now that you’re broken up, I bet the producers and the audiences will eat up the drama. They’d be stupid to say no to you. You mean ratings.”

I shake my head. My stomach sinks, sours, not just at the idea that I’d be ratings fodder, but at the inevitable attention, the speculation. People tagging me in conversations about what this facial expression meant, what I did wrong on the previous episode. It would be Pop-Up Kitchen all over again.

I learned so much on that show. New skills and techniques, and that I’m far more capable than I thought I was. And that stardom isn’t for me. The other contestants had a fire in their eyes when the cameras came on. They showed up ready to perform, I showed up just to cook. I woke up every day ready to create good food. But I was the one consumed, my spirit, my confidence. The only thing that got me through was Paul. And now he’s gone, too.