Free Hot Dish by Connie Brockway

life and her career, she offered heavenward.
    “Everyone in that room left with a crush on you. Brava!”
    “Thank you.”
    “Here, have a seat. Can I get you something? No? Fine.” Dan came forward to take her arm and lead her to the sofa. Nat headed for the buffet table out by the window. And Bob Reynolds.
    Dan waited until she’d been seated and then sat down next to her. “You didn’t know the butter sculpture by Jaax was still around, did you? You were surprised, weren’t you?”
    That was the understatement of the year. The idea that the butter head lived and apparently had been living all these years in her parents’ barn was sort of creepy, with a kind of “Telltale Heart” vibe to it. Mom had some ‘splainin’ to do.
    “Boy, I’ll say!” she enthused just to keep old Dan company in his delight. And now the segue … “You really did take me by surprise. As did the announcement I would be going to—”
    “I knew it!” Dan broke in, chuckling and rubbing his hands together. “I knew you didn’t know. Wait. It gets better. You’ll get a kick out of this, Jenn:
The Guinness Book of World Records
is interested in seeing it. And you,” he hurriedly added. “Together. It seems it might be the oldest surviving intact butter sculpture in existence.
    “And
Ripley’s Believe It or Not
might want to do a fluff piece, too.”
    Great. Instead of the Queen of Lifestyles, she was going to be known as the Methuselah of Butter Sculptures. As amazing as this was apparently going to be to Dan, she didn’t want to be in the World Record Book as being the oldest anything. And they shouldn’t want her to, either.
    But now was no time to deflate that particular balloon. Not in front of Dan’s subordinates.
    She should answer. She just had to focus, envision herself as a rock, a serene Nordic rock in a calm body of water. Abruptly the rock turned into a yellow monolith.
    “That’s wonderful, Dan” was all she managed instead of the single word that sprang immediately to mind. But that wouldn’t have been
Jenn Lind-like
. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d used that word. Probably the last time she was in Fawn Creek, where nobody paid any attention to her or expected anything from her, anyway.
    Except they were paying her attention, the sneaky bastards. Going behind her back to get her to play master of ceremonies at their sesquicentennial. Good try, but no way. Fawn Creek was not going to screw this up for her.
    Granted, she had done some stupid things in high school trying to get out of her Miss Fawn Creek obligations but most reasonable people wouldn’t care about a seventeen-year-old kid “acting out.” In fact, the people who’d done her background check hadn’t even bothered with her teenage years aside from looking into the state court records. But if Dwight Davies found out about her little stunt at the high school homecoming dance the fall of her senior year, he was just the man to magnify that minor sin into a felony offense. One worth firing her over.
    Now she was on the cusp of real celebrity, national recognition, lasting success, and she was not going to blow it. No mistakes this time. No misunderstood instructions in an application. No would-be friends secretly salivating for her comeuppance. She had this particular crown bought and stamped sold .
    “—so you can see, the whole thing will work out beautifully.” Bob Reynolds had pattered over to where she sat and was regarding her eagerly. If he had a tail, he’d have been wagging it. She still wasn’t sure she’d pet him, though. She suspected he had big teeth. “Right, Ms. Lind?”
    She’d only been half attending. No matter. It was time to put the whammy on their Fawn Creek Fantasy.
    “I’m sorry but I can’t ask AMS to rearrange their entire shooting schedule around a selfish whim to see my face on the front of the
Fawn Creek Crier
. I can’t. I wouldn’t feel right about it.”
    “Besides,” Nat said, hopping