Free Mumbo Gumbo by Jerrilyn Farmer

to Chef Howie, but at that moment the star was checking his mirror to see if his legendary sideburns were even. Quentin turned again to me. “I’ve been kind to you. I’ve been helpful. But you have just gone too d—, well, too far.”
    Quentin Shore couldn’t seem to bring himself to curse.
    “For your information,” he said, his voice tense, “I’ve been working on Freak since the pilot. Did you know that? Furthermore, Tim Stock is my good, good friend. He dropped me a note and asked me personally to look after the show while he was away. So it’s my duty and my responsibility and my job to brief—”
    “Tim Stock?” I asked quickly. “Where is he?”
    I noticed that Fate was watching us closely as we bickered back and forth, her hand dipping into a can of Planters cashews.
    How had I gotten in the middle of a catfight? As an event planner and caterer, I had taken pride in my tactfulness, in my good relations with both clients and staff. Heck, I like to make people happy. But the emotions in this line of work clearly ran hotter. People hereliked to brawl. My friendly little “get-along” personality wasn’t serving me at all well, I was discovering, in this extreme sport of Hollywood ego wrestling. This temp recipe-writing job, which should have been a breeze, had already pitted me against a good number of combatants, each with an agenda the size of Mount Wilson. And why? Because in this arena, I was an unknown, a rank amateur. Everyone wanted to take me on. Here, on this turf, I had zero credibility.
    But every problem must have a solution. If my rational approach wasn’t working, I’d have to adapt to the culture, and, lucky for me, this was a world where outsiders could move up fast. Acting was called for, and I’d have to change my vocabulary, too. I looked at Quentin coolly and tried the New Hollywood–version Madeline out on him. My voice lost every ounce of its calm and friendly tone. “Cut the bullshit, Quentin.”
    “What?”
    “Stop fucking around. Stick with the topic, okay? Tim Stock. Just where the fuck is he?”
    At the table, Fate Finkelberg stopped chewing her cashew, and in the makeup corner, Chef Howie’s hairdresser stopped spraying Freeze and Shine on Chef Howie’s perfect hair.
    “I don’t know where he is right this very minute,” Quentin pleaded, a tinge of hurt now creeping into his belligerent tone. “I don’t. I got a card,” he explained, “from Vegas. Tim asked me to look after Chef Howie, and that’s all. I’m not trying to give you a hard time, Madeline. Honestly,” he lied.
    I blinked. Quentin had responded perfectly to the New Madeline. So this is what it took—being willing to be more obnoxious than the other guy. I realized why people hated what Hollywood did to them. Butnow, even the New Madeline’s silence threatened Quentin.
    “It’s the truth. I swear,” he said. Quentin’s eyes darted over to Fate. She sat there ignoring Quentin. She was, instead, checking me out. Recalculating, I hoped.
    “Go,” I ordered him. The dominatrix approach seemed to be working, so why change it? “Talk to Greta. Talk to Artie. Just get going.”
    Quentin, head bowed, turned to Howie and said brightly, “Well, I’ll leave you now and get back to my meetings at the office.” And with that, he left.
    Two f-words. That seemed to be all it took for anyone to be taken seriously in Hollywood. You simply need a competitive nature, which I clearly proved I had, and a willingness to sink to that level. I swallowed.
    “So,” Fate said slowly. “What do you want?”
    That was a good question. My original plan had been to get Chef Howie alone. He had seemed like a nice guy. I had hoped I could convince him to be a pal and call off the taping. Perhaps it could have been implied that he wasn’t feeling well. Getting Howie alone, however, would be a challenge. In the meantime, I had to stall. “Let’s go over today’s script,” I suggested.
    “That’s a laugh.”