Chapter 9
CHAPTER NINE
Ivy called Eva from the bottom of the community center steps, before she'd reached the parking lot, before she'd fully processed what had just happened in that room.
Eva picked up on the first ring.
"I KNEW IT!" Eva said after Ivy dished all the details. "I knew it the second I saw the clip. Mrs. Patel has been scheming since—"
"How do you know Mrs. Patel?"
"Everyone knows Mrs. Patel. Her husband set me and Fran up."
"You never told me that."
"You've been gone for a while. Looks like Mrs. Patel is the matchmaker now."
"Finn and I aren't dating. We're just partnering up."
"Sure. For now." A brief sound of movement, as if Eva was repositioning. "What are you going to do?"
"It's real money, Eva. Even better exposure for my platform."
"What does he need it for?"
Ivy paused on the sidewalk. "What makes you think I know what he needs it for?"
A beat. "Well?"
"A restaurant. I think. At least that's the impression I got when Mrs. Patel brought it up and Finn looked like she was dangling proprietary seedlings over his head."
"So you're doing it?"
"Neither of us had a rational basis for refusing."
"That's the most romantic thing I've heard all month."
"Eva—"
"Two people with competing needs recognizing that their interests are aligned and proceeding on the basis of rational self-interest? That's basically a Regency novel." She sounded deeply pleased. "When do you start?"
"We're meeting tonight to set ground rules."
"He proposed ground rules?"
"He said he had a format."
Eva laughed. "Of course he does." Then, more gently: "Hey. Is this okay? Actually okay?"
Ivy looked at the community center door. "Ask me after tonight. I've got another call coming in."
Roz started in without preamble when Ivy clicked over. "I saw the numbers this morning. Two point three million."
"It wasn't planned."
"I know it wasn't planned; planned would have been a different clip — planned would have been lighting and a script, and you wouldn't have had the thing on your face."
"What thing on my face?"
"We'll come back to that. Tell me this guy is open to a collaboration?"
Ivy told her about the partnership proposal. Roz listened, which she was excellent at; making the small sounds that meant I'm here and keep going at the right intervals. When Ivy finished, there was a pause.
"Did you plan this?" Roz said.
"No."
"I know you didn't plan the clip, but the competition — the timing—"
"Roz."
"I'm asking because the whole setup has a—"
"I did not plan a fake viral moment in order to engineer a cooking competition in a town I haven't lived in for ten years."
A pause. "Okay," Roz said, in the tone of someone who had decided to take this on faith.
"You sound unconvinced."
"I'm convinced you didn't plan it. I'm noting that it worked out well and you should be prepared for people to think you planned it."
Ivy sat down on a bench outside the pharmacy. Through the window she could see the original soda counter, the morning light hitting the old tin ceiling. "Devon is probably thinking it."
"Devon thinks everyone operates the way Devon operates." Roz's voice had the flat quality it got when Devon came up, like a door closing. "What does Tomato Guy think?"
"His name is Finn. He's into it. There's a prize. Real money. And lots of exposure. Maybe even nationwide. This could launch me, Roz. Really launch me."
Ivy looked at the bench slats. They were painted green, the old municipal green that Valor had apparently been using since sometime in the Eisenhower administration. "I'm meeting him tonight to go over the ground rules. He has a format."
"A format," Roz said.
"For the ground rules. He — yes."
"Ivy."
"Don't."
"I just need to tell you not to fall for another guy you work with. It didn't end well the first time."
"I know that. Don't you think I know that?" Ivy was the one with the broken heart, after all.
"Okay, babe. But the thing on your face in the clip—"
"Goodbye, Roz."
She hung up, not unkindly, and sat on the green bench. Her phone was silent in her hand. The social media app blinked with dozens of notifications. She opened the comment section on the viral clip, which she knew was a poor use of her time, and did it anyway.
They were mostly affectionate. That was the thing: the comments weren't prurient or mean; they were warm.
-…the way he almost smiled, though…
-She knows exactly what she's doing.
-Has anyone figured out if he's single?
-This is an enemies to lovers origin story, and I will not be taking questions.
There was a whole thread analyzing the Edison lights, their color temperature, the way the Cherokee Purples read in the background. A food writer in the comments had identified the variety correctly and gotten three thousand likes.
Most of the comments were about Finn. They were kind, mostly.
Funny in ways that were not malicious. But they were also, she thought, wrong.
Not wrong about the facts but wrong about the texture of it, flattening him into a type, the grumpy foil to her sunshine, and she found herself reading with a growing irritation on his behalf that she put her phone away rather than examine.
She and Finn kept their distance all afternoon.
They were too busy for anything else. The lunch rush went straight into rush hour.
Ivy still had a line five minutes after her official closing.
It took Finn ushering people away before she could start her closing procedures.
Once she was done, he was waiting for her, leaning against his closed truck.
He waved her in the direction of the Millstone, the bar where they had decided to talk.
The Millstone was the kind of bar that had been exactly what it was for forty years and felt no obligation to update this assessment.
Dark wood, good lighting, a chalkboard menu that changed weekly and always had one thing on it that shouldn't have worked but did.
She'd been here twice in her childhood; once at someone's graduation party, and once when she was seventeen and had gotten in with a borrowed ID that the bartender had pretended to believe and only served her soda.
She sat down across from Finn, who handed her a list.
"The ground rules. I drafted them as a starting point."
She looked at the list.
1. The Purple Heart Ranch is off-limits for content without explicit prior approval, specific to each visit and each piece of content.
2. Neither party uses the partnership in individual content without advance notice to the other.
3. Competition recipe development is collaborative, and credit is shared equally in any public representation.
"These are reasonable," she said.
Something shifted in his expression. He made a small mark on the pad. "The ranch visits need to be scheduled in advance. I have a rotation schedule and I can't—"
"I'll give you a week's notice."
He looked at her. She looked back with the pleasant steadiness she'd developed over years of production meetings with people who mistook patience for weakness.
"The goal is the State Prize," he said.
"Yes," she agreed.
"And we're agreed that the dish—"
"Or menu."
"Or menu — has to be genuinely good. Not good for market competition. Good."
Ivy became aware that a glass had appeared in front of her.
She looked at it. Looked at the bar, where their server had moved on.
Looked at Finn, who was writing something on his legal pad.
It was a ginger beer with lime and a salted rim.
It was exactly what she would have ordered.
She did not say: how did you know that? She did not say anything about it.
She picked up the glass and drank, and they moved on to talking about the competition format.
Finn's handwriting was confident in the way he was confident; broad strokes, no hesitation, letters that knew where they were going before he'd finished forming them.
His hand moved across the page as if the decision had already been made and writing it down was just the confirmation.
She watched his biceps flex slightly with each line.
Then he paused. Whatever he was working through had snagged on something, and he went still — not absent, just interior — and tugged his lower lip between his teeth while he thought it out. It was the most unguarded she'd seen him outside of his food truck.
They had been there for forty minutes and were discussing sourcing logistics when Ivy became aware of a presence at the edge of the table. Mrs. Patel sat down with a small smile and the fundamental serenity of someone who had not arrived at this moment by accident.
"I hope I'm not interrupting," she said. "You two in the competition is wonderful for the town. The interest has been — you've both seen the numbers. I wanted to raise something. Informally. As a member of the community who cares about the outcome."
Finn's brows narrowed suspiciously at the older woman and said nothing. Ivy, still new to the changed dynamics in her small town, followed suit.
"The internet loves you," Mrs. Patel said. "Both of you. Together. The clip — the comments, the coverage — it's because people see something when they watch you. Something—" she tilted her head as if searching for the precise word she had definitely already chosen — "real."
Finn went still. Ivy could see the tension roll off him. She didn't think he was breathing. She almost said something out of concern, but Mrs. Patel continued.
"The exhibition judges aren't just tasting the food; they're watching the story.
The state board, the outside press — they're here because of the clip.
They want to see the Tomato Couple. Not just a good dish.
" She paused, with the timing of someone who had done community theater at some point.
"If you leaned into it. Not dishonestly.
Just — let the cameras catch the moments.
The warmth that's already there. The way you—"
"Mrs. Patel," Finn said.
"I'm just saying that authenticity is—"
"You're suggesting we perform a relationship for the judges."
Oh. The conversation with Eva came back to Ivy. Matchmaking. Is that what was happening here? Did Ivy want that to happen here? It was clear from the look on Finn's face that he did not want any part of this.
"I'm suggesting you don't underform the relationship that's already there.
" Mrs. Patel said it pleasantly, without a flicker.
"The reach would be significant. The judges respond to what the internet responds to.
You'd have—" she turned to Ivy — "the foundation for something much larger than a single competition win.
And you'd have—" she turned to Finn — "the town behind you. Fully. Loudly."
She stood up. "Think about it. The competition starts soon."
They watched her cross the bar and go out the door with the serenity of a woman who felt good about how that had gone.
The silence lasted approximately ten seconds. Finn looked at Ivy. Ivy looked at Finn. They were regarding each other in what felt like one of those Western standoffs. Except there were no guns. Just the bullet of a fake relationship being fired into the atmosphere.
Ivy said, "I'm not saying yes."
Finn said, "I'm not saying yes either."
The bullet stalled between them. Neither ducking. Neither dodging. Both just holding still and letting the bullet decide.
Finn picked up his pen. Set it down again. Looked at the legal pad with its three working ground rules and the notes beneath them, all of which now existed in a slightly different context than they had forty minutes ago.