Chương 154: Sarah's Interview

Arthur's visit was a stone dropped into still water, and the rings were still moving through all three of them. That cooling philosophy, taken to its absolute limit, and the warning about special rules at the end of it, had pushed the training kitchen back into a low, pressed-down mood. Chris knew he couldn't let it ferment. He needed an outlet — something to take the strain off the team's nerves for an hour. Right then his phone rang. It was Sarah.

"Busy man. Any time for an exclusive with The Pass?" She sounded bright, a smile in it.

"The whole world wants to know what the American hero who beat France is thinking right now." Chris glanced at Ethan and Kira, each of them staring at nothing, and had an idea.

"I've got time," he said.

"But I have a condition."

"Which is?"

"You don't interview me. You interview the team. And not in the training kitchen — let's go outside." Half an hour later, at a café terrace on the bank of the Seine, Chris, Ethan and Kira sat down with Sarah. She wasn't in her reporting suit today; she was dressed casually, and looked like a tourist on holiday in Paris.

"Wow. All three of you. Now I'm nervous." Sarah joked, trying to loosen the air. She could see perfectly well that none of them were right. Ethan managed something at the corner of his mouth. Kira just nodded to her.

"Ignore them, they're still tasting yesterday's champagne," Chris said, covering for them, and turned to Sarah.

"Go ahead. Ask whatever you want." Sarah switched on her recorder, but she didn't go straight at it. She chatted first.

"Honestly, Chris — the day of the semifinal, when the chairman announced you'd won, I was a mess in the stands. You have no idea how… how impossible that moment felt."

"It felt impossible from our side too," Ethan muttered.

"No. It wasn't impossible, and it wasn't a miracle." Chris shook his head. He looked at Sarah and said it seriously.

"It was ours. We traded the truest things we had for that ticket to the final." Sarah's eyes lit up. Here was the interview.

"The truest things. Can you be specific? A lot of people are saying you won on story, on emotion. But there are critics saying that's a departure from what competitive cooking actually is — that it's closer to the sentimental beats of a reality show." This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version. It was a sharp question, aimed straight at the center of their win. Ethan's brow came down immediately; the framing clearly offended him. Chris stayed calm.

He picked up his coffee, drank, and answered slowly.

"Then I'd like to ask those critics what cooking actually is. More precise temperature control? More complicated molecular structure? A more spectacular plate?" He paused.

"For me it has never been any of that. Cooking is a conversation. It's a silent conversation the cook has with the guest, conducted through food. We put our experience, our feeling, our thinking into the dish, and the guest tastes it and feels it and understands it. If a dish is technically perfect but has nothing to say, then it's a failed dish."

"In the semifinal, France told a vast story about five hundred years of French history. We respect that enormously. We chose to tell three small stories about ourselves instead. One about a childhood by the sea. One about a Christmas spent alone. And one about a bowl of instant noodles late at night. The judges chose us — not because our stories were more moving, but because in that moment they heard what we were trying to say. That's the conversation." Ethan and Kira both lifted their heads.

It was the first time either of them had heard Chris state their shared fight this clearly, and turn it into a philosophy. Sarah was moved too. She turned off the recorder.

"Chris. What comes next isn't the interview." She dropped her voice, and her face went serious.

"I picked something up from the league committee. About England." Three sets of nerves pulled tight.

"The bookmakers have England at 1. 2 to take the title. You're at 4. 5. Practically everyone thinks the dark-horse run ends here," Sarah said. The news wasn't a surprise.

"Why?" Ethan couldn't help himself.

"Because your opponent, Arthur Campbell, is considered the most stable chef alive. Seventeen official competitions since he debuted, and not one significant error in any of them. People describe his cooking as clockwork. You're the opposite — your style is made of uncertainty. In a pressure environment like a final, everyone believes the steadier side wins."

"Steady…" Chris turned the word over, and a smile came onto his face.

"You can still laugh?" Ethan stared at him.

"Why wouldn't I?" Chris said.

"Everyone's decided we've lost already. Isn't that the best possible situation? No pressure, nothing to carry. We can play. We can make a mess. We can do anything we want. And Arthur is carrying the expectations of every single one of those people. He can't lose, and more than that, he can't make a mistake. Which of us do you think is under more weight?" It went through the group like clean air and took the cloud with it. He was right. Men with no shoes on don't fear the man in good boots.

They'd fought their way here from the wrong end of every prediction. One step from the end, what exactly was there to be afraid of? Ethan's face cleared. Kira lifted her coffee and took a small sip. Sarah watched Chris with open admiration. This man could always, at the moment it mattered most, find the one angle nobody else had and dissolve all the pressure in the room. He was built to lead.

"Last question, Chris." Sarah switched the recorder back on.

"Is there anything you want to say to Arthur before the final?" Chris thought for a moment, then spoke to the recorder, calmly.

"Arthur — I respect your philosophy of cooking. It's a road to an extreme. But I want to tell you this: however precisely a clock runs, it never feels time passing. And we're going to spend one dish's worth of time letting you taste what a life is like." The short interview worked on them like physiotherapy applied at the right hour.

By the time the three of them got back to the training kitchen, the tension and the pressure were gone, and what stood in their place was something loose and settled and ready to fight. They were ready for a final that was never going to be ordinary.