My Fair Lazy - Jen Lancaster [98]
“I said I wanted to take a grilling class there, not some mincing wine-and-cheese class.”
“Well, you’re in luck! I signed us up for lessons on making Brazilian and Indian food, too. But tomorrow night, we learn wine and cheese.”
Fletch then puts on an expression I call his “Muppet face.” He wrinkles his brow and flattens his lips so hard that his chin begins to curl up toward his nose, like he’s a sock puppet and the fist inside is clenching. “Any chance I can get out of this?”
I consider his request for a moment. “Tell you what—you find the office machinery that goes with the cord in your hand, and I’ll rope someone else into going with me.”
Fletch and I arrive at the Chopping Block with a few minutes to spare. We check in at the front counter, and I locate my sticky paper name tag. When I signed up I wasn’t quite sure who’d join me, so I simply wrote “guest” on the form. I pick up a blank name tag and a Sharpie and hand them to Fletch. “Fill this in.”
“Why?” He’s been antagonistic about tonight ever since we got in the car. I swear he Googled every road under construction and made sure to take them, so our three-mile trip took forty-five minutes.
If I had to guess why he’s uncomfortable, I’d say this is one of those instances in which he’s worried people will assume he’s gay, like when I ask him to hold my purse while I tie my shoe or suggest he might enjoy whipped cream in his mocha.
(Sidebar: I blame Judd Apatow for Fletch’s sensitivity. Had he not written such a great scene in The 40 Year-Old Virgin, Fletch and I wouldn’t have spent the last few years telling each other, “You know how I know you’re gay?” )
I massage my temples. “Because you have to. Everyone else is wearing name tags.”
“Can’t I leave it blank? Or just fill in ‘guest’?”
Barely containing my annoyance, I hiss, “Or maybe you can draw one of those round-trumpet-arrow symbols, and we’ll have the rest of the class call you Prince?”
He gives in. “Fine. But you fill it out. I have the handwriting of a serial killer.”
We pass all the upscale kitchen accessories and cookbooks188 and settle in on chairs around the big butcher-block counter filling the center of the room. Each place is set with a plate of seven cheeses, two wineglasses, one of which contains champagne, a cup of water, a pencil, some paper with descriptions printed on them, and a butter knife. We sit at the end, and I can see Fletch tense up when he notices every other person at the counter is female.
As I am having none of his tomfoolery, I take a closer look at my plate. I’m delighted to recognize some of what’s there. There are a couple of pale, hard offerings that I’m sure are Manchego and Gruyère.189 I’m willing to wager the big white dollop is goat cheese and the soft, double-rind-covered one is Brie. Brie was my gateway cheese—I tried it for the first time some years back, and I loved it so much it gave me the courage to realize that not all cheese is rectangular, individually wrapped, and the color of Paris Hilton after a spray tan.
Most of the offerings look delicious, save for the pile of debris sitting in the middle of it all. This heaving, yellowing, blue-green mass is lumpy and loose and crumbly. This is less “cheese” and more “gangrene.”
As if this mass of unpasteurized unhappiness weren’t gross enough, it also reeks.
A lot.
If someone wanted to spread the taste of death on a crostini, this is what they’d choose. If I accidentally stepped in this, I’d find the nearest garden hose to remove it, as the sidewalk edge might not get it all off and I’d fear it would eat through my shoe.
I point at the glob. “This one is terrifying.”
“Yeah, but maybe if you understand it, it won’t be so scary,” Fletch counters.
“Really, now you choose to be the voice of reason? Really?”
Before he can reply, a late-coming couple takes the two remaining seats next to us. They appear to not