"Tu n'as pas à faire ça, tu sais—" You don't have to do this, you know.
She gave a start, wondering if her powers had expanded, before realizing the voice came inches away and was most decidedly French, at that. Curly chestnut hair, collegiate, and a peculiar expression—
Clotilde. Her baking partner. 'Partner' was a generous term, as each student followed the chef's directions on their own fougasse creation. The only 'partner' aspect was peer mentorship, and the raven-haired lady, pushing her rimmed glasses further up her nose, definitely found this in extremely short supply.
Switching to English, the French woman continued beneath the drone of instructions. "You're...qu'est-ce qui ce mot?...ah, yes. Staring. You have, as they say, beef? With 'im?" Clotilde pointed in the direction of the grizzled older man up front, currently demonstrating how to best shape and slash pale pliable dough, itself manufactured through questionable means.
"Regarde ça!" He held the pan up, demonstrating a puffed tree-like creation. "Et voila!" as the group dissolved into faint, polite applause.
"It 'is unorthodox, what 'e does, but 'e means well—" Clotilde regarded her with a pleading glance. Please. Please don't do this—
Rather than respond, the raven-haired lady turned to her own mound of elongated, ovoid dough, slashing symmetrical marks with discomfiting ease, pretending in that moment to be Zorro, bringer of justice—absorbing herself into Clotilde, who continued shaping her own fougasse. Who was Clotilde?
A vision—a much-older man, a glamorous woman—a girl with curly hair—arguments—departure—the older man, welcomed into the arms of another, surly and distrustful—a cloud of –familial—
She opened her eyes. "Secrets," she all but whispered. Clotilde leaned forward, no doubt adding to her already-made entreaties, but—
"Does his wife know?"
The crown of chestnut hair fled her immediate orbit, to the far end of the table. She sighed, resuming her study of the chef himself.
His soul practically singing, he basked in the glow of admiration. Eau chaude. Levure sèche active. Farine.
Huile d'olive. Romarin. Thym. De gros sel. 167 grammes de levain. Épice Z'atar. A certain air of mischief—a Manille card game—leaflets snatched—a recipe, ripped from a pocket—words uttered—machinery—Maurizio—
Gasping, her attention fell on the last word. Or rather, name. Maurizio.
This fougasse recipe was sourdough-based. Pain de campagne. And stolen from an up-and-coming chef named Maurizio.
Based on the dough's consistency and smell, the secret fougasse recipe seemed to match up. "Let's nail this sucker," she muttered to herself, pounding the dough's interior with renewed zeal. One final thing...re-entering, she visualized his handwriting, a coarse scrawl, practically indecipherable to anyone but those who knew him best...
One Day Later
Lettre: Maître Cuisiniers de France, Rue Blanche
J'ai une confession. J'ai volé une recette de fougasse au levain et jeté la disgrâce sur l'industrie, en utilisant des moyens de fabrication artificiels. Que les conséquences soient les mêmes.
Traduction/Translation: I have a confession. I have stolen a recipe for sourdough fougasse and brought disgrace upon the industry, using artificial means of manufacture. Let the consequences be as they may.
-Chef, Fougasse Artisanale
She dropped the sealed letter off at the doorstep of 40 Rue Blanche, a faded-but-stately five-storied marble building, remnants of wild rooftop garden peeking from above.
One Week Later
Turning to Le Monde's culinary section, she found a headline detailing the decline of Fougasse Artisanale's chef. The fallout had been immense; a throng of newly-unemployed, an acrimonious divorce, and the chef himself fleeing to Lausanne to live with his ex-convict mother. Rescinded culinary memberships too. In a postscript, it was mentioned that Maurizio sought appellation d'origine contrôlée protection for his recipe. Akin to a culinary patent.
And Clotilde?
Outed as the chef's love child, she dropped out of cooking classes, transferring elsewhere (but not before petitioning for a name change).
Did the ends justify the means?
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Imposter Syndrome
FantastiqueA woman's super-empath gift enables her to get her dream job. However, she acts as unwilling mercenary, tasked with nullifying powers throughout the globe. She questions her mission, and what emerges is her superhero origin story and her tale of fal...
