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Cheers sound from every corner of the lounge, and cameras flash, and I make sure to stand just a little bit behind Lacey so that I don’t look too pregnant at that very moment. Can’t jump the gun on this.

Lacey is utterly embarrassed, but she endures. We talked about this well before the event. Lacey prefers the kitchen; it’s part of the reason she didn’t open her own restaurant. Being in front of cameras makes her nervous, and she’s already sweating and blushing, but she’s a trouper.

Gloria, of course, manages to swoop in like a vulture and perch to Lacey’s other side, smiling for the cameras and playing the part of “one of the girls.”

Once the pictures are taken, the bloggers all start filing in to talk with Lacey about how she came up with the dishes, and what it’s like working in a female-run establishment as a female executive chef, questions both of us abhor but which we’ve already talked about because it’s inevitable.

Luckily Gloria is there to give her two cents.

“These days it just, like, so important for women to take charge of their own lives, you know? And I think what we’ve accomplished here is so important for women everywhere, right? I tell all my girlfriends that you just have to, like, surround yourself with powerful women because we all have to stick together. And when we do, look what happens.”

The look on Lacey’s face is almost certainly going to make it onto someone’s blog as Gloria heaps praise upon herself as part of the “we” in that statement — as if she had anything to do with making Red Hall successful.

Unfortunately, she’s the pretty one between the three of us, and the one with the most cleavage, and we’re being interviewed almost exclusively by men. Guess who steals the attention?

Lacey and I do manage to get a few questions answered the way we’ve discussed, much to Gloria’s chagrin, and of course, she makes sure to drop her opinion in the bucket afterward whether the questioner is still taking notes or not.

Eventually, it’s over. And it’s 9:58.

Gloria touches my arm. “Almost time. Better make your way up to the limelight. Big news, am I right? We’re going to be on every blog and paper in the city tomorrow morning! There are even some people live tweeting right now.”

It doesn’t surprise me. Everyone here has a phone out. There are probably more pictures of Lacey’s dishes in existence right now than there are dishes prepared.

At one end of the lounge, a stage has been set up displaying all the different hot sauces and the peppers they’re made from. There are also dishes sprayed with resin and meant to simply look gorgeous, which they do.

The clock is ticking, so I make my way up there before Gloria decides to follow through with her promise. Along the way a few people stop us to make conversation or ask for a picture, but Gloria is, for once, entirely focused on one task — getting me to the stage. She runs interference with remarkable alacrity and efficiency. It really is a shame.

W

hen we get to the edge of the stage, Gloria goes up ahead of me and, for once, she’s not a complete failure of a human being.

“If I could have your attention, please!” she says, and she gets it. The lounge quiets down. “Thank you all so much for being here. For those of you that don’t know me, I’m Gloria Price, and I work for one of the most amazing women in this city.

“Now, I bet a lot of you don’t know that Janie Hall came from next to nothing. She wasn’t born rich like some people on this street were,” she jerks a thumb in the direction of Ferry Lights, and that gets a rueful chuckle from a few of the more in-the-know folks in the crowd. “But she was born with grit, and determination, and a dream — and a little bit of badass bitch!” She laughs, and so do some in the crowd, but my face is simply frozen in a professional smile that might read decently in a picture.

“And she took those things,” Gloria goes on, “and used them to hog-tie the life she wanted for herself. She graduated a semester early after paying her own way through college and taking a workload that most of you men would probably crumble under, frankly. She opened up Red Hall just a year after she graduated, and can you believe what this place has become?” More cheering. Gloria waits. “So it is my honor and privilege to ask her to come up here and stand with me now to celebrate this incredible, momentous step forward for the Red Hall Lounge! Come on up here, Janie Hall!”

The gall of that girl. Even if I fire her after this, everyone will assume that she’s the spokesperson for the lounge, whether I renege on the deal and make my own announcement or not.

She offers me her hand to help me up on stage, but I ignore it, and walk up and past her.

Gloria doesn’t miss a beat, though, and follows me to the display, where she stands beside me, smiling and waving to the crowd.

Now that all eyes are on me, I turn to her, smiling as pleasantly as I can manage. “Let’s have them get a few shots of just me for the announcement, and then I’ll call you back up. Make it look like a surprise.”

Her smile falters just a bit, and she looks uncertain. Then she looks suspicious. “Don’t fuck me,” she mutters. “I’ve got Reginald Ferry’s people on speed dial.”

“Didn’t I mention?” I ask. “Jake knows. Now go wait offstage until I call you back up.”

We shake hands, and even hug, but as she leaves me there I can see murder in her eyes. Maybe she guesses what I’m planning, and maybe she doesn’t. Frankly, it won’t matter a minute from now.

When she leaves, the photographers begin calling my name, and I have to spend a few painful minutes staring at flashes and holding up bottles until everyone’s got their shot. It leaves me light-blinded, and the track lights pointed at the stage don’t help either.

Once they’re done, I laugh a little. “All those flashing lights!” I say to the crowd. “They don’t prepare you for that in college, that’s for sure. Thank you all so, so much for being here. I can’t even begin to say what it means to me — ”

The lights clear a bit. Just enough. I never look directly at the crowd when I do these public-speaking things. Instead, I look a little over them, sweeping my gaze so it seems like I’m looking at everyone directly. At that moment, I’m looking out over the crowd and at the door.

My heart skips a beat, and I suddenly forget everything I’d planned to say. I mean to pick up where I left off, riff a little, get myself back on track, but when I try to speak the only thing that comes out as I see, even from the stage, those smoldering eyes, is: