entry 080 - if you need love with no condition (1/5)
Title: If You Need Love With No Condition (Cause Down In Hell's Kitchen)
Author: jamie_love13
Beta-Edited: Franziska.
Pairings/Characters: Oh. Dear. God. Uhm. Okay. Jared/Jensen. Jeff/Jim. Steve/Chris. Chad/Sophia. Katie/Danneel. A brief past mention of Jared/Chris Evans (Imagine the hotness!). Gordon Ramsay. Scott Liebfried. Heather West. Jean-Phillipe Susilovic.
Word Count: 44, 469 Words in 5 Parts.
Rating: NC-17/R
Summary: Jared never thought he'd be in Hell's Kitchen, but as he goes through the challenges, he also never thought he'd fall for someone like Jensen. However, he has a game to win, and he has to put his feelings on the back-burner. He just hopes he can actually do it.
Disclaimer: Definitely don't own. And I definitely do not believe any of this is true. It's all fake. All of it. Well, except for Heather West winning season two, and other mentions of past seasons of Hell's Kitchen.
Warnings: None? Well, no. Cock-blocking and extreme waiting for the 'big' finale. More of a look of the guys in the kitchen, and not there relationship, but I tried. ;)
Notes: This thing was a fucking monster!!! It was my baby though. Go check out my acknowledgements/more notes page for more things. :)
If you had asked Jared a month ago if he saw himself here, he would’ve laughed hysterically. Not because Jared is crazy (he isn't) but because Jared wasn't able to see himself here, in a limo with eleven other people, talking about how excited they all were to get started was not something Jared could see himself doing, at all. Hell, he only applied because of a joke by Chad, who had also managed to get in and is currently flirting with some girl named Sophia. Next to Chad is some guy with long brown hair, faded blue jeans and cowboy boots, which Jared tries his hardest not to snort at. Next to that guy is another girl, with brownish-black hair and a petite face who keeps looking at him. Next to the girl is another girl, this time with brown hair and just as small as he is tall, who also keeps looking at him. Then there were two guys, both older looking, talking to one another like they’ve been best friends for years, and Jared feels a small ache in his heart, wondering why he can't have something like that in his life. He’s not saying Chad and him are close, cause they are, but well - Jared doesn’t have that; that one feeling of a friendship that makes you good. One of the older guys has a salt and pepper beard while the other is wearing a trucker hat. Beside them sits another cowboy-looking dude, quiet except for the tune he hums out, all the while looking at the other guy with the cowboy boots and attitude. Another girl, this one with red hair, sits next to him, talking to the girl next to her, who has blond hair. Next to those two girls, and ending up next to him on his left side, is a guy with blondish-brown, somewhat spiked hair and from what Jared can tell, green eyes that he would love to get lost in. So yes, Jared would laugh hysterically at you if you said this was where he’d be today. Then again, he’s always loved the show, the host and the high-pressured tasks the contestants were always given. And if anything, Jared loves food, so he supposed that since he loves it so much - eating and cooking it - it makes sense that he is here anyways.
“So, what are your names?” That comes from the blond sitting next to the redhead, the two of them looking him up and down.
“Jared, and you are...?” He looks back at them, arches his eyebrows and smiles as he does so before shaking his head as an encouragement for them to continue the thought.
“I’m Danneel, and this lovely blond is Katie,” Katie nods her head in acknowledgement before letting out a small smile.
“I’m Jensen,” Jared looks next to him and sees the green eyed guy biting his lips, looking down at his feet. He has a faint blush on his cheeks that Jared can’t help but find attractive.
“Hi,” he breathes, Jensen’s blush deepening while he smiles at Jared.
Quite suddenly, all Jared can hear is Chad. “Aw hell Jared, don’t tell me you’ve already got a crush!”
Jared looks down, a blush coloring his cheeks as everyone looks at him.)
“Chad! Man, can’t you just shut up?” He groans, not looking up.
“Hey, it’s cool. You’re not the only gay guy here.” Jared looks up to see the cowboy booted guy grinning and Jared can’t help but laugh, relieved.
“I’m Chris, by the way.” He continues and Jared’s about to reply when someone else speaks.
“I’m Steve. Also out and proud,” Steve finishes, grinning at Chris who only grins back.
“Jeff here, dating Jim there,” Jared looks over at the two men, one with the salt and pepper beard and the other with a trucker hat and Jared lets out a small smile, wonders how long they’ve been together.
“Jensen: also gay - very gay -“ Jared looks back at Jensen quickly and grins when he sees Jensen grinning at him while playing with a ring on his finger.
“Awh man,” Jared looks up at Chad’s outburst and shakes his head.
“Don’t tell me I’m the only straight guy here!” Chad jokes, causing everyone to laugh and Jared feels a calm settle into him that wasn’t there earlier and isn't going to stay there for long but either way, Jared’s glad he’s in the limo, anyways.
***
As the limo rolls to a stop, Jared can feel the nerves coming back full force at him and he gets out of the limo slowly. When he’s finally outside, he takes a look around, just like everyone else is and can feel his breath being taken away. The building is somewhat large, stairs leading up to it with a red carpet placed in the middle. There are fountains around the landing, turned off at the moment but still completely beautiful. Even with the fountains turned off, everyone can imagine what it’s like with them turned on and Jared knows that it would look amazing. Jared can hear everyone around him gossiping about the building but Jared ignores the buzzing and makes his way to the steps slowly, letting the feeling of excitement overcome his main thought. When Jared reaches the doors and opens them, he can feel his heart nearly stopping completely at the sight before him. Everything is dark, plush red and the lights set a glow in the hall, causing everything to shine. Jared can see the kitchen from where he’s standing and he can tell instantly that all of the appliances are state of the art.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” Jared looks over at Jensen, who has followed him into the dining room and is looking as awed as Jared feels.
“Yeah, it is. But I didn’t come here for the beauty.” Jared replies, looking over his shoulder at Jensen, to see Jensen’s eyes snap to his. He can tell instantly that Jensen is trying to see through him, but to no avail. He sees Jensen opening his mouth to speak but before he can get the words out, he hears someone come up behind him and he tenses. He watches as Jensen turns around and scrunches up his face and all he can think about his how adorable the man looks.
“Hi Jared,” he hears someone purr and when he turns around, he isn’t surprised to see the two girls that were eyeing him up in the limo earlier. He smiles tightly, before saying a quick hello, praying the girls leave him alone, and soon. He can see that the girls are about to say something when he hears Jensen speak before them, quickly interrupting them.
“Hey man, I think Chris and Steve wanted to speak with us,” Jared feels a sigh of relief escape his mouth and he gives another tight smile to the girls before walking away from the kitchens quickly, pulling Jensen along with him to the stairs outside.
“Thanks so much,” Jensen laughs and god, Jared could listen to Jensen’s laugh forever. He’s about to reply when he hears a shriek coming from right above the stairs, where he and Jensen just left from. Jensen and he turn around only to spot the main man himself, standing up on the stairs, his arms crossed, feet shoulder length apart. His eyes go wide at the sight but at the same time, he wants to roll them at the shriek.
“Well, what are you waiting for? Make me your fucking signature dishes you dimwitted fools!”
~***~//~***~
Jared’s mind is completely immersed in the cooking of his dish, not paying any attention to anything other than the food and the times being yelled out. He bumps into different people a few times, but ignores the feeling of the other ones around him and continues working. He can feel the stress of the others around him, but continues to ignore it and instead, feels a pressure in his stomach that he always gets when he’s forgetting something. He’s looking around the kitchen and biting his lip when he tries to remember what he has forgotten. He runs quickly to the refrigerator, and after looking for what feels like forever for his ingredient, he finally finds it and runs out with it, adding it into his dish. When he looks up, he nearly jumps out of his skin when he realizes that none other than Chef fucking Ramsay is staring at him. He takes a deep breath and continues with his dish, listening as Ramsay shouts out the last minute. It’s down to the plating now and Jared can see Jensen in the corner of his eye, plating a dish that looks absolutely scrumptious. Jared smiles and shakes his head before bringing his plate to the pass and covering it. Jensen steps up next to him and sighs, tension all over his body, from his shoulders to his knees.
Jared looks over at Jensen and lets his eyes go up and down Jensen’s length, and he can’t help but bite his lip and wonder just how well of a chef Jensen is compared to him. Just looking back at Jensen while he had cooked his plate makes Jared’s mouth water, upon remembering the foods he’d seen. He won’t lie, Jensen’s attractive, and he knows that Jensen feels the same with Jared’s looks but it’s not about the looks - well, not always - it’s about the personality and how comfortable Jared feels with the other person. Jared hasn’t even really talked to Jensen and he can’t help but feel a strong connection between the two of them and that scares the hell out of him. He blinks when he hears people shuffling and when his mind finally enters the picture, he’s realized that everyone has lined up and all of the food has been moved to two round tables and that Ramsay is in the center of, looking at them. Which just brings Jared to another thing - how scary Gordon fucking Ramsay looks up close and in person. He’s standing tall, his arms crossed in front of him once more and Jared can’t help but take in a deep gulp, its noise resonating towards Jensen, who just smirks. He nudges the other man and glares before smiling and looking back at Ramsay, watching as he looks them all up and down, taking them in and judging them. Jared wonders what the chef is thinking, unsure if he truly wants to know. When the chef’s gaze passes by Jared and Jensen, Jared tries his hardest not to look away from Ramsay’s piercing gaze. It’s hard, Jared knows this, but he pulls it off and narrows his eyes as he does so, looks on as Chef raises an eyebrow before continuing onwards. As he does so, Jared lets out a deep breath that he didn’t know he was holding in and smirks at Jensen, his body tense and thrumming with built-up energy, his heart pounding too fast.
***
Five dishes have already been tried - Jeff’s, Danneel’s, Sandy’s, Chad’s and Sophia’s. Out of those five, Jeff and Danneel’s dishes have been good but not great, Sandy and Chad’s have been horrible enough that Chef vomited Sandy’s up and threw Chad’s out - which Jared just hates for Chad, because he knows the guy is a great chef - and Sophia’s has been ‘perfect’. Currently, Ramsay is twirling the tables with the remaining dishes, and Jared can hear Jensen’s breathing pick up, like he has a feeling that his dish is going to be next. When the Chef picks up the dome on his next dish to try, Jared’s breathing gets abruptly faster because while it’s not Jensen’s, it is most definitely his own and now he can’t help but truly be nervous.
“Whose dish is this?” Jared takes a deep breath before stepping forward; not missing the way Jensen quietly wishes him good luck. He can feel the lights up ahead hitting him directly and cannot help but wonder if he truly is sweating and everyone can see it or if it’s just his imagination.
“Mine, Chef,” he replies, moving his fingers briefly in order to calm himself down. He can feel the Chef’s eyes regarding him and by god, all Jared wants to do is crouch down behind something and hide until he feels safe, but he denies that want and straightens his back, standing up tall and straight, just as he was always taught to.
“You’re a big boy, aren’t you?” Chef questions and Jared smiles briefly, looking down then back up before nodding his head and replying with the usual ‘Yes, Chef’, feeling like a puppet being pulled tightly by its strings whilst he does so. He can hear a few giggles behind him, and someone barely whispering the tell tale, “I wonder what else he has that’s so big” joke and it just makes him want to roll his eyes at the immaturity of the person that said that.
“And what’s your dish?” Chef questions, completely ignoring the previous comment, even though Jared knows it was heard, as Chef had slightly raised his eyebrow at it. Jared takes a deep breath before looking at the chef head on. He can feel his face reddening as he does so and swallows before replying.
“Shrimp Creole, Chef.” Jared replies, biting his lip and rocking forward on his feet before standing still once more when Ramsay takes a forkful of his dish. He sees the Chef close his eyes and wonders if Ramsay is closing them so he can moan at the taste or closing them so he can hide his distaste. After a few moments of watching the Chef, Jared lets out a deep breath and quickly looks towards Jensen, surprised to see the older man looking at him. He nearly jumps out of his skin in shock before looking back to Ramsay. He nearly double jumps when he sees the Chef watching him - and his interaction with Jensen - before he sees a quirk of the eyebrow and a very slight smile, which, what the fuck?
“I’m not going to lie this is…” Chef begins, and Jared holds his breath in, too nervous to hear everything but anticipating a near excitement over the thoughts of the Chef. He watches as Ramsay licks his lips and quirks his head.
“It’s probably the best dish I’ve had all day.” Ramsay finishes and Jared feels himself let go of the breath he was holding and a relief go through his veins like ice cold water. He lets out one of his megawatt smiles and tilts his head forward before thanking the Chef and stepping back into the line. His heart is beating faster than it was five minutes ago and he doesn’t know if it’s because of the adrenaline or because Jensen is walking forward to the Chef. Jared whispers a good luck back to the other man and sees Jensen grin and only hopes that Jensen’s dish is just as good as Jared’s. Jared watches as Chef eats Jensen’s dish - a nicely smelling Jambalaya. Jared bites his lip and lets out a small grin when Chef says Jensen’s dish is just as good as Jared’s - though he’s still kind of worried about the fact that Jensen seems to be as good as Jared when it comes to cooking and he can definitely see Jensen getting far in the game. Next up is Steve, who’s dish is a good, but not perfect; Genevieve’s dish isn’t nearly as good as it could be as the main was undercooked and the sides overcooked; Katie’s dish ranks on the perfect system, Jim’s dish is thrown away because of raw chicken, and damn does that just suck and Chris’ dish is fine, but a little bland. Jared sighs as he waits for Chris to come back into the lineup, briefly looking up at the ceiling.
After everyone has gotten back into the line and straightened their backs almost like they’re army men, Jared bites his lip and waits for the Chef to begin his talk. He’s watched the show long enough to know that something big is going to happen and he’s waiting excitedly for whatever that is.
“Personally, I’m a little worried.” Ramsay starts, and Jared can’t help but bite his lip some more, a really bad habit that he knows he’s going to have to stop at some point.
“I’m worried, because there are only a few of you that are great chefs - exceptional chefs. The rest of you, I have to ask, how the hell do you expect to get by in this competition?” Ramsay shakes his head and crosses his arms before stepping back and allowing the two boxes on his sides appear.
“You will be separated into two teams, the red and blue teams. Red has Danneel, Katie, Jensen, Jared and Jeff. Blue team includes Jim, Chris, Sandra, Chad, Steve and Sophia.” As he says the team’s names, he ends up throwing them their chef jackets and once Jared catches his, he can’t help but feel euphoric. He has his own chef jacket on Hell’s fucking Kitchen, he’s on a team with a group of people who all had good dishes, some great, and with freaking Jensen! Yes, Jared is definitely feeling euphoric.
“Now off to your rooms! Oh, and before you do, there’s service tonight, so make sure you’re fucking ready! I want a great service tonight!” The group all yells the usual ‘Yes Chef!’ before heading off to their rooms.
***
When the group finally gets to the dorms, everyone is in awe over how gorgeous it truly looks. There are plenty of bedrooms this time around, with two to three beds in each room and three bathrooms attached to a few of those bedrooms. The kitchen is pretty big, but (of course) not nearly as big as the one downstairs and the living area has three couches with four cushions and a patio door that leads to the outside living area. Jared spots his bag on the floor in front of one of the doors and goes to it immediately, zipping the bag open and grabbing what he needs before opening the door to the bedroom and stopping in awe. The bedroom is huge, two beds on the left side of the room, against the wall, where there’s a mirror in front of it. Next to the beds, in the middle of them is a nightstand, which Jared thinks is nice but he really doesn’t have time to notice everything about the room - though the dressers on the opposite side of the beds are nice. He throws his baggage against the bed furthest from the door and closes it, walking towards the patio, but doesn’t go outside just yet. Instead, he walks towards the kitchen and picks up a binder full of recipes that he knows he’s gonna have to memorize fairly quickly if he wants his team to do well tonight. It’s then that he finally makes his way outside and sits down next to Danneel and Katie, smiling at them before taking out a cigarette, lighting it and opening the book on his lap, oomphing at the thump it makes on his knees.
“Can I borrow a light?” That’s Danneel, who’s currently playing with a stray cigarette and Jared nods before handing his box of matches over to the girl and going back to his book. She scrunches up her face before smiling.
“You use matches instead of lighters?” Katie asks, her face full of confusion and Jared smiles slightly before sighing and looking at her from the corner of his eyes.
“Yeah. My hands are too big for lighters so I tend to use matches instead.” Jared replies before turning the page and going onto the next recipe.
“Dude, how’d you get that so quickly?” Danneel questions once more and Jared can’t help but laugh because damn he really wanted to keep this a secret.
“Photographic memory. It’ll help the team but try not to tell anyone else, alright?” Danneel opens her mouth in shock before nodding her head and going back to her book and Katie - well, she just looks at him.
“What?” He laughs.
“Dude, you are such an asset to this team.” She laughs and Jared can’t help but snort and looks up briefly, only to spot Jensen and Jeff coming towards them both. Jared watches as Jeff says something to Jensen, but Jensen only has eyes for Jared. It causes him to look down and blush a little. He hears the women chuckling at him and quickly whispers a ‘shut up’ whilst grinning.
“Hey guys, you studying the menu?” Jensen asks, sitting across from Jared and smiling at him lightly. Jared smiles back before looking down and turning the page. The group stays like that, with Danneel, Katie and him constantly smoking whilst Jeff bums off of them a few times although it's nothing ever serious. Jensen just watches Jared, making him flush from his head to his toes. Jared ignores it though, knows that even with his photographic memory, he still has to look at the recipe in order to memorize it. He bites his lip and reads the next recipe, trying his hardest to ignore the feeling of Jensen’s gaze on him and really craves to have a puff of his cigarette. Unfortunately, Jeff has it, and damn, the guy is just taking it away from him, constantly asking for a bum and Jared feels like just taking it back from Jeff.
Instead, Jared stands up from the couch and says he’ll be back, just has to get something from his duffel and goes inside. He makes his way to his room and realizes Jensen’s hurrying to catch up with him and just slows down a tiny bit so Jensen can reach him. As he opens the door though, he sees the second duffel on the opposite bed and wonders whose it is.
“It’s mine.” Jared turns around to see Jensen smiling at him and he blushes once more before grinning back at the green-eyed man.
“So, there’s something about us-“ Jared starts biting his lip, wanting to laugh because seriously, he’s never felt so connected to anyone so quickly and it scares the hell out of him. He sees Jensen nod and in mutual understanding they sit on the bed together, Jared looking through the recipes again so he can appear busy and not fret too much about it, wondering why he brought the book with him in the first place.
“I --- I’m hesitant to do anything about it but I like you and I want to get to know you.” Jensen says and Jared nods, scratching his thigh, flashes of his past relationship coming back to haunt him. He’s so lost in thought that it takes a couple of minutes for Jared to realize he’s been talked to.
“Want to look through the recipes together?” Jensen whispers and before Jared nods his head he realizes he’ll have to tell Jensen his ability and he snorts at the thought, like it’s some kind of superpower.
“I have a photographic memory, so it might be tough for you to study with me.” Jared replies shyly and Jensen’s eyes crinkle before he lets out a low chuckle, which Jared just wants to listen to forever.
“Is… is it cheesy and corny and absolutely ironic that I feel like I’m going to love that about you?” Jared laughs at that while shaking his head no before opening the binder and looking through the recipes with Jensen, completely ignoring the sounds coming from outside.
***
It’s nearly two hours later, close to seven o’clock to be precise, and the groups are finally making their way down the hallway and into the kitchen for the first time to prep for their first service. On the red team, down come Jeff, Danneel, Jared, Katie and then Jensen and Genevieve, all in their red scrubs and all composed with tightly leashed excitement. On the opposite side is the blue team, with Chris, Sandy, Chad, Sophia and Steve, all quietly rubbing the sleep out of their eyes or furiously looking through whatever pages of the binder they have in front of them. Jared nearly snorts at that, knows they probably hadn’t studied at all and when Jared catches Genevieve doing the same thing, he has to sigh. He knows that Sandy and her have a crush on him and spent nearly all of the past two hours drinking and talking about it, which definitely sucks because it means that Genevieve won’t be ready for tonight and Jared needs everyone to be ready tonight - they need everyone to be ready tonight.
Everyone has lined up in front of the pass by now, waiting for Chef Ramsay’s instructions, some people acting antsy and some people looking completely calm. Jared is on the completely calm side on the surface, but on the inside, he’s completely freaking out, trying his hardest not to have a panic attack before the first service like Aaron did in an earlier season. After a few minutes of waiting, the group watches as Chef Ramsay comes down the steps from his office, anticipation in his step as he does so. When he finally gets down the stairs and stands in front of everyone, it’s almost like a switch has been hit. Despite how tired everyone is, they all stand up straighter and pay more attention to the Chef. Ramsay crosses his arms against his chest and looks at them all with a firm eye.
“I want a perfect service tonight. Don’t fuck up. Now, five minutes until we open, so let’s move!’ At that, everyone rushes into their respective kitchens and starts moving around pots and pans, shouting out the dishes that they are starting to prepare after prepping them. The kitchen becomes a vessel of noise as everyone truly begins shouting out things on Jared’s team. They all make sure that everyone knows about their own stations, makes sure that if anyone needs help, they get their help. Jared is kind of nervous at this time - he’s currently on the appetizers which, everyone knows starts off the kitchen - but he’s on the station with Genevieve, who truly has no idea what she’s doing.
“Alright Genevieve, what you do is when Chef shouts out what the apps are -“
“Jared, don’t worry, I know what to do.”
“Are you sure, because I know you didn’t study any of the recipes and -“
“Jared, please, have faith in me,” Jared sighs before running his hands through his hair and quickly washing them, knowing that he can’t serve food with his hands dirty. He looks over at Genevieve and quickly says something before he loses her attention.
“Genevieve, if you have any problems, you have to tell me immediately, because if you fuck this up, I swear -“
“Jared, I’m fine. If I need any help, I’ll ask, just focus on the god damn dishes, alright?” Jared looks over at the girl and quickly nods his head before getting his food ready, but not yet setting anything in the dishes. When he sees Genevieve about to fire up the food, he quickly shouts her to stop and when he arches his eyebrow and she bites her lip and nods her head, he knows that his message has been received - that would have been a big mistake if I hadn’t stopped you.
Jared feels bad about the thought but knows he has to put it in the back of his head, especially when he sees Chef Ramsay coming up into the kitchen.
“Alright! Great service today, yeah? Don’t mess it up, let’s go.” Ramsay claps his hands leaving, and Jared nods his head before looking at the team and smiling.
After a few minutes of waiting, the Chef reappears in the red kitchen with a ticket, and Jared feels himself straightening up and his hands tightening into them, wanting to move and shake thanks to the adrenalin.
“Alright guys, first ticket yeah? Let’s go.” Chef calls out the first ticket and Jared can feel everyone shouting ‘Yes Chef’ instead of hearing it and god damn that is amazing, right there. As soon as that’s done, Jared immediately starts working on the appetizers, not wanting to fuck anything up. He begins to talk to Danneel about when the dishes should come up to the pass, knowing the Chef wants everything to be together. In his peripheral vision, he can see Genevieve looking a little flushed and goes to help her in the midst of cooking his app. After a few seconds, she’s back on her feet and Jared’s talking to Katie, helping her alongside Jensen doing his part. He can hear the Chef yelling and looks over quickly to the next kitchen and is not shocked to see the Chef yelling at Sandy for making the appetizers horrible. He wants to snort at that but is too focused on his own dish and the team.
“Jared, pass me the pepper!” Danneel yells and Jared does so, making sure the pepper is closed before actually passing it to her. She catches it nicely and puts it in her dish and Jared smiles slightly, before jumping.
“What the fuck are you doing, Cortese?” Jared looks over to see Chef in their kitchen, yelling at Genevieve, and he can’t help but sigh in annoyance. It’s only the first service and he knows he’s going to find this girl extremely annoying until she leaves. Hopefully, long before he does.
“Jared, I need help, here!” Jensen shouts, and Jared rushes over to help the guy. After a few minutes, Jensen is in the clear, smiling at Jared.
“Jared, HELP!” Jared looks over at Genevieve and sighs, seeing her pan full of flames. He really has no idea why she bothers trying to indicate she doesn’t need help when she does. Jared rushes over to help her, and after many minutes of him shouting at the girl, he finally gets the flames under control, and notices the apps are burnt.
“Dammit, Genevieve, the appetizers are burnt!” He shouts, dumping out the pan and starting fresh. He lets the food simmer, watches Danneel as she looks over at him, nodding his head. They make their way to the pass letting Sous Chef Scott know that their food is up, and watches him test it out. It could go either way - Jared’s food could be undercooked or Danneel’s could be overcooked and burnt. They let out a breath of air when Scott tells the waiters to take the dish and go, and damn, that feeling is great, knowing that they’re done with the appetizers and can go on to the entrées. The light is on Jensen and Katie now, and Jared can only hope everything goes well.
“Alright guys, let’s go now, yes yes.” Chef calls the order and Jared hears Jensen and Katie say
'Yes, Chef' before setting everything up. Jared watches as they work in sync, helps them when they ask for it, until he hears the Chef yelling at Sandy again. He looks over at the other kitchen and winces as he sees that Sandy is getting yelled at for burning the appetizers again - which is not good at all, since they’re still in the first ten tables of appetizers.
“Jared, c’mon.” Jared snaps back to attention, nodding and helping Jeff help Jensen with the dish, feeling the heat in the kitchen and absolutely loving it.
***
Chef claps his hands and everyone stands to, sweaty and panting, happy that most of them got through their first service alive. Chef looks at them all, causing a few people to fidget nervously. After a few seconds of it, he stops and crosses his arms in front of him and Jared can’t help but notice how often he does that.
Winning team - there is none. Sure, the red team did well; they got out all of their appetizers and most of their entrées. However, if there wasn’t that raw chicken -“Jared watches as Katie bites her lip and looks down, regret and guilt on her face. He feels bad for his fellow teammate, knows how hard she tries to do well, knows how much she wants to - needs to - do well in this competition and bites his lip before lightly smiling at her in support when she looks back at him.
“-But the blue team could not even get past the appetizers. They were stuck there. STUCK THERE.” Jared nearly laughs as Chef’s voice goes higher in pitch, before looking down and controlling himself, knowing he’s not on his couch at his home, watching the show on his television set.
“Blue team, you are the worse of the worst. Pick two members to put up and come back in one hour to tell me your nominations.” The blue team yells their replies, before turning and going.
“Red team, do better next time.” He says, and the red team leaves while nodding their heads. It’s been a rough service for them all, but at least they’re not on the chopping block for the first time, on the first service. Halfway through the hallway to the dorms, Jared hears something he definitely shouldn’t hear.
“It’s not my fault at all you guys!” Sandy cries and Jared just rolls his eyes.
~***~//~***~
Half an hour later, the two groups make their way to the kitchen, with the blue team in front of the red, each of them with their heads down, a low rumbling coming from them as they talk about their nominations and how they feel about them. Jared looks at each member of their team and wonders what’s going to happen to the team. Jared knows that the group is tense with their nominations, unhappy with things said, if the shouting Jared’s team had heard while they were outside was any indication. However, Jared isn’t exactly paying attention to the other team - instead, he’s in a group discussion with Jeff, Jensen and Katie about what they’re going to do about Genevieve - how they could help her get better, because let’s admit, they need to help her get better. Jared mentions how they'll need her to take her tasks more seriously and everyone nods as they sit down at the table to watch the elimination.
***
A good chunk of time later, Jared stands up from the table and walks behind Jensen as both teams walk back to the dorms. The blue team’s angry with the words that were said during the nominations - not because of what the remaining members said about each other (because they said nothing) but about what Sandy had said about them. Sure, the girl was gone from the competition and sure, they hadn’t known each other that long but Sandy definitely left an impression on the rest of the group with her words - who knew she knew so many mean words? Halfway through the hallway leading to the dorms, Jared can hear the members of the blue team talking about how they can make things better and Jared just blocks it out, not wanting to listen to their game. Instead, he looks over at his own team; Danneel, Katie, Jensen and Jeff, all walking next to him, like a true team, all at the same pace too.
“When we get to the dorms, I think we should study the recipes some more -“ That’s Jeff, with his hands in his pockets and his eyes on Genevieve, who’s walking ahead of them and mumbling how she cannot believe that Sandy is gone -“And, maybe, try to include Cortese in our group. She may be bad, and she may be a black sheep currently but, she needs all the help she can get.” He finishes, and Jared finds himself nodding in agreement. He looks over at the other members, can see that Danneel and Katie are having a conversation with the looks they’re giving each other, and he wonders how long they’ve been together.
“Two years, Jare.” Danneel says and Jared can’t help but scrunch up his eyebrows in confusion before he realizes he asked that question aloud. He smiles at that and looks over at Jeff.
“Jeff, do you wish Jim was on the same team as you?” He asks, wondering about Jeff’s thoughts and especially about his thoughts with his own boyfriend.
“No. I know of his potential, and I know he’s one hell of a competitive guy so…I’d rather just see him without all that between us.” Jeff responds, looking over at Jim and winking.
“But…” Jensen begins, biting his lip -“Wouldn’t he be competitive anyways, because you’re on separate teams?”
“Yes and no. He’ll be competitive with you guys but definitely not me,” He laughs, his head thrown back and his eyes wide with delight, causing Jared to stare in rapture and Jensen to arch an eyebrow and check him out. Jared grins at that before looking over at Jensen and letting his grin turn into a sincere smile.
***
When the teams finally reach the dorms, they all make their way to the patio outside with their cigarettes, some of the contestants changing into something more comfortable. Jared is one of those people, needing to change into his favorite flannel pajamas and hooded sweater before he enters the patio with his own pack of smokes and binder of recipes. He sits between Chad and Genevieve, the only spot available and very far from Jensen, which is the last thing he wanted. He sighs before nudging Chad and smirking when Chad moves around. He nudges him one more time, right in the spot where he knows Chad is ticklish. He nearly laughs out loud when his friend jumps up in shock.
“Dude, enough.” Chad whines and this actually makes Jared laugh loudly, causing everyone to look at them with confusion before they shrug it off and look away.
“So, how are you and Sophia hitting it off?” Jared questions knowing that Chad has a soft spot for the girl and wants to get to know her. When Chad sighs, Jared can’t help but look over at him with his face scrunched up. His eyes widen when he realizes why Chad sighs, realizing that Sophia is making him be her friend first instead of just jumping straight into bed with him like most girls usually do, before he looks at Sophia and smiles.
“Atta girl,” he snorts, causing Chad to glare before smirking at Jared. Chad ends it quickly though when he looks over at Sophia and sighs again, which, woah. Twice in a minute is definitely a record for Chad.
“I want to know her so bad, Jay.” Chad whispers and Jared lets out a soft smile before shaking his head and looking back at the binder. Every few minutes though, he feels Jensen’s eyes on him and will look up and smile slightly when he notices that Jensen’s not looking at him at that moment. Instead, Jared will look at Jensen until Jensen looks at him, thus looking away and therefore, a game commences.
It goes like this for a good ten minutes, both of them smiling after each view, until Jim snorts and rolls his eyes whilst chuckling.
“Alright, I’m going to bed. Jeff, join me?” Jeff laughs at that before smirking and nodding his head.
“Jensen, Jared -“Jim states, returning Jeff’s smirk -“That is how you get past the flirting.” Jared blushes at that, which, what, since when did he blush? He keeps his eyes on his paper, even though he knows everyone is laughing at him. He bites his lip before he gets up and walks away, needing to get away from the laughter before he regresses back to his younger insecure self, not wanting to remember all of the times he was bullied as a young child for the fact that he was gay, liked cooking and living in Texas. As he’s walking up the hall to his own room, he hears Katie rushing up to speak to him.
“Hey man, are you alright?” She questions, putting her hand on his bicep, worry in her gaze as she flexes her fingers.
“I just… I don’t take people laughing at me that well,” he shrugs, running a hand through his hair. She nods in understanding before smiling and nodding her head towards his room and wiggling her eyebrows suggestively.
“Wanna study?” She laughs, breaking the silence and causing Jared to laugh back.
“Yeah, let’s go,” he replies, jumping on his bed and reopening the binder.
***
Jared opens his eyes as he hears the loud thumping of drums, his body jolting upwards in shock. He can hear someone yelling to get their asses up and shortly afterwards, Jared can only assume everyone is jolting up and getting dressed like Jensen and himself are doing. They dress quickly in their baggy clothes that they definitely won’t mind getting dirty because, well, c’mon, its Hell’s kitchen and they’re going to have to go through the garbage at some point. Jared looks up to see Jensen staring at him with his mouth open and Jared laughs.
“I think you have a little drool there, man.” Jared chuckles when he watches Jensen’s eyes go wide and slam his mouth shut.
“Shut up. You’re hot and you know it.”
Jared nods his head before walking towards the door and slapping Jensen’s ass as he does so, making him jump in shock before laughing some more. As Jared makes his way out of the dorms and into the kitchen, he can see a lot of the others joining him, standing as straight as he is, some even straighter. Within five minutes, everyone is down by the kitchens, standing rim rod straight, hands behind their backs - everyone but Genevieve. When Chef comes down and looks at the teams, he arches his eyebrow before he himself just stands there. After five minutes of waiting, Jared begins to feel really awkward and starts moving around. He looks at his team and when he catches their eyes he bites his lip and nods once everyone else nods and sighs before he turns around and runs back to the dorm rooms. He browses the bedrooms, looking for Genevieve, as he’s never really been near her. Once he finally finds her - in the bathroom, primping, he sighs before standing behind her and pulling her away from the mirror.
“Jared, put me the fuck down!” She shouts, kicking him as good as she can, even though he won’t let her go.
“Listen, princess, Chef is downstairs waiting - has been for probably ten minutes now - and we cannot afford for you to be in front of a mirror, trying to get pretty, while we’re all waiting for the challenge, so no - you will not be put the fuck down.” He gasps, finally making his way through the kitchen and dropping her unceremoniously in front of Danneel and Katie before joining the lineup. He sees Chef nod his head and stands a little straighter.
As Ramsay explains the challenge - cleaning and cutting squid properly - he shows them how he does it, and when he’s done explaining, and telling them their challenge - clean and cut the most squid properly- the teams enter into challenge mode.
After twenty minutes of cleaning and cutting squid, Chef calls for them to stop and brings the first person from Jared’s team - Genevieve - so he can count the correct number. When Chef picks up the first squid and calls it perfect, Jared lets out a sigh of relief. When Genevieve gets 8 out of her 10 squid perfect, the team lets out a small clap and cheer in relief. Next up is Jeff, who, out of 13, gets 10, which isn’t that bad. Up next is Jensen, who gets all 15 of his perfect, which, hell yes! Then there’s Katie, who has 10 out of 11 perfect, Jared whose next, gets 12 out of 14 perfect and Danneel, who gets 9 out of 13 perfect. They finish with the winning number of 64, and are now looking on at the blue team, who are looking pretty satisfied with their own plates.
With their team, Chad gets 8 out of 13 perfect, Sophia gets 10 out of 10, Jim gets 10 out of 11, Steve gets 10 out of 11 and Chris gets 13 out of 14, giving them a total of 51 perfect squid, making Jared’s team winners. They end up cheering at that news, some of the girls - alright, all of them - jumping up and down. Jared and Jensen quickly pat each other on the back, smiling at their win, until they quiet down and wait for the chef to tell them their prize.
“Winners will have a nice lunch with me while losers will clean and cut squid, and clean both kitchens in time for service tonight.” Jared watches as everyone in the blue team puts their heads down in disappointment whilst the red team smiles.
~***~//~***~
A near two hours later, Jared and his team are walking towards the steps to Hell’s Kitchen, laughing as they think about the lunch they shared with Gordon Ramsay - about how they should play the game, how they’re doing good as a team so far. The team is on a high, but as they reach the stairs, they all become serious, realizing that there’s a service tonight, and they’re really going to need to do their best. As they walk through the main hallway, Jared notices Chris and Steve talking, their bodies angled towards each other. Jared stops walking and pulls Jensen back, who was in front of him, pointing Jensen towards the sight that he sees. Jensen looks at him with confusion before turning to the other two and smiling softly.
“Look at them Jen, they look so happy with one another,” Jared laughs, walking towards Chris and Steve and smiling at them when they notice Jensen and him.
“Hey man, how was the reward?” Steve asks, kicking his feet back and forth in boredom.
“It was pretty nice, with good food and great company.” Jensen laughs, knowing that Steve will love the irony of that comment. When Steve does laugh, Jared notices that Chris is staring at Steve in awe and Jared just smirks.
“So, you guys uh, how are y’all?” Jared asks, shuffling his feet and looking down before smiling at the two of them and arching his eyebrow. When the duo just laughs, Jared relaxes a bit before grinning and shakes his head.
“So you guys hooked up, then?” Jensen asks with laughter in his voice.
“Well, we kind of knew each other from before - a quickie in the airport after drinking our nerves away.” Chris smirks, looking at Steve with something indescribable in his eyes. Jared feels a little awkward at the moment and shuffles his feet again before saying bye and getting ready for the service, not wanting to intrude on such a private moment between the two guys.
***
Both teams are in the kitchen prepping, Jared’s team on prepping the desserts, and Chris’ team on prepping the entrées. The kitchens are both busy, people running around, shouting out things that are important for the prep. Jared is standing against the pass, talking to Chris about how Chris’ team might need an ingredient from them, and how they could pass said ingredient between the two teams without getting any competitive streak between them. It is within this conversation that the Chef comes out and walks towards the two, a stride in his step, a look on his face that makes the two of them gulp.
“Chris, can I see you upstairs in my office?”Chef says when he gets to the two of them. Jared watches as Chris nods his head slowly, and follows Ramsay to his office, not without looking back towards Jared with his eyes wide with fear. Jared thinks he knows what Chris is thinking and only hopes that it isn’t what Chris believes it to be.
***
“Alright guys, restaurant opens in five minutes, let’s go, let’s go.” Chef says, clapping his hands. Jared looks around for Chris and sees his eyes still wide and open, a thin layer of sweat on his forehead. Jared rushes over to the end of the pass, watching as Chris comes over too.
“What’s the matter, man?” Jared asks, crossing his arms over his chest and scrunching up his face.
“My dad died. Chef gave me the option of leaving so I could be with my family.”
“Shit man, I’m so sorry.” Jared says, feeling the grief of a lost one on his mind, knowing what Chris is going through and knowing that his dad dying while Chris was away was the one thing Chris didn’t want to happen.
“What are you going to do?” Jared asks, knowing that Chris is in a tough spot, that he’ll have to pick his family but will definitely regret leaving the competition.
“Leave. I’ve gotta tell my team, though.” Chris replies while looking at Steve with sadness in his eyes before looking at Jared once more and sighing.
“I’m sorry,” Jared says again, patting Chris on the back sympathetically and walking away towards Jensen, with his shoulders dropping and his lip being bitten unmercifully.
“Is he alright?” Jensen asks, looking on at Chris with worry in his eyes. Jared shakes his head no, before quickly mumbling the situation to his friend while they finish their prep and get ready for the opening of the restaurant. The two of them watch as Chris tells his team what’s going on, watches as their faces fall and they hug Chris goodbye, Steve holding on a little longer than customary.
When Ramsay finally comes down from his office again, he says goodbye to Chris as well and they all watch as the older man leaves, staring at the doors of Hell’s Kitchen until Chef claps his hands one more time and tells Jean-Phillipe to open the restaurant.
***
The kitchen is hot and people on both sides are bustling about. The blue team is yelling at each other while not watching their food as it burns or doesn’t even get cooked, which just causes Chef Ramsay to shake his head in disappointment. Jared can’t help but feel bad for the blue team, especially when they bring up raw chicken. That just causes Chef to yell even louder, which subsequently causes everyone on the red team to grimace, without stopping the food they were cooking.
“Jeff, watch the time on that!” Jared yells across the kitchen, looking back onto his own food when he sees Jeff nod his acknowledgement. He can also see Genevieve flailing about with the food she’s cooking, but she’s not exactly his problem this time, thank god for that, but he does feel sorry for Katie, who is on the same area as Genevieve.
“Jared, the appetizers, how long?” Jensen yells, his head turning back quickly whilst watching his food steadily, making sure his entrées don’t burn.
“2 minutes, Jen!” Jared yells, swishing his pan from side to side to make sure everything gets cooked evenly. Jensen nods his head, before he yells he’s going to the pass after the minute and a half goes by. Jared finds himself walking up just as soon as Jensen, and when Sous Chef Scott sends it out, Jared’s thankful as always.
Jared looks over when he hears Sous Chef Heather yelling at the other team, which just causes Jared and the others of his team to grimace even more so than before.
The rest of the night goes this way, with both teams being yelled at, but the blue team more than the red team. Whether it’s by themselves, by the Sous chefs, or by Chef Ramsay himself, the blue team has gotten the brunt of the yelling and Jared can tell it’s bringing the team down. With Chris gone, one of their better chefs, and no one there to coordinate the team, even though Steve is definitely trying to lead, and everyone getting yelled at and floundering around with their heads chopped off like chickens, it looks pretty hopeless for them.
***
After three hours, the two teams are lined up in their respective kitchens, their backs straight even though some of the people are shuffling their feet nervously. Jared’s biting his lips, watches as the Chef paces back and forth.
“Red team, you’re the best of the worst right now.” Thinking to himself, Jared can see how his team is the best of the worst. They tend to move and move and move some more, sometimes without thinking about anything else. Jared knows that this can create problems in the kitchen, especially when the communication is gone, and it appears that Chef can see that too. His team lets out a small sigh of relief at hearing that before they get back to a calmness that the Chef accepts. Everyone is completely quiet on both sides, waiting for Ramsay to finish his thought and tell the blue team what’s going to happen to them. When Chef looks at the blue team, Jared can see the steeliness in his eyes and tries to suppress a shiver that runs through his body.
“Blue team, while you may be the losers of tonight, you have already lost a member. Go upstairs, think of ways to become a better team, and I’ll see you all at the challenge tomorrow.” Chef says before watching as the teams walk away to the dorms.
Jared can feel the heat of Chef’s gaze on him and does everything he can not to turn back and look him in the eyes. Once he’s past the kitchens, only then does he stop and lean against the wall, and close his eyes while sighing.
“Hey, are you alright?” Jared opens his eyes to see Jeff in front of him, a look of worry on his features and Jared does his best to nod his head, unsure of why he’s feeling woozy.
“Are you sure, Jared? You’re looking kind of pale.” That’s Danneel, who’s suddenly standing in front of him with her right hand on his left arm, and when Jared realizes that he can’t really see straight anymore, he shakes his head as a no, he’s not alright. Pretty soon, he realizes that most of his team is in front of him, plus most of the others from the other team, and Jared can feel his eyes going wide.
“I--- shit, I… I just need---“Jared tries to breathe out, until he realizes that everything has gone black.
Next Chapter
Author: jamie_love13
Beta-Edited: Franziska.
Pairings/Characters: Oh. Dear. God. Uhm. Okay. Jared/Jensen. Jeff/Jim. Steve/Chris. Chad/Sophia. Katie/Danneel. A brief past mention of Jared/Chris Evans (Imagine the hotness!). Gordon Ramsay. Scott Liebfried. Heather West. Jean-Phillipe Susilovic.
Word Count: 44, 469 Words in 5 Parts.
Rating: NC-17/R
Summary: Jared never thought he'd be in Hell's Kitchen, but as he goes through the challenges, he also never thought he'd fall for someone like Jensen. However, he has a game to win, and he has to put his feelings on the back-burner. He just hopes he can actually do it.
Disclaimer: Definitely don't own. And I definitely do not believe any of this is true. It's all fake. All of it. Well, except for Heather West winning season two, and other mentions of past seasons of Hell's Kitchen.
Warnings: None? Well, no. Cock-blocking and extreme waiting for the 'big' finale. More of a look of the guys in the kitchen, and not there relationship, but I tried. ;)
Notes: This thing was a fucking monster!!! It was my baby though. Go check out my acknowledgements/more notes page for more things. :)
If you had asked Jared a month ago if he saw himself here, he would’ve laughed hysterically. Not because Jared is crazy (he isn't) but because Jared wasn't able to see himself here, in a limo with eleven other people, talking about how excited they all were to get started was not something Jared could see himself doing, at all. Hell, he only applied because of a joke by Chad, who had also managed to get in and is currently flirting with some girl named Sophia. Next to Chad is some guy with long brown hair, faded blue jeans and cowboy boots, which Jared tries his hardest not to snort at. Next to that guy is another girl, with brownish-black hair and a petite face who keeps looking at him. Next to the girl is another girl, this time with brown hair and just as small as he is tall, who also keeps looking at him. Then there were two guys, both older looking, talking to one another like they’ve been best friends for years, and Jared feels a small ache in his heart, wondering why he can't have something like that in his life. He’s not saying Chad and him are close, cause they are, but well - Jared doesn’t have that; that one feeling of a friendship that makes you good. One of the older guys has a salt and pepper beard while the other is wearing a trucker hat. Beside them sits another cowboy-looking dude, quiet except for the tune he hums out, all the while looking at the other guy with the cowboy boots and attitude. Another girl, this one with red hair, sits next to him, talking to the girl next to her, who has blond hair. Next to those two girls, and ending up next to him on his left side, is a guy with blondish-brown, somewhat spiked hair and from what Jared can tell, green eyes that he would love to get lost in. So yes, Jared would laugh hysterically at you if you said this was where he’d be today. Then again, he’s always loved the show, the host and the high-pressured tasks the contestants were always given. And if anything, Jared loves food, so he supposed that since he loves it so much - eating and cooking it - it makes sense that he is here anyways.
“So, what are your names?” That comes from the blond sitting next to the redhead, the two of them looking him up and down.
“Jared, and you are...?” He looks back at them, arches his eyebrows and smiles as he does so before shaking his head as an encouragement for them to continue the thought.
“I’m Danneel, and this lovely blond is Katie,” Katie nods her head in acknowledgement before letting out a small smile.
“I’m Jensen,” Jared looks next to him and sees the green eyed guy biting his lips, looking down at his feet. He has a faint blush on his cheeks that Jared can’t help but find attractive.
“Hi,” he breathes, Jensen’s blush deepening while he smiles at Jared.
Quite suddenly, all Jared can hear is Chad. “Aw hell Jared, don’t tell me you’ve already got a crush!”
Jared looks down, a blush coloring his cheeks as everyone looks at him.)
“Chad! Man, can’t you just shut up?” He groans, not looking up.
“Hey, it’s cool. You’re not the only gay guy here.” Jared looks up to see the cowboy booted guy grinning and Jared can’t help but laugh, relieved.
“I’m Chris, by the way.” He continues and Jared’s about to reply when someone else speaks.
“I’m Steve. Also out and proud,” Steve finishes, grinning at Chris who only grins back.
“Jeff here, dating Jim there,” Jared looks over at the two men, one with the salt and pepper beard and the other with a trucker hat and Jared lets out a small smile, wonders how long they’ve been together.
“Jensen: also gay - very gay -“ Jared looks back at Jensen quickly and grins when he sees Jensen grinning at him while playing with a ring on his finger.
“Awh man,” Jared looks up at Chad’s outburst and shakes his head.
“Don’t tell me I’m the only straight guy here!” Chad jokes, causing everyone to laugh and Jared feels a calm settle into him that wasn’t there earlier and isn't going to stay there for long but either way, Jared’s glad he’s in the limo, anyways.
***
As the limo rolls to a stop, Jared can feel the nerves coming back full force at him and he gets out of the limo slowly. When he’s finally outside, he takes a look around, just like everyone else is and can feel his breath being taken away. The building is somewhat large, stairs leading up to it with a red carpet placed in the middle. There are fountains around the landing, turned off at the moment but still completely beautiful. Even with the fountains turned off, everyone can imagine what it’s like with them turned on and Jared knows that it would look amazing. Jared can hear everyone around him gossiping about the building but Jared ignores the buzzing and makes his way to the steps slowly, letting the feeling of excitement overcome his main thought. When Jared reaches the doors and opens them, he can feel his heart nearly stopping completely at the sight before him. Everything is dark, plush red and the lights set a glow in the hall, causing everything to shine. Jared can see the kitchen from where he’s standing and he can tell instantly that all of the appliances are state of the art.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” Jared looks over at Jensen, who has followed him into the dining room and is looking as awed as Jared feels.
“Yeah, it is. But I didn’t come here for the beauty.” Jared replies, looking over his shoulder at Jensen, to see Jensen’s eyes snap to his. He can tell instantly that Jensen is trying to see through him, but to no avail. He sees Jensen opening his mouth to speak but before he can get the words out, he hears someone come up behind him and he tenses. He watches as Jensen turns around and scrunches up his face and all he can think about his how adorable the man looks.
“Hi Jared,” he hears someone purr and when he turns around, he isn’t surprised to see the two girls that were eyeing him up in the limo earlier. He smiles tightly, before saying a quick hello, praying the girls leave him alone, and soon. He can see that the girls are about to say something when he hears Jensen speak before them, quickly interrupting them.
“Hey man, I think Chris and Steve wanted to speak with us,” Jared feels a sigh of relief escape his mouth and he gives another tight smile to the girls before walking away from the kitchens quickly, pulling Jensen along with him to the stairs outside.
“Thanks so much,” Jensen laughs and god, Jared could listen to Jensen’s laugh forever. He’s about to reply when he hears a shriek coming from right above the stairs, where he and Jensen just left from. Jensen and he turn around only to spot the main man himself, standing up on the stairs, his arms crossed, feet shoulder length apart. His eyes go wide at the sight but at the same time, he wants to roll them at the shriek.
“Well, what are you waiting for? Make me your fucking signature dishes you dimwitted fools!”
~***~//~***~
Jared’s mind is completely immersed in the cooking of his dish, not paying any attention to anything other than the food and the times being yelled out. He bumps into different people a few times, but ignores the feeling of the other ones around him and continues working. He can feel the stress of the others around him, but continues to ignore it and instead, feels a pressure in his stomach that he always gets when he’s forgetting something. He’s looking around the kitchen and biting his lip when he tries to remember what he has forgotten. He runs quickly to the refrigerator, and after looking for what feels like forever for his ingredient, he finally finds it and runs out with it, adding it into his dish. When he looks up, he nearly jumps out of his skin when he realizes that none other than Chef fucking Ramsay is staring at him. He takes a deep breath and continues with his dish, listening as Ramsay shouts out the last minute. It’s down to the plating now and Jared can see Jensen in the corner of his eye, plating a dish that looks absolutely scrumptious. Jared smiles and shakes his head before bringing his plate to the pass and covering it. Jensen steps up next to him and sighs, tension all over his body, from his shoulders to his knees.
Jared looks over at Jensen and lets his eyes go up and down Jensen’s length, and he can’t help but bite his lip and wonder just how well of a chef Jensen is compared to him. Just looking back at Jensen while he had cooked his plate makes Jared’s mouth water, upon remembering the foods he’d seen. He won’t lie, Jensen’s attractive, and he knows that Jensen feels the same with Jared’s looks but it’s not about the looks - well, not always - it’s about the personality and how comfortable Jared feels with the other person. Jared hasn’t even really talked to Jensen and he can’t help but feel a strong connection between the two of them and that scares the hell out of him. He blinks when he hears people shuffling and when his mind finally enters the picture, he’s realized that everyone has lined up and all of the food has been moved to two round tables and that Ramsay is in the center of, looking at them. Which just brings Jared to another thing - how scary Gordon fucking Ramsay looks up close and in person. He’s standing tall, his arms crossed in front of him once more and Jared can’t help but take in a deep gulp, its noise resonating towards Jensen, who just smirks. He nudges the other man and glares before smiling and looking back at Ramsay, watching as he looks them all up and down, taking them in and judging them. Jared wonders what the chef is thinking, unsure if he truly wants to know. When the chef’s gaze passes by Jared and Jensen, Jared tries his hardest not to look away from Ramsay’s piercing gaze. It’s hard, Jared knows this, but he pulls it off and narrows his eyes as he does so, looks on as Chef raises an eyebrow before continuing onwards. As he does so, Jared lets out a deep breath that he didn’t know he was holding in and smirks at Jensen, his body tense and thrumming with built-up energy, his heart pounding too fast.
***
Five dishes have already been tried - Jeff’s, Danneel’s, Sandy’s, Chad’s and Sophia’s. Out of those five, Jeff and Danneel’s dishes have been good but not great, Sandy and Chad’s have been horrible enough that Chef vomited Sandy’s up and threw Chad’s out - which Jared just hates for Chad, because he knows the guy is a great chef - and Sophia’s has been ‘perfect’. Currently, Ramsay is twirling the tables with the remaining dishes, and Jared can hear Jensen’s breathing pick up, like he has a feeling that his dish is going to be next. When the Chef picks up the dome on his next dish to try, Jared’s breathing gets abruptly faster because while it’s not Jensen’s, it is most definitely his own and now he can’t help but truly be nervous.
“Whose dish is this?” Jared takes a deep breath before stepping forward; not missing the way Jensen quietly wishes him good luck. He can feel the lights up ahead hitting him directly and cannot help but wonder if he truly is sweating and everyone can see it or if it’s just his imagination.
“Mine, Chef,” he replies, moving his fingers briefly in order to calm himself down. He can feel the Chef’s eyes regarding him and by god, all Jared wants to do is crouch down behind something and hide until he feels safe, but he denies that want and straightens his back, standing up tall and straight, just as he was always taught to.
“You’re a big boy, aren’t you?” Chef questions and Jared smiles briefly, looking down then back up before nodding his head and replying with the usual ‘Yes, Chef’, feeling like a puppet being pulled tightly by its strings whilst he does so. He can hear a few giggles behind him, and someone barely whispering the tell tale, “I wonder what else he has that’s so big” joke and it just makes him want to roll his eyes at the immaturity of the person that said that.
“And what’s your dish?” Chef questions, completely ignoring the previous comment, even though Jared knows it was heard, as Chef had slightly raised his eyebrow at it. Jared takes a deep breath before looking at the chef head on. He can feel his face reddening as he does so and swallows before replying.
“Shrimp Creole, Chef.” Jared replies, biting his lip and rocking forward on his feet before standing still once more when Ramsay takes a forkful of his dish. He sees the Chef close his eyes and wonders if Ramsay is closing them so he can moan at the taste or closing them so he can hide his distaste. After a few moments of watching the Chef, Jared lets out a deep breath and quickly looks towards Jensen, surprised to see the older man looking at him. He nearly jumps out of his skin in shock before looking back to Ramsay. He nearly double jumps when he sees the Chef watching him - and his interaction with Jensen - before he sees a quirk of the eyebrow and a very slight smile, which, what the fuck?
“I’m not going to lie this is…” Chef begins, and Jared holds his breath in, too nervous to hear everything but anticipating a near excitement over the thoughts of the Chef. He watches as Ramsay licks his lips and quirks his head.
“It’s probably the best dish I’ve had all day.” Ramsay finishes and Jared feels himself let go of the breath he was holding and a relief go through his veins like ice cold water. He lets out one of his megawatt smiles and tilts his head forward before thanking the Chef and stepping back into the line. His heart is beating faster than it was five minutes ago and he doesn’t know if it’s because of the adrenaline or because Jensen is walking forward to the Chef. Jared whispers a good luck back to the other man and sees Jensen grin and only hopes that Jensen’s dish is just as good as Jared’s. Jared watches as Chef eats Jensen’s dish - a nicely smelling Jambalaya. Jared bites his lip and lets out a small grin when Chef says Jensen’s dish is just as good as Jared’s - though he’s still kind of worried about the fact that Jensen seems to be as good as Jared when it comes to cooking and he can definitely see Jensen getting far in the game. Next up is Steve, who’s dish is a good, but not perfect; Genevieve’s dish isn’t nearly as good as it could be as the main was undercooked and the sides overcooked; Katie’s dish ranks on the perfect system, Jim’s dish is thrown away because of raw chicken, and damn does that just suck and Chris’ dish is fine, but a little bland. Jared sighs as he waits for Chris to come back into the lineup, briefly looking up at the ceiling.
After everyone has gotten back into the line and straightened their backs almost like they’re army men, Jared bites his lip and waits for the Chef to begin his talk. He’s watched the show long enough to know that something big is going to happen and he’s waiting excitedly for whatever that is.
“Personally, I’m a little worried.” Ramsay starts, and Jared can’t help but bite his lip some more, a really bad habit that he knows he’s going to have to stop at some point.
“I’m worried, because there are only a few of you that are great chefs - exceptional chefs. The rest of you, I have to ask, how the hell do you expect to get by in this competition?” Ramsay shakes his head and crosses his arms before stepping back and allowing the two boxes on his sides appear.
“You will be separated into two teams, the red and blue teams. Red has Danneel, Katie, Jensen, Jared and Jeff. Blue team includes Jim, Chris, Sandra, Chad, Steve and Sophia.” As he says the team’s names, he ends up throwing them their chef jackets and once Jared catches his, he can’t help but feel euphoric. He has his own chef jacket on Hell’s fucking Kitchen, he’s on a team with a group of people who all had good dishes, some great, and with freaking Jensen! Yes, Jared is definitely feeling euphoric.
“Now off to your rooms! Oh, and before you do, there’s service tonight, so make sure you’re fucking ready! I want a great service tonight!” The group all yells the usual ‘Yes Chef!’ before heading off to their rooms.
***
When the group finally gets to the dorms, everyone is in awe over how gorgeous it truly looks. There are plenty of bedrooms this time around, with two to three beds in each room and three bathrooms attached to a few of those bedrooms. The kitchen is pretty big, but (of course) not nearly as big as the one downstairs and the living area has three couches with four cushions and a patio door that leads to the outside living area. Jared spots his bag on the floor in front of one of the doors and goes to it immediately, zipping the bag open and grabbing what he needs before opening the door to the bedroom and stopping in awe. The bedroom is huge, two beds on the left side of the room, against the wall, where there’s a mirror in front of it. Next to the beds, in the middle of them is a nightstand, which Jared thinks is nice but he really doesn’t have time to notice everything about the room - though the dressers on the opposite side of the beds are nice. He throws his baggage against the bed furthest from the door and closes it, walking towards the patio, but doesn’t go outside just yet. Instead, he walks towards the kitchen and picks up a binder full of recipes that he knows he’s gonna have to memorize fairly quickly if he wants his team to do well tonight. It’s then that he finally makes his way outside and sits down next to Danneel and Katie, smiling at them before taking out a cigarette, lighting it and opening the book on his lap, oomphing at the thump it makes on his knees.
“Can I borrow a light?” That’s Danneel, who’s currently playing with a stray cigarette and Jared nods before handing his box of matches over to the girl and going back to his book. She scrunches up her face before smiling.
“You use matches instead of lighters?” Katie asks, her face full of confusion and Jared smiles slightly before sighing and looking at her from the corner of his eyes.
“Yeah. My hands are too big for lighters so I tend to use matches instead.” Jared replies before turning the page and going onto the next recipe.
“Dude, how’d you get that so quickly?” Danneel questions once more and Jared can’t help but laugh because damn he really wanted to keep this a secret.
“Photographic memory. It’ll help the team but try not to tell anyone else, alright?” Danneel opens her mouth in shock before nodding her head and going back to her book and Katie - well, she just looks at him.
“What?” He laughs.
“Dude, you are such an asset to this team.” She laughs and Jared can’t help but snort and looks up briefly, only to spot Jensen and Jeff coming towards them both. Jared watches as Jeff says something to Jensen, but Jensen only has eyes for Jared. It causes him to look down and blush a little. He hears the women chuckling at him and quickly whispers a ‘shut up’ whilst grinning.
“Hey guys, you studying the menu?” Jensen asks, sitting across from Jared and smiling at him lightly. Jared smiles back before looking down and turning the page. The group stays like that, with Danneel, Katie and him constantly smoking whilst Jeff bums off of them a few times although it's nothing ever serious. Jensen just watches Jared, making him flush from his head to his toes. Jared ignores it though, knows that even with his photographic memory, he still has to look at the recipe in order to memorize it. He bites his lip and reads the next recipe, trying his hardest to ignore the feeling of Jensen’s gaze on him and really craves to have a puff of his cigarette. Unfortunately, Jeff has it, and damn, the guy is just taking it away from him, constantly asking for a bum and Jared feels like just taking it back from Jeff.
Instead, Jared stands up from the couch and says he’ll be back, just has to get something from his duffel and goes inside. He makes his way to his room and realizes Jensen’s hurrying to catch up with him and just slows down a tiny bit so Jensen can reach him. As he opens the door though, he sees the second duffel on the opposite bed and wonders whose it is.
“It’s mine.” Jared turns around to see Jensen smiling at him and he blushes once more before grinning back at the green-eyed man.
“So, there’s something about us-“ Jared starts biting his lip, wanting to laugh because seriously, he’s never felt so connected to anyone so quickly and it scares the hell out of him. He sees Jensen nod and in mutual understanding they sit on the bed together, Jared looking through the recipes again so he can appear busy and not fret too much about it, wondering why he brought the book with him in the first place.
“I --- I’m hesitant to do anything about it but I like you and I want to get to know you.” Jensen says and Jared nods, scratching his thigh, flashes of his past relationship coming back to haunt him. He’s so lost in thought that it takes a couple of minutes for Jared to realize he’s been talked to.
“Want to look through the recipes together?” Jensen whispers and before Jared nods his head he realizes he’ll have to tell Jensen his ability and he snorts at the thought, like it’s some kind of superpower.
“I have a photographic memory, so it might be tough for you to study with me.” Jared replies shyly and Jensen’s eyes crinkle before he lets out a low chuckle, which Jared just wants to listen to forever.
“Is… is it cheesy and corny and absolutely ironic that I feel like I’m going to love that about you?” Jared laughs at that while shaking his head no before opening the binder and looking through the recipes with Jensen, completely ignoring the sounds coming from outside.
***
It’s nearly two hours later, close to seven o’clock to be precise, and the groups are finally making their way down the hallway and into the kitchen for the first time to prep for their first service. On the red team, down come Jeff, Danneel, Jared, Katie and then Jensen and Genevieve, all in their red scrubs and all composed with tightly leashed excitement. On the opposite side is the blue team, with Chris, Sandy, Chad, Sophia and Steve, all quietly rubbing the sleep out of their eyes or furiously looking through whatever pages of the binder they have in front of them. Jared nearly snorts at that, knows they probably hadn’t studied at all and when Jared catches Genevieve doing the same thing, he has to sigh. He knows that Sandy and her have a crush on him and spent nearly all of the past two hours drinking and talking about it, which definitely sucks because it means that Genevieve won’t be ready for tonight and Jared needs everyone to be ready tonight - they need everyone to be ready tonight.
Everyone has lined up in front of the pass by now, waiting for Chef Ramsay’s instructions, some people acting antsy and some people looking completely calm. Jared is on the completely calm side on the surface, but on the inside, he’s completely freaking out, trying his hardest not to have a panic attack before the first service like Aaron did in an earlier season. After a few minutes of waiting, the group watches as Chef Ramsay comes down the steps from his office, anticipation in his step as he does so. When he finally gets down the stairs and stands in front of everyone, it’s almost like a switch has been hit. Despite how tired everyone is, they all stand up straighter and pay more attention to the Chef. Ramsay crosses his arms against his chest and looks at them all with a firm eye.
“I want a perfect service tonight. Don’t fuck up. Now, five minutes until we open, so let’s move!’ At that, everyone rushes into their respective kitchens and starts moving around pots and pans, shouting out the dishes that they are starting to prepare after prepping them. The kitchen becomes a vessel of noise as everyone truly begins shouting out things on Jared’s team. They all make sure that everyone knows about their own stations, makes sure that if anyone needs help, they get their help. Jared is kind of nervous at this time - he’s currently on the appetizers which, everyone knows starts off the kitchen - but he’s on the station with Genevieve, who truly has no idea what she’s doing.
“Alright Genevieve, what you do is when Chef shouts out what the apps are -“
“Jared, don’t worry, I know what to do.”
“Are you sure, because I know you didn’t study any of the recipes and -“
“Jared, please, have faith in me,” Jared sighs before running his hands through his hair and quickly washing them, knowing that he can’t serve food with his hands dirty. He looks over at Genevieve and quickly says something before he loses her attention.
“Genevieve, if you have any problems, you have to tell me immediately, because if you fuck this up, I swear -“
“Jared, I’m fine. If I need any help, I’ll ask, just focus on the god damn dishes, alright?” Jared looks over at the girl and quickly nods his head before getting his food ready, but not yet setting anything in the dishes. When he sees Genevieve about to fire up the food, he quickly shouts her to stop and when he arches his eyebrow and she bites her lip and nods her head, he knows that his message has been received - that would have been a big mistake if I hadn’t stopped you.
Jared feels bad about the thought but knows he has to put it in the back of his head, especially when he sees Chef Ramsay coming up into the kitchen.
“Alright! Great service today, yeah? Don’t mess it up, let’s go.” Ramsay claps his hands leaving, and Jared nods his head before looking at the team and smiling.
After a few minutes of waiting, the Chef reappears in the red kitchen with a ticket, and Jared feels himself straightening up and his hands tightening into them, wanting to move and shake thanks to the adrenalin.
“Alright guys, first ticket yeah? Let’s go.” Chef calls out the first ticket and Jared can feel everyone shouting ‘Yes Chef’ instead of hearing it and god damn that is amazing, right there. As soon as that’s done, Jared immediately starts working on the appetizers, not wanting to fuck anything up. He begins to talk to Danneel about when the dishes should come up to the pass, knowing the Chef wants everything to be together. In his peripheral vision, he can see Genevieve looking a little flushed and goes to help her in the midst of cooking his app. After a few seconds, she’s back on her feet and Jared’s talking to Katie, helping her alongside Jensen doing his part. He can hear the Chef yelling and looks over quickly to the next kitchen and is not shocked to see the Chef yelling at Sandy for making the appetizers horrible. He wants to snort at that but is too focused on his own dish and the team.
“Jared, pass me the pepper!” Danneel yells and Jared does so, making sure the pepper is closed before actually passing it to her. She catches it nicely and puts it in her dish and Jared smiles slightly, before jumping.
“What the fuck are you doing, Cortese?” Jared looks over to see Chef in their kitchen, yelling at Genevieve, and he can’t help but sigh in annoyance. It’s only the first service and he knows he’s going to find this girl extremely annoying until she leaves. Hopefully, long before he does.
“Jared, I need help, here!” Jensen shouts, and Jared rushes over to help the guy. After a few minutes, Jensen is in the clear, smiling at Jared.
“Jared, HELP!” Jared looks over at Genevieve and sighs, seeing her pan full of flames. He really has no idea why she bothers trying to indicate she doesn’t need help when she does. Jared rushes over to help her, and after many minutes of him shouting at the girl, he finally gets the flames under control, and notices the apps are burnt.
“Dammit, Genevieve, the appetizers are burnt!” He shouts, dumping out the pan and starting fresh. He lets the food simmer, watches Danneel as she looks over at him, nodding his head. They make their way to the pass letting Sous Chef Scott know that their food is up, and watches him test it out. It could go either way - Jared’s food could be undercooked or Danneel’s could be overcooked and burnt. They let out a breath of air when Scott tells the waiters to take the dish and go, and damn, that feeling is great, knowing that they’re done with the appetizers and can go on to the entrées. The light is on Jensen and Katie now, and Jared can only hope everything goes well.
“Alright guys, let’s go now, yes yes.” Chef calls the order and Jared hears Jensen and Katie say
'Yes, Chef' before setting everything up. Jared watches as they work in sync, helps them when they ask for it, until he hears the Chef yelling at Sandy again. He looks over at the other kitchen and winces as he sees that Sandy is getting yelled at for burning the appetizers again - which is not good at all, since they’re still in the first ten tables of appetizers.
“Jared, c’mon.” Jared snaps back to attention, nodding and helping Jeff help Jensen with the dish, feeling the heat in the kitchen and absolutely loving it.
***
Chef claps his hands and everyone stands to, sweaty and panting, happy that most of them got through their first service alive. Chef looks at them all, causing a few people to fidget nervously. After a few seconds of it, he stops and crosses his arms in front of him and Jared can’t help but notice how often he does that.
Winning team - there is none. Sure, the red team did well; they got out all of their appetizers and most of their entrées. However, if there wasn’t that raw chicken -“Jared watches as Katie bites her lip and looks down, regret and guilt on her face. He feels bad for his fellow teammate, knows how hard she tries to do well, knows how much she wants to - needs to - do well in this competition and bites his lip before lightly smiling at her in support when she looks back at him.
“-But the blue team could not even get past the appetizers. They were stuck there. STUCK THERE.” Jared nearly laughs as Chef’s voice goes higher in pitch, before looking down and controlling himself, knowing he’s not on his couch at his home, watching the show on his television set.
“Blue team, you are the worse of the worst. Pick two members to put up and come back in one hour to tell me your nominations.” The blue team yells their replies, before turning and going.
“Red team, do better next time.” He says, and the red team leaves while nodding their heads. It’s been a rough service for them all, but at least they’re not on the chopping block for the first time, on the first service. Halfway through the hallway to the dorms, Jared hears something he definitely shouldn’t hear.
“It’s not my fault at all you guys!” Sandy cries and Jared just rolls his eyes.
~***~//~***~
Half an hour later, the two groups make their way to the kitchen, with the blue team in front of the red, each of them with their heads down, a low rumbling coming from them as they talk about their nominations and how they feel about them. Jared looks at each member of their team and wonders what’s going to happen to the team. Jared knows that the group is tense with their nominations, unhappy with things said, if the shouting Jared’s team had heard while they were outside was any indication. However, Jared isn’t exactly paying attention to the other team - instead, he’s in a group discussion with Jeff, Jensen and Katie about what they’re going to do about Genevieve - how they could help her get better, because let’s admit, they need to help her get better. Jared mentions how they'll need her to take her tasks more seriously and everyone nods as they sit down at the table to watch the elimination.
***
A good chunk of time later, Jared stands up from the table and walks behind Jensen as both teams walk back to the dorms. The blue team’s angry with the words that were said during the nominations - not because of what the remaining members said about each other (because they said nothing) but about what Sandy had said about them. Sure, the girl was gone from the competition and sure, they hadn’t known each other that long but Sandy definitely left an impression on the rest of the group with her words - who knew she knew so many mean words? Halfway through the hallway leading to the dorms, Jared can hear the members of the blue team talking about how they can make things better and Jared just blocks it out, not wanting to listen to their game. Instead, he looks over at his own team; Danneel, Katie, Jensen and Jeff, all walking next to him, like a true team, all at the same pace too.
“When we get to the dorms, I think we should study the recipes some more -“ That’s Jeff, with his hands in his pockets and his eyes on Genevieve, who’s walking ahead of them and mumbling how she cannot believe that Sandy is gone -“And, maybe, try to include Cortese in our group. She may be bad, and she may be a black sheep currently but, she needs all the help she can get.” He finishes, and Jared finds himself nodding in agreement. He looks over at the other members, can see that Danneel and Katie are having a conversation with the looks they’re giving each other, and he wonders how long they’ve been together.
“Two years, Jare.” Danneel says and Jared can’t help but scrunch up his eyebrows in confusion before he realizes he asked that question aloud. He smiles at that and looks over at Jeff.
“Jeff, do you wish Jim was on the same team as you?” He asks, wondering about Jeff’s thoughts and especially about his thoughts with his own boyfriend.
“No. I know of his potential, and I know he’s one hell of a competitive guy so…I’d rather just see him without all that between us.” Jeff responds, looking over at Jim and winking.
“But…” Jensen begins, biting his lip -“Wouldn’t he be competitive anyways, because you’re on separate teams?”
“Yes and no. He’ll be competitive with you guys but definitely not me,” He laughs, his head thrown back and his eyes wide with delight, causing Jared to stare in rapture and Jensen to arch an eyebrow and check him out. Jared grins at that before looking over at Jensen and letting his grin turn into a sincere smile.
***
When the teams finally reach the dorms, they all make their way to the patio outside with their cigarettes, some of the contestants changing into something more comfortable. Jared is one of those people, needing to change into his favorite flannel pajamas and hooded sweater before he enters the patio with his own pack of smokes and binder of recipes. He sits between Chad and Genevieve, the only spot available and very far from Jensen, which is the last thing he wanted. He sighs before nudging Chad and smirking when Chad moves around. He nudges him one more time, right in the spot where he knows Chad is ticklish. He nearly laughs out loud when his friend jumps up in shock.
“Dude, enough.” Chad whines and this actually makes Jared laugh loudly, causing everyone to look at them with confusion before they shrug it off and look away.
“So, how are you and Sophia hitting it off?” Jared questions knowing that Chad has a soft spot for the girl and wants to get to know her. When Chad sighs, Jared can’t help but look over at him with his face scrunched up. His eyes widen when he realizes why Chad sighs, realizing that Sophia is making him be her friend first instead of just jumping straight into bed with him like most girls usually do, before he looks at Sophia and smiles.
“Atta girl,” he snorts, causing Chad to glare before smirking at Jared. Chad ends it quickly though when he looks over at Sophia and sighs again, which, woah. Twice in a minute is definitely a record for Chad.
“I want to know her so bad, Jay.” Chad whispers and Jared lets out a soft smile before shaking his head and looking back at the binder. Every few minutes though, he feels Jensen’s eyes on him and will look up and smile slightly when he notices that Jensen’s not looking at him at that moment. Instead, Jared will look at Jensen until Jensen looks at him, thus looking away and therefore, a game commences.
It goes like this for a good ten minutes, both of them smiling after each view, until Jim snorts and rolls his eyes whilst chuckling.
“Alright, I’m going to bed. Jeff, join me?” Jeff laughs at that before smirking and nodding his head.
“Jensen, Jared -“Jim states, returning Jeff’s smirk -“That is how you get past the flirting.” Jared blushes at that, which, what, since when did he blush? He keeps his eyes on his paper, even though he knows everyone is laughing at him. He bites his lip before he gets up and walks away, needing to get away from the laughter before he regresses back to his younger insecure self, not wanting to remember all of the times he was bullied as a young child for the fact that he was gay, liked cooking and living in Texas. As he’s walking up the hall to his own room, he hears Katie rushing up to speak to him.
“Hey man, are you alright?” She questions, putting her hand on his bicep, worry in her gaze as she flexes her fingers.
“I just… I don’t take people laughing at me that well,” he shrugs, running a hand through his hair. She nods in understanding before smiling and nodding her head towards his room and wiggling her eyebrows suggestively.
“Wanna study?” She laughs, breaking the silence and causing Jared to laugh back.
“Yeah, let’s go,” he replies, jumping on his bed and reopening the binder.
***
Jared opens his eyes as he hears the loud thumping of drums, his body jolting upwards in shock. He can hear someone yelling to get their asses up and shortly afterwards, Jared can only assume everyone is jolting up and getting dressed like Jensen and himself are doing. They dress quickly in their baggy clothes that they definitely won’t mind getting dirty because, well, c’mon, its Hell’s kitchen and they’re going to have to go through the garbage at some point. Jared looks up to see Jensen staring at him with his mouth open and Jared laughs.
“I think you have a little drool there, man.” Jared chuckles when he watches Jensen’s eyes go wide and slam his mouth shut.
“Shut up. You’re hot and you know it.”
Jared nods his head before walking towards the door and slapping Jensen’s ass as he does so, making him jump in shock before laughing some more. As Jared makes his way out of the dorms and into the kitchen, he can see a lot of the others joining him, standing as straight as he is, some even straighter. Within five minutes, everyone is down by the kitchens, standing rim rod straight, hands behind their backs - everyone but Genevieve. When Chef comes down and looks at the teams, he arches his eyebrow before he himself just stands there. After five minutes of waiting, Jared begins to feel really awkward and starts moving around. He looks at his team and when he catches their eyes he bites his lip and nods once everyone else nods and sighs before he turns around and runs back to the dorm rooms. He browses the bedrooms, looking for Genevieve, as he’s never really been near her. Once he finally finds her - in the bathroom, primping, he sighs before standing behind her and pulling her away from the mirror.
“Jared, put me the fuck down!” She shouts, kicking him as good as she can, even though he won’t let her go.
“Listen, princess, Chef is downstairs waiting - has been for probably ten minutes now - and we cannot afford for you to be in front of a mirror, trying to get pretty, while we’re all waiting for the challenge, so no - you will not be put the fuck down.” He gasps, finally making his way through the kitchen and dropping her unceremoniously in front of Danneel and Katie before joining the lineup. He sees Chef nod his head and stands a little straighter.
As Ramsay explains the challenge - cleaning and cutting squid properly - he shows them how he does it, and when he’s done explaining, and telling them their challenge - clean and cut the most squid properly- the teams enter into challenge mode.
After twenty minutes of cleaning and cutting squid, Chef calls for them to stop and brings the first person from Jared’s team - Genevieve - so he can count the correct number. When Chef picks up the first squid and calls it perfect, Jared lets out a sigh of relief. When Genevieve gets 8 out of her 10 squid perfect, the team lets out a small clap and cheer in relief. Next up is Jeff, who, out of 13, gets 10, which isn’t that bad. Up next is Jensen, who gets all 15 of his perfect, which, hell yes! Then there’s Katie, who has 10 out of 11 perfect, Jared whose next, gets 12 out of 14 perfect and Danneel, who gets 9 out of 13 perfect. They finish with the winning number of 64, and are now looking on at the blue team, who are looking pretty satisfied with their own plates.
With their team, Chad gets 8 out of 13 perfect, Sophia gets 10 out of 10, Jim gets 10 out of 11, Steve gets 10 out of 11 and Chris gets 13 out of 14, giving them a total of 51 perfect squid, making Jared’s team winners. They end up cheering at that news, some of the girls - alright, all of them - jumping up and down. Jared and Jensen quickly pat each other on the back, smiling at their win, until they quiet down and wait for the chef to tell them their prize.
“Winners will have a nice lunch with me while losers will clean and cut squid, and clean both kitchens in time for service tonight.” Jared watches as everyone in the blue team puts their heads down in disappointment whilst the red team smiles.
~***~//~***~
A near two hours later, Jared and his team are walking towards the steps to Hell’s Kitchen, laughing as they think about the lunch they shared with Gordon Ramsay - about how they should play the game, how they’re doing good as a team so far. The team is on a high, but as they reach the stairs, they all become serious, realizing that there’s a service tonight, and they’re really going to need to do their best. As they walk through the main hallway, Jared notices Chris and Steve talking, their bodies angled towards each other. Jared stops walking and pulls Jensen back, who was in front of him, pointing Jensen towards the sight that he sees. Jensen looks at him with confusion before turning to the other two and smiling softly.
“Look at them Jen, they look so happy with one another,” Jared laughs, walking towards Chris and Steve and smiling at them when they notice Jensen and him.
“Hey man, how was the reward?” Steve asks, kicking his feet back and forth in boredom.
“It was pretty nice, with good food and great company.” Jensen laughs, knowing that Steve will love the irony of that comment. When Steve does laugh, Jared notices that Chris is staring at Steve in awe and Jared just smirks.
“So, you guys uh, how are y’all?” Jared asks, shuffling his feet and looking down before smiling at the two of them and arching his eyebrow. When the duo just laughs, Jared relaxes a bit before grinning and shakes his head.
“So you guys hooked up, then?” Jensen asks with laughter in his voice.
“Well, we kind of knew each other from before - a quickie in the airport after drinking our nerves away.” Chris smirks, looking at Steve with something indescribable in his eyes. Jared feels a little awkward at the moment and shuffles his feet again before saying bye and getting ready for the service, not wanting to intrude on such a private moment between the two guys.
***
Both teams are in the kitchen prepping, Jared’s team on prepping the desserts, and Chris’ team on prepping the entrées. The kitchens are both busy, people running around, shouting out things that are important for the prep. Jared is standing against the pass, talking to Chris about how Chris’ team might need an ingredient from them, and how they could pass said ingredient between the two teams without getting any competitive streak between them. It is within this conversation that the Chef comes out and walks towards the two, a stride in his step, a look on his face that makes the two of them gulp.
“Chris, can I see you upstairs in my office?”Chef says when he gets to the two of them. Jared watches as Chris nods his head slowly, and follows Ramsay to his office, not without looking back towards Jared with his eyes wide with fear. Jared thinks he knows what Chris is thinking and only hopes that it isn’t what Chris believes it to be.
***
“Alright guys, restaurant opens in five minutes, let’s go, let’s go.” Chef says, clapping his hands. Jared looks around for Chris and sees his eyes still wide and open, a thin layer of sweat on his forehead. Jared rushes over to the end of the pass, watching as Chris comes over too.
“What’s the matter, man?” Jared asks, crossing his arms over his chest and scrunching up his face.
“My dad died. Chef gave me the option of leaving so I could be with my family.”
“Shit man, I’m so sorry.” Jared says, feeling the grief of a lost one on his mind, knowing what Chris is going through and knowing that his dad dying while Chris was away was the one thing Chris didn’t want to happen.
“What are you going to do?” Jared asks, knowing that Chris is in a tough spot, that he’ll have to pick his family but will definitely regret leaving the competition.
“Leave. I’ve gotta tell my team, though.” Chris replies while looking at Steve with sadness in his eyes before looking at Jared once more and sighing.
“I’m sorry,” Jared says again, patting Chris on the back sympathetically and walking away towards Jensen, with his shoulders dropping and his lip being bitten unmercifully.
“Is he alright?” Jensen asks, looking on at Chris with worry in his eyes. Jared shakes his head no, before quickly mumbling the situation to his friend while they finish their prep and get ready for the opening of the restaurant. The two of them watch as Chris tells his team what’s going on, watches as their faces fall and they hug Chris goodbye, Steve holding on a little longer than customary.
When Ramsay finally comes down from his office again, he says goodbye to Chris as well and they all watch as the older man leaves, staring at the doors of Hell’s Kitchen until Chef claps his hands one more time and tells Jean-Phillipe to open the restaurant.
***
The kitchen is hot and people on both sides are bustling about. The blue team is yelling at each other while not watching their food as it burns or doesn’t even get cooked, which just causes Chef Ramsay to shake his head in disappointment. Jared can’t help but feel bad for the blue team, especially when they bring up raw chicken. That just causes Chef to yell even louder, which subsequently causes everyone on the red team to grimace, without stopping the food they were cooking.
“Jeff, watch the time on that!” Jared yells across the kitchen, looking back onto his own food when he sees Jeff nod his acknowledgement. He can also see Genevieve flailing about with the food she’s cooking, but she’s not exactly his problem this time, thank god for that, but he does feel sorry for Katie, who is on the same area as Genevieve.
“Jared, the appetizers, how long?” Jensen yells, his head turning back quickly whilst watching his food steadily, making sure his entrées don’t burn.
“2 minutes, Jen!” Jared yells, swishing his pan from side to side to make sure everything gets cooked evenly. Jensen nods his head, before he yells he’s going to the pass after the minute and a half goes by. Jared finds himself walking up just as soon as Jensen, and when Sous Chef Scott sends it out, Jared’s thankful as always.
Jared looks over when he hears Sous Chef Heather yelling at the other team, which just causes Jared and the others of his team to grimace even more so than before.
The rest of the night goes this way, with both teams being yelled at, but the blue team more than the red team. Whether it’s by themselves, by the Sous chefs, or by Chef Ramsay himself, the blue team has gotten the brunt of the yelling and Jared can tell it’s bringing the team down. With Chris gone, one of their better chefs, and no one there to coordinate the team, even though Steve is definitely trying to lead, and everyone getting yelled at and floundering around with their heads chopped off like chickens, it looks pretty hopeless for them.
***
After three hours, the two teams are lined up in their respective kitchens, their backs straight even though some of the people are shuffling their feet nervously. Jared’s biting his lips, watches as the Chef paces back and forth.
“Red team, you’re the best of the worst right now.” Thinking to himself, Jared can see how his team is the best of the worst. They tend to move and move and move some more, sometimes without thinking about anything else. Jared knows that this can create problems in the kitchen, especially when the communication is gone, and it appears that Chef can see that too. His team lets out a small sigh of relief at hearing that before they get back to a calmness that the Chef accepts. Everyone is completely quiet on both sides, waiting for Ramsay to finish his thought and tell the blue team what’s going to happen to them. When Chef looks at the blue team, Jared can see the steeliness in his eyes and tries to suppress a shiver that runs through his body.
“Blue team, while you may be the losers of tonight, you have already lost a member. Go upstairs, think of ways to become a better team, and I’ll see you all at the challenge tomorrow.” Chef says before watching as the teams walk away to the dorms.
Jared can feel the heat of Chef’s gaze on him and does everything he can not to turn back and look him in the eyes. Once he’s past the kitchens, only then does he stop and lean against the wall, and close his eyes while sighing.
“Hey, are you alright?” Jared opens his eyes to see Jeff in front of him, a look of worry on his features and Jared does his best to nod his head, unsure of why he’s feeling woozy.
“Are you sure, Jared? You’re looking kind of pale.” That’s Danneel, who’s suddenly standing in front of him with her right hand on his left arm, and when Jared realizes that he can’t really see straight anymore, he shakes his head as a no, he’s not alright. Pretty soon, he realizes that most of his team is in front of him, plus most of the others from the other team, and Jared can feel his eyes going wide.
“I--- shit, I… I just need---“Jared tries to breathe out, until he realizes that everything has gone black.
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