Chapter 109 – The Party Invite and Monica's Test Kitchen
Bruce clicked his tongue, swallowed the irritation of being pulled away mid-thought, and crossed the apartment to answer the door.
Joey stood in the hallway with half a glazed donut in his hand.
"Hey, Bruce! Hope I'm not interrupting anything?" He said it with his mouth still half full.
"Just working on the script." Bruce stepped aside and waved him in. "What's up?"
Joey squeezed past him, finished the donut in one aggressive bite, brushed the sugar off his hands onto his jeans, and turned around with the energy of someone who'd just remembered good news. "Okay, so — you remember Danny? The executive director from Our Days, the guy you really hit it off with on set last time?"
Bruce nodded. "Sure, great guy."
"He's throwing a party tomorrow night. Bunch of friends, some crew people. He specifically told me to bring you." Joey's eyebrows went up. "You in?"
Bruce scratched the back of his head. "Tomorrow evening's tough. I've got dinner plans with Grace, and once Brooklyn Fantasia really gets rolling I'm going to be buried — so I've been trying to carve out time with her before that happens."
"So bring her!" Joey spread his hands like the solution was self-evident. "Danny said plus-ones are totally welcome. More the merrier."
Bruce turned it over. Grace might actually enjoy the low-key industry atmosphere — nothing too formal, just people from the business. He reached for the phone and dialed.
"Hey, Grace — you got a minute? … So, party tomorrow night. Friend of Joey's, executive director from Our Days — should be a pretty relaxed crowd, lot of industry people. You want to come? … Yeah, Our Days — the one you watched growing up. Wild that it's on season thirty, right? … Perfect, I'll swing by and pick you up after work." He hung up and looked at Joey. "We're good. Three of us tomorrow."
"Yes!" Joey pumped his fist, nearly clipping a stack of scripts off the side table. Then he leaned in, trying to look casual and failing completely. "So… any word on where I stand with Brooklyn Fantasia?"
Bruce knew exactly who he meant — Vinny, the anxious but ride-or-die sidekick who anchored half the film's heart.
"Actually, I was about to get to that." Bruce gave Joey's arm a light pat. "The casting director isn't officially attached yet, but I talked to the exec producer. He watched you in Lock, Stock and caught your run on Our Days. He thinks your energy is right for Vinny." Bruce shrugged like it was already settled. "You should be fine. Plan on being at the table read."
Joey let out a sound that was somewhere between a cheer and a howl. "YES! Thank you, man, seriously!"
He settled down about three seconds later, because Joey was Joey, and curiosity always moved in right behind excitement. "Okay, but — Lucky Luca. The lead. Who are you thinking? Somebody I'd know? Nicolas Cage?"
"I'm actually leaning toward a newcomer," Bruce said. "Guy named Owen Wilson."
Joey stared at him. "Owen Wilson." He said it slowly, like he was trying to locate the name in a mental filing cabinet he was pretty sure didn't have a folder for it. "Never heard of him. Is he any good? What's he been in?"
"He's just getting started — one feature called Bottle Rocket, and a short film by the same name before that," Bruce said. "But he's got something you can't really teach. He's loose, a little goofy, scrappy — but underneath all that there's something genuinely sincere. That combination is exactly what Luca needs. The guy can make you laugh and then surprise you when things get serious."
What Bruce kept to himself was the full picture: in the life he remembered, Owen Wilson's slow Texas drawl and effortless, slightly-off-kilter charm had carried Shanghai Noon, Wedding Crashers, Midnight in Paris — film after film where he made likability look accidental. That particular quality was precisely what "Lucky" Luca required. And the idea of being the director who gave Owen Wilson his real break — that felt like something worth doing.
He walked Joey to the door, leaving him already chatting excitedly to himself about what to wear to the party, and turned back toward the desk.
The ideas Quentin had kicked loose — the structural rethinking, the Before the Rain triptych model — were still crackling in his head, ready to be caught on the page before they cooled. He sat down, loaded fresh sheets into the printer tray, took one steadying breath, and started typing.
He got through maybe half a page before the phone rang.
Bruce grabbed the receiver with the weary resignation of a man who has accepted that the universe is personally opposed to his first draft. "Hello?"
"Bruce!" Monica's voice came through bright and a little breathless. "Do not eat dinner alone tonight. Come downstairs."
"Monica?" He pulled himself back from Luca's Brooklyn with some effort. "What's going on?"
"I've been working on crew meal recipes for the film and I need real feedback from someone who's actually been on a set. Come taste everything and tell me what works. And you get a free dinner out of it, so really there's no downside here."
Bruce blinked. Then laughed. "Okay. Give me two minutes."
He headed down and knocked on Monica and Rachel's door. Monica opened it almost immediately — apron on, wooden spoon in hand, cheeks flushed with the particular focus she got when she was deep in cook mode. The apron read World's Greatest Chef, which in Monica's case felt less like a boast and more like a reasonable working hypothesis.
"Come in, come in!" She pulled him through the doorway. "The Brooklyn Fantasia crew meal tasting is officially in session."
The apartment smelled incredible. Bruce stepped inside and glanced around. "Rachel not here?"
"She's out with Ross." Monica steered him toward the kitchen with the authority of someone who has decided where you're going to stand. "Something about a special exhibit at the Natural History Museum."
Bruce smiled to himself. If Rachel was voluntarily spending her evening at a Natural History Museum exhibit, things between her and Ross were moving in exactly the right direction.
He turned toward the dining table and stopped.
Monica had laid out four dishes — not family dinner portions, but genuinely scaled quantities, the kind of volume that said I have been thinking about how to feed thirty people on a film set and I want you to know I am serious about this.
"Okay." Monica clicked into presentation mode, pointing at each dish in turn. "Italian sausage and tomato rigatoni — rich sauce, bold sausage, pasta cooked exactly to al dente. Fast carb reload for crew coming off a long morning."
She moved to a large salad bowl. "Avocado chicken salad — grilled breast, avocado, quinoa, spinach, cherry tomatoes, chickpeas, lemon vinaigrette. Fresh, filling, works for anyone trying to avoid heavy food mid-shoot."
Beside those sat a tray of golden, perfectly crisped Parmesan chicken cutlets and a wide pot of minestrone with steam still curling off the top. "Garlic bread's keeping warm in the oven," she added. Then, dropping her voice slightly, like she was confessing something mildly embarrassing: "I also want your honest take on portion sizing. And… cost-effectiveness. Per head."
Bruce surveyed the spread, accepted the plate Monica was already holding out to him, and worked through each dish methodically.
"Monica." He set his fork down after the rigatoni. "This is genuinely excellent. The pasta has real bite, the sauce is thick enough to hold up in a to-go container. The salad is layered — it doesn't fall apart on you. The cutlet is crispy outside, still juicy in the middle. And the soup—" he gestured at the minestrone — "that's exactly what you want on a cold exterior shoot day. Warm, substantial, no fuss."
He kept talking between bites. "The most important thing is that all of this feels like real food. Not craft service table food, not sad catering trays. People doing physical work all day — grips, electricians, the camera department — they notice the difference, and it affects the energy on set."
Monica looked like she might actually float off the floor.
They spent the next hour working through the practical questions — which dishes held heat the longest, which scaled most efficiently for larger headcounts, how to balance the menu across a full week without repeating yourself into oblivion. Bruce, drawing on a few productions' worth of set experience, suggested biodegradable clamshell containers and a citrus wedge on the side — small detail, made people feel like someone was paying attention.
When the table had been largely and enthusiastically cleared, Bruce set down his napkin and said, with some formality, "Monica. This menu is ready."
"Yes." She exhaled. Then pulled herself back together. "I promise you, Bruce — every single meal will be at this level. Your crew won't have a single complaint."
Bruce believed her completely. With Monica, that was never really the question.
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