Daily Flash Fiction Challenge

Saucy Chef

The newspaper headlines were far from flattering.
‘Chef turns up the heat with pants down’

The article stated celebrity Chef Simon Pearce was seen running from a house clutching his shoes and trousers while shocked neighbours looked on.

Simon sat on the sofa and stared up at his wife towering above him with folded arms and clenched teeth.

“It’s not what it looks like,” he stammered.

Nostrils flared as Paula Pearce stared daggers at her cowering husband.

“A customer at the restaurant said she knew a TV producer at Channel Five,” he said. “She offered to drive me home after I’d closed up.”

“And why couldn’t you drive yourself!” Paula shouted.

“I had a few drinks and she was on mineral water.”

“AND?”

“Well as we walked out to her car I tripped and got grass stains on my trousers.”

“SO?”

“Well they were only light but she insisted on stopping at her place near Burnley Woods and she’d clean me up.”

“Didn’t any alarm bells go off?” Paula said. She breathed out heavily and collapsed on the armchair opposite him.

Simon pursed his lips in thought. “Not really.”

“It says her husband turned up and you ran for it.”

Simon shrugged. A natural reaction for him caught in compromising situations.

Paula flopped forward and rested her head in her hands.

“She was very nice and really does know Stanley Collins.”

“And that makes it alright does it?”

Simon breathed out slowly. “What it doesn’t say in the article is Nancy Brightman is eighty two years old.”

Paula snapped upright and frowned. “You could have mentioned that earlier. So why were you seen running out of her house half dressed?”

“I heard car tyres on the gravel drive and panicked.”

“How many customers do invite you home?” Paula asked suspiciously.