The whole competition was broken up into three rounds—today's Round One, Round Two on Wednesday, a day off, then the Final Round to take place on Friday. Today, they had three hours to create their finished product. He'd decided to make a rhubarb-apple tart.

One of Soojung's favorites.

Usually, tarts were made with a less sweet, more biting apple, but ever since Soojung had, a few years ago, asked him to make one with Washington Red Gold apples, he'd been using a mix of those and Golden Delicious apples in this recipe. 

Which was why he'd named it the Rhuby Red Tart, in deference to the rhubarbs and red golds.

Having already prepared the fruit, he was meticulously constructing the base of the tart. A large, square piece of puff pastry rested on the upturned bottom of a chilled, wax paper covered-cookie sheet. The cool metal helped keep the delicate dough from warming too quickly but, with how sweaty his palms were right now, Sehun was pretty sure he might be fighting a loosing battle.

It wasn't that he was nervous about the baking, really, he thought, sprinkling the dough with sugar before pricking it all over with a fork. It was more the combination of stresses—the judges, the camera crew circling the room, the loud, buzzing noise of dozens of other chefs working on their creations—all of it was adding up to a big knot of tension in the center of his shoulders.

So far, the only thing that had kept him calm was Soojung's voice in his head but, at this point, even that wasn't helping as much. Right now, he was really concentrating, one-hundred percent on the tart he was forming. 

Minutes ticked by as he brushed an egg wash on the outer edges of the bottom layer of dough. He pressed a few thinner strips of pastry along the edges, ones that, during the baking, would rise and form a sort of wall around the fruit filling.

The fruit came next, a fresh, summery-smelling mix of rhubarb chunks and diced apple tossed with white sugar. Spooning the mixture into the center of the dough, he topped the tart with an interwoven roof of pastry dough strips, completing the presentation by brushing the whole thing with more egg wash that would turn the dough a glossy, golden color as it baked.

Sliding the whole creation into the preheated oven, he breathed out a sigh of relief and, finally, let himself glance up, toward the bleachers. Looking for Soojung. 

They'd set the competition up in the hotel's huge conference room, which was now filled with row upon row of cooking stations with counter-space and ovens. The perimeter of the room was lined with bleachers for spectators to watch the competition unfold. Scanning the crowded metal seats around the room, he felt like he was in a damn fish bowl. 

Then he saw Soojung, barely visible behind two tall men seated in front of her. 

She was already looking at him and her eyes lit up when he waved; she waved back and, letting out a tense breath, all he wanted to do was go up there and talk to her. It bothered him a little that he seemed to need her pep talks to encourage him along, but that didn't keep him from wanting to go up to her, either.

Still, he couldn't leave the floor until he'd presented his entry. So he forced himself to turn away, back to his station. He stood there for a few minutes, staring at the oven where his tart was baking. It took everything in him to keep from opening the oven to peek in at it. 

, he was driving himself insane. 

Running a hand along the back of his neck, he wandered through the crowded room, trying like hell not to notice what the other chefs were making. If he started comparing and contrasting, he knew he'd just make his nerves worse.

He made his way to a refreshment stand the competition organizers had set up in one corner and got some water from a huge water cooler. Standing there, sipping out of the small, paper cup, his eyes were glued to his station as he mentally calculated the time left before he needed to check on the tart.

"Kind of makes you feel like an expectant parent, doesn't it?" 

He glanced over his shoulder, taking in a tall, pretty, Hispanic woman with a wide mouth and nearly black eyes. Her long, curly, dark brown hair fell across her shoulder as she smiled up at him.

Sehun returned her smile. "Yeah, if being an expectant father feels like you wanna go throw up somewhere from shot nerves."

Chuckling, the woman walked over to stand next to him, sipping her water as she stared out at the competition floor. "It is pretty tense out there," she said. "It's worse than the SATs, actually. At least with that, you could take it more than once. But this is all or nothing."

Sehun laughed. "Actually, I never took the SATs, so I've got nothing to compare this with."

"No SATs?" she asked. "What're you? Canadian or something?"

Grinning, Sehun knew she was flirting with him and, damn if he wasn't enjoying it. "Nah, I just went to culinary school right out of high school. The Culinary Institute."

"Oh, a fancy pants," she teased, throwing away her cup. "Very nice. Color me intimidated."

He laughed and leaned slightly toward her. "Hey, feel free to spread the word. The more people I freak out, the better."

Laughing, she pushed her long hair over her shoulder. "Too bad for you, I work well under pressure. But," she said, stepping around him, "I think I hear my five-minute timer going off, so I'd better get back over there." She glanced back at him over her shoulder. "Oh, I'm Carmen."

"Sehun Oh," he returned. "Nice meeting you."

"You, too," she said with a lingering smile. "Good luck."

Sehun watched her leave. After a minute, he turned around and was refilling his empty cup when, yet another voice addressed him. But this one had his back stiffening up.

"I'm surprised, Sehun," Andreas Giordano said. "I always thought you preferred blondes."

Straightening, Sehun turned to face Andreas' mocking gray eyes. 

This bastard had some goddamn nerve talking to him. It took all of his concentration not to crush the water-filled paper cup in his fist. Instead, he glanced away, squaring his tense shoulders. "Can I help you with something?" 

Andreas' short laugh grated on his nerves. "Well, I saw Soojung sitting up in the bleachers and then you, over here...shamelessly flirting." He tsked at Sehun. "Just trying to offer some man-to-man advice—why play with fire when you've got such a pretty little brunette waiting for you up there?"

Sehun could literally hear the blood rushing through the veins behind his ears. He turned toward Andreas, his expression cold and closed. "You don't know a damn thing about Soojung, so don't mention her again."

Folding arms across his chest, Andreas raised one eyebrow. "You do have a point, but I must confess to hoping to get to know Soojung better this week. Much better." 

Sehun's eyes narrowed and two involuntary, fury-filled steps had him practically chest-to-chest with Andreas. "Listen, you son of a —" he gritted out through clenched teeth, but Andreas' cut him off.

"Easy, Sehun. All I'm saying is Soojung's a lovely girl. Big, brown eyes, that soft-looking hair. And those s," he cupped both hands in front of his chest. "I can see why you—"

"Shut the  up," Sehun spat. A loud, angry buzzing filled his head as he fought the overwhelming urge to deck this . "And stay the hell away from Soojung." 

Before Andreas could say anything else, Sehun shoved past him, knowing that if he stuck around any longer he'd end up planting his fist in the middle of that bastard's face.

Once he made it back to his station, he sat there for a minute, staring at the timer counting down until his tart was finished baking. But even that wasn't enough to distract him. All he could do was sit there and seethe. 

That loved to push his ing buttons. It'd always been like that. All through school. Andreas had been a year ahead of him and Sam, and, from what Sehun knew, he'd been the reigning ho