Chapter 21: For

Chef pushed the Line Diary across the steel and told me to read it.

My hands were steady, and I was glad of it.

I opened to the first against-line and read it out in my own voice.

"September thirteenth. Against Hattie Sorrell. Signed with the name of the tall guy from the third row."

The tall guy's face went red to the ears.

"Say the vote you cast," Chef told him.

"I never voted against her," he said, loud. "I voted for. I'd have voted for her all day."

"Next."

I turned the page.

"September twenty-seventh. Against. Signed with the name of the girl with the short hair."

"For," said the short-haired girl. "I wrote it on Monday on Hattie's own paper. Look."

She pulled a folded square from her apron and held it up, and across it in pencil, large, was FOR.

"October eleventh," I said. "Against. Signed B. Oakes."

Bridget stood up.

"For," she said. "I was throwing up in an ER that night. And I'd vote for her from there too."

Someone laughed, short and breathless.

Another one of them stood up before I even read the name.

Then another.

I read them, one after the next.

The dish-pit guy stood and said it.

Then the woman from the garde manger station.

Then both brothers from the sauce line.

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