Aftertaste Page 8

  Not if the death looks too suspicious, I suppose.

  By Wednesday evening, I’ve convinced Chloe’s peers and their parents of my cooking prowess and dutifully eaten my sweet potato and marshmallow casserole while wearing a Pilgrim’s collar and cuffs. I’ve also taken an entire roll of pictures of Chloe eating her first pumpkin pie, supervised the service of over two hundred lunches, finalized the winter menu, shopped, cooked, and cleaned the apartment. The complicated machinations that have allowed me to achieve this delicate balance between family and work have left me looking and feeling like a stale Krispy Kreme donut, glazed and pasty on the outside and filled with jelly. I’m in the midst of setting the table when Richard calls to tell me that his flight has been delayed. Instead of taking advantage of the extra time I have to sit down and relax before he arrives, I put Chloe to bed and start baking biscotti, because I think it’s a nice hostessy thing to do.

  Even though my mother had been a Cordon Bleu–trained chef, it was not she who taught me to cook—that I learned from Mrs. Favish, our next-door neighbor. It was during the first spring my mother was away, drying out at the expensive retreat center in New Hampshire. I was ten years old. Some people might have found it intimidating teaching the daughter of a professional chef to cook, but it hadn’t seemed to bother Mrs. Favish. In fact, she undertook my culinary education with extraordinary zeal, teaching me first to bake because she believed that one must learn to follow the rules, culinarily speaking, before one could break them.

  Chefs, I’ve found, can generally be divided into two groups: those who bake and those who do not. Baking is for the rule bound, the people who sat up front in cooking class and paid attention, who wrote things down, rather than relying on the feel of a recipe. I did none of those things, which was why it was unusual that I initially found my niche in the cooking world as a pastry chef. I think it was because Mrs. Favish taught me to bake first, and at a time in my life when I was craving predictability, looking for rules, for reasons why things should work.

  I bake biscotti, dozens of them. Hazelnut, pistachio, cornmeal, anise, and black pepper. Before long the soothing aroma of anise and toasting nuts fills the kitchen. While I’m waiting for Richard, I sample one of each, along with a pot of tea, strong and very sweet, because that is how Mrs. Favish taught me to drink it. Sometimes I think my only chance for happiness is in a kitchen, that any life I live outside is destined to be a shadowy, half-lived sort of life. It is, after all, where I’ve spent the better part of my adult existence, and a decent chunk of my childhood as well, a place where things both tragic and wonderful have taken place. Maybe the only place I really know how to be me.

  I’m shaping the last of the biscotti logs when the doorbell rings. Wiping my floury hands on my jeans, I run to answer it. I open the door and fling myself into Richard’s arms.

  “Sweetheart, watch the coat. Is that dough on your hands?” His words are light and teasing, but he holds me tightly.

  “Yes, and I’m going to get it all over your expensive cashmere coat.”

  “This old thing? So, where is she, the divine Chloe? It’s her I came to see,” he says, ruffling my hair. I can smell his cologne. Bay Rum. A smell so comforting it makes me want to bury my face into his shirt and weep.

  I take his coat and hang it on the coat rack while Richard meticulously folds his Burberry scarf and places it in the inside breast pocket of his jacket. At fifty-four years old Richard is still a good-looking man, due in part to two decades of near obsessive devotion to exercise and healthy eating, made necessary by a reckless and degenerate youth. In fact, the only clues to his age are a hint of silver in his golden hair and a few extra lines around his mouth and eyes.

  We tiptoe into Chloe’s room so that Richard can sneak a peek at her. She’s sleeping on her back with her arms flung over her head in a gesture of complete surrender. Richard leans in, his palms to his cheeks in an exaggerated gesture of delight.

  “She’s gorgeous,” he whispers, taking my hand.

  She stirs, and I shush him. “Come on, you’ll wake her,” I tell him.

  “Pleasant dreams, sweetie,” he says, gently brushing a wisp of hair from her forehead.

  “Come on, I’ve made biscotti,” I tell him, hustling him out of the room. “And a pot of tea.”

  “I just survived the flight from hell. I think we’re going to need something stronger than tea!”

  In the kitchen, I watch as he opens the antique china cupboard and helps himself to two delicate demitasse cups and saucers. He opens another door and takes out the old-fashioned stove-top Italian coffee maker, for Richard’s idea of something stronger—espresso. He does these things with a minimum of looking around. Although he has been here only a handful of times, somehow Richard knows his way around my kitchen.

  We work side by side, in companionable silence. It doesn’t seem to matter how seldom I see Richard, because no matter how long it’s been, we are somehow in sync. He rolls up the sleeves of his expensive shirt, revealing two strong, tanned arms and a Rolex watch. The antique business was obviously doing well.

  “Nice watch,” I tell him.

  “Thanks, it was a gift,” he says, smiling at my raised eyebrows. “No, it’s not what you think. I agreed to do the apartment of a little old matron who’s been coming into the shop for years. She bought one of those hideous-looking condos on Mount Washington. I did a fabulous job. She was just trying to show her appreciation. Anyway, it’s probably a fake, but it’s a good one, so what do I care?”

  We sit down at the kitchen table and sip our espresso. It is good, strong and hot. Neither of us says anything for a minute or so.

  “Chloe’s beautiful,” Richard says finally. “Your father must be over the moon.”

  “He thinks she’s great. Not that we’ve seen much of him. He came out when she was first born, and I was hoping that he’d be here for Thanksgiving, but . . .” I let this last bit hang in the air, trying to keep the resentment out of my voice.

  “What about Jake? Does he see her?”

  This is a dangerous question, one most people I know avoid. Probably the reason most people don’t ask is they assume that when a marriage breaks up so soon after the birth of a child, that somehow the child is at the heart of it. But Richard isn’t most people. And, because it’s Richard, I tell him everything—about Jake’s doomed visit, how he had to feign food poisoning the next day, how Nicola showed up sniffing around for clues, and how Jake has been avoiding me ever since.

  One of the great things about Richard is that you could tell him you just ax murdered your best friend, chopped her up, and fed her to the dog, and he would flick a piece of lint from his lapel and raise an eyebrow as if to say, “And then?” This is why I know I can tell him the truth. What actually happened matters less than what I know lurked menacingly beneath the surface. Seduction was in my heart, and I know that had Jake shown even the slightest interest, I would have taken him back. Not just back into my bed, but back into my life, and for that I hate myself. For being weak and needy and for being ready to resign Chloe to a father who doesn’t want her.

  Up until now I haven’t verbalized any of this. I’ve told no one about Jake’s visit. I can feel the tightness behind my eyes, and I know that I’m going to cry. Richard knows it, too, because he leans across the table and covers my folded hands with both of his and squeezes, hard.

  “Come on now. Enough about Jake.” Kind of him to say so when we really hadn’t been talking about Jake. “It’s definitely over and better for Chloe, if you ask me, that she doesn’t see him.” He leans in conspiratorially. “Now, what I really want are the gory details. Spare nothing!” he whispers, his voice husky with anticipation. “Did you really claw her eyes out?” This is Richard’s modus operandi. When the going gets tough, distract them. Make ’em laugh. It’s a pretty good strategy.

  “No, of course not,” I say, my sniffling turning quickly into a giggle. “It was her hair. I pulled some out.” It is still a satisfyi
ng memory. Richard lifts the corner of his mouth in a half smile, but doesn’t say anything.

  “I know, I know,” I tell him. “I went nuts.”

  “No, you didn’t,” he finally says, waving his hand dismissively and walking back over to the stove for more coffee. “You did what any sane jilted wife with an infant daughter would have done. He’s the nut. An asshole, really. Never liked him. And her, the worst kind of slut.”

  I know Richard is not just saying this to make me feel good. He’d never liked Jake, and the feeling had been quite mutual. In the early days of our marriage, Richard had come to New York fairly frequently to visit us, me really. Although Richard was always perfectly pleasant, he’d made Jake uncomfortable. After the first couple of visits, Jake usually found some excuse to make himself scarce when Richard was here.

  By the time the last of the biscotti are out of the oven, we have established that just about every single base impulse I’ve acted upon over the last several months has been completely justified, including the debacle at the anger-management class, that particular anecdote nearly causing Richard to choke on his espresso.

  Richard is still asleep on the pullout couch in the living room when the doorbell rings early the next morning. It’s Hope, bearing a large Tupperware container and a plastic plate covered with a paper napkin decorated with a cartoon turkey.

  “Good morning!” she chirps. She’s wearing a festive green velvet robe with puffed sleeves and, for once, isn’t sporting large Velcro rollers in her hair.

  “Now, Mira, I thought I’d bring over the ambrosia. Oh, and I went ahead and baked up a tin of those nice crescent rolls. I thought that your friend—Richard, is it?—might enjoy some for breakfast. And I know how busy you are this morning.” She smiles in the direction of the sleeping Richard, her voice dropping to a whisper. “I hope I haven’t woken him.” Of course, what she has really come to do is spy on Richard, who I suspect is awake, because his snoring has suddenly stopped.

  My suspicions are confirmed when Richard gets up mere seconds after Hope’s departure. “Did I hear someone say there are warm crescent rolls?” he says, rolling over and clicking on the TV. I pour us steaming bowls of caffè latte, load up a tray with the rolls and some biscotti, and bring it into the living room, where Richard is watching the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade from the sofa bed. Now that he’s awake, I give Chloe her busy box to play with. I climb across Richard and sit on the foot of the bed where I can keep an eye on Chloe who, intermittently, is distracted by the large floats on TV, as is Richard. Nonetheless, I decide the time is right for me to begin my interrogation. Besides, I might even get more information from Richard this way.

  “So what is up with my dad?’

  “What do you mean?”

  “Is he okay? He seems just, I don’t know, a little distant and distracted lately, and I was wondering if everything is all right.”

  Richard doesn’t say anything. He and Chloe are mesmerized by a giant SpongeBob SquarePants balloon floating down Thirty-fourth Street.

  “I’m worried. Do you think he is all right physically? Do you think he could be sick?”

  “What makes you think he’s sick?”

  “I don’t know, nothing really,” I tell him, remembering my father’s deliberate speech and his forgetfulness. “It’s just that I get the feeling that he is keeping something from me, that’s all. And it would be just like him to not want to share bad news like that.”

  Again, nothing from Richard. He helps himself to another roll, his third.

  “Has he said anything to you? Because if he has, I think you should tell me. As his only child, I think I have a right to know. He is not a young man anymore, and any time now I might have to start, you know, making arrangements for his care.”

  “No, he hasn’t said anything, and he doesn’t look sick. Not that I have seen too much of him lately, but when I have, he seems the picture of health.”

  I slump against the pillows, unsatisfied. I suspect he’s lying.

  Rather improbably, Richard and my father had become friends over the years. Even though I’d done my best to keep him a secret, a few weeks after we met, Richard, tired of my begging to be left off at the top of my street when he dropped me off after the Al-Anon meeting, insisted on taking me home and meeting my parents. (He’s a bit of a prude and wanted to dispel any notion of impropriety should I be seen getting out of his sports car late at night by one of our well-meaning but meddlesome neighbors.) And there was a time when my mother had tried to quit drinking in earnest and Richard had actually moved in with us briefly, acting in equal parts as an older brother, AA sponsor, and friend. Richard and my dad still occasionally meet for dinner, or take in a movie, or get together on a Sunday afternoon to watch the Steelers.

  Richard takes a long draft of his coffee and helps himself to another biscotti. He knows me well enough to know that I haven’t given up; I’m merely considering my next line of questioning.

  Richard puts his coffee mug down on the breakfast tray, folds his hands across his stomach, and gives me his full attention. “Well, have you asked him if anything is wrong?”

  “Of course I have.”

  “Well?”

  “He said everything is fine, he’s just been busy.”

  He pauses a minute, then continues, “Well, then, I think he’s just been busy.” There is something about the way he says busy. I look up sharply, and Richard quickly looks away.

  “Really, Mira, if your father chooses not to tell you something, if, in fact, there is a glimmer of truth to your paranoid delusions, then he must have his reasons. It certainly isn’t my place to . . .”

  Sensing an opportunity, I move quickly to seize the advantage. “You obviously know something, Richard.”

  “The thing is, I really don’t—not for sure anyway. He hasn’t told me anything, either. Your father, in case it has escaped your notice, Mira, is an extremely private person. He tells nobody anything if he can help it. I’ve long since stopped taking it personally, and I suggest you do the same. Do you know,” he says, looking over his half-moon glasses at me, “I’ve known him for almost twenty years, and I couldn’t tell you his political party, his favorite restaurant, or his views on capital punishment, although I could probably guess. It also appears that I may have been wrong.”

  Bingo. “What do you mean, you may have been wrong?”

  “Nothing, really. Just a conversation I had with your dad a while back.”

  “What kind of conversation?”

  “Really, Mira, your father is a big boy. But, if you must know, it was a conversation about women.”

  “Women? Why would my father, who talks to no one, talk to you, of all people, about women? Do you think he’s dating someone? Why wouldn’t he want to tell me that?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe he feels disloyal. Guilty. I don’t know.”

  “Guilty? Why should he feel guilty? My mother has been dead eighteen years, for goodness’ sake!”

  Richard ignores me. “I think I’ve met her,” he says, sitting up in bed. “About a month ago a woman came into the shop, said she was a friend of your father’s. Browsed around, inquired about a little religious figurine, a nothing item. A little della Robbia knockoff that’s been hanging around the shop forever. When I told her the price, she smiled very politely and said she’d think about it. About a week later your father came into the shop and bought it. When I told him about the woman who had been in, saying that she was a friend of his, he got funny, embarrassed, I don’t know. I offered just to give it to him, but he insisted on paying. Got all stiff and formal about it.”

  “Well, what was she like?”

  “That’s the thing. She looked young, much younger than your father, that’s for sure. My age, or even younger, maybe. Very tan, lots of makeup, blond, tightly permed hair. Enormous breasts, probably fake. And she was wearing leopard pants. Can you believe it, leopard pants? Not exactly the kind of woman I’d picture your father with, which is why I
didn’t make anything of it. I figured maybe it was his secretary, and he wanted to buy her a gift or something.”

  My father has had the same secretary for the last twenty-five years, and she is neither young nor blond. Her name is Mrs. Hudson, and although she does have enormous breasts, she also has enormous everything else—hips, thighs, stomach, not to mention chins.

  “I’m sure it’s not his secretary. You’ve met Mrs. Hudson.”

  “Don’t remember.”

  I’m instantly bombarded by obscene thoughts of my father and this woman Richard has described, and I give my head a violent shake. This amuses Richard, who knows exactly what I’m thinking.

  “What do you say,” he says, clapping his hands and putting himself in Chloe’s line of vision, “that we get dressed and hustle over to Herald Square and catch part of the parade? I’ve never actually been to the Macy’s Parade, and what better time to go than Chloe’s first Thanksgiving?”

  Later, on the subway home, Richard says, “I hope we’re right about your dad. It is about time he had some fun. No one should be alone.” I put my head on his shoulder and sigh. Richard and I are both alone. No partners. No prospects. “Don’t worry,” he whispers. “You won’t be alone for long. You are much too beautiful and much too good a cook not to get married again, if that is what you decide you want. If I have to, I’ll marry you myself—we could be the ultimate marriage of convenience. All you need to do is get ahold of that recipe for crescent rolls from your friend Hope, and I’ll be a happy man.”

  As soon as we open the apartment door, we can smell the turkey roasting. I’ve cooked it in a paper bag (a neat trick that ensures an incredibly moist bird without basting). The smell is a heady combination of roasting turkey, and apple brandy, butter, and wild mushrooms that I’ve combined and rubbed on the inside of the bird and under the skin of the breast and legs. It will be delicious.