by Linda Byler
Well, no use shirking her duty. She’d prepare the food she was used to, and if it didn’t pass muster, then so be it.
Both children were watching their morning shows, so she checked the cupboards for supplies before making decisions. She couldn’t imagine Kathy wanted to be disturbed, so . . .
Milk. Heavy whipping cream. But no cornstarch or cocoa powder. Apples, flour, butter. Apple pie, perhaps. There was no shortening for pie crust, either. Butter would have to do. She found a small container of brown sugar as hard as a rock on the back shelf of a corner cupboard. If she could cook this lump of hardened sugar, dissolve it with water, she could thicken the sauce with flour.
Lord willing, she thought grimly, and set to work.
Both children drifted into the kitchen, having heard the pots and bowls on the countertop.
Emma turned to smile at them.
“What are you doing?” Brent asked, in his polite way.
“I am making two apple pies,” Emma answered. “For tonight.”
“What’s tonight?”
“We’re having company.”
She said it brightly, to inspire Annalise.
The child frowned, petulant. “Charlie Brown doesn’t want company.”
“He doesn’t?”
This was thrown out without much thought as Emma poured a mixture of water, beaten egg, and vinegar to wet the pie crust crumbs, thinking how her mother would throw her hands up and shake her head, seeing the butter used as shortening.
Emma had baked pies since she was fifteen, helping her mother replenish the supply at the roadside stand. They made shoofly, apple, raisin, blueberry, cherry, vanilla—too many to think about.
“We want to watch,” Brent said.
“Here. I’ll move the barstools and you can climb up.”
She helped both of them to a seat, then watched as they positioned themselves onto their knees and leaned on their elbows as Emma mixed the pie dough.
She scattered flour on the work surface of the island, the detached appendage to the kitchen cabinets, a wonder that Emma resolved to add to her own kitchen if she ever had the good fortune to have one.
“I want to! I want to!” Annalise shouted, clapping her soft, dimpled hands.
So Emma placed a small amount of the pie dough in each one’s hand, scattered some flour, and allowed them to play with a knife and fork to cut the dough into pieces.
They squealed, talked incessantly, clearly delighted to be able to do what Emma was doing.
And Emma assembled the pies, crimped the crusts, brushed the tops with egg wash and sprinkled liberal amounts of sugar on top before carrying them to the preheated oven. Then she mixed a yellow cake, baked it in a fluted pan, and made a cooked caramel glaze with the last of the brown sugar while the children played with the dough. Charlie Brown lay beneath a barstool, completely forgotten.
She peeled potatoes and set them to boil, whole. She watched carefully to remove them as soon as they boiled, and set them aside.
She tore romaine lettuce, boiled eggs, and cooked bacon. When Annalise demanded bacon, she allowed her a small piece and one for Brent, but when she wanted another one for Charlie Brown, Emma said no.
Annalise glared at her, took in two gulps of air, her mouth taking on the projected downturn, a signal for the coming shriek.
Emma stood directly in front of her and glared back without restraint.
“Don’t do it, Annalise.”
She said it in what she hoped was a non-threatening tone, but one that meant there would be no monkey business.
“Well, Charlie Brown needs a piece of bacon,” she said in a grownup voice, dipping her head in an elaborate motion.
Emma smiled.
“But if he eats it we won’t have enough for the salad.”
Annalise eyed Emma, then clambered off the stool and went to find her mother. Quickly, Emma detained her with a scoop of her arm, told her firmly that Mommy was working and she could not go up there.
“But I want to tell her I want bacon.”
“You can’t tell her, okay? She’s working.”
The kitchen was being filled with the scent of baking pies, the yellow cake giving off a rich buttery smell that gave Emma a pang of homesickness.
Kathy came down the open stairway, saying she couldn’t work with these outrageous smells seeping into her room.
Emma opened the oven door to check on the pies, then closed it again, placing the hot pad on the island countertop.
“It’s just apple pie.”
“Just!”
She threw her hands up, saying it couldn’t be ordinary, everyday apple pie.
“A cake, too.”
Kathy lifted lids, smiled, and oohed and aahed her way through the kitchen, then turned and told Emma she was truly a wonder. Any trace of the former animosity was gone.
“Thank you. But I’m afraid it’s plain Pennsylvania Dutch cooking.”
“It will be perfect. These men are your people, aren’t they?” Kathy asked.
“Yes. Except the driver.”
“I personally cannot wait to savor every dish.”
Kathy patted her shoulder, then said she was going for a run.
“Me come too!” Annalise shouted.
“Do something with her,” Kathy mouthed, before kissing the top of Brent’s head, tying her running shoes and letting herself out the door without as much as a glance in her daughter’s direction, who by now was taking deep breaths with the accompanying downturn of her mouth.
She scrambled off the barstool, threw herself at her mother, her cries gaining volume.
“Honey, oh honey. Don’t cry.”
“Me go too!” Annalise wailed.
Emma washed her hands at the kitchen faucet, then reached Kathy’s side in a few quick strides, gently lifted the howling child, and turned away.
Kathy let herself out, swiftly, leaving Emma to deal with the girl’s inability to accept a refusal to her will.
She sat on the sofa and held the small heaving child, who was crying heartbrokenly this time, without the usual kicking and screaming that accompanied her anger.
“Me go too!” was released between sobs and hiccups.
Emma thought of the food preparation, checked the clock, then told the children to get their sneakers, they were going for a run.
“Me go with Mommy!” Annalise wailed.
“No, Anna. We are going to do something else special,” Emma told her, putting her on the couch before heading to the bathroom for a ponytail holder.
The sun was so huge and so bright, the landscape washed clean by yesterday’s shower. Shore birds trilled or warbled or called in their high-pitched voices and the wind tossed the tall grasses and sent a fine layer of sand skidding across the oyster-shell driveway. Emma breathed in deeply, something she did without thinking. Oh how she loved the brackish smell of the low-lying pockets of salty water surrounded by the thick growth of sea grass.
What an absolutely perfect day!
The sky was so blue it made the ocean appear almost artificial, as if someone had painted the scene in an amateurish way. The white haze of humidity had been swept away by the storm, leaving this clear, gorgeous view, this world she would never want to leave.
“Hey!”
She turned to find him running up to them.
“Hey!” he said warmly, as if they were already old friends. “Do you want to take a walk tonight? On the beach? After a storm, there are thousands of shells.”
Emma watched his animated face, the way the sun ruffled his blond hair and revealed the darker copper colors underneath. His skin was bronzed from the days in the sun, and it was only the end of May.
“I probably shouldn’t consider walking with a stranger, so I guess you’d better tell me your name.”
He lifted his face to the sky and laughed, sobered, and said solemnly.
“Benjamin Glick, Junior. Ben is sufficient.”
“How do you do, Ben?”
The
y were both laughing when they shook hands.
“So it’s Ben. An honest, common Amish name,” she remarked. “Actually, I can’t go walking with you. You are supper guests at our house. At seven o’clock if I’m right.”
His eyes narrowed. “Have they come to an agreement, then?”
She knew nothing about a disagreement, so she said evidently they had.
He clearly did not relish the idea, but shrugged his shoulders in a good-natured way and smiled.
“Well, that takes care of the walk, then. Tomorrow night?”
She nodded.
“We could do that.”
“How’s everything going?”
“Alright.”
He saw the hesitation, the flicker of doubt, and made a mental note to ask her again when he could. He had to get back to work, and anyway they couldn’t have a real conversation with Annalise pulling on her hand, begging her to get going.
She lifted a hand, and he was gone.
What was this? So soon. A walk on the beach—the epitome of romance.
She stared across the glittering wavelets on the horizon, the doubts and misgivings crowding her senses.
“Hey, come on, Emma,” Brent said, coming back from his digging in the shallow sand by the driveway.
“Alright, here we go,” she said, taking off in a pretend fast run.
Annalise giggled, then lowered her head, pumped her arms, and ran on her short little legs, the white dress billowing around her. Brent was soon so far ahead she had to call him back.
When they reached the road, she made them turn around. There were passing motorists that would make it unsafe for small children. Annalise was breathing hard, real or make believe, but Brent was like a skittish young colt, seemingly able to run for hours without becoming winded.
When she heard the crunch of tires on oyster shells, she glanced over her shoulder, herding the children to the side as Roger drove the SUV to a standstill.
“Hello there, Emma. Returning from a walk?”
Roger hung from the window, a thin freckled arm looped across the top of the car door, his blue eyes open and friendly.
“Yes, in fact, we are.”
“Daddy! We were running!” Annalise shouted, breathing heavily in exaggeration.
“Good! See you at the house.”
She watched him unload shopping bags, then climb the front stairway with them. When they entered the sunny, white kitchen, he had already dumped the oysters, shrimp, and scallops in individual bowls. He opened a brown paper bag and sniffed.
“Mm-mm. The best clams on the eastern shore.”
The kitchen smelled as if he’d brought the ocean in with him. She looked forward to his cooking skills, hoped the simple food she had prepared would go well with the seafood.
When Kathy returned, there was a display of hugging and kissing, the children largely ignored, as Kathy tripped up the stairs as gaily as a teenager, trilling something about doing her nails.
Annalise fell asleep on the recliner, and Brent found a show to watch on TV after his father shooed him out of the kitchen. Emma was grateful she had gotten her baking done in the morning so she didn’t need to share the workspace with Roger.
“What? What is this?” he shouted. “Apple pie!”
Emma said nothing, dusted the top of the furniture, and pulled out the sweeper.
“Did you make these, Emma?”
“I did.”
“Oh my lady! How can this be true?”
He came close to her and bowed from the waist, an expression of worship on his face, until Emma couldn’t help herself. She burst out laughing.
“Oh come on,” she said, still smiling.
“When we hired you, I had no clue we were getting a pastry chef in the deal. Give the lady a raise!” he yelled.
Kathy was on the stairs, checking on the ruckus from her husband.
She laughed, but it was more like china breaking, a forced sound that held no merriment at all.
“The lady doth bake!” he shouted again.
“Oh come off it, Roger. It’s not as if you’ve never had an apple pie before.”
“Oh, but honeybun. These pies will delight the palate, no doubt.”
Emma started the vacuum and turned her back to escape Kathy’s answer. She stayed intent on her work. By the time the stemware was washed and dried, it was too late for a shower, so she merely ran a comb through her hair and took a washcloth to her face. She changed into an olive-green dress and called it good enough.
Kathy floated down the stairs, a vision in a summery dress of pastel yellow, her arms bare, her hair a beautiful blond halo. Roger had no time to change, with the streamer going, measuring spices and oils, managing to create the biggest mess Emma had ever seen. There were at least half a dozen dishcloths laying in disarray, two tea towels around his neck, and one protruding from the pocket of his apron. The ceramic tile floor was slick with oil and water, the blender splattered with green. She tried to stay out of the way, but had to assemble the salad and make the dressing without getting caught in the hurricane that was Roger in the kitchen.
Precisely at seven, the crew came tromping up the stairs, with Kathy flushed and eager, her manners impeccable, making the five workmen feel at home immediately.
What a beautiful woman, Emma thought. She withdrew to the background, remembering that she was the help, not the hostess or a guest. She served the children’s dinner on trays and supervised the meal before taking them upstairs for their bath and bedtime story. Then she reappeared to fill her own plate and eat at the bar that ran along one side of the patio.
These had been Kathy’s instructions, making it clear that after the meal was served it was her duty to look after the children until they fell asleep. They were not to be brought to the table for any reason other than an emergency.
The table was set on the patio with Kathy seated to Ben’s right and Roger at the head, presiding over the meal. Daniel sat to his left and the three others next to him. They talked about the renovations, each one trying to impress the others with their knowledge or wit or experience. The workers complimented the seafood, tossing empty shells into big bowls and heaping more potato salad onto their plates.
Emma watched Kathy lean into Ben, touch his arm, and gaze unabashedly into his face. She told herself it was nothing—another cultural difference between the English and the Amish. Ben stayed polite but aloof, which seemed to fuel Kathy’s eagerness until it became obvious she was speaking exclusively to him and ignoring the rest of the table, which initiated darts of disapproval from her husband.
Emma served the apple pie with vanilla gelato, which was evidently an Italian ice cream. She had never heard of it, but she found it smoother and even better than ordinary ice cream. The cake brought plenty of praise.
“Who made the desserts?” Ben asked.
“I did, of course!” Kathy quipped, slapping Ben’s arm playfully.
“It was Emma, the pastry queen,” Roger said levelly.
She was partially hidden by a tall houseplant, so there were no comments in her direction. The meal wore on and on, so Emma began cleanup, her back to the diners who were ready for coffee, which she served properly.
When Ben caught her eye, she looked away immediately. She was still washing dishes when they all trooped over to the house to discuss the ongoing work.
Emma sighed deeply, went to the bathroom, then sat down at the bar with a huge slice of cake. She poured a tall glass of tea over ice and enjoyed the time alone before finishing up the cleaning.
The kitchen was spotless when she went back out onto the deck to enjoy the moonlight path on the water, the dark swaying of the grasses, the absolute charm of this lovely strip of land that lay between the ocean and the bay. She would never tire of breathing in the scent of water and salt. She wished she could bottle it to take back home in September.
The day had gone okay with only a few minor blips. Everyone had enjoyed her potato salad and the desserts. She refl
ected on the day’s preparation, the baking and cooking and cleaning, how different her culinary habits were from Roger’s. But she really liked Roger, she decided. He felt almost like a brother or a cousin. He was funny, unpretentious. You would never imagine he was a surgeon at this young age, but perhaps he was older than he appeared, or gifted, sailing through classes in double-quick time.
Staring across to the sandy beach, she tried to imagine what her walk with Ben would be like. Did she want it to be romantic or not? A walk on the beach could easily just be a walk on the beach, as long as you kept your priorities straight. That was the most practical way to view it. Just a simple walk on the beach, nothing more.
She asked Kathy if she could leave at seven and if, perhaps, she and Roger could do bedtime that night.
She was met with lowered brows, a thin line of irritation appearing between them.
“Not really, Emma. We are both extremely pushed.”
“What?” Roger’s voice drifted from the living room.
“Emma wants off at seven.”
“Why can’t she?”
“Are you putting the children to bed?”
“Of course. I’m not doing anything.”
“Yes you are. The Sheffields are coming over for drinks.”
Roger leaned against the doorframe, a slight figure in cargo shorts and an old T-shirt, as if he still attended high school.
“No they aren’t. That guy is a bore, I mean, a total . . .”
He spun a forefinger close to his temple.
“Really Roger? A mere ‘no’ would have sufficed.”
“Well no, then.”
“Well, okay then.”
Kathy smiled at her boyish husband and everything was set straight, although Emma employed every ounce of willpower to keep from laughing at the spinning forefinger.
At 6:30 Emma showered, dressed in her pale pink dress, black apron, and white head covering. She decided to go barefoot—no reason to wear sandals on the beach in the evening, when the sand would no longer be fiery hot. She glanced in the bathroom mirror, pleased to notice the disappearance of quite a few freckles, the deepening tan on her face, the sun streaks in her hair.
The evening was too perfect, like a stage set for a play, with the evening sun painting everything with a pink glow. She peered out of the upstairs window and found the sight almost indescribable, the beauty of a seaside evening on the cusp of summertime.