by Jody Sharpe
“Actually, Gram, I can’t wait. You know I wish I’d never have left Mystic Bay now. What a complete fool I was.”
“Oh yes, you should have. You had to find out for yourself if Brian was the right one. No one could tell you what to do.”
“I know you and GG didn’t think he was good enough, but you’re prejudiced.”
“Well, Honey, we love you and want you with someone who values you; that’s the bottom line.”
I feed King and he wolfs down the large portion in five seconds like he usually does. We should put it on YouTube. It could be titled…King Inhales Dinner. Cookie has already eaten like she’s a young starving puppy too. Pouring us each a cup, I sit down with Gram at the antique table.
“I made vegetable lasagna last night and put it in the fridge for you and GG. I won’t be home till after midnight for sure. Do you want me to bring a couple of pieces of apple torte from Jack’s for your lunch on my way to babysit?”
“Well, yes, please but only if you have time and they have extra. We’re thrilled that our little cook is here to stay, keeping us company.”
“Me, too.” I smile listening to her plans for the day, but as she talks my mind strays, glancing around the kitchen where I love to cook while watching the dogs and cat just chilling out. Lost in thought, I visualize my childhood growing up slow within the loving walls of this old house. GG and Great Grandpa Joe built it with love and care for Gram. Then Gram lived with them after her husband left and brought my mother up here too. Then I came along. Strange how the idyllic pattern changed when my Gram’s husband left; my grandfather Sean Malone and then my mother left too. Gram tries to hide it, but I know she’s beyond hurt; you can see it in her clear blue eyes. She never speaks of my biological mother anymore. She can’t go there. I go over and give her a big hug and smile as GG walks in with her walker. She’s pretty darn fast. Maybe she really doesn’t need it.
“GG, let me help you.” I pull the chair out and she sits down. Her snow-white hair catches the light peeking in the window. June gloom is leaving as the month of July moves in. GG’s infectious smile warms my heart. At one hundred and counting, she’s still an amazing psychic and pretty darn strong. She says the walker is her safety net like flying circus acrobats use, like Cookies’ diaper.
“Oh Maggie,” GG almost gushes, “It’s such a treat having you here again. I can hardly believe it. We don’t want you to feel burdened by us. We have Mabel to tend to the housework. But, boy, can we take a breather from her cooking.” We all laugh Mabel has been with us for years. She’s dedicated and cleans up a storm, though she’s not known for her culinary skills. GG doesn’t have the stamina anymore to cook and Gram doesn’t like to, so Mabel’s tasteless meatloaf stuffed with leftover rice mixed-in with long shredded carrots, served with lumpy mashed potatoes is her best dish. You could lose weight in this house. Her talented husband Acedro is our landscaper and does such an extraordinary job that we’re on the local Garden Club’s tour every year.
“I’ll fatten you two up, GG.” I laugh and kiss my great grandmother on the forehead.
“I’ve got to get ready for work but I’ve already cooked a lasagna supper. And tomorrow I’m making you the honest to goodness best meatloaf in Mystic Bay, maybe even better than Mabel’s, maybe the best in the state.” I fix them fried eggs and toast then run upstairs to my room to get ready for my job at Jack’s By The Sea, the restaurant so near our house I can walk. Stella and Jack Benfield, the owners, and their grown kids, Jenny and her older brother Guy, are great family friends. Jack hired me this summer to make their famous dessert, the apple tortes, and to wait tables on the weekends with Jenny. All during high school I worked there setting tables and helping in the kitchen and waiting tables during vacations, home from college till I met Brian. Guy’s son, Patrick, a darling young boy with disabilities, will be one of my students in the fall at Mystic Bay Elementary and is a playmate of Emma Rose.
My clothes are folded neatly in the white whicker drawers and the tiny closet is filled to the max with color coordinated bulging hangers. I pet Blue, our eighteen-year old cross-eyed cat, as he stretches out on the puffy purple comforter. I never know where that cat is looking. His days consist of eating and taking a zillion naps and sometimes I hum a tune and he looks up as if he loves the sound of music. He especially loves it when I sing him to sleep. I wanted to take him with me to college and then LA, but we figured he was safer here. Now that I’m home the cuddling is non-stop. Who needs a man when an animal sleeps so close? Of course, I know I do.
When ready, I head downstairs and walk in the parlor where Gram and GG are sitting in twin red leather recliners. Cookie sleeps in her little red bed on the floor, and King wags his tail and sits on the plaid couch looking out the window facing the road. No need for a doorbell. When new clients see a big shepherd mix in the window barking, Gram goes out and coaxes them in. They soon find out that the large dog is just masquerading as a big dog but is really a playful puppy rolling over waiting for pats.
We say our goodbyes. Walking to work down Moon Road to Jack’s By The Sea, I touch a little tree limb feeling its pulse; it almost sings. The comforting hum of life vibrates around me. It’s an amazing thing, isn’t it? How lucky I am to have an angel in a dream send me home again.
2
Apple Tortes & Noah’s Ark
The misty summer morning with a tease of sun is still cool heading down Moon Road to Jack’s by the Sea. The seagulls are diving for their breakfast, the tide is out, and rocks form a layer of brown patterns on the sand. The long restaurant with grey shingles and big white sign with a giant fish on it always looks like home to me. A few cars are in the driveway.
The restaurant smells of yummy clam chowder and sour dough bread. As I walk in, Gor Don, the natural clown-like sous-chef greets me with his usual humor, “Ah Maggie, you’re the apple of my eye!” Gor Don’s mother named him for her two favorite men, Al Gore and Don Knotts. What a combo. He thinks that his name is very cool. Good thing he does. He is working hard and Chef Mario is here for a little while to get things started. He’ll come back at four again. He and Jack are bringing in fresh fish with Anthony, the older truck driver. I think Anthony has a crush on me. He smiles a grin with three teeth missing, and I smile back. I’m hoping he’s not an example of the kind of guy I’m likely to attract now, older and semi-toothless.
After dating a couple of guys in college proved a joke, I met totally cute Brian through a mutual friend and I was hooked. He was fun, smart and, after law school was heading for LA where his dream job would be waiting.. At first he actually seemed like the real deal and I was impressed. I played down the abilities of my psychic family, never telling him how I heard the hum of life especially in trees in Mystic Bay. Foolish me, moving to Los Angeles to be near him. What was I thinking? Love actually? I found a job right away with high school students with special needs. The kids I loved, but the over-crowded school made it hard to accomplish anything.
I say hello to all, wash my hands, put on the apron, and start slicing apples for the tortes. I make at least twelve tortes a day, sometimes more. Stella’s grandma’s recipe is a hit with everyone. We serve it warm with vanilla ice cream. I always have a piece if there are leftovers from the night before and bring Gram and GG some. I love it cold with no ice cream and a cup of coffee. I think Stella makes a few extra on the weekends just to give to friends like us.
Tad, the tan and muscular weekend bartender walks in. Why is he here? His white blond hair is slicked back. His green eyes wink at me. He’s a surfer with a white shiny toothy smile.
“Tad, hey, how’s the surf today?” I say. The attractive guy is my age but seems much younger.
“Epic, Maggie.” Then he flips my long brown ponytail. He teases me that I look like an Italian actress, Lianni Giovanni. That’s a nice compliment but it makes me wonder about my heritage, where my background comes from, and the father I’ll never know.
“Mornin, all you wild and wonderful peo
ple,” he jokes as he slips his surfer dude body past me. I catch a whiff of coconut sunscreen. It makes me wish for LA, a beach day, and a tan.
“Tad, what’s up?” says Jack, as he sets a box of fish on the floor.
“Hey, could I have an advance, Jack?” Tad’s always asking for advances. He told us his dysfunctional dad threw him out of the house up in the tony town of Hillsboro for “no good reason.” I feel sorry for him because he’s a nice guy, yet being nice doesn’t solve money problems.
“Sure, Tad,” Jack, the pushover says. “But why don’t you work a couple extra nights? Then you’ll have enough money and won’t have to ask.” Jack is a big old teddy bear of a man with a smile for everyone.
“Uh, sure, great. When do you need me?”
“Well, tonight and Wednesday are pretty busy lately. Dean is going to leave soon for graduate school, and I could use the help”.
“Okay. Tonight I’ll be here about five. Hey thanks . . . Bye, beautiful,” he says to me as I watch him walk away. I spill some flour on the floor as he leaves. Everyone laughs and I join in, “You know guys, Tad does have puppy dog eyes.”
“Yes, I think he has eyes for the lady with the scent of apples,” Gor Don kids.
These people make it easy to be myself. I think of Tad’s pretty but snooty girlfriend, Missy, a blonde beauty whose family owns a women’s clothing boutique in Hillsboro and another one in the Hamptons. Tad says she’s from a very wealthy family, was raised in the Big Apple. She comes in here every night he works and sips red wine, making sure none of the female patrons come on to him. Since Tad obviously is one big flirt, she looks each woman up and down as if to say, “Watch it, Sister.”
“All the girls like Tad,” sings short and stout Mario with his Italian accent. “Why not me? Look at me, I’m a puppy doggie too.” Using his index fingers, he pushes his eyes down at the corners to mirror Tad’s eyes.
Everyone laughs and Jack kids, “Yes Mario, you are handsome, but if memory serves me, you just got married to Sophia here last month? “
“Yes, of course, I adore Sophia, but all men want to be a little, you know, sexy to all the ladies!”
“Do you want to be, you know, sexy to the ladies, Jack?” Stella kids Jack with a pinch as she walks in. Her laugh is one of those contagious laughs, catching and sunny as she is. I’ve never seen salt and pepper hair so beautiful. Her beauty has passed down to Jenny. Their eyes are like identical twins, the prettiest chestnut brown.
Jack laughs, “No,” as he puts his arms around her waist tied with an apron. “Only you, my little rose petal.” Everyone hoots and whistles.
Jenny walks in, her long blonde hair tied in a ponytail too. “Hey everybody, what’s so funny?”
“How about Anthony, the handsome fish man for Maggie?” Mario kids me now.
“Stop it, Mario. I’m too young for him. He’s like sixty!”
Everyone laughs at me. I’ve known them all since I was a little girl and so I’m the one who laughs the hardest.
“We’ve got to find someone great for Maggie,” Jenny says with her arm around my shoulder. “Jason and I are looking for just the right guy this time,” she whispers to me.
Jenny and Stella are going to look for wedding dresses in San Francisco today. Since the end with Brian, Jenny and her fiancé Jason Doherty are trying to fix me up. Last weekend’s blind date flopped big time. Jason manages his dad’s tree farm, Phil’s Christmas Trees, and this guy, Lance, is their accountant. He’s very good looking and a math whiz, but with zero personality. Math whiz, I’m not, and so the double date ended like a comedy sitcom. He started apotheosizing how math is the language of the universe and I almost fell asleep, my head in the pepperoni pizza. Then Jason shared with him, much to my chagrin, my Great Grandmother and Grandmother’s talents as the town’s best-known psychics. Then he had to, of course, explain to him that I’m a wee bit psychic too. He made up a story that I could predict Lance’s future looking into his eyes. Suddenly, poor Lance didn’t feel well and left Bob’s Pizza fast as lightening. We laughed and ate the pizza he didn’t eat. Why waste Bob’s best pepperoni? We’ll laugh for eternity about that disaster. If I’d told Lance I heard trees hum he might have fainted dead away.
After all the tortes are in the oven and five are out cooling, Stella asks me, “Maggie dear, on your way out could you take half a torte to Madam Norma and Marilyn and half to Elena and Emma Rose? Wait till you meet that precious child. She and Patrick have such fun. You will be such a fine teacher for them both.” Stella hugs me.
“Thanks for the confidence. I can’t wait for school to start and wow, thanks for the tortes. Do you have enough though for tonight?”
“Every time you’re here I want you to take some okay? You’re such a help to us. Jenny is so thrilled you’re home and working here…and the wedding next month and you maid of honor. I can’t wait for you to pick out your dress if we can find that color. If not, I’ll have it made!” Stella is so excited and it’s fun to see it all happening. I can’t wait.
As the only attendant, Jen said I could choose anything as long as it’s shocking pink. I’ve looked in all the bride’s magazines we can find to no avail. After thanking Stella, I cleaned up my station.
This is a great job to make ends meet. Jack wants me to continue to wait tables on weekends when school starts. My dream job is really happening. Plus Jenny teaches fifth grade there too. And me? Just seven kids in a classroom, a job offered almost like magic from an innovative grant for the Mystic Bay Elementary School. My last job was so stressful and my relationship with Brian was so done. Then to have to live without Jeb was too much. But now I have a new beginning. I pick up the torte ready to leave when Stella says, “Oh, on your way, would you have time to take a torte up Bluff Road to Marshall Greenstreet and his son Noah?”
“Sure, which house do they live in?” Well now, I just might get to meet the dog jogger! This should be interesting.
“You go up Bluff Road below The Sea Watch Hotel and turn on Sea Watch Drive. Marshall has been so ill since his wife died. I take one up every two weeks but today I have to shop!” Stella continues as she walks out the door, “It’s the modern gray block and glass…they live next to July North’s new stone and white-shuttered house. You can’t miss it. The Greenstreet house has wrought iron gates that only close at night and the lawn has lots of statues of angels and animals. It’s quite a menagerie but somehow so serene. Thank you so much, dear.”
“I’m on my way.” I take the two tortes and walk home. I set them on the table. Since they’re big, I cut one in half and leave half out for Gram and GG and put the other half in a little basket for Elena and Emma Rose. I put the whole one for the Greenstreet’s in a pretty basket and tie it with a blue ribbon. Gram and GG are in the backyard sitting in the bench glider watching the birds and bunnies and the bright blue sky. The lawn sprinkler waves back and forth, filtering golden sunlight. Cookie is napping, snoring really, on Gram’s lap, and King’s head rests on GG’s lap as usual, ignoring the bunnies. He’s a lap dog, or at least, his head is. He sees me, gets up, and runs to me. As I kneel down to hug him, a bee buzzes near. But something’s peculiar. It has feathery golden wings, and I can’t recall ever seeing one like that before. I watch it fly away.
“Hi ladies,” I brought you half the famous apple torte from Stella. I’m taking the other half to Elena and Emma Rose.”
“Oh, that’s so sweet; our lunch today. I‘ll call Stella and thank her later. You will fatten us up for sure, dear,” Gram remarks.
I get up and tease them with a wink, “Oh, and by the way, I’m taking a torte up to Marshall Greenstreet and his son, Noah.”
GG sighs, “Oh, how wonderful. Please remember us to Marshall.” Before I can answer, she continues, “I have a feeling about Noah, Maggie. You are going to like him!” GG is teasing me back and takes my hand. “He’s handsome and kind.”
I roll my eyes. “Okay, GG, start planning. A Dog Beach wedding sounds good.”
>
Gram shakes her head. “You deserve someone more thoughtful than Mama’s Sonny Boy.” Our smiles grow into laughter. Brian’s mom used to call him her Sonny Boy. I think, which one of us was the biggest loser?
GG, reading my mind like she can at odd times pipes in, “He’s the loser and you know it.” Yes, she can really read minds upon occasion.
“Oh, GG,” I say, kissing her on the top of her head. “You’re so right.” We say goodbye and I get in my yellow mustang and head up Bluff Road, feeling a little pang in my heart. I thought Brian was the one, that my college romance would be the fairytale kind. But once I moved to LA, it became a fractured fairy tale. Then Jeb passed away, and I went home for Christmas, without Jeb, without Brian, without hope.
The scenic road almost commands me to stop and stare mesmerized by the rolling ocean. It seems to go on for forever. The Sea Watch Hotel stands like a castle on the tip of the bluff. Dotted below is an array of new custom built houses. Turning onto the winding road before the hotel sign, I pass a few lovely homes, including the inviting stone house with white shutters that must be July North’s. There is a star-shaped plaque on the gate that reads, “Northstar”. Next door to it, are the lacy wrought iron gates open to a yard full of angels and animal statues held in a beautifully manicured yard. The modern home is spectacularly built with large windows reaching to the roof. The gate also has a plaque on it, “Josephine’s Garden.”
I maneuver up the drive nervously because I’ll get to meet the very man who has intrigued me each morning these last few weeks. I hear the dogs barking in the back yard. Maybe I’ll only get to meet his father. I get out smoothing my favorite sweater, the red polka dot one, and I touch my hair, making sure the ponytail is in place. Another golden-feathered winged bee lands on my side view mirror. I’m captivated for a moment. It flies away. The trees on the Greenstreet property hum almost like a kitten’s purr. Finally centered, picking up the torte neatly placed in the basket, I walk up the stone steps and ring the doorbell. More barking ensues, this time from within.