Georgia’s Kitchen

by Jenny Nelson

“Yeah, I figured. How’ve you been, Georgia?” He licked his lips and fixed them in a pout. His skin was so bronze he’d either just returned from South Beach or a session at Portofino Sun Tanning.

  “Great. Good. Opening a restaurant.”

  “Figured that too. Congratulations.” He jangled the keys in his pocket, then ran a hand through his black hair, which was now a shade beyond shoe polish. Anything to hide the gray.

  “Thanks. What are you doing here? I thought you were in D.C.”

  “Nah, that town sucks. It’s all politics and nerds. Boring with a capital B. I’m opening up a place in Jersey. It’s gonna be great.”

  “I’ll bet,” Georgia said. “Well, sorry about the Marzocco.”

  “No biggie. I’ll buy a new one. Money’s not a problem. Anyway, the used ones break down all the time.”

  “Right.” Georgia stifled a laugh. He hadn’t changed a bit.

  A burly guy in a plaid jacket wheeled out the espresso machine on a dolly. “Where do you want this?” he asked Georgia.

  “My friend will be out front with a car in a second. You can leave it here for now, thanks.”

  The guy turned to Marco. “What about you? I got all those plates and pots and pans and forks and knives and all that other shit you bought. Where do you want it?”

  Marco glared at him. “I was bidding for a friend. You’ll have to ask him, since it’s not mine.”

  “I don’t care who it belongs to. I just gotta get it outta here. Let me know when you find your friend.” The guy walked away.

  “Where the hell is he?” Marco muttered, scoping out the restaurant over Georgia’s head.

  She peered out the window, where Bernard had just pulled up, double-parking the van he’d borrowed for the day. After dropping off the Marzocco at their restaurant, they had a bunch of smaller equipment to pick up on Bowery, which would save on delivery charges. Every dollar helped. “I don’t know where your friend is, but mine’s out front. It was good to see you, Marco. Good luck with the new place.”

  “Yeah, you too. Good luck with your new toy.”

  Georgia walked outside to greet Bernard while Marco took off, presumably to look for his pal.

  “Who were you talking to?” Bernard asked.

  “Marco.”

  “The Marco?”

  “The Marco.”

  “What’s he doing back in New York? What happened to D.C.?”

  “My guess is that Marco was too slimy even for D.C. He’s opening a place in Jersey, and I beat him out on the Marzocco. He also cleaned out the whole restaurant, even the flatware, and then pretended none of it was his. I’d say our old boss is not in a good way.”

  Bernard chuckled. “Awww, poor Marco.”

  “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I sort of feel bad for him. Two years ago he was on top of the world. Now he’s scrounging for chipped china. What if that happens to us, B?”

  “Not a fucking chance.” Bernard pulled open the van’s doors. “And can you honestly feel bad for a guy who calls you ‘the chef-ette’?”

  Georgia shook her head. “Not so bad, I guess.”

  “Good. Now where’s the Marzocco? We have places to go.”

  The guy rolled the dolly onto the sidewalk. “This your friend?” he asked, gesturing to Bernard.

  “Yeah. And he’s also my partner.” Georgia squeezed his arm. “Thank God for that.”

  Standing outside the Oven, wearing a wool hat pulled low, leather gloves pulled high, and a knee-length coat, Georgia hopped from boot to boot, trying to keep warm and to settle her nerves. She had a date. For the first time in her post-Glenn New York City life, she had a date. And he was eight minutes late. Normally, this wouldn’t faze her. But since it was already eleven o’clock, and her days now routinely began at dawn, the clock was ticking.

  “Georgia,” a voice said behind her. A lovely voice.

  She pivoted on her toes, and Andrew Henderson stood before her. As promised, he’d called, she’d called back, and they’d embarked on a game of phone tag so endless it could have become an urban legend. Finally, a few nights back, they’d connected; she couldn’t remember who’d called whom. What mattered was that they were here, together.

  “Andrew. It’s great to see you.” Wearing her four-inch-high Louboutins—her lucky Lous, Lo christened them after Luca came through with the money—she and Andrew were just about the same height. They simultaneously bent in for the kiss, bonked foreheads a bit, and she got a whiff of his shaving cream, the drugstore kind that came in a peppermint-striped aerosol can. She liked it.

  “You too.” He wore a thick, navy blue duffel coat and jeans and looked as if he’d stepped out of a Kennedy family photo. This was not a bad thing.

  “So where are we going?” she asked. Midtown at eleven was not exactly teeming with options.

  “I thought we’d stay here,” he said, looking around him.

  “Here?”

  He pointed to the ice rink below, which looked slightly forlorn now that the tree was gone. A few die-hard skaters stumbled around the rink, but with the windchill at ten degrees, and without the tree looming overhead, the romance was gone. Even tourists thought the rink looked plain old cold.

  “You want to go ice-skating? Now?”

  He nodded. “Why not? We’ve got an hour before it closes.”

  “Ice-skating,” Georgia said, realizing how little she actually knew about Andrew. “At Rock Center. Is this a typical date for you?”

  Andrew laughed. “Don’t worry, Georgia, I’m not some freaky Ice Capades fanatic. You’ve been in a restaurant all day, and when you weren’t physically in a restaurant you were thinking about restaurants, so that pretty much rules out going to a restaurant. Besides, it’s eleven o’clock, it’s a school night, and the rink is right here. What do you say?”

  “All right. I guess I’m game.”

  While Britney or some other deposed pop princess sang breathlessly about broken hearts and broken promises, Georgia and Andrew lurched onto the ice. Their ugly brown rental skates were as sharp as soupspoons, and within minutes Andrew’s feet flew out from underneath him and he landed smack on his butt. He pulled himself up while Georgia tried to look sympathetic.

  “This wasn’t my idea,” she reminded him. “But it is sorta fun.”

  On their first painfully slow loop, they skated single file, heads down, hands clutching the rail. Between the boppy music and the slippy ice, there wasn’t much room for conversation, beyond the occasional “I haven’t been on ice skates in ages” or (mostly from him) “Oh, shit.” During the second, slightly less sluggish loop, Georgia dared venture away from the rail and next to her date, and they started talking, beginning with a topic they both knew: his mother. Andrew quickly put the kibosh on that one, and they moved on to another topic they both knew: restaurants, namely hers. By the fourth, still-speedier loop they’d covered favorite movies (his, The Sting; hers, To Kill a Mockingbird); first real job (his, runner at the New York Stock Exchange; hers, garde-manger at Simon Says); last relationship (his, the aforementioned Lisa; hers, Glenn); favorite thing to do on a rainy Sunday (both: matinee, followed by an overpriced late-afternoon lunch). On the fifth-and-fastest-yet loop, he took her glove in his, and they skated hand in hand without saying a word… for a whopping twenty feet, when the loudspeaker announced that the rink was closing.

  “I guess our Tai Babilonia–Randy Gardner moment is over,” Georgia said.

  They returned their skates and walked side by side to a nearly empty Fifth Avenue. Having reached that slightly awkward point of the date where they could either share a cab or go their separate ways, they both peered up the avenue, looking for the vacant taxi(s) that would determine their fate.

  “Hmmm,” said Andrew. “Doesn’t look like there are any cabs.”

  “No. I guess we could—”

  “Walk?”

  “Sure,” she said, glancing down at her Louboutins.

  Andrew held out his hand, and Georgia sli
pped hers into his, instantly forgetting about her pinched feet. He took her other hand and they stood looking at each other for a second or two before he leaned forward and kissed her, softly, on the lips. When they pulled away, they grinned that first-kiss grin at each other, the one that says “I like kissing you and I think I might really like kissing you.” She pulled him toward her and they kissed again, and this one was long and warm, and she felt that pinging in her belly, and she knew that she could absolutely learn to love kissing Andrew. He cleared his throat and looked down so she wouldn’t see the smile playing out on his face, but she did, and she knew he was thinking the same thing.

  “So,” Andrew said, grinning, and this time looking directly at her. “Shall we?” He held out his arm.

  “Yes. Let’s.”

  “Want to take Fifth?”

  “Nope,” she said. “I’m over Fifth. Let’s go Park.”

  They walked slowly despite the frosty air, coming to a complete stop at every crosswalk. With the streets almost empty, their chances of getting mowed down by an irate driver seemed slim, but after the Sally incident Georgia wasn’t taking any chances. Besides, it was the best walk she could remember taking. They turned onto her block, stopping shy of her building’s awning, so they could say good-bye without an audience. Within seconds, they were kissing.

  “You know, I’m glad you didn’t invest,” Georgia said when they finally broke their embrace.

  “So am I.”

  Georgia raised an eyebrow.

  “Not because I don’t think you’ll be a smash success. But if I had, I couldn’t be here. And I’d rather be here.”

  “Me too. And if you play your cards right, you may get an invite to our opening party.”

  An elegantly dressed white-haired couple approached the building, and Andrew stepped aside to let them pass. The man motioned with his hand to his head, as if to tip the hat that wasn’t there.

  “So,” Andrew said. “I really had a great time tonight, Georgia.”

  “I did too.”

  He reached out and touched her cheek. “I’ll call you.”

  “Good. I’ll count on it.”

  He kissed her once more, then headed uptown for the seven-block walk to his apartment.

  This year, instead of a preholiday jaunt down Fifth, Georgia had taken a postholiday stroll up Park. It was too soon to say whether it was a new tradition in the making, or just new. But she’d find out.

  “We got it!” Bernard blew into Georgia’s apartment, pumping both fists in the air.

  “Got what?” Poised with a pink marker in her hand, Georgia crouched by one of the many whiteboards with which she and Sally now shared their apartment. She turned to look at her partner. “And why are you acting like you’re at a Black Sabbath concert?”

  “Robert from JAM just called.” Bernard paused to catch his breath. “We got the C of O!”

  They’d been waiting for the certificate of occupancy, the series of licenses that would allow them to open Nana’s Kitchen, for weeks. The puzzle was complete.

  “We got it? Oh, Bernard, that’s fantastic!” Georgia leaped up and threw her arms around his neck. Bernard’s hands encircled her waist and they jumped up and down until they were both breathless, Sally barking at their heels.

  When they stopped hopping, Bernard gazed down at Georgia, whose hands had slid to his chest. She dropped her arms to her sides and took a step backward.

  “So now what, B?”

  He pointed to the five whiteboards leaning against the wall, lined up like cars in a train. Though he’d never cop to being superstitious, he refused to erase anything once it had been checked off, afraid it would somehow undo the action. He bought a fresh whiteboard every time they ran out of space. Though she indulged him this pricey quirk, she stopped short of allowing him to hammer into her walls and hang them like paintings.

  “Would you like to do the honors?” Bernard asked.

  “I’ll let you. These boards are much more your thing.”

  Bernard knelt by the last one, where only one square of a dozen remained blank. He rummaged through the mug of markers until he found the one he wanted. “Here it is,” he said, popping the top of the cherry red marker. He drew the final check with a flourish. “Checkmate.”

  “I can’t believe it. We’re really opening.”

  “Yes, we really are.”

  “What do we do now?” Georgia bent down and scratched Sally’s ears. “I suddenly feel like I need to go for a run, or do a cartwheel or dunk my head in the East River or—”

  “Drink vodka and eat caviar at Petrossian?”

  “Exactly. That’s exactly what I need to do.”

  Bernard lit the final votive and blew out the match in his hand. “There.”

  Standing with her back against the bar, Georgia directed an appraising eye around the room. After three go-rounds, the walls were finally the perfect color: a burnt sienna that cast a warm glow during daylight hours and grew cozier as the sun went down. The walnut floor, reclaimed from an old farmhouse in upstate New York, had needed nothing more than tung oil to bring out its natural patina. Diaphanous drapes covered floor-to-ceiling windows; on warmer days they would be pulled back, the windows thrown open, and a handful of tables set upon the small bluestone patio next to the entrance. A huge antique mirror backed the bird’s-eye maple bar, and custom built-ins along the wall housed simple stem- and glassware.

  In the center of the room a vintage Murano chandelier was ablaze with tiny white lights. Bouquets of calla lilies, kumquats, and eucalyptus leaves in burlap-covered vases were placed around the room alongside glass votives wrapped with twine. On the buffet table, servers set platters of grilled vegetables, cheeses of all shapes and sizes, various pestos and spreads, trays of cured meats, and plates of multihued, bite-size canapés. The only thing missing were the tables, chairs, and barstools, which still hadn’t arrived from the mill in North Carolina. Ever industrious, Bernard arranged for an acquaintance who ran a banquet-supply company to drop off a slew of ballroom chairs and tables in exchange for an invite to the opening party. If the furniture didn’t show in two days, there’d be trouble, but for now all was okay.

  “It does look great, doesn’t it?” Georgia said happily. She turned to her partner. “And so, I must say, do you. Very natty, Bernard. Must be the French in you.”

  Bernard wore a navy velvet jacket and a red-and-blue silk tie with slim trousers. Though quintessentially American, he’d inherited the Frenchman’s flair for dressing (in addition to his love of red wine and punk rock—Georgia had yet to meet a French guy who wasn’t fanatical about both).

  “And you,” he said, “look even lovelier than our restaurant.”

  Her hair was pulled back and tied at the neck with a simple black ribbon, frizz factor a barely there two. Wavy curls framed her face, which, save for a few coats of black mascara and a swipe of red lipstick (the red lipstick, courtesy of Charlotte Troy), was bare. She wore a sleeveless melanzana dress that nipped in slightly at the waist and strappy black sandals. Cabochon amethyst earrings (borrowed from Lo, of course) dangled from her ears, and a ring with a jade stone carved into an elephant’s head, her old pal Ganesh, sat on her left ring finger. A gift from Lo and Clem to celebrate the opening, it was only the second ring she’d worn since graduating culinary school, and it fit a whole lot better than its predecessor.

  “We did it, B. We really did it.”

  “We sure did. To us, a good team.”

  The four months between Georgia and Bernard’s random run-in at Barnes & Noble and the opening party had been packed with as much drama, cuticle biting, and curl pulling as a Falcon Crest rerun. Would they get the money? Would they get the additional money? The space? The staff? The certificate of occupancy? The liquor license? Their quest seemed endless, but it had ended in the right place, in the right way, and even, Georgia thought, at the right time.

  “Good? Look at this place.” Georgia gestured to the restaurant with an open palm.
“Don’t you mean great?”

  “You’re right. To us, a great team.”

  Absent any drinks, they bumped fists, laughing as they recalled the first time they’d exchanged those words. The night Mercedes Sante reviewed Marco seemed like a lifetime ago; it was hard to imagine that not even a year had passed. There was no telling what might have happened had the restaurant got the three forks it was due, but one thing seemed certain: it couldn’t beat opening Nana’s Kitchen.

  In a few minutes, the party would start. Guests would arrive, hors d’oeuvres would be nibbled, drinks consumed in rapid succession. A cleanup crew would roll in shortly before midnight, sweeping up all traces of the party so that at the next day’s mandatory staff meeting, the restaurant, if not the staff, would be well scrubbed and well rested. A week later, Nana’s would officially open its doors and anyone who’d wondered if redemption was possible after a crushing, half-fork review could find out for themselves.

  “Yoo-hoo!” Clem shouted as she walked in the door. “George, you were right. I never thought I’d notice a door handle, but it’s really beautiful.”

  “See?” Georgia said to Bernard, who had balked at the price the Vermont metalworker charged for a simple door handle. “I told you. It’s all in the details.”

  “Right.” Bernard nodded his head while staring at her. “It’s all in the details.”

  Lo arrived next. “This place looks amazing. I can’t believe that just four months ago it was the home of the Suds ’N Buds Laundromat.”

  The head server peered out from the kitchen. “Do you want us to start passing?”

  Georgia and Bernard looked at each other and then back at him. “Ten minutes,” they said in unison.

  Clem frowned. “It’s sorta creepy how in sync you two are.”

  Dorothy and Hal walked in before Georgia could respond, and she ran over to her parents.

  “I’m so glad you got here before everyone arrived,” she said. “How’s the hotel? I hope it’s okay. They said they’d upgrade your room. Did you get the flowers and fruit basket—”

  “The hotel is wonderful. And they’re really giving us the VIP treatment. It’s good to have a daughter who’s a famous chef!” Dorothy wore a royal blue raw-silk tunic over flowing black pants, and a double strand of chunky lapis beads hung down to her belly.