by Tess Lake
“… need to chill the plate if that's going to solidify properly. Oh Harlow, finally, you answered. We're about ready so you need to get down here now,” Mom said.
“What you mean, finally answered?” I said, but already the line had gone dead. She'd hung up on me.
My cousins appeared to have had similar conversations. Luce was scowling at her phone. Only Molly seemed relatively unaffected. She smooched Ollie on the cheek and then plucked a small piece of lint off him.
“It'll be fine. Let's go drink some wine,” she rhymed again.
I saw Jack smiling to himself. He'd been present at plenty of Torrent witch disaster dinners too but he mostly thought they were funny as everything careened off the rails. I grabbed him by the arm, pulled him out the door and everyone followed along.
When we stepped inside the four men started sniffing like bloodhounds at the smell of delicious food emanating from the kitchen.
“Oh what is that? It smells like dumplings,” Will said.
“Yeah, that's a dumpling, some delicious sauce,” Ollie said. The four of them were so mesmerized by the scent that they hadn't noticed the dining table. Someone had put out three enormous candelabras with candles in them that were burning brightly. The lights had been turned down and so we were definitely in mood lighting for this dinner. It would have looked incredibly romantic except of course there were multiple chairs around the table and we knew we were going to have a crazy amount of people for dinner, including possibly one extra crazy costume designer. I was happy that Henry G at least was coming. I didn't know exactly what Aunt Cass's plan was but Henry G was witty and hilarious, and I'm sure would be delighted to meet the moms and to see Aunt Cass saying crazy things.
“Where is Aunt Cass?” Luce asked.
“Speak of someone fabulous and they shall appear!” Aunt Cass said from behind her.
“Ahhhh!” Luce squealed jumping in place.
Aunt Cass walked around to the head of the dining table, looking over the eight of us with an appraising eye.
“Ah, the four sets of young lovers. So glad you could bring your passionate selves to dinner,” she said.
Luce and I shared a look again. It was one that said oh no, she is definitely up to something. Will and Ollie had plastered on faint smiles because they didn't know quite what to say. Only Jack laughed.
“So poetic this evening Cassandra,” he quipped.
“That's because it is a night for love, a night for passion and poetry my darling Jack-o'-lantern,” Aunt Cass said and then gave him a wink.
“Does anyone want any wine?” Luce asked, heading for the nearest bottles.
Before we could answer the three moms came bursting out of the kitchen, looking very flustered indeed.
“Oh good, everyone is almost here. Take a seat and as soon as Sheriff Hardy has arrived we'll begin,” Aunt Freya said.
The moms were quickly greeting everyone when there came a knocking at the front door.
“Oh my, I wonder who that is,” Aunt Cass said, barely concealing a grin.
“I assume Sheriff Hardy?” I said.
“Assume away, my fine feathered friend,” Aunt Cass said and then winked at me. She pulled the door open to reveal it was in fact Sheriff Hardy, but there were two men also standing by his sides.
Behind me Mom and Aunt Freya gasped so sharply that I swear I almost felt myself get pulled back by the force of the wind.
I thought I recognized one of the men - he was the manager of the local Harlot Bay Bank. A long time ago we'd overheard that my mom had been possibly seeing the local bank manager, but we hadn't dug any further into that. If this was indeed the bank manager that she was secretly seeing invited to dinner, then that could only mean that the other man was Boris the cheesemaker, who Aunt Freya was seeing.
Both the men were in their fifties but couldn't have been dressed any more differently. The bank manager was wearing a beautiful suit and carrying what looked to be an expensive bottle of wine. The man who I assume was Boris was carrying a rough paper sack with Dubois Cheese Company printed on it. He was dressed in a simple pair of black pants and an open-necked blue shirt. One appeared to be a man who worked with his hands and the other one appeared to be a man who worked with other people's money. I say that in the nicest of terms because both men were trying to put on a warm face when confronted with all of us behind the doorway, staring at them.
“Come in, come in. Welcome to our dinner. Everyone, this is Varrius Dixon, bank manager and Delilah's paramour, and this young gentleman here is Boris Dubois master cheesemaker and Freya's new love,” Aunt Cass said.
There was a moment of shocked silence before Sheriff Hardy cleared his throat and gave everyone a smile.
“And me, Sheriff Hardy, who you already know,” he said and came in.
“Very nice to meet you all,” I said.
“I brought cheese,” Boris said.
Sheriff Hardy walking in managed to pull the two other men in with him. Luce, acting on instinct, took the wine from Varrius and the cheese from Boris and gave them both glasses of white wine, which they quickly took a gulp of. I don't know what it was that Aunt Cass must've told them, but they clearly weren't expecting a gigantic family dinner.
We had a round of introductions then, Mom, Aunt Freya and Aunt Ro still somewhat frozen by the appearance of these men. I admit I got over the shock quite quickly because I was intensely curious about them. It's one thing to hear that your mom has a secret love life and it's quite another to meet the man himself. Luce for her part was looking through the bag of cheeses and then back at Boris, as though judging him by the quality of his produce.
“How did you all meet?” I asked. My question was to go unanswered because the moms finally snapped out of their daze. Mom and Aunt Freya gave Aunt Cass a look that could have killed a weaker woman. Both seemed to make a decision on the spot and then they rushed over to their respective men and smooched them right there in front of us.
“So glad you could come, I'm so happy to see you. Yes everyone, this is my paramour,” Mom said, giving Varrius another kiss and Aunt Cass a glare.
“And this is Boris, who is an astounding man,” Aunt Freya said, kissing him.
“Okay, okay, everyone sit down,” Aunt Cass said. There was a bit of shuffling then as we all figured out where to sit. Usually between me, Molly and Luce there was a bit of a fight not to sit directly next to Aunt Cass because then you would become the buffer between her and everyone else. But surprisingly Molly volunteered for this seat and pulled Ollie down beside her.
I sat down and then Jack leaned over and whispered in my ear “What exactly is your aunt planning?” he asked.
“I have no idea. It's possible she's gone mad,” I whispered back and took a sip of wine.
Barely thirty seconds had passed, people starting to make conversation before there was another rap on the door. This time Molly jumped out of her chair.
“Oh my, who could this be now at our door? Possibly another love?” she said, dramatically. She rushed over to the door and pulled it open… only to reveal Henry G standing there holding two bottles of champagne.
“Oh, um it's Henry G, that's your name, right?” Molly said.
“Were you expecting someone else, darling?” Henry G said and swept past her.
Peta jumped up from her chair and gave him a big hug and kiss, then Henry G went around the room like he was an MC, meeting everyone and saying outrageous things. Molly closed the door and returned to her seat, sitting down to face Aunt Cass.
“Are you playing with fire, my dear?” Aunt Cass said to her.
“I guess we'll see won't we, my darling aunt,” Molly said sweetly.
We made room for Henry G who quickly opened the two bottles of champagne. It wasn't long before the moms emerged from the kitchen carrying huge platters of food which they put onto the table. They had taken Boris's bag of delicious cheeses and whipped them up into an incredible platter. I recognized blue cheese, brie, camem
bert, and then there was a bunch of other cheeses that I had no idea what they were but they looked incredible. There was a quince paste, salami, prosciutto, black olives, green olives, artichoke hearts, cracked pepper crackers, celery, pretzels, basil pesto, some dried apricots, almonds and other nuts, a pile of grapes, figs, goat cheese, and then glistening sun-dried tomatoes in oil. That was just on one platter alone.
“Oh, that's gonna go straight to my hips,” Henry G quipped. Before anyone else could compliment that platter of food there was another knock on the door.
Molly shot up out of her seat like she was in the hundred yard dash and they had just fired the starting gun.
“Oh my, who could that be? Perhaps another lover?” she said, looking a little manic. She rushed to the door and pulled it open to reveal a man who was probably in his late sixties with gray stubble that was shaved close to the skin. He too was holding a bottle of wine and looked vaguely familiar to me.
Molly grabbed him by the arm and pulled him inside, closing the door behind him.
“Oh look who this is that I've invited to dinner tonight. This is Artemis Fogg who runs Fogg’s Island Tour Company, and in keeping with the theme of this evening is Aunt Cass's paramour,” Molly said.
“You can just call me Art,” Art said, looking around the assorted faces, clearly confused as to what was going on.
The moms may have been shocked when Aunt Cass had invited their loves to dinner, but it was nothing compared to the expression on Aunt Cass's face now. There was a moment of shock followed by a grimace in Molly's direction and then a scrambling recovery. She leaped up from the head of the table, grabbed Art and planted a passionate kiss on his lips. When they pulled apart, the poor man was gasping.
“Yes, this is him, my lover, Art. Welcome to dinner. This is wonderful,” she said. She pulled him across to the table and we all shifted down, Art taking Molly's place. There was another round of introductions, more wine and champagne poured, and then a pregnant silence as all of us looked at each other trying to work out what exactly was going on. Jack kept smiling to himself thinking this was the most hilarious thing he'd ever seen. Normally in events like this, I would feel a burst of anxiety or be worried something bad was going to happen, but for some reason I felt the same as Jack: I was laughing on the inside and just wondering what it was that Aunt Cass had planned.
The moms quickly returned to the kitchen and brought out more food. There was a platter of candied tomatoes on basil leaves and also some crispy bocconcini with a tomato chili sauce, and it turned out Will and Ollie's noses had been correct: there were a variety of dumplings served with a delicious dipping sauce. Given the moms had arrived home quite late, I honestly had no idea how they'd managed to make so much extraordinary food in such a short time. I was still personal training with Kaylee Osterman when I could, but with all this food in front of me I sent my deepest apologies to my thighs and dived in along with everyone else. In between bites I saw Molly lean over to Aunt Cass.
“Revenge is a dish best served cold,” she said.
“We'll see about that,” Aunt Cass said back in an undertone.
“Never send to know for whom the bell tolls: it tolls for thee,” Molly said.
“What are you doing?” I whispered to Molly.
“Don't you remember, when she cursed me to only say nice things about her? Well, this is my evening of revenge,” she said.
“I'm not sure inviting the guy that Aunt Cass is seeing to dinner exactly counts as revenge,” I whispered.
“Revenge!” Molly declared and stabbed a dumpling.
“How did you even know Aunt Cass was inviting the moms’ boyfriends anyway?”
“Saw Aunt Cass going into the bank a few days ago. Looked in the window and saw her talking with the bank manager. Put two and two together and it added up to a delicious opportunity for payback!”
The moms returned to the kitchen and brought out more platters of food: small ravioli served with a sauce, salad, and all our guests were eating not realizing this was just the entrée and there was still the main coming. The moms finally sat down after bringing out jugs of green tea that had ginger and mint in them. I had a quick taste and it was delicious, but tonight everyone was drinking wine and champagne.
The conversation around the dinner table was like a surging ocean, waves of it rushing in from all directions and soon everyone was laughing and drinking.
“The plan is that we'll open a café and then we're gonna beat those Magic Bean people. We'll have delicious food and a musician,” Luce said.
“One who is scruffy, very scruffy, the scruffiest musician there is, with blue eyes, incredibly blue eyes,” Molly said.
“We could supply you with some delicious bread,” Aunt Freya said.
“What can you tell me about the flour that bread is made with?” Luce said, waving a glass of wine that she’d perhaps had a little too much of.
“Um, it's flour and we use it to make bread,” Aunt Freya said, clearly confused.
“No, no, no, no, no. That's not going to do at all. Is it stone-ground or something? Does it come from the Scottish Highlands?” Luce said, taking another drink of wine.
“I'm not sure where it comes from exactly,” Aunt Freya said.
“Then we don't want it! We need bespoke! We need flour with a story! With a history! We need to tell a story with every ingredient that we're going to use in our café so we can beat those Magic Bean sons of… I mean Magic Bean people,” Luce said cutting herself off.
Aunt Cass zipped away from the table at some point and returned with a variety of chili sauces, which he placed down in the center of the table.
“These aren't the chili sauces that caused that problem are they?” Mom asked, wary.
“Don't worry these are not those. These are delicious ones that everyone should try,” Aunt Cass said. She dipped a dumpling in the chili sauce and then gave it to Art who ate it off her fork and then smiled back at her.
The dinner continued, the conversation surging. Ollie talked about how he was putting the posts that he'd been writing on his website together into a book of local history and then how he might publish it online for people to buy. That led to me talking about how I'd started writing a story about a ghost, and how I wasn't going to be doing much on the Harlot Bay Reader anymore. At this, Boris piped up.
“It's always good to do what you're passionate about. When I was young, I went into working in the law because that's what my father did. I even became a lawyer, but then one day I realized it wasn't for me and so I changed careers and now I make cheeses and I couldn't be happier. You need to find what makes you happy,” he said, beaming across at me.
“Thanks, that makes me feel a lot better,” I said to him.
Aunt Freya wrapped her arms around Boris and gave him a kiss on the cheek.
It certainly felt the night was in some crazy overload. Since our respective three fathers had left, we'd never really seen our mothers in any other role other than being mothers. Although we suspected there had been men involved, we'd never seen any at the house and apart from Aunt Ro getting together with Sheriff Hardy we had no real idea about our moms' love lives at all. Seeing them here in front of us was quite odd but there felt something quite right about it. It was as though there had been something missing from our lives for all these years.
“So Varrius, tell us an exciting banking story,” Aunt Cass said, dinging her glass with her fork.
Everyone focused their attention on Varrius who coughed and then took a big gulp of wine.
I noticed he had taken off his tie at some point and now had undone the top button of his shirt as he relaxed.
“There are no exciting banking stories. It's banking, what can we say? We had someone drop a small gold bar once in the bank and then it was lost for all of four hours. Wow, what an exciting tale,” he said with a smile on his face. Will laughed, although it wasn’t an entertaining story, the alcohol and the night certainly helping us along.
/> The conversation swirled around for a while as we ate before the moms returned to the kitchen and brought out the main course. The entrées had been quite exquisite but the mains they brought out looked like regular burgers at first glance.
“Buffalo turkey burgers with blue cheese, lettuce and broccolini slaw served with a side salad,” Aunt Ro announced.
They quickly served out the burgers and everyone dug in although we were full from the entrées.
“Oh I have died and gone to food heaven,” Henry G said.
I bit into my burger and groaned myself. It was utterly delectable.
“This is the type of thing you should serve at the café,” I said to Molly and Luce.
“Burgers for all!” Luce shouted out, definitely having had a little too much wine.
I took a quick trip to the bathroom and when I returned I touched Art on the shoulder as I moved by him. There was a sudden burst of sound, seagulls and ropes creaking, the sound of people talking and laughing, the gentle lapping of waves. It came and went in a moment. It was Art's history, his life I guessed. I sat down in my chair, smiling to myself and feeling quite good. Honestly, it was rare that a slip witch power turned out to be positive rather than negative. Feeling a little tipsy, the next time Boris reached out to grab some food, I did too and brushed my fingers against his hand. I heard cows mooing, sheep and goats bleating, and the sound of laughter. I tried again when Varrius reached from the last dumpling. This time I heard noise of a typewriter clacking away. Clack, clack, clack, ding. Behind it I faintly heard the sound of coins dropping onto a marble floor.
“Are you okay?” Jack whispered to me.
I realized I was smiling like an idiot.
“Yes, I am far, far better than okay,” I said.
Somehow the conversation swirled around back to the play and then to Hans being poisoned (which had since been confirmed by Sheriff Hardy).
“He's still in the hospital and it's both good and bad news. Because he didn't die there's a good chance he'll survive but because he's still unconscious it's not looking great. I can't say much more,” Sheriff Hardy said.