by Linda West
The kitchen in the new café was part of the ambiance. There was a small counter with a few bar seats where the regulars would soon sit to eat and put their two cents into what ever the chef was making. Open concept kitchen they called it. None of their darn business is what I called it.
I pulled out a dark IPA Vermont beer from my stash in the fridge and popped the cap off. This was going to be my secret ingredient. Each of the five of us girls on the team were trying out different chili, based on Grandma Izzy’s recipes, but with some new trendier additions that would be our very own creations.
The plan was for five of us to get together tomorrow night right here at the cafe, the eve of the contest. We would try each other’s chili and choose a favorite. The winner would then go on to represent the new Enchanted Cozy Café as our contest entry.
Between the five of us stellar cooks, we were sure to get a chili that would be a blue ribbon winner. I secretly hoped they would pick mine so I could gain a little cred around the place. I had tough competition with this group.
Dodie Anderson, boasted veteran experience and had taken first place at the Silver Bells Christmas Cookie Contest this year, aided by the Landers of course -so she was a sure to be a tough contender.
Summer Landers had been raised by the cooking legends so she had gourmet DNA in her blood.
Carol and Ethel had that darn magic recipe book from their mom…
But I had been trained in France.
After the betrayal by Lance in Paris, I couldn’t come straight home to face the unpleasant music. I needed time. So I sold my engagement ring, thankfully that wasn’t a fake, and took a French cooking class with the money. I was drunk through most of it, but I learned two things in my French cooking class that are the most important things to know about being a true gourmet chef :
How to add liquor to everything you make so it tastes ‘chic’.
How to be rude to customers who asked about the makings of said chic dish.
That’s another reason I got the job at the café – my French cooking skills. Wink wink. Actually I only had the French liquor skill to work with here in Kissing Bridge.
Rude didn’t fly on Kissing Bridge Mountain. Everyone was just too nice. They didn’t understand the chicness of being rude. It’s a place where people actually care about you and they take the time to say hello, plus they’re all pretty much Christmas crazy all year long. That and skiing and snowboarding. Actually anything in the snow, because Kissing Bridge EXCELS at snow.
Tonight I was trying out my third different chili recipe from Grandma Izzy’s recipe book – this one was You’re Gonna Love it Chili. A little on the nose, but I liked it. Plus I was going to add my dark Vermont home brew IPA that Earl up at the lodge had brewed himself. I think I had the winning combination, and I was eager to get cooking.
I also kind of liked the privacy of being alone after what I’d been through. Even though I’m extremely popular – just ask anyone - I found that I actually enjoyed the solace of cooking and baking. Making a great dish is so unlike life. Life just spits out whatever it wants like a kid that hates his peas. Splat on the plate. Baking you could rely on. In baking you could put in all the ingredients you were supposed to, and you could pretty much count on what would come out of the darn oven.
CHAPTER 5
Speaking of ovens, I jumped when the alarm went off reminding me that the cheese muffins I was making to go with the chili were done. I opened the oven, and basked in the smell of the fresh melted cheddar and tart tarragon spice I had ground into it. I took a spatula, and lifted a corner of one to make sure it was the perfect shade of tan done. It needed just another minute.
I pushed the tray back in, when the front door of the cafe swung open with a load bang and a little bell tingle. I lifted my head quickly and banged it on the top of the shelf. Ouch. Darn Aphrodite what had she gotten herself into? I was prepared to call her out, when a group of loud people bustled into the cafe, and they were all arguing. The only one I knew was Jackson Jennings.
Jackson was my boss Carol Landers’ ex fiancé. He was a short man with a shock of bright white hair that stood up a good three inches like he had seen something that made him afraid. He had the kind of eyes that were slit so you couldn’t tell the color or if they were really focused on you. He was wearing a bright green suit that was expensive, but obviously bought when he was much thinner, because his gut pushed at the buttons like it wanted to break free. Despite his bad style, initially my heart went out to Jackson.
He wasn’t particularly liked around Kissing Bridge, but I had heard the rumors of Carol Landers leaving him at the altar. I related to his heartbreak having recently endured a similar catastrophe in my own love life.
I started to say we weren’t open yet, when I was cut off rudely. Any heart connection I may have felt that bonded the two of us was gone the minute Jackson Jennings opened his mouth.
“Where’s Carol?”
He barked angrily. He stomped around the café like he owned it pulling his “date” with him. He dragged her around with him by her hand like she was a little poodle that wouldn’t listen.
The poodle wasn’t from Kissing Bridge; I didn’t recognize her and I knew just about everyone on the mountain. She looked like the little girl in Beatle Juice with too white a face and too dark of hair. She seemed to be about twenty-two, and as if she needed a pastry to fatten her up. I wondered what she was doing with a man old enough to be her grandpa?
“Carol!” Jackson screamed again loudly for some reason despite the whole place was pretty tiny, and she obviously wasn’t there.
“Carol.”
He looked behind the fireplace and inside the grate. He dug around the flames with the iron poker as if the senior was hiding there between the logs. I rolled my eyes.
He continued searching around the one room café chanting like a madman.
“Carol. Carol!”
As odd as he was acting, I found myself focused on the huge diamond on the Poodle’s hand. Was that an engagement ring? Was Jackson engaged to the Poodle?
After making his way through every corner of the café, Jackson finally walked over to the counter and picked up the crockpot which was half full of my ingredients, still looking for Carol as if she might have shrunken up and deiced to sit beneath it.
I snatched the crockpot back from him and looked at him sternly. No one touched Carol’s crockpot unless directed. This guy was looking for trouble.
“Jackson Jennings get your hands off my boss’s crock pot! Carol’s not here – and the café is not officially open yet!”
I pointed to the CLOSED sign on the door. “Any other time I’d let you look around, but I’ve got serious business here to get to, and we’re closed. Sorry.”
A whining moan like a dying hyena filled the room. I stiffened at the eerie sound. It was coming from the young man wearing a Harvard sweatshirt, and tight blue jeans, topped off with a blue parka. He was standing next to an older lady. His hair hung limply and was a dishwater-blonde and disheveled under his snowcap. He had his lip stuck out so far from pouting I couldn’t tell if he had a hair lip or just a horrible attitude. The mouth unfurled and demanded in a low long whiiiiiiiiiiiiine
“I’m hungry Uncle Jackson! You said there was food here!” The mouth appeared to work fine. Bad attitude it was.
He turned to the other lady, who appeared to be his mother with the same lifeless blue eyes and limp hair. She was dressed in all black with a single strand of pearls.
“I told you we shouldn’t have come here mom. He’s never going to change.”
The mother snorted in Jackson’s direction. “Gosh darn it Jackson do you have to be such a pompous arse always thinking about yourself? Let’s go someplace else the young lady said they’re not open and Frankie needs to eat or…” Jackson snarled at her.
“Why did you even come to Kissing Bridge? You’re just here hoping I’ll croak soon so you can steal my money.”
The dish-washy mother�
�s white cheeks flamed a radish purple hue, and her face pinched up like the bottom of a fig.
“You mean the money you stole from us!”
She curled her elegant hands up into little balls and shook with fury, and I wondered if she was going to hit Jackson when she got up in his face. Than they all started yelling at once.
Bratty teenager guy started banging his hands on the counter to get his hunger needs across more dramatically, and I had to stop him right there. This counter was BRAND NEW. I had seen Carl Weathers come in just yesterday and put it in himself. Quartz is expensive. FYI.
“STOP!”
I had to yell to get their attention they were all arguing, even the Poodle.
“I’m sorry you’ll have to go. I’m cooking. As I said, this is important.”
I pointed to the obvious crockpot, and the onions and chilies ready for browning in the saucepan - and then gasped, as I smelled the cheese muffins over-baking.
I pulled out the tray of burnt muffins, and tossed the rack on the back shelf to cool. I threw my arms up in the air exasperated.
“Now I’ve burned my muffins!”
Bratty Harvard guy opened his mouth to protest again, I’m pretty sure he was going to repeat his complaints about being hungry again, but he must have seen the evil look in my eye and backed off.
Just in case they didn’t realize the headspace I was in, I brandished my spatula to bring home the point.
“You!” I pointed to Jackson who was the leader of this idiot entourage. He looked at me with wide eyes but he stopped yelling. Poodle chick broke away from his slimy old man grasp and slipped outside and lit a cigarette. I tried to calm myself and be professional, but I didn’t put my spatula down.
“Jackson I will tell my boss, Carol, that you were looking for her when I see her tomorrow. My guess she is home with her HUSBAND – Dr. Archibald.”
I pointed at the other two, and said through grated teeth, “We are not open on this side yet, but you can go next door to the Landers’ Bakery side and they will gladly serve you food.”
Oooh how I wanted to throw in some of my trained French rudeness right now! But I refrained. I resorted to aggressively waving my spatula around again just for effect. I must have looked imposing enough because they all stopped their nonsense and looked at each other.
The fig-faced lady made a haughty gesture and said disdainfully, “The front door was open, you shouldn’t keep the door unlocked if you’re not open - everyone knows that.”
Her stupid son nodded in agreement.“Yeah everyone knows that.”
Oooh what I wanted to say.
What I did instead, was point wordlessly, once more, with even bigger strokes from my spatula, towards the door with the CLOSED sign on it.
They complained amongst themselves for another minute, and then finally grumbled there way out the front wooden door.
When I heard it shut, I breathed a sigh of relief. I instinctively reached for the bottle cap from the beer I had used to flavor the now burnt muffins. I felt the cool hard ridges of the cylindrical steel cap roll around in my hands, and wrapped my fingers around it lovingly. With one perfect motion, I snapped the cap with perfect precision - and a bit of annoyance -and it flew out of my hand like a bullet.
The silver bottle cap zipped across the room, banked off the bookcase, and flicked the lock mechanism on the front door to the lock position with a defiant click.
Closed, like I said.
CHAPTER 6
I locked up the café, and started home around nine o’clock. It was an extra cold night even for Kissing Bridge, and I lamented the loss of my wheels and the fact that I was back where I started.
I walked along the main street, and then turned off on Oak Ridge where I lived. The wind was blowing a weird ominous howl through the bare branches as I continued walking home in the dark cold night with Aphrodite clinging to my neck. Somehow I felt protected by her little white furry body, though I’m not sure attack cat is how I would describe her. More wuss. Maybe if you could attack with an irritating meow.
I wondered why I was thinking I needed protection? I did feel a strange sense of dread that was pretty unusual. Kissing Bridge was as safe a place as Mayberry RFD. I had walked these streets alone late at night without a thought since I was a young girl. Maybe it was the odd interaction with Jackson Jennings and his strange entourage? And why was he looking for Carol Landers? Maybe he still nursed a love for her deep inside. And that weird phone call with Mr. Maritime…
CHAPTER 7
I got home to find my dad asleep on the couch with The Voice on TV. I swear that shows goes on for four hours straight. No telling how long he had had it on. He was still in is work uniform, and Athena was curled up on his stomach sleeping. Every time Dad breathed hard her little kitty body rose up with it.
Athena is a cool cat. She’s black with large green eyes, and like her name she’s definitely the smartest of the group. If they’re getting in trouble I can blame it on Athena. She’s also figured out Dad is the biggest softie.
I covered Dad up with a blanket, and tucked it around Athena with a quick pet. I turned off the TV just as Hera came sauntering down the stairs like the queen she is. Hera is gray, she’s a little bigger than her sisters, and her eyes are a hazel color. When she gets angry they turn a bright yellow, and even I leave the room. That yellow eye-thing is just crazy, and I have no idea what’s going on in that furry head of hers’, but I stay clear. She fancies herself the leader of the gang. Then don’t they all.
I went into the kitchen and got down some of the homemade cat treats Carol had made up for my girls. Carol wore her badge as Cat Woman proudly. I was still warming up to the fact. I put the treats in the toaster oven to heat them up.
Dad had already fed the crew of goddesses, but I needed to make sure they weren’t loving him more than me, so I always gave them special treats when I got home at night.
Artemis and Demeter came trotting out of the living room when they heard me open the fridge. They are best buddies, and hang out together all the time. Both are tabby colored orange and white; salt of the earth kitties just like their goddess names. They’re also the most easy-going of Mrs. Olympus’s brood, and rarely can be seen inside for they prefer running around outside, interacting and being natural huntresses. But I know enough to keep them home at night. Especially after the coyote got their mother.
Mrs. Olympus was a tough lady. She had fought off the coyote long enough to save her young kittens, but lost the fight in the end. The wounds she incurred in the battle proved to be the end of her. But, we made sure her offspring were totally spoiled, and home safe at night.
I rinsed out each of their bowls and unwrapped Aphrodite from around my neck. She’s a little devil, and stunningly beautiful as befitting her moniker. She’s completely white, and her eyes are very blue almost to the point of violet like mine - how dare she compete with my baby violet blues! I wasn’t named Katherine Scarlet O’Hara for nothing.
The weird thing about Aphrodite is that she just loves to wear herself around my neck as if she’s Princess Di and I’m supposed to carry her around! The darn thing insists on cleaving to my neck, so I’ve just given up. It wasn’t easy to give in to this living fur feline mind you.
It’s really kind of embarrassing to walk down the main street in town with a cat on your neck. But again, with all the rumors about Lance’s and my fake marriage in Paris, maybe the live cat wearing fur thing works in my favor. I’m thinking when somebody’s walking around wearing a cat like Aphrodite right down Main Street that’s a heck of a lot more interesting then another girl that got duped by her stupid idiot ex? Not that I’m holding any grudges as you can tell.
That said, I can’t bring Aphrodite to the bakeshop or café with me officially, but that doesn’t mean I listen. Especially since I’ve been working alone nights getting the café ready and nobody else is usually around. Plus since I have to walk to work, I can tell you she’s better than a scarf against those moun
tain winds.
I put a treat in each of their kitty bowls and sat down at the kitchen table with a sigh. I couldn’t get my mind around the ruckus that had just occurred.
I wondered what Jackson Jennings wanted with Carol Landers? And who was that girl with him – his fiancée? I wondered if I should call Carol now, or maybe her sister Ethel? They were both newly married and wanted time at night with their husbands – thus why they hired me as extra help. I guessed it could wait until tomorrow. Still, I didn’t like that Jackson Jennings one bit. I was glad Carol had chosen to marry Dr. Archibald instead. All of the thoughts wrestled in my mind at once.
At least with all this strangeness going on it had given me a few moments of relief from thinking about Lance.
I was taking that betrayal and loss day by day. As my namesake Scarlet O’Hara advised - think about it tomorrow, after all tomorrow is another day… With this mantra somehow Scarlett managed to get away with never actually dealing with things by pushing it off into that endless tomorrow. A tomorrow that never came.
I opened the fridge and grabbed a beer, and flipped off the cap with my opener. I looked at the shiny silver ridges and wrapped my fingers around it. The bottle cap felt good in my hand. As I twirled the cool metal, it relaxed my mind. I sat for a while thinking, twirling and drinking.