“I think the first day at a new job should be daunting. Then it will always seem easier after that,” Claire replied.
Liza laughed. “You have a good point. I’m going into the office for a little while. See you at lunch.”
* * *
CLAIRE was not used to having a helper. It was almost as time-consuming to explain to Jamie what he had to do and how to do it than to do it herself.
She didn’t realize that she would feel that way. It was a surprise to her, and she even had to laugh at herself when she was showing Jamie how to sweep the porch and wash it down without ruining the paint or getting any of the wicker furniture wet. Claire usually took care of this task early in the morning, before most of the guests were up, but there had not been any time today.
Everything had to be moved to one side of the porch, and then everything had to be moved to the other. The trick was to keep the water stream steady and pointed down, so the entire house wasn’t dripping all day.
Jamie started off all right but used too much water pressure, and Claire feared he would peel the paint right off the boards.
“Slow down. The water is too hard,” she said.
“It’s okay. I get it, Claire. I can take it from here.”
Jamie didn’t mean to spray her, but as he tried to keep hold of the hose and adjust the water, Claire tried to grab hold of it, too. Startled, Jamie dropped the hose and it jumped around on the porch, spraying in all directions, as if it were alive. By the time Jamie got hold of it and turned off the water, the two of them were soaked, head to toe.
“I’m so sorry . . . I didn’t mean to spray you.”
He did look truly sorry. Claire had to laugh as she wiped her face on her apron. “That’s all right. It’s a hot day. That was . . . refreshing.” Then they both started laughing.
After the porch was cleaned and set to rights again, Claire showed him the power mower and edger. She was relieved to see he knew even more about lawn work than she did. Among his many jobs, he had worked for a landscaping company. The day passed quickly, with Jamie mowing the lawn and cleaning off the bikes in the barn.
Claire gave him a short break in the late afternoon to clean up and rest in his room. Later, he ate his dinner quickly in the kitchen while the guests lingered on the porch with appetizers. Then he helped Liza serve dinner in the big dining room.
After dinner, his last official act was taking out the trash. When he came back inside, Claire had just finished with the kitchen and was making herself a cup of tea.
“Anything else?” he asked. She could tell from his tone he was weary and sorely hoped that she was going to say no. But it was good of him to ask anyway.
“That’s it for today. Thanks for all your help.”
He nodded, looking relieved. “No problem.”
“Would you like some tea?” She filled a teapot with boiling water. There was plenty there for two.
“I’m good . . . What are you going to do now?”
“Sit on the porch and knit.”
“Oh, right.”
“There are some books in the sitting room. I think you may have left the one you started the other night.”
“It was sort of boring . . . Is there a TV around here somewhere?”
Claire checked her tea. “We do have a TV, a very nice one. But we only use it for emergencies. It’s down in the cellar, locked up.”
She waited and watched his expression. Surprised at first, then disappointed. Then he realized she was teasing him.
“Right, good one.”
“It’s in the sitting room. Just open that big hutch across from the couch. The remote should be in there, too.”
“Great. I just wanted to see how the Sox are doing.”
“Help yourself. No problem with that at all.”
When Claire walked out to the porch with her knitting and tea, she saw that Jamie already had the TV tuned into the ball game. He sat on the sofa while he talked on his cell phone. All the guests had left the inn soon after dinner, and he had the sitting room all to himself.
He worked hard all day and deserves some relaxation now, Claire thought, glad he was able to find the game he wanted to see.
* * *
IT was half past eight on Friday night, prime time for dining out. At least back in Boston it had been. Avery kept telling herself to focus on the cooking, but she couldn’t help walking over to the kitchen door every other minute and looking out to see if any more customers had come in.
She had taken three or four reservations during the week and hoped that more customers would walk in during the night. But so far, the dining room had been practically empty.
Embarrassingly empty. Frighteningly empty. Avery’s dark side couldn’t help embellishing it into a full-blown disaster.
Calm down. It’s the first night in an out-of-the-way place. It’s not like couples are strolling around a busy neighborhood, looking for a place to eat. People have to come out here intentionally in the evening, she reminded herself. It’s not a place for random traffic.
She was glad now that her mother and sister had not been able to come. She would have been even more anxious and embarrassed at the poor showing on her big opening night.
She just hoped Mike Rossi didn’t saunter by again. He would probably have some clever remarks tomorrow about the lack of traffic in the Peregrine. Or maybe not. It pained her to admit it, but the truth was, he was probably too busy to notice what was going on in her restaurant. She had walked outside and looked down the street at his place a few times so far tonight.
The Lazy Tuna was bursting with customers, a noisy, boisterous crowd of adults, kids, and seniors. Every seat seemed to be filled, with pop music blasting from speakers over the wooden picnic tables set up outside.
Inside the Peregrine, you could hear a fork drop despite the mellow jazz standards playing on Avery’s sound system. Mike’s music was practically drowning out her own.
She would have run down there and asked him to lower it, but that would have meant admitting her café was quiet and empty.
Avery was preparing an order of halibut. The menu listed the fish sautéed with a special glaze, but the customer had asked for it plain broiled.
No fun at all, Avery thought, slipping the fish onto a dinner plate and adding a garnish. But the customer is always right. She had done the best she could with it.
Gena ran into the kitchen as Avery was cleaning off her cutting board. “Do you have anything back here you can throw together for kids? A couple just came in with two children, about five and seven. Chicken nuggets, mac and cheese?”
Mac and cheese? It took Avery a moment to wrap her mind around the idea. Of course, there would be families on vacation out here, but she had never thought of this café as a likely destination for children. Still, she had better rethink things if she didn’t want their parents to wind up at the Tuna. It had been a mistake not to list anything for them on the menu.
“That’s four covers, Avery,” Gena reminded her when she hesitated. “We’ve only had six other customers so far—”
“All right, all right. I can do mac and cheese, no problem.” Avery pressed her fingers to her forehead, a little habit she had when she felt stressed. As if to hold the top of her head on when it felt like it might blow off. In a calmer voice she added, “We have some fresh orecchiette and artisanal—”
Gena had handed in the order for the table to Teresa and was already halfway to the kitchen door. “It’s better if I don’t know. Just use a lot of butter and make sure the cheese isn’t too smelly.”
“Coming right up,” Avery promised.
Teresa started on the appetizers—steamed mussels with white wine and garlic, and an arugula salad with goat cheese.
Avery set some water to boil for the pasta then stared into the big ste
el fridge, wondering which of the exotic cheeses she had on hand was the least odoriferous.
“There’s a block of cheddar, down on the bottom. Behind the cream,” Teresa told her.
Avery eagerly dug out the modest New England staple, good old cheddar cheese. She set in on the work table, sliced off a chunk, and dumped it in the Cuisinart to shred it.
“Is this your secret stash of cheese?”
Teresa laughed. “It’s Jack’s. Whenever you go out on an errand in the afternoon, he makes himself cheeseburgers.”
“Cheeseburgers? Where does he get the burgers?”
“Oh, those are hidden back in the cold box somewhere. You’ll have to ask him if you want to borrow a few.”
Avery sighed. “It is slow out there . . . but not slow enough to add burgers to the specials.”
A short time later, all the dinner orders were filled and no new customers had come in. Avery felt so fidgety back in the kitchen, she put on a clean white jacket, smoothed her hair—which she wore in a tight bun while cooking—put on a dab of lipstick, and walked out in the café. It was half past nine. Customers filled exactly four of the tables. She doubted that many more would come in now, but she walked from table to table with a welcoming smile and asked how everyone had liked the food.
Some reactions were very enthusiastic, some merely polite. While she got more yeas than nays, to Avery, a tepid response felt crushing. A young couple in the corner, holding hands across the table, was the most lavish with their praise. Avery could have stood listening to them compliment her all night.
And almost did. Until Gena gently tugged her away. “Sorry, but you told me to say something if you were hovering.”
“Was I hovering? I thought I was just . . . chatting.”
Gena gave her a kind but doubtful look. “No one wants to go out for a romantic evening and have the chef sitting in their lap.”
“Oh, right.” Avery could not argue with that. She was trying to advertise her café as the perfect setting for a romantic dinner. She didn’t want word to get around that food was good but the chef stalked the patrons. Not good.
As she headed back to the kitchen, she caught a bit of conversation from an older couple. “—the place is pretty, but the halibut was a little dry,” the husband complained.
Dry? Aren’t you the guy who asked me to hold all the sauces and broil it to smithereens? Avery wanted to whirl around and counter. But she just bit her tongue, waiting to hear what the wife said. “I liked my dish. You just ordered the wrong thing.”
Avery took a breath, feeling vindicated. Until the husband said, “If you ask me, we should have gone down the street to Larry the Tuna.”
“The Lazy Tuna,” his wife corrected him.
The husband waved his hand at her. “Whatever.”
Avery stomped into the kitchen, wanting to cry and scream at the same time. She stood at the steel work table, taking deep breaths to calm her nerves.
Teresa came up beside her and rested a hand on her back.
“What happened to you? Did you eat a bad scallop or something?”
“I’m fine, thanks.” Avery marched to the cold box. “Tell Gena not to let table three get up from their seats. Tell them the chef is sending out a special dessert.”
A few minutes later, Avery watched from the window in the kitchen door as the Lazy Tuna fans practically had a duel with their teaspoons as they devoured their complimentary dessert.
“They loved it,” Gena reported gleefully. “They practically licked the dish and left me a huge tip.”
“Score one for our side,” Avery murmured.
“What did you send out there?” Teresa had been busy at the stove and hadn’t seen the final masterpiece.
“The Chocolate Barge, with an extra-heavy cargo of praline ice cream and bittersweet fudge sauce.”
An admiring light shone in Teresa’s small blue eyes. “Like I always say, when the going gets tough, the tough get cooking.”
“Two orders of the Barge,” Serena announced coming into the kitchen.
“I got this,” Avery told Teresa. It was a small victory, but something.
But at half past ten it seemed apparent that no one else was coming to dine at Café Peregrine. Serena asked if she could go. She had a date in town. The rest of the crew stayed, and by the time they shut the door, Teresa had cleaned the entire kitchen. Jack set to work sweeping and mopping the floor while Gena stored the dishes and glasses that had gone through the dishwasher.
Avery was busy making everyone a late dinner. She had told them to order anything they wanted from the menu. Most restaurants gave their staff an evening meal, but it was usually an inexpensive dish, pulled together by the chef with odds and ends.
Even though the night had not gone as planned, everyone had worked hard. Avery still wanted to celebrate her first night in business; she wouldn’t let this rough kickoff bring her down.
She was sure that the tips had not been great for her servers. Some waitresses would complain, but Serena and Gena had not said a word. She hoped business would be better as the weekend went on, for their sake, too.
They gathered at the big steel work table sitting on high stools, and Avery served them each her special dishes. They talked and laughed and finally relaxed, joking again about the couple who gobbled their dessert and the kids who had curious looks for their gourmet mac and cheese.
It was half past eleven, but Avery could still hear music from the Lazy Tuna. She was sure her staff could hear it, too, and felt grateful when no one mentioned it.
* * *
CLAIRE was not sure how long she had been out on the porch knitting. She just wanted to finish the sleeve of the sweater she was working on. The murmur of the baseball game floated out through the sitting room window, a pleasant, summer night sound, blending with the dull, distant beat of the ocean waves and the soft hum of insects out in the darkness.
On her way up to bed, she passed the sitting room and peeked in. Jamie was stretched out on the sofa, fast asleep, his head propped on a throw pillow, his long legs dangling to the floor.
His cell phone was on his chest, buzzing and vibrating. She was surprised it didn’t wake him.
She didn’t mean to breach his privacy, but it was not hard to read the short message that lit up the screen.
Yo dude. Hanging @ Ryans Pub.
Where is $$$ U owe me, man?
Claire took a quiet step back. She shouldn’t have looked at the message; it was private. But now that she had, it made her wonder.
Jamie owed someone money. Was that why he’d come out here—seeking help but not being able to say it outright? Either way, it seemed that this job had come at a good time for him for more reasons that one.
If he were in the city tonight, he would be carousing with his friends, not sleeping in front of the TV at half past ten. She wondered if he would get bored out here. That could be a problem. Claire caught herself. She couldn’t fret over every little possibility. He was an adult and could figure things out for himself.
She leaned over and roused him. “Come on, Jamie. You ought to go up to bed.”
He nodded sleepily, then slowly sat up, grabbing his phone before it fell on the floor. He rubbed his face and yawned. “I can’t believe I fell asleep . . . I’m beat.” He rose to his feet, then signalled good night with a dazed wave. “See you tomorrow,” he said, walking wearily out of the room.
Claire said good night, then shut off the television and snapped off the lamp. She wondered if Jamie had second thoughts now about the job. Maybe he had not expected it to be so much work.
She hoped he would give it a chance. Life at the inn had its own distinct rhythm, like the tides and the sea. An ebb and flow of activity, hectic and slow times. It was never hectic forever, nor did the quiet last very long.
When she passed his room, no light came from under the door and she heard soft snoring. She would have to see how he acted tomorrow. It was his decision to stay or go. If this didn’t work out, it would be hard for her, but either way, Claire knew she would have to accept it.
Chapter Five
CLAIRE barely caught sight of Avery over the weekend. She was a slim, fleeting shadow, first one out in the morning and the last one back at night. But on Monday morning, Claire noticed it was almost ten and Avery still had not come down from her room.
Liza was in the kitchen, pouring herself coffee. The guests were starting to check out, and she had to get the bills prepared.
Once the guests were gone, Liza had some errands to take care of in Boston with Daniel and would be gone the rest of the day.
“Do you think Avery is all right? She’s usually up by now. Maybe she’s not feeling well,” Claire said.
“She must be tired. Even if the café didn’t do a huge business, opening weekends are very stressful.” Liza spoke from experience. It wasn’t too long ago she had suffered from those same jitters.
“I guess you’re right. I won’t bother her. I was just concerned. I’ll save her some breakfast,” Claire added.
Avery had not given them too many details, but from the little she did say, Liza and Claire gathered that the café, had not been mobbed with customers. They offered words of encouragement, but Claire could sense Avery’s disappointment and even her doubts about choosing the island.
Claire was sure the young chef was tougher than she looked. After a second breath, Avery would dust herself off, put her apron back on, and head back into the ring.
Sometimes it seemed to Claire that the art of getting along in life was a series of adjustments. Like steering a sailboat. You could never reach your destination in a straight line, but only by tacking this way and that, adjusting to the wind and current and whatever else God, in His wisdom, saw fit to toss at you.
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