Aftertaste (21 page)

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Authors: Meredith Mileti

BOOK: Aftertaste
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My first reaction is to rip it to shreds and burn the evidence. If I rip it up, I can deny its existence, and when asked by Dr. D-P for a status report on my “irons in the fire,” as she calls them, I can tell her I haven't heard anything. She's lately begun to intimate that I should have a few more irons in the fire and that I shouldn't be putting all my eggs in one basket. She's a woman who likes to communicate in short bursts of energy and often uses clichés because they get the point across with a minimum of explanation. But every once in a while, when she suspects she's lost my attention, she'll drop a little bomb and then sit back and examine her nails. Like last week, we were talking about the fact that in the last three weeks I've only managed to send out one résumé, and Dr. D-P suggested that this might be construed as not making enough of an effort. To which I challenged that I was waiting to see what happened with the
Post-Gazette
before I planned my assault on the restaurants of Pittsburgh. To which
she
added that putting all my eggs in one basket seemed to be an issue with me. I'd done it before, hadn't I? I'd put everything into Grappa and into my relationship with Jake and look where it had gotten me. I'd spent all of my emotional capital, when what I'd really needed to do was keep something back, just for me. It may be why, she hinted, I feel so lost and empty all the time.
I told Dr. D-P that a marriage is like a soufflé, a labor of love, requiring the taming of plenty of temperamental eggs, under precise conditions and under the direction of a skilled and talented chef. It seems to me that if you can't put all your eggs in the marriage basket, then you ought to just forget it and order takeout. Actually, I hadn't told her that, I just thought of it, but now I wish I'd said it.
Today, still stinging from the
Post-Gazette
rejection, I decide that my homework assignment will have to wait. I'm supposed to be putting together a list of restaurants where I'd be interested in working and researching the Pittsburgh catering scene, neither of which, I've decided, I have any interest in doing.
Later, when I tell this to Dr. D-P, she nods and asks why.
“Look,” I tell her, my tone defiant. “I managed and owned a successful New York restaurant. I'm way past the point in my career where I'm interested in working for someone else. And in case you haven't noticed, I don't play particularly well with others.”
She laughs. “So open a new restaurant, Mira. It doesn't have to be a four-star ‘serious' restaurant. It can be a tearoom, a deli, a breakfast joint, you decide. That is, after all, the point. You get to decide.”
I thump my fists into the cushions of the couch, exasperated. We have had this conversation before. “I-I just can't get excited about something new.”
She tilts her head and gives me a quizzical look. “That isn't really true, is it? You've been very excited about the possibility of doing some food writing, some restaurant reviewing. That would be a new venture for you.”
Something about my body language must have alerted her to the possibility that this is no longer an option, because she's all over me in seconds. “So, have you heard anything from the
Post-Gazette
?”
I don't answer her right away. I fidget and look up at the ceiling. “They are not interested at this time.” My voice is tight and formal, just like the letter, and I feel a sudden heat behind my eyes.
“I see,” she says quietly. She doesn't say anything else, but moves forward in her chair. “I know that's a real blow, Mira. I'm sorry.” And I think for a second she's going to say something about eggs in baskets, but she doesn't.
I'm crying, ridiculous as it seems, sitting with my fists clenched in my lap crying real tears because I've received a three-sentence form rejection letter for a job I knew I had no real chance of getting.
She considers me a moment, chewing thoughtfully on her lower lip before handing me a Kleenex.
“What was the biggest obstacle you encountered in running Grappa?”
I blow my nose. The biggest obstacle? Who knows, there were so many. “There were obstacles every day. Running a restaurant isn't easy. Starting up was nightmarish—there were weeks on end, before we opened and then right after, when I don't think I slept more than a couple of hours a night.”
“But you succeeded, against improbable odds, didn't you?”
“Yes, we did, but there were two of us. We were in it together. I can't do this alone.” A deep, guttural choking sound escapes me, and I look up self-consciously. I can't believe I've become someone who cries in her therapist's office.
“Mira, don't let Jake take this from you, too.” She says this softly and, reaching over, puts both her hands on top of my own clenched fists. Her voice is low and soft, but there's an urgency there and an undercurrent of something that sounds like anger.
chapter 19
In the lobby of the Highland Towers there is a little deli called the Brown Bag. I had planned on treating myself to a nice lunch at Casbah, and had even briefly entertained the possibility of calling Richard and asking him to join me, but I'm emotionally spent from my life coaching appointment and can barely make it down to the deli on the first floor. I order a grilled Reuben sandwich and some steak fries the instant I'm seated, without even looking at the menu.
The waitress shouts my order to the line cook and fills my water glass, slopping some onto the chipped Formica table. When the cook grumbles that it's almost two o'clock, she fixes him with a withering look.
“After two, it's only pie, coffee, and fountain drinks, but don't worry, hon,” she says to me. “It's only five till.”
She's wearing a brown polyester uniform with a white collar and cuffs. Her nails are long, artificial talons, painted a frosted pink, and her fingers, all ten of them, are crusted with cheap silver rings. I try to imagine myself in a greasy white apron and a hairnet, grumpily manning the grill, taking orders from a waitress old enough to be my grandmother.
“Thanks,” is all I can manage.
“Coffee?”
I nod, too exhausted to speak.
Dr. D-P has earned double her fee this afternoon in a marathon cheerleading session. The latter half of the therapy hour was devoted to something she calls “Leapfrog Theory.” According to Leapfrog Theory, it apparently doesn't matter that I have no experience writing restaurant reviews; if it's what I decide I want to do, then I should just go for it and not let a little thing like Enid Maxwell's rejection put a damper on my plans. The initial rejection is best viewed as merely an obstacle, she tells me, one that may or may not be easily leapt over. The point is that I won't know unless I try. And so I've agreed to telephone Enid Maxwell and extract some sort of commitment to meet with me so that I might share with her my expansive knowledge of the New York restaurant world. Like I'm doing her some kind of favor.
When I balked at this suggestion, Dr. D-P told me that she wouldn't have suggested it had she not known that I had it in me. “Whether you recognize it or not, Mira, one doesn't get to the top of one's profession without the liberal application of Leapfrog principles.” When I tried to tell her that there's also a hefty element of luck involved, she reminded me of my iron-willed resolve in trying to hold onto Jake and Grappa. Sure, it hadn't worked out, but it hadn't been because I gave up too easily.
I devour the sandwich, a mountain of corned beef between two greasy slabs of marble rye, leaking cheese and Russian dressing all down the front of my sweater. It's delicious, and I don't stop eating until I've finished the last thick fry, which I use to mop up the remains of the sandwich. I need all the sustenance I can get for what I'm about to do.
I leave the waitress a hefty tip, which she tucks into the breast pocket of her uniform. “Thanks, doll,” she calls, smiling at me and waving, her silver rings glinting in the afternoon sun.
An hour later, I'm sitting cross-legged on my bed, clutching the rejection letter, on which Enid Maxwell's phone number is prominently displayed, making it all too easy for me to call her. I've spent the last thirty minutes online on my laptop reading past Food section excerpts. At a minimum, it has given me second thoughts about having any association with the
Post-Gazette
. The recipes are uninteresting (cream of cauliflower soup made with frozen cauliflower, Velveeta Light, and canned tomatoes). In addition, they review a different fast-food freezer item each week. This week's offering, Amy's Vegan Black Bean Burritos, has been given two thumbs-up by the reviewers. Doesn't anyone in Pittsburgh cook?
I'm looking for excuses not to call, but the alternative—having to fess up to Dr. D-P next week that I hadn't been able to do it—is by far the more frightening prospect. Dr. D-P has made it seem as if my psychological well-being, not to mention my entire future, is riding on this one phone call. If I'm ever going to be able to move on with my life, I have to get over my fear of rejection, she said. It's as if Jake's rejection has seeped into every area of my life, polluting my sense of self worth so that now I live in constant fear of being spurned again, even by a newspaper that lauds the use of processed cheese products.
So, I'm stuck. Finally, I arrive at the psychologically comfortable compromise of calling after five and leaving a message. I'm counting on what I can remember from episodes of
The Wire,
that newspaper editors are seldom at their desks and rarely answer their land-line phones. So I prepare and rehearse a confident-sounding message, gently challenging Enid's provincial sensibilities and offering to meet with her to discuss the rise of the Pittsburgh restaurant.
I dial the phone.
While it's ringing I rehearse my message. I take a deep breath. I want to sound relaxed and confident. “Hello, Enid. This is Mira Rinaldi. Listen, I just wanted to touch—”
“Pressroom.” The voice that answers is gruff and masculine.
“Yes, hi. I just wanted to leave a message for Enid Maxwell.” There is a deafening noise in the background.
“Who? I can barely hear you.”
“Enid Maxwell,” I yell.
“This is the pressroom. She must have forwarded her phone. Hang on, I'll find her.”
“No!” I practically scream into the phone. “I mean, that's okay, don't disturb her, I'll just leave a mess—”
“Oh, wait a sec, she just walked in.” The background sounds suddenly become muffled as the man puts his hand over the receiver and yells, “Yo, Enid, phone.”
I'm seized by a sudden urge to hang up—and I'm about to—when an irrepressible, irrational thought suddenly flashes through my wearied brain, as irrational thoughts have a habit of doing when you are tired, stressed, and genetically predisposed to paranoia. Newspapers probably have caller ID on their phones—making it easier to identify informants calling in with anonymous tips. Enid could easily identify me as the caller, and I would be busted for hanging up on her.
“Yeah, Enid Maxwell,” she barks.
“Enid, this is Mira Rinaldi. I—”
“Who? Listen, you're going to have to speak up. We're running a test sheet in the pressroom, and I can't hear you.”
I try again, feeling ridiculous. “It's Mira Rinaldi,” I yell into the phone.
Suddenly, whatever had been causing the deafening noise in the background stops dead, leaving the echo of my shouted name reverberating in the empty air.
“Oh, Mira, the aspiring food critic.” Her voice has returned to its presumably normal tones.
I'm shocked that she remembers me from the three-sentence rejection letter, which I'd assumed was just a form letter, prepared and signed by some underling. “Yes, that's me.”
“Okay. What's up? Make it quick if you can. I'm rushing to meet a press deadline, which means I have about thirty seconds to talk with you.”
“Well,” I begin, taking a breath, trying to force some air into my constricted chest. “I got your letter and I, I was wondering if we might be able to meet. I think I have something to offer that you might have overlooked in my—”
“Look,” she interrupts. “I read the review you enclosed. Your restaurant, what is it called, Limoncello, Vino, something like—”
“Grappa.”
“Yeah, right. Well, Grappa sounds like a wonderful restaurant, and
Gourmet,
I know, did not bestow its praise lightly. Clearly you and your husband are talented chefs, but what makes you think that you could be a restaurant reviewer?”
Her tone is condescending, and I hate to be condescended to. “Ex-husband. And you want to know why I think I could be a restaurant reviewer? One: I have spent the last twenty years eating great food. Two: I have a well-developed palate. Three: I've also run a successful Manhattan restaurant, which is no small thing, as I'm sure you know. I know what it takes to make a restaurant successful,” I tell her.
“Yes,” she sighs, “but you have to be able to
write
about it. Look, do you think just because you read
Gourmet
you can suddenly become Ruth Reichl? How are your writing skills? Do you have a sample to submit?” She sounds just this side of irritated.
Let's see. Jake and I had written our own wedding vows that, in a fit of rage after the separation, I had torched with the portable gas flame we used for doing crème brûleé. I'd written a few papers while at the Culinary Institute, but most of them were cost analyses and technical explanations. How to make a brown veal stock. The pros and cons of using a blond versus a brown roux.
“Well, I have some writing from school. I had to write some papers at the Culinary Institute, but they're several years old. I guess I—”
“The CIA? You went to the CIA?” For some reason she sounds impressed.
“Yes, I did.”
Suddenly the deafening noise is back, and once again Enid has to shout to make herself heard. “Look, I've got to go. Get me a writing sample and we'll talk.”
I'm about to hang up when the noise once again stops abruptly and Enid continues, her tone softer and resigned. “This is not New York, Ms. Rinaldi. Do you know how often
Gourmet, Bon Appétit,
and
Food and Wine
have featured a Pittsburgh restaurant? Exactly never. Go ahead. Send me a sample, and if I like it, I'll give you a try, but don't get your hopes up. You may find that you are the one who is disappointed.”
 
“So, do you want the short version or all the gory details?” Ruth asks when I arrive on her doorstep a full hour late to pick up Chloe. I'd tried calling in the interim, but Ruth either had turned off her answering machine or was on the phone and hadn't picked up. I'd even stopped at the Smallman Street Deli on the way over to pick up Ruth's favorite corned beef sandwich and a couple of kosher hot dogs for Carlos as a peace offering for being late, but she doesn't even mention it. Instead, she drops the bag on the counter without even looking inside and ushers me into the family room where Chloe and Carlos are sitting on the floor in front of a video gnawing on frozen bagels. “Sorry,” Ruth says when she catches me looking around at the toy-strewn room and at Carlos's and Chloe's glazed and glassy-eyed expressions, clear evidence of TV coma. “You know I don't usually park them in front of the TV, but we are definitely talking extenuating circumstances here.”
She hands me a box of tissues, when I was really hoping she'd offer me the other half of her corned beef sandwich. “What are these for?” I ask innocently.
“Just wait until you hear this. Trust me, you'll need them. By the way, I hope you can watch the kids a week from Thursday,” Ruth says. I nod, even though she hadn't really been asking. “Oh,” Ruth continues, “and do you think you could help me make a couple dozen rugelach? It's very important that they be good and mine; well, suffice it to say I have a problem with anything that involves a rolling pin. And in this instance, props are key.”
“Props?”
“Yes, the machine has been put in motion!” Ruth says, leaning toward me, her face pink with excitement. A pool of saliva has begun to accumulate in the corners of her mouth that, coupled with her flushed face, makes her appear vaguely rabid.
“What are you talking about?” I ask, looking at her with alarm.
Ruth stops short and looks at me with surprise. “Can you really be this dense?” she asks.
“Apparently so,” I tell her, removing my coat and taking a seat on the sofa.
“Clearly, you're going to need the long version,” Ruth says, plopping down on the ottoman next to me.
I'm barely settled on the sofa before Ruth launches into her story. While the kids were napping, she got a call from Leah Hollander inviting her to join them for their weekly mah-jongg game at Rona Silverman's house the following Thursday afternoon.
“Okay, so while we're on the phone, Leah asks me how long I've been divorced, and when I tell her that I've never been married and that Carlos is adopted, she says something about what a good mother I must be to take all this on alone.” Ruth looks over at Carlos, whose face is covered in masticated bagel, which he is in the process of smearing onto Ruth's expensive Persian rug. “Hmm, well, anyway,” Ruth continues, turning back to me. “She then proceeds to tell me all about her poor son, Neil, whom she would love to see settled, particularly with a woman who is so clearly interested in being a mother.”
“I'm beginning to get the picture,” I tell her.
“I thought you might,” Ruth says, getting up to retrieve the deli bag from the kitchen counter. On the way back, she grabs two beers from the bar fridge. “You can't drink wine with corned beef, right?”
“Definitely not,” I tell her, accepting the Stella Artois she offers me, along with a sheaf of napkins and the other half of her corned beef sandwich.

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