How to Bake a Perfect Life (42 page)

“A lot of small businesses, especially restaurants and food service, have failed. You have resources in the family, and you don’t have to be one of them.” He takes out a manila envelope. “I’ve put together an offer. Take your time, look at it later. Maybe we can talk.”

I shake my head. “I don’t want to do that.”

“Ramona.” His steel-blue eyes are sharp. “Don’t let pride lead you to a fall.”

Katie comes with the tea. My father winks at her. “I hear you’ve been planting a lot of flowers.”

“I have. Do you want to see them?”

“Maybe before I go. Give us a minute.”

She nods.

I hold the envelope in my hand, smarting. Mad at my brother. Mad at the economy. Humiliated.

My dad drinks his tea. “I’m proud of you, Ramona. You’ve got guts.”

“Thanks,” I say, sure he’s saying that only because my brother told him something.

He clears his throat. “Also, I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

His mouth moves, and he keeps his gaze trained on the corn growing in the garden. “For not firing Dane. I should have. The job could have been yours.”

“Did Ryan tell you everything? I’m going to kill him.”

“He didn’t tell me anything. I figured it out all by myself.” Now he does look at me. His mouth twitches in amusement. “I was wrong, okay?”

“Okay. I’ll take a look, Dad. No promises.”

“None expected.”

But right after his visit, the inspector arrives, and we’re finally cleared for opening. I call my employees to tell them the good news. We’ll be open for business tomorrow morning. Jimmy asks how dire things are. “Should I be looking for another job?”

“I won’t lie.” I sigh over the phone. “It’s bad, but with a little luck we can make it up next weekend.” There is a festival that brings in tens of thousands of people, and with all the promotions I’ve done over the past few weeks and the trades I’ve made with motels and hotels in the area, surely we can make up some of it. “We’ll get our A game on and do the best we can.”

“Yay, team.”

“You’re my quarterback.”

Tattooed and pierced and be-ringed, Jimmy snorts. “Whatever, Coach.”

That’s when I take the envelope into the office and open it. There is a single sheet, outlining an offer to bring Mother Bridget’s Boulangerie under the umbrella of the Gallagher Group for a sum that would put me well out of debt. Ownership would go to the corporation, but I would be the general manager of the bakery.

Autonomy and possible complete failure?

Or community and possible success?

How can I give up now? For the moment, I put the offer back into the envelope and slide it into the small wall safe.

I’ve invited Jonah over for dinner, since I won’t have any time for the next five or six days, and it seems fitting to celebrate the green light for the bakery. As Katie and I prepare the meal,
we’re listening to her favorite, Lady Gaga, and I find I like dancing around to it, singing lyrics I know by osmosis. I’ve roasted some corn in the oven and cut the kernels off into a big bowl, then sprinkled sea salt over them.

Katie helps me toss the salad and squashes the avocados for guacamole. She, perhaps by virtue of living in El Paso, likes things much hotter than I can tolerate, and I caution her to go easy with the jalapeños.

“Wimp,” she says, grinning.

“I just like the roof of my mouth.”

I slice cold roast chicken and lay it out on one of my grandmother’s plates, because I’ve been thinking of her and roast chicken was one of her favorites. Her recipe for roasting chicken is heavenly, but this is one I bought at the local organic-foods store, already cooked and studded with big flakes of black pepper. It’s been busy, and I’m not much for cooking main meals. That was always Stephanie’s great pleasure. Nibbling on tidbits of tender chicken and crackly skin, I think of the Erin again, the dated, sad look of it, the tired menu. Why hasn’t she done anything about it? It’s probably that my father is too stubborn to listen to her.

When everything is ready, we carry it all down to the backyard, where I’ve spread a tablecloth over the table, fastened down with rocks to keep it from blowing away. Merlin is playing in the grass, tossing around a ragged toy almost as if he is playing with someone. “That is one crazy dog.”

When Jonah arrives, he brings wine and sparkling cider, big yellow daisies, and a CD for Katie. “Thought you might like this,” he says.

She looks at him with suspicion. “You know I don’t like classical, right?”

He grins, plucking a tortilla chip from the ceramic bowl. “What makes you think it’s classical?”

“That’s what you guys listen to all the time.”

“Hardly!” I protest, and launch into the story of Jonah and the record store and the music we shared.

“And when was that, 1980-something?” Katie asks.

Jonah laughs. “Old school, right?” He uses the tongs to serve himself salad, wipes a little vinegar from his hands with his napkin, and says, “Just give it a try. If you don’t like it, no problem.”

After dinner, Katie, who has been very meticulous about doing chores since yesterday, clears the table, leaving the wine. “See you lovebirds laaa-ter,” she says, and dances upstairs to read in the living room.

“Finally,” Jonah says, and scoots closer to kiss me. His hand slides under my shirt at the back and moves in a circle that sends a shiver through my middle. Again I think,
How can I be both so happy and so worried? So content and so frantic?

But maybe that’s what life is—a mix. As we swing on the glider, I tell Jonah about Katie’s trek to the flower show, and he tells me about the composition he has been working on. “Have you baked me a loaf of bread yet?”

“Is that what you’re working on? Something that sounds like a summer evening?”

“With Ramona at the center.”

“I suppose I should get busy, then.”

“Time enough,” he says. “Time enough.”

Katie

  W
hen she finishes cleaning up the kitchen, Katie signs on to the Internet to play around a little. She has two new emails. One is from her mother, the same one she saw yesterday. The other is a new one, also from her mother. In the subject line is
SORRY!
Katie’s heart does this weird thing, a double bump.

She opens the email.

TO: [email protected]

FROM: [email protected]

SUBJECT: SORRY!

OH HONEY, I JUST HERED THE NEWS BOUT YOUR DADDY SO SORRY. YOU’RE PRACTICALLY AN ORPHAN NOW ARENT YOU? I WISH I COULD CALL YOU AND MAKE SURE YOUR ALLRIGHT BUT YOU NOW I CAN’ T AND THAT I AM THINKING ABOUT YOU. COME SEE ME AS SOON AS YOU CAN AND ILL HUG YOU AND HUG YOU ALL BETTER. YOU KNOW YOUR MOMMA IS THE ONE YOU CAN DEPEND ON YOU CAN JUST RIDE THE BUS, RIGHT TO THE OLD PLACE, WHERE I WAS B4 AND THEN WE COULD GO WALKING IN THE PARK OR SOMETHING MAYBE GET ICE CREAM, WHICH I KNOW YOU LIKE.

LOVE MOM

Katie’s hands are shaking as she reads through the note a second time. What does that mean,
practically an orphan
? It feels like her throat is closing up, maybe so she won’t scream. She opens the first email to see if it says anything else, but it’s only the usual thing. Nothing.

She closes her eyes. Something black buzzes right beneath her skin, at the back of her neck and down her arms.

Don’t let him be dead
.

But of course he wouldn’t be. Ramona had promised to tell Katie the truth about her dad at all times.

But what if …?

A pain tears across the top of her stomach, and she can’t even breathe right. Merlin comes over and urgently puts his head in her lap, as if he has heard some sound she didn’t even know she made. He looks at her with whiskey eyes. For a second, Katie can’t even move enough to pet him.

What would happen to her if her dad was dead? Where would she live?

After a long minute, she puts her hand on Merlin’s head and threads his gold ear through her fingers, like the satin on a blanket. He licks her wrist. Slowly, patiently.

Go down and ask Ramona
, a little voice in her head says, all reasonable.

But what if they’re making out or something? They are so lovey-dovey it’s embarrassing, and although she knows they’re trying not to do anything in front of her, Katie had once accidentally seen Jonah slide his hands under Ramona’s skirt. Barf.

She’ll just make a lot of noise going down the stairs. Standing up before she can change her mind, she says, “Come on, Merlin.”

Ramona

  J
onah and I are swinging lazily back and forth on the glider, hardly even talking, when Katie comes crashing down the stairs and yells out, “Ramona!”

There’s something in her voice. I straighten, taking Jonah’s hand for courage. “Here I am!”

She is in high huff, but there’s something so wild in her eyes that I stand up, reaching for her even before she clenches her fists and cries, “Is my dad dead?”

“No!” I bolt forward and put my hands on her thin arms. At least there is some flesh to them now. “No, he is not dead.”

“Promise?”

“Yes. Why are you asking?”

“My mother sent me an email and it sounded like my dad was dead, because I’m almost an orphan.”

I look over my shoulder at Jonah, who nods imperceptibly. I should never have kept this from her. The weight of my betrayal is gigantic, even more so since the adults in her life have let her down over and over. Her dad, too. “There
is
something I need to tell you, Katie.”

She slides out of my grasp, almost visibly building armor. Merlin comes and stands at her side, like a page or a bodyguard. “What?” she asks in a harsh voice.

“There is no easy way to say this.” I gather my breath and squeeze my hands together. “He’s okay, but he tried to commit suicide.”

Even in the evening light, I can see the color drain away from her face, leaving her as pale as the moonflowers she planted against the fence. “When?”

“The night before last.”

“When did you find out?”

“Sunday night.”

“And you didn’t tell me?”

“I was just—”

“You promised you would tell me anything I needed to know.” Her shoulders are shivering faintly. “I think this counts.”

“Katie, I was trying to find a gentle way. I didn’t want it to upset you. I didn’t want you to feel so squashed—”

“He’s
my
father, okay? Mine. Everybody else is related to him by marriage, but he is my own blood, and I had a right to know that right away. Right away.”

“You did. I’m sorry. I made the wrong decision, but I was trying to protect you.”

“I don’t want to be protected!” she screams. Her fists are at her sides, balled up tight at the end of rigid arms. “I hate you! All of you! This makes me sick. I should be with him. He wouldn’t do that if I was there!”

She bursts into tears, and I dive forward to put my arms around her. With a wild roar, she flings her arms upward to break my grip, a classic self-defense move. I stumble backward slightly, still reaching for her, and she bolts.

“Katie!” I cry, and run after her.

At the door, she halts, holding up a hand, palm out, her breath coming in ragged gasps, her face wet with tears. “Don’t. I want to be alone.”

With effort, I clasp my hands, step back. “I’m sorry.”

She flings herself inside and I stand in the gilded light, staring
after her. Cool air comes up from the grass. Somewhere, someone is playing music.

Merlin nudges my hand, licks my palm, then stands there looking at me. “She will not welcome me right now, sweetie.” I open the screen. “Go with her.”

He pauses, his tail low, his wise old eyes transmitting some message I don’t understand. I wish I spoke Dog. “What is it?”

His tail waves slowly, and he looks back up the stairs.

“I know. Go to her. Take care of her.”

He trots up the stairs, and I close the screen door. Jonah comes up behind me, his hand making a comforting circle on the top of my back. I step away. “I need to think. To be alone.”

“I see.”