Aftertaste - Meredith Mileti [110]
“It’s a faucet on the wall by the stove. For filling big pasta pots.”
“Huh?”
“A pasta spigot. That’s what it is.”
“Oh.” Ben seems to consider this tidbit. Out loud. “Why not just fill them at the sink and carry them over?”
“Well, you could. But the deep pots sometimes don’t fit under ordinary faucets. And besides, they’re heavy to lift.”
“Jeez. How much pasta is this lady gonna cook? Anyway, it’s a plumbing nightmare. The water lines are all the way across the kitchen island! Good thing money’s no object.”
Ben, I guess, is a practical sort of guy.
“Hey, it’s not your money. You can charge her whatever you want. Think of it that way.”
“Yeah, I guess. Anyway, she isn’t even here yet. She’s moving here from Texas. Took some executive job at Del Monte. There’s only one unit left, at the penthouse level, and she needs to know what kinds of things will fit in the space, what she might have to add, before she makes an offer. I mentioned to Skip, my friend, that you might be able to help lay it out for her because you used to be a professional chef.”
Used to be.
“Sure,” I croak, attempting to clear the lump in my throat. “Spending someone else’s money is always fun.”
I agree to join Ben and his friend Skip for their meeting at the loft tomorrow morning at nine. I hang up the phone and lie there in the dark listening to Chloe breathe. Although it’s barely April, the attic is close, the air heavy and thick with heat. I’ll need to buy a new air conditioner soon. I open all the windows and climb back into bed, trying not to think of what Ben said about my having been a professional chef. What am I now?
When I arrive at the lofts the next morning, Chloe in tow, Ben is waiting for me in the lobby with a latte from Bruno’s and a bag full of biscotti. He’s also brought Chloe’s birthday present, a little Fisher Price peg board with a hammer and big chunky nails.
“Hey, thanks for coming on such short notice,” he tells me, handing me the coffee and fishing a biscotti out of the bag for Chloe. “This woman is hot to get this deal done. Another unit sold over the weekend, and this is the only one left. Skip will be here in a couple of minutes, but we can go on up and get started. He faxed me a copy of the wish list,” Ben says, reaching into the front pocket of his work shirt and shaking it out with a flourish.
On the way up, Ben shows me the list: a Gaggenau six-burner gas range, a wall-sized electric convection double oven, a SubZero professional refrigerator and freezer, warming tray, pasta spigot, and a built-in Jura-Capresso espresso machine; in fact she proposes a whole coffee station, including a sink with a built-in water filtration system and a top-drawer fridge for storing coffee, milk, and cream.
Three sinks in three separate areas. Ben will have a field day. The space is bigger than most traditional New York loft spaces. There’s a large, partitioned area for a bedroom and another sleeping loft suspended over the living room, which is reached by a narrow, wrought iron staircase. Because it’s a corner apartment on the top floor, there are six big, arched windows wrapping around the apartment on two sides. The walls are exposed brick, and the floor a rich, dark stained hardwood. There are some low built-in bookcases running along the back wall under the stairs, and someone has set out a couple of sofas, a comfortable-looking easy chair, and a reading lamp. Standard model apartment furniture. It’s a pretty apartment, light and airy, but the best thing about it is the kitchen, which is open to both the living and dining areas. Even without the appliances, the kitchen dominates the space. Standing in the middle of the kitchen, you can see and be seen from just about any place in the whole apartment.
“A second bedroom