How Sweet It Is - Alice J. Wisler [30]
fifteen
Iam sipping Belgian coffee from the bear mug and thinking of the kids at The Center when Chef B calls the next morning. In his typical fashion he makes it sound as though he hasn’t slept at all since my departure because he’s had no idea if I even made it to North Carolina. “You not call me,” he scolds. “I worry you end up in hospital in Gainesville.”
Well, don’t think I wasn’t afraid of the same thing.
Chef B asks about the cabin and the state of the kitchen appliances.
“Gas stove,” I say, because he, unlike Sally and Jeannie, will care about that.
He doesn’t disappoint me. “Ah, gas is good, good. Better control of heat.”
I smile at his approval of the stove.
“Are you writing in journal book?”
I tell him I have written in the book; I do not say that I haven’t written in it every day as he instructed. He asks what I’m doing with my time. I tell him about my grandfather’s plan for me to teach cooking lessons to children.
He clears his throat, and I anticipate that he will say, “How awful!” or “That is beneath your skill!” Instead he says, “Deena, that is perfect for you.” With eagerness in his baritone voice he asks, “What did you teach them?”
I mutter that I started with a white sauce.
“White sauce?” His voice is raised, and I have to pull the cell phone away from my ear to save my hearing. “Teach them fun stuff,” he tells me. Again I am aware that white sauce was a big mistake.
“Children want to make brownies. Sweets. Things they eat right away. How you say?” He pauses for a few seconds. “Instant gratification.”
As I long for the kitchen at the restaurant, he tells a story about how Ashley Judd came to Palacio del Rey for dinner the other night. He wants to tell me what she ordered and who she was with, but all I want to know is if her skin is as flawless as it is on the cover of Cosmo. Does she have wrinkles? Does she have scars on her arms?
He doesn’t tell me because I don’t ask.
————
I carry the ingredients to make brownies in my Whole Foods bag. My prayer is that all the children will be absent today.
The kids are all there when I arrive.
When I say that we will bake brownies and then eat them, there are a few cheers. Then they all wonder why I have brought sugar, cocoa, and flour.
“Don’t you just add water to a brownie box?” Dougy asks innocently.
“You can,” I say, “if you have a brownie box or brownie mix. But we are going to make brownies from scratch.”
“We get to scratch?” Bubba looks confused.
“No, dummy!” belts out Bobby. “That means…” But he doesn’t know how to explain what it means, so I tell them.
“When we cook from scratch it means we don’t use any mix or box already prepared. We measure our own ingredients.”
The class still looks confused until Lisa says, “It means we don’t use instant.”
“Oh. Oh, yeah,” Bubba and Dougy say in unison.
Lisa beams like she is the teacher’s pet; at this point, the pickings are slim for that honor, and she is the only one on my “almost good” list.
Darren sits with his notebook, not giving me any eye contact. I am sure he hates me. I should have asked Chef B how to make this kid like me. I think it will take more than brownies.
————
When the class is over and the kids run outside to play basketball, I head to the bathroom before washing the dishes. Making brownies was a good choice, but even so, the kids talked incessantly and fought over who was going to stir the batter next. I asked Darren to chop some walnuts and he refused. Dougy said Darren was afraid of knives. Darren yelled, “Shut up!” It was aimed at Dougy and not at me this time, but it still wasn’t appropriate. I told Darren to be considerate of others, and he shot me an evil glare that made me think of his mother, Felicia. So much angry resemblance.
As I come out