Читать книгу The Wing Girl: A laugh out loud romantic comedy - Nic Tatano - Страница 12

Ariel’s mother, Cassandra Baymont, is a best-selling author and magazine contributor. Not because she can weave words into a clever plot. Nope, her forte is non-fiction. Specifically, she’s America’s foremost expert on etiquette. You see where this is going?

We took a Saturday morning limo ride to the shores of Eastern Connecticut (I wanted to take the train but Mrs. Baymont would not hear of it. Besides, she’s loaded.) Ariel, her mother and I were seated at a posh restaurant she owns called the Hampton View. You can see the Hamptons with a pair of binoculars from the tables next to a window, hence the name. The place is only open for dinner, but because Mrs. Baymont deemed this the etiquette equivalent of DEFCON ONE she brought in a few staffers to serve us a private lunch.

And, you guessed it, to teach me how to eat.

I should mention the source of my current culinary habits. My mom died when I was two, so I was raised by a single father and four older brothers. So seeing things like people vacuuming potato-chip crumbs from their sweatshirts after a long day of watching football and shooting aerosol cheese into their mouths directly from the can doesn’t seem strange to me. Couple that with a career that often forces me to eat in the news car and wolf down whatever I can grab in ten minutes. The result is that Ariel said I resembled a starving man who escaped from a prison camp when I eat. She added that I had apparently never heard of the invention of the napkin, which no doubt accounted for my love of long sleeves.

So we were seated at the best table in the restaurant, next to the window overlooking the shore. Seagulls laughed and occasionally dove for minnows as the waves gently lapped the beach. Our round table was covered with a starched eggshell linen tablecloth. The cutlery was heavy Sterling silver. The place seated only about fifty people, but it felt like a museum, filled with beautiful antiques and framed prints of lighthouses. The walls were a deep red, while the twelve-foot ceiling was painted beige. The whole effect was soothing, rich and classy.

Mrs. Baymont was seated to my left. She’s in her early fifties and well-preserved, an older carbon copy of Ariel. Always impeccably coiffed and dressed, I can’t even imagine the woman in a tee shirt. Even though no one else was there but a waiter and a chef, she was in a lacy white blouse with her ever-present triple strand of pearls. She talked with that affected snobby lilt common to many parts of Connecticut’s most wealthy towns and old money. But she’s a sweet woman who would do anything for her daughter, and has always been very fond of me. Her manners are such that she’s never commented on my appearance, which I realized must have made her do a slow burn every time she saw me.

“Now, dearie,” she said. (She calls everyone dearie.) “Let’s go over the place setting and the various utensils.” A tall, slender middle-aged waiter in a white tux removed the large pewter plates and replaced them with bone china through which you could read a newspaper.

I raised one finger. “I have a question.”

“Yes?”

“Why does the waiter always remove the plates that are on the table when you arrive?”

“Those are called charger plates, dearie.”

“Because they’re from San Diego?”

Mrs. Baymont frowned.

“You know. San Diego? Chargers?”

She shook her head and politely smiled. “They’re decorative. The term comes from the middle English chargeour, but you don’t really need to know that for our purposes.” She pointed to the silver on the right of my plate. “Do you know why one fork is longer than the rest?”

I shrugged. “I dunno. So … you can get the food in your mouth quicker?”

Ariel snorted.

Mrs. Baymont widened her eyes and looked at me like a third-grade teacher. “No, dearie. That’s your salad fork. Each fork has a purpose. One cannot eat a seven-course meal with one utensil.”

I thought, why the hell not, I do it all the time, but I didn’t say it. (Not surprisingly, the “spork” is not among the silverware.)

So before any food even arrived, I learned more about the history, care and feeding of forks than I cared to know. And then there was the thing about the order forks are used and that you should always move toward the plate as the meal goes on. Apparently in this part of the world it would be nothing short of a scandal if you actually ate fish with your salad fork. It was like having an air traffic controller in charge of lunch. The instruction was so detailed and went on for so long I wished she simply owned a Chinese restaurant and we could deal with sticks. I began to wonder if spoons 101 would be as difficult.

My stomach growled audibly. Mrs. Baymont noticed. “Did you eat anything at all this morning?”

“No.”

“One should never dine while starving. The result is unbecoming for a young lady. A light snack before a meal can take care of that … rumble.”

I nodded as the waiter arrived and placed a steaming bowl of soup in front of each of us. I immediately grabbed my spoon but was stopped when it was inches from the bowl.

“Eh-eh-eh,” said Mrs. Baymont, as she wagged her finger. “First, you’re holding your spoon like a tennis racquet.” She took it from me, then manipulated my hand to the proper form and placed the spoon in it. “Think of it as holding a pencil, like when you’re reporting and taking notes.”

Now I really did feel like a third grader. And a naughty one at that.

“Okay.” It felt funny but I could deal with it. I started to dip the spoon into the soup.

“Eh-eh-eh.” Again with the finger.

“What now?”

“Take your spoon and dip some soup into it from the back of the bowl with the side of the spoon farthest away. Your motion should be away from you, the opposite of what you normally do. This way you’ll never drip any of the soup on your clothes.” She demonstrated it for me, and it actually made sense. Since my shirts often look like painter’s drop cloths, I figured this tip was a keeper.

I dipped my spoon into the far side of the bowl, lifted it to my mouth and took a sip of creamy lobster bisque. “Oh, that’s terrific,” I said. I looked to Mrs. Baymont for approval. “Did I do that right?”

“Yes, dearie. You may continue.”

Two hours and countless lectures on silverware, china and crystal later, we were done. Mrs. Baymont pronounced me ready for everything from a casual lunch to a cotillion. Personally I would draw the line at hoop skirts and parasols, but it was nice to know I was now approved to eat in public.

***

I leaned back in the plush leather of the black stretch limo, fat and happy after devouring everything from bisque to salad to some incredible veal to something called “intermezzo,” which I thought meant I had to sing opera during my meal but was actually a scoop of lime sorbet. We sped west back to Manhattan, the Saturday afternoon traffic pretty thin on the Connecticut Turnpike. “Ariel, that was really nice of your mother to do that,” I said.

“Are you kidding? She loves doing that kind of stuff.”

“Really?”

“Yep. It’s her mission in life to teach the entire world to eat with the proper fork.”

“It’s amazing how she knew all of the things I was doing wrong. And some of them before I even did them.”

“Well, there’s a reason for that.” Ariel pulled out her smart phone, punched a few buttons and handed it to me. “Last night at dinner when I put my phone on the table, I taped you as you were eating.”

I scrunched up my face. “You’re kidding, right?”

She shook her head. “I wanted mother to see what we were dealing with before we arrived, so I sent it to her when I got home.”

“Oh, for God’s sake—”

The video interrupted me. My jaw hung open like a trophy bass as I watched myself in a restaurant, literally shoveling food into my yap like a werewolf on a bloodlust bender, talking with my mouth full, and at one point using my sleeve as a napkin.

“Dear God, I look like that when I eat?”

“Did you ever notice you’re always finished ten minutes before the rest of us? I’m surprised sparks don’t come out of your knife and fork. If I was a guy and saw that I’d take you to that medieval restaurant in Atlantic City where you eat with your hands.”

“Sir Lancelot’s? I love that place!”

“I rest my case.”

I was riveted as I saw all the “mistakes” I was making, thanks to Mrs. Baymont’s instruction. “God, this is embarrassing. I can’t watch any more.” I handed the phone back to her. “Please delete this right now. It would get a million hits on YouTube. I can see the title. Brass Cupcake devours everything in her path.”

She punched a few buttons. “There. Gone forever. As are your previous eating habits.” Suddenly she got a gleam in her eyes. “Speaking of which, you have a lunch date tomorrow.”

***

If you had told me a week ago that I’d spend two hours getting all decked out to clean cat boxes, I would have said you were insane.

Yet here I was, after getting up at the ungodly hour of seven-thirty on a Sunday morning, finishing up my prep work for what could be a meal consisting of a hot dog from a street vendor. I felt like a teenager on a first date, eager to debut my new and improved self for a guy I’ve known all of two minutes. Last night I went out with the girls for a casual dinner and Ariel gave me a B+ on my new eating habits. She would have given me an A but I slurped up the last bit of soup by picking up the bowl. What the hell, I hate to waste food. Kids starving in India and all.

So I bounced into the shelter, hair all done up, eighty-dollar skinny jeans that made my spunky ass pop, tight turquoise gathered top, eyes decorated.

Diane lit up as I moved toward the counter. “Well, I was waiting to see if the new you looked as good in person as you do on my high-def flat screen.”

“And?”

“Amazing. I had no idea you were a beautiful swan. That’s not to imply you were an ugly duckling.”

“I didn’t think that’s what you meant. Thank you for the compliment.”

“You’ll be beating them off with a stick.”

“Already am, and it’s not all it’s cracked up to be,” I said, as I headed for the back wearing a huge smile.

“By the way, he’s not coming today.”

I stopped dead in my tracks.

Use whatever image you want. Air coming out of a balloon, wind out of sails, man’s dose of Viagra running out, whatever. My perfectly made-up face dropped. “He quit already?”

“No, he had another family thing today so he came in yesterday.”

Yesterday? Shit. “Oh. Did he, uh, say anything?”

“About what?”

“Never mind. Lemme go play with my cats.”

“Hey, that old Siamese you liked got adopted. Nice couple with a kid in a wheelchair that wanted a quiet cat.”

My favorite cat, Pandora, wasn’t there either. “Aw, I’ll miss her. But glad she found a good home.”

I shuffled down the hall, head down, the spring in my step gone. Most of the cats perked up as I turned the corner, and I did as well.

I crouched down and began to give some attention to each cat, getting purrs and licks in return. I was beginning to feel a little better.

And then I saw it.

A yellow sticky note with my name on it attached to the giant bin of cat food. I jumped up and grabbed it, then turned it over.

Sorry I missed you. Rain check?

-Scott

The smile I had earlier returned. I picked up a Himalayan kitten and hugged her close to my new blouse, which was immediately covered with fur. “What the hell, kitty,” I said. “Go ahead and shed.”