A Table by the Window: A Novel of Family Secrets and Heirloom Recipes (Two Blue Doors)

For Danny—I’m glad we clicked
.

“I can’t believe she left you the prep table,” my brother Nico groused as he and my oldest brother, Alex, carried the piece up the stairs to my apartment. “That’s a solid French oak cutting service. And that wood inlay? It’s unbelievable work. Nice and tall too. Don’t have to stoop. I hate that—chopping vegetables and getting a crick in my back. Too young for that. Great storage for knives and tools beneath. They don’t make them like this anymore.”

“Have you noticed that Nico hasn’t said anything about the cameo and pearls?” I asked Alex with a wink.

Alex winked back, adjusting his grip on the table to keep it level.

“Really, Juliette”—Nico fixed me with his sincerest expression—“I’d buy it from you. I’m serious.”

“I’m serious about keeping it,” I said, keeping my voice light. My second-oldest brother was nothing if not stubborn. “Be careful around that corner.”

One last step. “But it’s the perfect prep table!”

“I know it’s the perfect prep table.” I held the door open while my brothers carried the piece inside. “That’s why I want to keep it. Watch the back left corner; it’s awfully close to the railing.”

I breathed a sigh of relief once the table touched down in my kitchen without injuries.

“But I’m a chef!” my brother beseeched, splaying his hands in old-school
Italian style. “I was nominated for a James Beard award—I chop more than you do!”

“First,” I began, wishing for a moment that I wasn’t dealing with the piquant blend that was our father’s Italian persistence and our French mother’s stubbornness, “I don’t think anyone’s going to forget about your nomination anytime soon. Second, I’m not going to argue with you about who chops more,” I said, trying to keep my frustration at bay. “I like the table.
Grand-mère
willed me the table. I’m not going to argue with our grandmother’s last wishes.
C’est la vie
.”

Nico muttered something unflattering in Italian. Alex and I exchanged glances.

I breathed deep to keep my emotions in check. “I have homemade ice cream in my freezer,” I said. “I used my Tahitian vanilla beans. And I still have the lavender caramel sauce I made last week.”

As I suspected, my more tempestuous brother thawed by the time I served up the ice cream, complete with caramel sauce and a shortbread cookie for kicks.

My brothers are notoriously easy to placate.

“I’m sorry I was … insensitive about the table,” Nico said around a bite of cookie. “I like the table. But you should have it. You were Grand-mère’s favorite anyway.”

“No, I wasn’t,” I protested, then took a bite of ice cream myself. “I just saw her more because I worked the register at the patisserie all through high school.”

“You were also the one she taught her pastry secrets to,” Alex pointed out. “But that’s all right.”

I shook my head. “She loved all of us. I know she did. I can’t … I can’t believe she’s gone.”

Nico lifted his spoon. “This is her ice cream recipe, isn’t it?”

“Of course.”

“She’d like that.” He flipped the spoon over, consumed the contents, and held out the empty utensil.
“Salute!”

“Salute,”
Alex and I echoed, clinking spoons together out of respect for ice cream and ice cream makers, past and present.

I gave the prep table a more thorough inspection after my brothers left. It had been in Grand-mère’s kitchen for as long as I could remember; I used to perch beneath it as a child.

Having it in my own kitchen was bittersweet and unsettling all at once. I could be jocular with my brothers about it, but on the inside I was still heartsick from the loss. Two months had passed since she had succumbed to a stroke. Most of the grief had subsided, but a familiar ache had taken residence in my heart.