A Table by the Window: A Novel of Family Secrets and Heirloom Recipes (Two Blue Doors) (13 page)

I arrived at my parents’ home Saturday morning with baguettes and Meyer lemons. The bread I brought for practicality—my
oncle
Henri was not an easy man to get along with. Younger than my mother by five years, Henri’s temperament ran to the taciturn, his opinions fixed, his demeanor unyielding. A resident of Seattle since his college days, he reveled in pointing out the city’s superiority to Portland.

His wife, Margueritte, chose not to speak very often, and I didn’t blame her.

I figured the best I could do was bring some of the best bread the city offered, hoping that chewing might prevent arguing.

The lemons—they were an impulse purchase. Faced with three straight weeks of Portland’s wind and rain, I was defenseless to their charms.

Everyone sat around my parents’ huge oak table, passing around heaping plates of food. The scents of frittata, pain au chocolat, cut fruit, and carafes of steaming coffee wafted around the threads of conversation.

While everyone ate, I took the opportunity for some genetic reconnaissance.
I’d spent an hour that morning looking at photos of my grandfather Gilles at several stages of life, and I could confirm without effort that Henri, at least, looked just like him. They shared the same fair coloring, the same hairline, the same nose, the same stubborn chin.

No paternity questions there. But I knew there were five years between my mother and her brother.

A lot could happen in five years.

While my mother did share Henri’s eyes and cheekbones, they were admittedly the same as my grandmother Mireille’s.

Different fathers? To the naked eye, it was entirely possible.

Nico, sitting at my left, interrupted my thoughts with his elbow. “I’m interviewing a potential sous-chef later. He looks great on paper—Kenny recommended him.”

“Oh good,” I said, though I had secretly hoped that our kitchen might be the only one that could function without a sous. I pushed thoughts of Éric from my head.

“Do you think it’s a good idea,” my uncle asked from across the table, “to open a restaurant in this economy? The market hasn’t been kind to small businesses for quite some time.”

I shrugged, holding on to my calm even as Nico looked ready to throw his forkful of frittata across the table.

Honestly, the last thing we needed at this gathering was an old-fashioned schoolyard food fight.

“A poor business model won’t survive even in a good economy,” I pointed out. “Our job is to come up with a strong concept, requiring a modest budget, and execute it deliciously.” I turned to Nico. “Wouldn’t you agree?” I asked my brother, though I focused on my uncle before Nico could open his mouth and get us both in trouble. “Everything that is beautiful and noble is the product of reason and calculation,” I said, quoting Baudelaire.

Henri shrugged, his usual response to Baudelaire. “Just make sure there is enough reason and calculation,” he said.

“Enough.” Maman’s tone did not invite further argument. “This is a family gathering, not a business meeting.”

Henri opened his mouth to protest, but my mother merely held up her hand. “Not here.”

The table chatter started back up moments later as everyone returned to their food and conversations.

“I can’t believe we’re related to him,” Nico grumbled.

I gave his arm a blithe pat. “I wouldn’t worry about it overmuch.”

Once the guests had gone, the rest of us lingered longer over coffee. Maman carried three more boxes of my grandmother’s papers and photos into the living room, boxes that had migrated from Grand-mère’s apartment to my parents’ home.

“I’m working on a story about Grand-mère for the paper,” I told her. “How she was trained in pastry during the late thirties, giving up her career to raise a family but teaching her daughter pastry technique—it’s a good human-interest story.”

“She did not speak much of those days in France,” my mother told me. “The days before the war, you know. And her life with my father …” A shrug.

I leaned forward. “Were they happy?”

“Happiness is transient,” my mother replied.

“How so?” I asked, hugging my arms to myself.

“My father … well, Henri is not so different from him. He was a good man, but stubborn. They disagreed about things, the way married couples do. Maybe more so. My mother loved pastry and wanted to open a patisserie in the village. My father felt it would be shameful. Your grand-mère, she contented herself with baking for us and throwing parties with the very best food.” She smiled. “That made him happy, and it made her the toast of the village.”

“So that’s why she opened the patisserie here after he died. I never put that together.” I smiled. “Thanks for pulling these out for me.”

Back home, I took a closer look at the boxes’ contents. There were very few
photos of my grandmother as a young woman, but cameras weren’t household items at the time, especially in the South of France.

One photo showed her on her wedding day to my grandfather Gilles. Marked 1943, the portrait showed a very serious bride and groom. Grand-mère’s dress was lovely, of course, but I searched her expression for any signs of joy and found none.

The more I looked at the photos, the less I thought of my grandmother as Grand-mère. When I looked at her, I saw Mireille Bessette, a woman near my age who happened to be living her life seventy years ago.

I knew wedded bliss to be a very modern concept, but Mireille looked awfully grim for a woman who just married of her own free will, with no goats used as inducement.

The photos I had were usually labeled with dates on the back, but the wedding photo had no such notation. At my desk, I took the photos of Mireille and lined them up in chronological order as best I could.

There was another man—I was sure of it. I didn’t have any concrete evidence, but the more I looked at Mireille and Gilles, the more I believed that the man in the photo I found was my true grandfather.

My cell phone buzzed while I was still midthought; I picked it up absently.

“Jules! Guess who got tickets to hear Feist tonight at the Bing Lounge?” Linn practically yelled the question into my ear.

I sat up straighter. “Really?”

“Are you free?”

“Absolutely! What about your husband?”

“He’s strictly a Decemberists kind of guy. Feist isn’t his jam.”

“Then I’ll start getting ready now.”

“That’s all I could ever want.”

We made plans to meet and drive over together, and for the first time in a week, I felt a little lighter in spirit.

In preparation for the concert, I changed into a black jersey wrap dress with long sleeves, black patterned tights, and black boots. I added a vintage-looking silver collar necklace and a coat of soft pink lipstick to keep the look from being too severe. When Linn arrived, I threw on my red trench and Burberry-esque scarf.

Feist had just finished her first set when I felt my phone vibrate in my boot. Fearing a family emergency, I glanced at the phone. A text message from Nico. “Where are you?”

“Bing Lounge with Linn,” I texted back.

My phone vibrated again a moment later. “Cool. See you soon.”

I had no idea what that meant. Later in the evening? Later that week? month? Who knew? While Feist and her band sang “My Moon, My Man,” I double-checked to see if I’d had an e-mail from Neil.

Still nothing.

Two songs later, I felt a tapping on my shoulder. I turned, curious, to find my brother and a stranger standing just behind me.

“What are you doing here?” I asked, trying to walk that fine line between being heard over the band and disturbing other people’s experience.

Nico grinned; I knew he’d have a long story on the subject once the concert was over. Since he didn’t seem to need anything but an acknowledgment
of his existence, I turned back to face the front and enjoyed the rest of the band’s set.

Afterward, I asked him again how he’d managed to get in.

“I simply asked the nice young lady at the door,” he said, wearing his European charm like a strong cologne.

I knew for a fact that more than a young lady stood between my brother and the interior of the venue. “It’s an invitation-only event.”

Another shrug. Linn looked impressed, but I wasn’t. I knew my brother could charm the brass knuckles off a bouncer. And not only had he gotten himself in, but he’d smuggled the stranger in as well.

“I’m Adrian,” the stranger said, rather obviously giving me a visual once-over as he proffered a hand and grinned.

“He’s the one I was interviewing for the sous-chef position,” Nico explained.

“Ah,” I said, and found myself taking a defensive step back.

Adrian stood two inches taller than my brother and possessed the kind of long lashes and ringlets many women would envy. On some men, it would look effeminate, but on Adrian the opposite appeared true.

He was good looking, and with the show of friendliness turned my way, I suspected the feeling was mutual.

Not that it mattered. I’d fallen for a coworker once; never again. Adrian could flirt with me all he wanted, but I wasn’t interested. Far from it—remembering how things had ended with Éric made me sick to my stomach.

“We were thinking of going out for a bit,” Linn said, no doubt thinking she was performing a kindness by extending the evening. “You’re welcome to join us.”

“We’d love to,” Adrian said, his grin somehow growing wider.

I narrowed my eyes. “How are either of you here? It’s Saturday night, after all.” Since it was the peak time for diners, almost no one in the restaurant industry had Saturday night off. At least not until midnight.

“Adrian is the sous-chef for the breakfast and lunch service at Mirrorage,”
Nico explained. “And since I’m going to leave Elle at some point, Dad wanted Manuel to get a few Saturday dinner services under his belt.”

“Fair enough. Mirrorage is a great spot.”

“So, food?” Linn slung her purse strap over her shoulder. “I’m hungry. I wish the Spicy Pickle were open later. I want their Parisian wrap.”

“If French sounds good, Little Bird isn’t more than a few blocks away,” I pointed out.

“If by a few, you mean ten blocks, sure.”

“I don’t mind the walk, if you don’t.”

“We shall escort you both,” Nico said gallantly. He offered an arm to Linn, who cackled at him before starting off on her own—a Southern belle, Linn wasn’t.

Adrian stayed by my side as we walked. “Nico said you’re to manage the restaurant’s opening and possibly continue afterward.”

“That’s right,” I said, keeping my voice businesslike. “I’m a food writer at the paper.”

“I’ve read your stuff,” he said. “You’re tough.”

I bristled.

“No—tough in a good way. Somebody has to be.”

“Thanks,” I said, though I still couldn’t tell if I’d been paid a compliment or not. “How are things at Mirrorage?”

“It’s a good place. The owner’s a fair man.”

I nodded. “He’s friends with my dad.”

“It’s good work, but I’d prefer to move to a dinner service. That’s where all the action is.”

I shook my head. “I can’t understand how you and Nico and the rest of you enjoy that kind of work pace, night after night.”

“Every seating is an adventure, a race, but one where you have to be precise. It’s like a competition against yourself.”

“Like golf?”

“Sure, but with knives and fire.”

I couldn’t help myself—I chuckled, and Adrian’s smile could have doubled as a flashlight.

But I didn’t care how handsome or charming he was—I had learned my lesson with coworkers in general and sous-chefs in particular.

“I brought Adrian because I knew you had to meet him,” Nico told me as we walked inside Little Bird.

For a brief moment I felt myself go pale. He
wanted
me to meet him? As in, a setup? Was my brother
trying
to sabotage the restaurant before it opened?

My circulation returned to normal when Nico began to recount the interview, Adrian’s credentials, the many things he and Adrian shared in common, and their instant friendship. I nodded and listened intently.