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Authors: Meredith Mileti

BOOK: Aftertaste
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“Okay, okay, we'll just cancel it and reorder the Parsons chairs. It will take an additional six weeks, but if you are in no hurry . . . Yes. Okay. Fine.” I can tell by the way he says “fine” that it really isn't, that it really is anything but.
He hangs up the phone. “Zebra-striped Parsons chairs. Sometimes you just can't save people from themselves, no matter how hard you try.”
How true.
“I'm glad to see that you're feeling better,” he continues, after a moment. His voice is formal, as if he is still talking to the recalcitrant client, and I suspect he feels guilty about hurting me.
“I am better. I'm fine, really.” My voice is only slightly less formal than his. “I'm seeing a therapist now. I've just come from her, in fact,” I tell him. And then, unable to resist a gratuitous dig, I add softly, “See, I'm not too proud for that.” Richard winces.
“Actually, she isn't really a therapist,” I continue, my voice louder and just a bit smug. “She's a life coach, which, if you ever get sick of decorating people's houses, you might look into. As a life coach you get to hound people for a living, nag at them until they do what you want, until they do what
you
think is good for them. You'd be perfect at it.” This, of course, isn't really true (at least the part about Dr. D-P hounding me to do what she wanted), but I can't resist teasing Richard. It's always been the best and quickest way to clear the air between us.
He finally smiles. “Good for you,” he says quietly, and I can tell he really means it.
Richard makes us some chamomile tea in the little kitchenette beside his workroom. I sit on one of the high stools beside his drafting table and tell him about my plan to take over the Pittsburgh dining world.
“This life coach sounds worth her weight in gold. Maybe I should go and see her.”
“What on earth would she do for you?” I ask him, surprised. “Your life has always been exactly as you like it. At least since I've known you,” I add, tacitly acknowledging the time in his life long before I knew him, when Richard probably could have used a life coach. It's something we almost never talk about. “Besides, you are definitely not coachable,” I tell him, taking a sip of tea.
“And you are?” He shoots me an amused look. “Anyway, let's not talk about it. I'm having a perfectly nice time right now and don't want to get depressed. And conversations concerning matters of the heart have a habit of doing just that.”
Richard doesn't usually talk about his romantic entanglements, or if he does, he scrupulously avoids specifics. I don't know if he thinks it unseemly to tell me about his boyfriends; he can, at times, be rather prudish. I could understand his reluctance when I was younger, but now that we're both adults, I wonder at his reticence regarding discussing “matters of the heart,” as he had called them.
“So, are you seeing someone?” I ask. Judging from the way he shakes his head and looks quickly away, I know that he is, or has been. Richard refills our cups and pulls out a stash of Carr's wheatmeal biscuits from the cupboard by the sink. He hands me the package to open and then, ducking out into the shop for a minute, grabs a delicate Limoges dish.
“Here,” he says, handing me the plate. “Use this.”
I arrange the cookies on the plate, glad to have something to do.
Richard changes the subject. “I like Fiona,” he says, breaking a biscuit in half and dipping it delicately in his tea.
“That's nice,” I say, adding another lump of sugar to my cup. Richard hands me a spoon.
“Mira—”
“Look, it isn't that I don't like her, it's just that she's not . . .”
“She's not what? Not smart enough? So what? Smart is overrated.”
“It isn't just that. They don't have any of the same interests. It was painful watching them try to play Scrabble.”
“Well, good for her. At least she's trying to learn.” Richard shrugs, as if this too is no big deal. I stare at him, incredulous. Richard's always maintained that he could never fall for anyone who hadn't read (and loved)
Gravity's Rainbow,
couldn't tell Lapsang souchong from Darjeeling, and didn't worship the Pittsburgh Steelers. Which might just explain why his love life is suffering.
“She's just so—I don't know—different.”
Richard takes a bite of his biscuit and chews noisily. “You mean from your mother?”
“You say that like it's a bad thing.”
Richard frowns. He doesn't believe in speaking ill of the dead, even though he knows I'm half kidding.
“Let's face it, she was difficult,” I tell him.
“She was temperamental. Like lots of creative people.”
“Not all creative people drink a fifth of whiskey a day,” I remind him.
“True,” Richard says, pausing to sip his tea.
“Well, I guess if Fiona makes him happy, who am I to say?” I tell him, even though I don't really mean it.
“Creative temperament aside, even though your mother might have been his intellectual match and shared his interests, Fiona's a much better choice. She's one for the distance,” Richard says, shaking a biscuit in my direction.
I'm about to tell him that I find it difficult to believe that someone who wears spandex and plays Bunko has the staying power to satisfy my father in the long term, but Richard interrupts me.
“Besides, Fiona takes good care of your father. He's never looked better, and when a man gets to be his age, what he wants is to be taken care of.” I look up, surprised by the sudden intensity in Richard's voice. He isn't looking at me, though. He's studying the other half of his biscuit like it's the Rosetta stone.
Neither one of us says anything for a moment. Richard and my father are pretty close in age, within ten or so years anyway, and I'm starting to get the feeling we haven't just been talking about my father. I also know better than to press him. Again, Richard changes the subject, and we talk about other things—his latest design project, whether Fiona's breasts have indeed been surgically altered, my new friend Ruth.
On the way home I think about what Richard said, what we both said, and, more important, didn't say. He's got a cagey, secretive side, not to mention a disarming smile and a well-developed capacity for changing the subject whenever it hits too close to home. Even after all these years, for someone I consider my best friend, there's still a lot I don't know about Richard.
chapter 18
I'm in the coatroom at Gymboree the following morning, wrestling Chloe out of her jacket, when Ruth breezes in. She's wearing eye makeup and lipstick, and her hair is swept up in a complicated chignon. Instead of her favorite Wharton B-School sweatshirt and faded Gap chinos, she's wearing designer jeans and a turquoise cowl-necked sweater. She looks around the coatroom furtively. “Well?”
“You look great,” I tell her.
“Thanks,” she says, plopping Carlos down on the bench next to Chloe. “Is he here? Did you see him yet?” she whispers, rummaging around in her diaper bag. I shake my head. Carlos has begun to squirm, so I start unzipping his coat while Ruth pulls a pair of wedge heels from the bag and holds them against her sweater. “Too much?” she asks. “I couldn't decide.”
“Yup, definitely,” I tell her, slipping Carlos out of his jacket.
“Okay, right,” she says, stuffing them back into the diaper bag. I thrust the kids' jackets and bags into the cubbies while Ruth stands there hyperventilating.
“Wait a minute,” she says, laying a hand on my arm. “Can you just check to see if he's out there?”
“Ruth, get a grip. What is the big deal? You've never even spoken to the guy. He might be a complete moron.”
“You've been married, Mira. Do you have any idea of the stigma attached to someone my age who's never even been
asked?
” I look over at Ruth, whose face threatens to collapse in a mass of worry lines.
“Okay, okay, I'll check.” I duck my head out into the gym and look around. “No. He's not even here. Come on, let's go,” I say, propelling Ruth and Carlos into the JCC gym.
After a while, Ruth relaxes. I lift Chloe into the long tube, and Carlos toddles in after her. Ruth sinks down onto the brightly colored mat and blows a wisp of hair that has escaped her chignon out of her face. “I can't believe I let someone I don't even know unglue me like that. What a loser I am, huh?”
I sit down next to her and give her hand a squeeze. “Not at all,” I tell her. Chloe emerges from the other side of the tube and makes her way at a fast crawl to join us on the mat. When Carlos fails to follow her, Ruth ducks her head inside the tube only to find that he's parked himself smack in the middle of it, causing a traffic jam of testy toddlers to build up from the other side. Ruth leans in and calls his name. “Come on out, buddy.” Nothing. Ruth looks at me and rolls her eyes before climbing in after him. Because she's tall, she has to arch her back to fit inside the tube, which makes her rear end stick out at an unattractive angle.
I gather Chloe into my lap and think about what Ruth had said. She's right. No one would think it odd if a forty-three-year-old man had never been married, but a woman? Forget it.
Just then I look up and see him. Gym-Dad is standing in the doorway of the coatroom, looking nervously around the room. He's holding his son, a redheaded toddler. One of the other moms advances on him, offering a name tag and a pen.
“Hey, Ruth,” I whisper.
“Hang on, I can't quite reach him,” Ruth says, inching her way further into the tube, so that her backside is now fully encased. “Mira, can you go around and try to get him from the other side? I think he's closer.” Gym-Dad makes his way into the room, pausing to release his son, who, of course, makes his way at a fast clip to the large huddle of toddlers surrounding the other side of the yellow tube.
“Ah, Ruth,” I say, this time leaning in and tugging urgently at her foot.
“Damn, these things aren't exactly made to accommodate the middle-aged woman's anatomy. I think I'm stuck,” Ruth says, her voice echoing hollowly in the yellow plastic tube.
Just then Carlos emerges from the other end, and the little redheaded boy joins the crush of kids scrambling back in. When I look up, Gym-Dad is crouching next to me, leaning down to look into the back end of the tube, expecting, I assume, to see his son, but instead gazing straight into Ruth's backside.
“Bit of a roadblock, I see,” he says evenly, his eyes smiling. He's got a pleasant face, more youthful than boyish, at odds with the softly graying temples and small craggy lines around his eyes and mouth.
I can see Ruth's body tense at the sound of his voice. “Mira?” she says, hesitantly.
“I'm right here,” I tell her as I watch Carlos, who has now escaped the tube, hurl himself toward a sea of yoga balls.
“Grab Carlos, will you? While I, um, try to get out of here,” she mutters.
When I return with Carlos and Chloe, Gym-Dad is helping Ruth to her feet. Her hair's come loose, one of Carlos's tiny gym socks is stuck to her pant leg, and her face is the color of a late season persimmon.
“Thanks,” Ruth says, bending low to dust off the knees of her pants and remove the stray sock. I bend down to put Carlos's sock back on, and when I catch Ruth's eye, she glares at me. The two of us stand up.
“Hi, I'm Mira,” I say, extending my hand to Gym-Dad. “This is Chloe, and this is Carlos, who belongs to Ruth, whom you've already met.”
“No, I haven't, but it's nice to meet you both,” he says, taking my hand and shaking it. “I'm Neil, and this is Eli,” he says, running his fingers through Eli's thick red curls as he stands with his head buried in his father's pant leg. “Those tubes can be tricky,” Neil says sympathetically. Ruth nods mutely and looks down with concern at Eli.
“I'm sorry. I think I scared him,” she says.
“He'll be all right. He's a bit of a nervous kid, that's all.” The three of us stand there awkwardly until Carlos pokes Eli in the back. Eli begins to whimper.
“Carlos!” Ruth says.
“No, don't worry about it,” Neil says, picking up Eli. “He was just being curious. Well, I guess we'll look around a bit,” he says, wandering off in the direction of the rocking horses.
“How could you?” Ruth hisses, as soon as Neil is out of earshot.
“I tried to warn you—” I begin, but Ruth interrupts.
“Then his kid comes charging through the other end of the tube, takes one look at me, and begins to cry. Nice.”
“Who cares? And besides, now at least he'll remember you,” I tell her.
“My butt, more likely—not exactly my finest feature, in case you hadn't noticed.”
I give Ruth's arm a nudge and incline my head in the direction of the rocking horses. “Come on, Carlos loves those. Let's go over and—”
“No!”
“Don't you want a chance to talk to him?” When I look over, Neil is looking at us. “Don't look now, but he's looking this way. Come on, let's just go over and—”
“NO!” Ruth says, grabbing my arm, panic in her eyes.
“Okay, okay. Never mind. It's almost time for ‘The Bubble Song' anyway.” Ruth, the kids, and I make our way over to where the instructors are setting up the parachute and filling the bubble trays.
Ruth is quiet during the rest of class and, for some reason I can't fathom, still seems annoyed with me. In the coatroom after class, I tell her I was just trying to help. “You spent the better part of the week talking about the guy; I figured you might want a chance to get to know him, that's all.”
“I know. It's not your fault, really. I've always been this way. I get nervous and tongue-tied, and you're all ‘Hi, I'm Mira,' and then I feel like even more of a yutz,” Ruth says miserably. “And p.s., I think he was looking at you, not me, anyway. And why wouldn't he? You didn't get your fat ass stuck in—”
We're on our way out the door of the coatroom and into the JCC lobby when I catch sight of Rona Silverman standing smack in the middle of the lobby, talking with an older woman with platinum hair. I groan.
“What's the matter?” Ruth asks.
At the last minute I try to steer Ruth out of the way, but it's too late. Rona's already spotted me. “Why, Mira dear,” she calls to me, waving me over. “What are you doing still in town? I thought you'd left ages ago!”
“No, still here,” I tell her.
Rona pats her frosted bob and smiles at Chloe. “How is that restaurant of yours surviving without you?” And then, turning to her companion, Rona says, “Leah, Mira's the one I was telling you about. She's a cook in New York. You ate at her restaurant when you were there a couple of months ago, remember?”
“Did I?” asks Leah. “Oh, yes, of course, delicious,” she says absently, which makes me flinch. I feel like I've been punched. Ruth looks at me with concern.
“Forgive me, girls, this is my friend, Leah Hollander,” Rona says, introducing her companion. “We're playing mah-jongg at eleven.” She looks at her watch and clucks. “Supposed to anyway. Your class got out late,” she says, frowning.
“I love mah-jongg,” Ruth says. All three of us turn to look at her.
“Really, dear? Not many people your age know the game,” Rona says, sizing Ruth up and exchanging a look with her friend. “And you are?” Rona says, turning to look from Ruth to me for the introduction.
“Oh, this is my friend, Ruth Bernstein,” I tell the women.
“How lovely to meet you, Ruth,” Leah says, taking Ruth's hand in hers. “We don't usually play here,” she continues. “We usually play at one of our houses on Thursday afternoons, but our fourth recently broke her ankle and can't negotiate the steps, so until she's better, we're relegated to playing here. Have you girls just come from the baby exercise class? I was hoping to catch a glimpse of my grandson, but we must have missed him,” says Leah, looking beyond us into the gym.
Just then, Rona Silverman begins waving. “Look, Leah, there they are.” Ruth, Leah, and I all turn around, just as Neil and Eli make their way out of the men's room and head toward us.
“Neil dear, we thought we'd missed you,” Leah calls to her son. “There's my darling boy,” she says, reaching to take Eli from Neil.
“Mother, Mrs. Silverman,” Neil says, smiling. “There's no changing table in the men's room. Posed a bit of a challenge, I'm afraid.”
“Neil, come meet Mira and her friend Ruth
Bernstein,
” Rona Silverman says.
“We've already met. Ladies, nice to see you again,” Neil says, pausing to pull his BlackBerry from his pocket.
Leah Hollander frowns at her son. “Put that thing away, Neil. It's rude, and besides you shouldn't be keeping it in your pocket. You could get testicular cancer, you know.”
“Mother!” Neil exclaims, horrified. I can't help laughing. Ruth, Rona, and Leah all look at me askance while Neil shakes his head. “Apparently, nothing is sacred,” he says, turning to me and smiling before slipping his BlackBerry back into his pocket and taking Eli from his mother's arms.
“Oh, don't be such a prude, Neil,” his mother says, even though she's looking at me like she knows I'm the kid who laughed in fifth grade health class at the first mention of the word “penis,” which, for the record, I was. “These are both married women. They know what testicles are. They've got babies for goodness—”
“We're not married,” Ruth interrupts, breathlessly.
“Look, they're going to start without you,” Neil says, gesturing beyond us into the gym, where a dozen women are now taking their places at the folding tables just set up by the custodian. “Don't you think you'd better start racking your tiles?”
“Yes, come on, Leah, let's go. I don't want to be stuck sitting with Heddy Markowicz again. She's too slow,” Rona says.
“Don't forget you're coming for dinner tonight. Six thirty, sharp,” Leah says, reaching up to kiss her son's cheek.
“Yes, Mother,” Neil says, bending low to receive her kiss. “Mrs. Silverman, ladies,” and with a nod he's gone.
We're almost to the door when Leah flags us down again. “Ruth dear, so glad I caught you. Rona and I were just talking. Perhaps you'd like to join us for mahj sometime? I don't suppose you have a card, do you?”
“Sure, I do,” Ruth says, rummaging in her purse for a moment before handing Leah her card. “It's been ages since I've played, so I'm sure I'm rusty, but I'd love to, if you can tolerate me,” she says, smiling like she's just won the lottery.
“What are you smiling at?” I ask her, as soon as Leah is out of sight.
“The game is afoot,” Ruth says softly.
 
Enid Maxwell, the food editor at the
Post-Gazette
, has sent me a form letter, thanking me for my interest. There are no openings at this time, she writes, but my interest is appreciated. The letter looks odd, as if she is trying to fill up the expanse of white letterhead with three lousy lines. Enid even signed her name with a big, bold flourish, probably trying to take up more space. It seems as if a letter from a journalist should be more eloquent.

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