Last Bite: A Novel of Culinary Romance (32 page)

“Maybe we need an exorcism.”

“Probably, but Father Joseph still won’t have anything to do with her.”

“So much for ‘Father forgive them.’”

“Oh, and there’s some really big news.”

“What’s that?”

“Your Aunt Connie is ‘back from her trip.’” He used the euphemism the family had chosen and added his own mocking tone.

“No way. How did that happen?”

“Well, according to Russell, the girlfriend dumped Uncle Mike because he had strange eating habits and wouldn’t take her to decent restaurants anymore.”

“Russell probably made that up.”

“Probably. But whatever the reason, it took Mike just two days before he was back at Aunt Connie’s.”

“And she took him back? Boy, Father Joseph could learn a thing or two about forgiveness from Aunt Connie.”

“She did. And no one acted like it had been anything but a little vacation.”

“Wow. I guess Aunt Connie missed out on the revenge gene. I would have made him suffer for a long time before taking him back, if I did at all.”

“Not if you looked like Aunt Connie. She missed out on a lot of genes.”

I glared at my father and imitated my mother’s pretended annoyance. “Mike!”

He gave me the exaggerated naive look he’d perfected. “What. What’d I say?”

We laughed at how well we had it down and then he continued with the family saga.

“Raymond is supposedly turning over a new leaf.”

“How so?”

“Well, Uncle Little Joey threatened to send him away to a rehabilitation place, so he agreed to go to one of those anonymous groups for—as your mother put it—for people with special problems. You know your mother—she couldn’t bring herself to say ‘drug addict’ about one of her own. Anyway, your aunt Gina has been going with him every day since you left, and I guess it’s working. Gina says he’s a whole new person. He’s cut his hair and is letting his pierced parts close up. I don’t know what he’ll do about that hideous tattoo.”

As we were pulling into our driveway, my father said, “You might want to act as though you’re hearing most of this for the first time when your mother tells you. She’ll want to give you her interpretation of the situations.”

“You got it.”

No more than ten minutes from the time I walked in the back door, we were all sitting at the kitchen table drinking coffee and nibbling on Italian pastries. I told them briefly about Italy, knowing I’d have to repeat it all when Mary got there. I said nothing about George or Danny. I decided to withhold George until Mary got there and Danny altogether. Then I passed out presents, and after they had opened them and showed appropriate appreciation, Nonna said, “I have a present for you.”

“You do?” I said.

“I’m making you eggplant parmigiana for your homecoming
dinner. Where you were in Italy, they don’t know how to do it right.” No one knew how to do it like Nonna. Hers was the best and the meal I craved most. I couldn’t think of anything better.

“Would you like me to slice the eggplant?” Dad asked. The secret to a good eggplant parmigiana begins with the slicing. The pieces have to be very thin and even; thin so they will cook all the way through and melt into each other when they bake, and even so they will brown at the same time. My father has the steady hand of an artist and is the undisputed best eggplant slicer in the family. But Nonna still believed in caution.

“Okay, Michael,” Nonna said. “But do it next to me so I can watch. Casey can help you, and I’ll make the marinara. Paula, you make a salad and cook some sausages to go on the side.” Marinara, a meatless tomato sauce, is secret number two of eggplant parmigiana. Meat sauce masks the flavor of the eggplant.

I washed the eggplants and gave them to my father to slice. Then, since we didn’t have a sauna, I went to the garden to pick basil for Nonna’s marinara. As soon as my father had several perfect, paper-thin slices in front of him, I gathered them up and put them in a colander with salt between the layers and a couple of paper towels on top. I placed a can of tomatoes on top of the towels to weight the slices so they would exude any bitter juices, and then beat up several eggs. Secret number three: don’t coat the eggplant with bread crumbs; a thin coating of egg is all that is needed to protect the delicate slices while they fry. I poured olive oil into a large frying pan and then got out a large wedge of Parmesan cheese. That’s the last secret: don’t guck up the eggplant with a lot of different cheeses; just use freshly grated Parmesan.

As we stirred, sliced, and grated, Mom and Nonna gave me their versions of the family events. Mary arrived just as we
were putting the eggplant in the oven, and after a few minutes of hugging everyone, she dragged me up to my room.

“So, tell me what happened after I left Florence.”

“We went to Ravenna—”

“I’m going to strangle you. Tell me about Danny, and I want all the details.”

So I told her about the Florence almost-making-it night, and then about the Florence holiday day, and then about the making-it-in-the-sexy-French-underwear night. I tried to make it sound like just one of those fling things.

She threw both hands over her heart and fell back on my bed. “Thank God. I can barely talk.” Then she sat up and said, “See. What did I tell you?”

“What did you tell me?”

She held her hands guitar style. “‘I never mind getting burned if I can just stand near the flame.’”

“It doesn’t go like that, but no matter because I do mind getting burned. It was a fling and now it’s over.”

“You’re kidding, right?”

I shook my head.

“What? Are you crazy? If you’re going to throw water on the fire, at least wait a while. You’ve just had a great time with a great guy. And, believe me, he
is
hot. Pul-lease tell me you haven’t told him that it’s over.”

“I have.”

“Oh shit, Casey. What’d he say?”

“He hung up on me.”

She leaned back on the pillow and shook her head. “It’s the Bobby Morgan syndrome all over again.”

W
E GOT BACK DOWNSTAIRS
just as the eggplant was coming out of the oven. Everyone sat down to eat.

“Okay, now we are all here,” my mother said, cutting the eggplant. “Tell us
everything
about the trip.”

I began with the easy stuff, and they all had questions. Mary wanted to know in detail what the Italian women were wearing, which of the Calvin Klein outfits I had worn, and how on earth could I have not gone into Prada and Escada? Nonna wanted to know exactly what Rosa put in her
brodetto
, how Anna Maria made her pasta dough, and, again, why we hadn’t gone to Naples. Mom asked if I’d spoken some Italian there, if I’d refrain from using my
goombah
garbage mouth, and if I’d gotten addresses to write thank-you notes. Dad had only one question, but he asked it more than once: “Where do I find this Mario bastard with the wandering hands?”

We were still sitting there two hours later, and fanny fatigue was beginning to set in. I had eaten three servings of eggplant, undone two inches of zipper on my pants, and had yet to tell them about George.

“Tell them about your Florence holiday, Casey,” Mary said. I shot her the evil eye, which she ignored. I did want to tell my mother about the day, but I hadn’t decided what I wanted to say about Danny, so I told them about the day and pretended it had ended as sweetly as the real
Roman Holiday
, with me and Danny going our separate ways.

Mary coughed but said nothing. We were working on coffee and Italian pastries when I finally brought up George. I told them as much as I could without getting into that classified area. They listened with their mouths open.

“It’s so unbelievable!” Mary said. “George was blackmailing Sally and that’s why she was pretending he was her agent? What was he using as bait?”

This is where it got tricky, but I had worked out an answer. “He made up lies but was able to convince Sally they were true.
I don’t know what the lies were and, frankly, I don’t want to know. Do you remember that girl Carol who was with him at the party at Oran Mor?”

“The one with the pink Marshmallow Peep hairdo who was shoveling the hors d’oeuvres into her purse?”

“That’s her. Her real name is Olga Davinsky and she’s George’s cousin. They were in on this together. She’s been arrested as well.”

“Well, what will all the important chefs do for demonstration assistants with her out of the picture?” Mary said sarcastically. The stereo was on, and we could hear Louis Prima singing “I’ll Be Glad When You’re Dead, You Rascal You.”

“My sentiments exactly,” I said.

Nonna agreed and then asked me again about Danny. I wondered if Mary was feeding her information under the table.

T
HE REST OF THE
week went by like a blur. I arrived at the studio Wednesday morning to find that Mae had things well in hand. I gave her the vintage boa-like wrap that I’d found in a flea market in Florence and she adored it. Then I took out my scripts and went to work.

Our celebrity chef, Allison Field, was an ex-sitcom star who had been fired from her show in a very public studio dispute. She was rumored to be difficult and demanding and was now television roadkill. But at the height of her popularity, she had given Sonya one of her first on-air interviews and so Sonya had said yes when Allison had asked if she could come on our show. Allison had just put out an exercise video that included a small booklet of low-fat, delicious recipes that, combined with the exercise, were guaranteed to keep one fit. By the looks of her, she was well qualified to tell the rest of us what to do with our bodies.

“Where do you want me to start?” I asked Mae, since she knew what still needed to be done.

“You set up the turkey meatloaf and I’ll do the spaghetti-squash pasta,” she said, grinning at the change of roles.

Jonathan, still in his neck brace, came into the kitchen and, ignoring the colors of the four peppers that went into the spaghetti squash dish, zeroed in on the brown meatloaf.

“It’s not as brown as beef meatloaf, and it does have a nice red tomato salsa on top,” I said hopefully.

“Brown is brown,” he grumbled.

I gave him the colorful Deruta pitcher shaped like a chicken I had bought for him, and he actually smiled at me.

“By the way, how is your neck? Is it getting any better?”

“Not at all. I shouldn’t even be here. The chiropractor said I’ll probably have to see him for the rest of my life. He said I was a mess.”

I grinned at him. “You sure he was talking about your neck?”

“I’m not in a funny mood, Casey.”

So much for the smile. As for the mood, Jonathan had had funny-bypass surgery long before I’d met him.

Sonya brought Allison into the kitchen about half an hour before she was due on air. There was nothing about the star that even suggested she was difficult. She thought the food looked great, complimented us on the script breakdown, and even made Jonathan semihappy by ogling his cabinet collection of whatnots. Our collected opinion of her was that she was a kind, sweet person. She did a great show and finished by flexing several well-defined muscles for the audience.

Thursday we had an all-chocolate show, which had Jonathan close to apoplexy. The pastry chef was going to show how to temper chocolate and then make truffles and fancy decorations
for cakes. I tried to convince Jonathan that the dark brown would be dynamite against a white background, but he pouted throughout the morning and I gave up trying to put him in a better mood. I wasn’t in such a great mood myself. And I knew why. I had e-mailed the scripts to Sally and Danny, along with nice little notes. I didn’t want to get involved with Danny, but I did have to work with him and wanted to remain friends. Sally had replied with “Sounds great! Can’t wait to see you. :).” Danny had replied with nada.

T
HURSDAY NIGHT, THERE WAS
a different type of nada. Richard called.

“Casey, I’m sorry. I was an idiot. It was all so foolish. You and I weren’t getting along and Lexi was letting me know she thought I was terrific. I just got crazy.”

Welcome to the fold, I thought but said nothing, so he went on with his nada. “I miss you. I want you to come back to the apartment. Just so you know, Lexi no longer works for me.”

“I’m sorry, Richard. But you’re right. It wasn’t working and there’s no reason to believe that it will now.”

“Casey, I love you.”

“I’m sorry, Richard, but I don’t love you. And I don’t think you really love me. I think our relationship was just convenient.”

“That’s harsh.”

“No. It’s true.”

“There’s someone else, isn’t there?”

“No. There
isn’t
.”

“Well, then you’re still angry, and you have a right to be.”

“Richard, if I were angry, I’d be swearing at you in Italian.”

He was quiet for a moment and must have realized that what I’d said was true. “Is there anything I can do to change your mind?” he asked.

“Not about us, but I could use an appointment to get my teeth cleaned.” Sometimes you have to be practical. Good dentists are hard to find.

F
RIDAY MORNING WE HAD
no live spot and we prepped for Monday’s Baked Alaska. Mondays are always a tough day for live spots because none of us are there on Sunday. We baked the cakes, laid out the trays, molded and froze ice cream, and I mentally prepared myself for the deep-freeze treatment I expected from Danny.

Maybe I didn’t treat you quite as good as I should have.
—Willie Nelson

I
couldn’t remember ever going into the studio to work with Sally feeling as down as I did on Monday morning. I hadn’t heard one word from Danny and I wondered if he planned to continue the silent treatment all morning. Maybe I hadn’t handled it all that well after all. I hadn’t expected this reaction from him, and I decided that if he was in the kitchen alone when I got there, I would act cheery, as though nothing unusual had gone on.

Danny was not in the kitchen when I arrived. In fact, he didn’t come in until after everyone else was there. Obviously, he wanted to avoid having to be alone with me. At least he said hello to me—after he’d said hello to Sonya, Sally, Mae, Jonathan, and two Tonys. That “hello” was the extent of our exchange, and then we all went on with our work. Everyone but me seemed to be in great spirits. I made Jonathan look like a one-man comedy show.