The Monday Night Cooking School Part 10

"Actually, I was hoping for just dessert and coffee. You can be my cover-that way Lillian won't get mad because I'm not eating a whole dinner."

"I haven't been someone's cover in a while," Isabelle answered with a laugh. She looked at the tables around them, many of which had emptied over the course of the evening, so that now the restaurant was only half full.

"Do you think she's expecting a late-night rush?" Isabelle asked, one eyebrow raised.

"I'VE BEEN WONDERING," Isabelle commented reflectively over dessert, "if it is foolish to make new memories when you know you are going to lose them."

"And yet here you are, taking a cooking cla.s.s," Tom noted.

"Well, not tonight, apparently," Isabelle pointed out wryly. Tom smiled.

They ate in an easy silence, reveling in the creamy lemon tart in front of them. After a while, Isabelle spoke again. "You know," she said, holding up a forkful, "I am starting to think that maybe memories are like this dessert. I eat it, and it becomes a part of me, whether I remember it later or not."

"I knew someone who used to say something like that," Tom said.

"Is that why you are sad?" Isabelle asked, and then saw his expression. "I'm sorry. My manners are going along with my memories."

Tom shook his head softly. "Your manners are fine-and your mind is plenty sharp." He blew across the surface of his coffee, took a sip. "My wife. She died a little over a year ago. She was a chef, and she always used to say the same thing about food. I try to believe it, but it was easier when she was here and the food was hers."

"Ah"-Isabelle looked at Tom thoughtfully-"so we are not so different."

"How is that?"

"We both have a past we can't keep hold of."

"I suppose that's true." Tom looked at her, as if waiting for something more.

"I used to know a sculptor," Isabelle said, nodding. "He always said that if you looked hard enough, you could see where each person carried his soul in his body. It sounds crazy, but when you saw his sculptures, it made sense. I think the same is true with those we love," she explained. "Our bodies carry our memories of them, in our muscles, in our skin, in our bones. My children are right here." She pointed to the inside curve of her elbow. "Where I held them when they were babies. Even if there comes a time when I don't know who they are anymore, I believe I will feel them here.

"Where do you hold your wife?" she asked Tom.

Tom looked at Isabelle, his eyes full. He put his right hand to the side of his own face, then took it away and adjusted the shape slightly.

"That is her jawline," he said softly, running his left index finger along the half-circle at the base of his hand, then along the top curve where his hand met his fingers. "And here is her cheekbone."

TOM EXCUSED HIMSELF on the pretense of going to the restroom, and went toward Lillian, who stood by the front door, a wine-gla.s.s in her hand, receiving the compliments of a departing couple. Tom looked around the dining room and was surprised to realize it was empty, except for Isabelle at their table. on the pretense of going to the restroom, and went toward Lillian, who stood by the front door, a wine-gla.s.s in her hand, receiving the compliments of a departing couple. Tom looked around the dining room and was surprised to realize it was empty, except for Isabelle at their table.

Tom walked up and touched her shoulder. "I'd like to pick up Isabelle's check," he said.

Lillian smiled. "It's on the house."

"Thank you for calling me. I don't know how you always know..."

"Lucky guess," Lillian said, raising her winegla.s.s.

IT WAS COOL OUTSIDE, after the warmth of the restaurant. The streetlights shone through the new growth on the fruit trees of Lillian's garden. Tom walked with Isabelle along the lavender path to the gate; out on the street, people walked by, their voices animated by the prospect of spring, discussing bedding plants and summer vacation plans.

"Can I give you a ride home?" Tom asked.

"Lillian knows to call me a taxi," Isabelle said, motioning toward the street, where a yellow cab was pulling up to the curb. "My doctor says I'm not allowed to drive anymore."

"It was a lovely evening," Tom said. "Thank you."

Isabelle leaned up and kissed him softly on the cheek.

"It was was lovely. Thank you, Rory," she said. She moved away and walked toward the cab that stood waiting under the streetlight. lovely. Thank you, Rory," she said. She moved away and walked toward the cab that stood waiting under the streetlight.

Helen

Helen and Carl walked up the main street of town to the cooking cla.s.s. It was a clear, cold evening in early February, the end of a miraculously blue day blown in from the north like a celebration. People in the Northwest tended to greet such weather with a child's sense of joy; strangers exchanged grins, houses were suddenly cleaner, and neighbors could be found in their yards in shirtsleeves, regardless of the temperature, indulging a sudden desire to dig in rich, dark dirt.

In the soft circle of lamplight ahead of them, Helen and Carl saw a man reach the gate of Lillian's restaurant; at the same time a woman approached from the other direction. The man unlatched the gate and stood aside to let the woman enter, his hand following her, unbidden, never quite touching her back and yet seemingly incapable of returning to his own side.

Helen watched the two walk up the path between the blue-gray lavender bushes-and the hand, the movement, the longing behind it, struck her with the intensity of a perfume she had long ago stopped wearing, drifting across a room she never intended to traverse.

HELEN HAD BEEN forty-one the first time she saw the man who became her lover. It was at the grocery store, a setting both absurd and logical for a woman who considered herself unequivocally married, who shied away from admiring glances at New Year's parties or darkened symphony halls or the weddings of dear friends where emotions, everyone knew, rode on high-speed elevators to greater heights than could ever be maintained the following day. forty-one the first time she saw the man who became her lover. It was at the grocery store, a setting both absurd and logical for a woman who considered herself unequivocally married, who shied away from admiring glances at New Year's parties or darkened symphony halls or the weddings of dear friends where emotions, everyone knew, rode on high-speed elevators to greater heights than could ever be maintained the following day.

She had come to the store for eggs (Laurie had a teenager's addiction to egg-white facials), dog food, paper for Mark's new school notebook, steak for dinner (Carl's doctor said his iron count was low), and the usual-h.o.m.ogenized milk, Yuban coffee, Cheerios, rice, potatoes, paper napkins. She knew these aisles as well as her own kitchen, which was convenient, as a second list was running through her head-Mark to football practice, Laurie to piano, walk the dog, iron the tablecloth-a series of to-dos that moved in and out of her consciousness like breathing.

He was in the produce aisle. She wondered later whether anything would have happened if she had encountered him first among the cardboard boxes in the cereal section, spied him through the frosted gla.s.s of an opened door in the freezer department. But set amid the fecundity of late-summer melons and gauzy lettuce, swollen red peppers and plump navel oranges, he seemed simply beautiful in comparison, and any desire on her part more aesthetic than pa.s.sionate. She watched his long fingers wander across the vegetables, reaching toward an onion, some carrots, opting for a bouquet of leeks. His eyes, when he looked up and saw her watching him, were infinitely brown and kind and his hair flowed in ill-kempt waves that he needed to cut but she immediately hoped he wouldn't, an almost maternal feeling-a rationalization that allowed her to step closer to the ocean that would surely soak her shoes.

He held up the vegetables in his hand. "My mother was French," he said to her, as if by way of explanation. "She was always asking me, 'What do you do that makes you happy?' Today, for me, leeks."

Helen stood, saying nothing, her hands empty. His eyes searched hers, and then he leaned forward, more serious, his voice gentle. "What about you?"

And Helen, who had begun to feel as if her life was like the daily turning of pages filled with other people's writing, felt as if she suddenly had come upon an ill.u.s.tration.

CARL CAUGHT the closing gate and pulled it open again for Helen. "Wasn't that Ian and Antonia?" he asked. the closing gate and pulled it open again for Helen. "Wasn't that Ian and Antonia?" he asked.

Helen shook her head, loosening her thoughts. "Yes," she replied, "I do believe it was."

"That would be nice for both of them, if that could work out."

"Don't be getting ideas about being helpful, Carl." The familiar rhythm of their banter was a bridge leading her back to him. "You saw how well that worked with our daughter." She touched his arm as she pa.s.sed through the gate.

"But Mark is happy, and he gave you grandchildren." Carl's voice rippled with mischief.

They walked up to the restaurant, the garden around them February-quiet, all roots and no flowers. The bricks of the pathway clinked together under their feet in the cold; their breath moved ahead of them as if in a hurry to get inside the warm restaurant.

"I like winter," Helen commented.

Carl took her hand and drew her closer. "Good thing," he replied.

SHE HAD INTENDED to leave her marriage, was ready to tell Carl, her heart full of fireworks for this new man, the one whose clothes by the bed she had never bought or washed or mended, whose fingers slipped across her skin like a river, tracing cool, lingering trails to the inner curve of her ear, the slope of her hip, as if he was on a trip with no itinerary, no return date. to leave her marriage, was ready to tell Carl, her heart full of fireworks for this new man, the one whose clothes by the bed she had never bought or washed or mended, whose fingers slipped across her skin like a river, tracing cool, lingering trails to the inner curve of her ear, the slope of her hip, as if he was on a trip with no itinerary, no return date.

She had begun the conversation with Carl straight enough, readying the words she would use to help him accept the end of a union that had lasted longer than either of their childhoods. She had chosen the kitchen table, a place of domestic warmth, without the pa.s.sion of a bedroom; they had planned vacations there, chosen health insurance, decided what to do with the dead guinea pig they found one Sat.u.r.day morning before the children were awake. They had always worked well at this table.

Carl sat across from her. She saw his face, his eyes scanning her expression for hints of delight or anger or confusion, a road sign for the direction of their conversation.

He doesn't know what I am going to tell him, she thought. He doesn't know-and the idea struck her, strange as a bell mis-chiming. I know something about me that he doesn't. She couldn't remember the last time that was true. She looked at him watching her and she realized-not that it made any sense, but even so-that for her somehow Carl had always been with her, in her mind, in her body, in some unconscious but completely tangible way, through all the kisses and moans and explorations of her affair, just as he was when she gardened in the yard or cut her toenails sitting alone on the edge of the bathtub. After almost twenty years she simply carried him, a part of her, like blood or bones or dreams. But he hadn't been there. This man across from her, with his sandy brown hair and clear blue eyes, whose hands had held hers in childbirth and on every plane trip they had ever taken, was separate from her. And in that moment, Helen knew exactly what the pain of her leaving would look like, how it would wash across his face and turn his eyes a gray that would never exactly leave.

I would kill anyone who did that to him, she thought, and realized how completely that was true and that she could never do it herself. I love him, she thought, and the idea was as solid as the table between them.

Carl sat, waiting for her to speak.

"There was a man," she told him. "It's over now."

NOT THAT IT WAS; the body takes its time to follow where the mind leads. She never returned to her lover, but there were moments when she caught sight of a profile so like his at a traffic light that her body stopped, electrified, as if it was stepping without her consent into another life, as if being in both of those lives at one time, she might cease to exist completely.

If Carl knew it was not completely finished, it was not because she told him. He had entered the gray world of hurt, if not the one she had sworn to avoid, at least so close to it as to be easily confused. The irony of the situation caught at her, infiltrating her memories of her former lover until Carl became more a part of her lost affair than the man she had slept with. When she saw the men she thought were her lover, it was while driving her daughter to a sleepover, or carrying Carl's shirts from the dry cleaners, the smell of starch creating its own world around her. If she thought about the affair, it was while lying next to Carl, at night when everything in the house was finally quiet, with Carl's smell in the sheets, his breath playing across the pillow next to her. When she cooked using ingredients her former lover had introduced her to, standing half clothed in his tiny apartment kitchen, it was for her family, and over time the dishes acquired new meanings-Laurie's favorite dessert, the soup that made Mark eat vegetables, the stew that could be counted on to comfort for the loss of a football game, a boyfriend, a job offer.

So when she finally did see the man who had once been her lover-at her son's high school graduation, her daughter laughing and pointing at her brother, who was crossing the podium with just the slightest hop to his step-it was with the kind of longing we experience for something we never really intended to have in the first place. An older sister's boyfriend. A year in Provence. When her mind cleared, her son was across the stage, arms raised in jubilation, and Carl's hand was holding hers.

That night, after the cake and jokes and the symbolic gla.s.s of wine for Mark that everyone acknowledged was not legal but also not likely a virginal experience, after the children, who could no longer really be called children, had gone off to bed or parties, Carl had handed her an envelope full of the magazine pictures she had been cutting out for years.

"Provence," said Carl, and smiled. "A month at the end of August, when Mark goes off to college."

LILLIAN CALLED the cla.s.s to their seats. "It's February," she began. "Almost Valentine's Day. I think Valentine's Day is a gift, like the weather we had today. Here we are in the midst of winter. Our skin has been hibernating in layers of clothes for months; we are accustomed to gray. We can start to think that this is how it always will be. And then, there's Valentine's Day. A day to look in your lover's eyes and see color. To eat something that plays with your taste buds and to remember romance. the cla.s.s to their seats. "It's February," she began. "Almost Valentine's Day. I think Valentine's Day is a gift, like the weather we had today. Here we are in the midst of winter. Our skin has been hibernating in layers of clothes for months; we are accustomed to gray. We can start to think that this is how it always will be. And then, there's Valentine's Day. A day to look in your lover's eyes and see color. To eat something that plays with your taste buds and to remember romance.

"But here's the thing." Lillian ran her fingertips thoughtfully along the smooth surface of the wooden prep table in front of her. "If you live in your senses, slowly, with attention, if you use your eyes and your fingertips and your taste buds, then romance is something you'll never need a greeting card to make you remember."

Lillian looked out at her cla.s.s, at Claire's hair, still tousled from her baby's exuberant good-bye, Antonia's sleek black work blazer, Tom's business shirt, rumpled at the end of a long day.

"It's not always easy to slow our lives down. But just in case we need a little help, we have a natural opportunity, three times a day, to relearn the lesson."

"Food?" Ian suggested with a grin.

"What a lovely idea," Lillian responded.

"AS A SENSUALIST, your ingredients are your first priority," Lillian remarked, holding up the bottle of thick green olive oil. "Beautiful, luscious ingredients will color the atmosphere of a meal and whatever follows it, as will those which are mean and cheap." She poured a small portion of olive oil onto a plate, then dipped the tip of her finger in the liquid and licked it off contemplatively.

"Try this," she said, pa.s.sing the plate to Chloe, who sat at the end of the first row of chairs.

"It feels like a flower," Chloe commented, sucking her finger to get the last of the liquid before pa.s.sing the plate on to Antonia.

Lillian held up a second bottle, smaller and darker than the first. "Truly great balsamic vinegar is made through a long, careful process. The liquid is moved from one barrel to the next, each time taking on the flavors of a different type of wood-oak, cherry, and juniper-becoming denser and more complex with each step. Fifty-year-old vinegar is as highly prized and highly priced as great wine."

"Ian, hold out your hand," Lillian directed, and poured a few drops of balsamic vinegar, dense as mola.s.ses, in the curve of skin between his thumb and index finger.

"The best way to taste balsamic vinegar is with the warmth of your own skin," Antonia explained to Ian, holding out her own hand toward the bottle.

After everyone had tasted the liquid from both bottles, Lillian set them all to tasks, half the cla.s.s grating cheese and measuring white wine and kirsch and cornstarch, the other half washing lettuce and cutting up tomatoes and baguettes.

"Helen, put the grated cheese and cornstarch in a plastic bag and shake it. The cornstarch will coat the cheese and it will melt more smoothly," Lillian suggested. "And, Carl, you can rub the inside of that red pot with a garlic clove. Some people like to leave the clove in the pot when they're done, or even add others to it."

"What are we making?" asked Claire.

"It's fondue, right?" Ian jumped in.

"Indeed. It seemed like a fun choice for Valentine's Day. Do any of you know where the word 'fondue' comes from?" Lillian asked the cla.s.s.

"Fondre," replied Helen without effort. "It's French." replied Helen without effort. "It's French."

"To melt," added Lillian.

HELEN HAD ALWAYS wanted to live in France, although her French, studied a.s.siduously in her early schooling, had over the years of college and marriage and children become an attic collection, wanted to live in France, although her French, studied a.s.siduously in her early schooling, had over the years of college and marriage and children become an attic collection, r r's rolling like lumpy tricycle wheels, verb conjugations jumbled together without labels or organization. She had bought French audiotapes and the playful sparkle of syntax and syllables brought her delight, no matter how clumsy her attempts at imitation. She had always wondered whether, if she was given the chance, given a week, or two, to sink into another culture, this language would somehow rise out of her and become a way of thinking. What would she dream about, if she dreamed in French?

PROVENCE, when she and Carl arrived at the end of August, had smelled of lavender-the air, the sheets, the wine, even the milk in her coffee in the morning-the lightest of under-currents, a watercolor world of soft purple. She found herself breathing deeply and slowly, to pull it in, to hold it in every part of her for later.

In the mornings they woke to songbirds and church bells, then walked across the crunch of small white rocks in the courtyard of their bed and breakfast to one of the round green metal tables set under a linden tree. They poured thick black coffee from one silver pot and foaming hot milk from another into wide white cups that warmed their hands as they drank. They ate croissants that melted in their fingertips, scattering crumbs that disappeared among the rocks, only to be found by the song-birds after they had left.

They rented a small car and spent days exploring roads that wound like grapevines up through towns set on the tops of hills, their limestone houses drenched in wisteria, their shutters pale blues or violet or faded sage green, the smells of lunch and dinner slipping out of the windows like children, playing in narrow streets that curved and meandered and made no sense, if only you cared about where you were going, which they didn't.

In tiny restaurants tucked into the corners of ancient, white towns, Helen and Carl made a pact, pulling out their dictionary, Carl vowing to try any dish they couldn't find a translation for. To match his bravery, Helen shopped in the mornings at the tiny stores in their town and made fledging conversations with the fruit man until one day she triumphantly brought home a perfectly ripe melon, which they fed each other for lunch, its flesh warm and thick as the air.

It was hot in the afternoons, a heat that slammed through their open car windows and made them pant, pushed down on their shoulders and heads until finally they retreated to the shuttered cool of their room, to the delight of pounding water in their white-tiled shower, and finally to bed, where they stayed like teenagers until dinner. Only to do it the next day, and the next.

"This is why the Mediterraneans are so healthy," Carl had remarked one night, as he stretched his long arms luxuriantly above his head.

"Oui," she said, and smiled at him over a dish they had thought would be a warm ca.s.serole but was, in fact, a cool a.s.semblage of pink and white meats. (Should they buy a larger dictionary? they pondered. No, in fact, they would not.) she said, and smiled at him over a dish they had thought would be a warm ca.s.serole but was, in fact, a cool a.s.semblage of pink and white meats. (Should they buy a larger dictionary? they pondered. No, in fact, they would not.) And that night she dreamed in French.

THE CLa.s.s STOOD around the large prep table, two cheerful red pots perched on stands at each end, heated by small flickering silver cans underneath. The smell of warming cheese and wine, mellowed with the heat, rose languorously toward their faces, and they all found themselves leaning forward, hypnotized by the smell and the soft bubbling below them. Lillian took a long, two-p.r.o.nged fork and skewered a piece of baguette from the bowl nearby, dipping it in the simmering fondue and pulling it away, trailing a bridal veil of cheese, which she deftly wrapped around her fork in a swirling motion. around the large prep table, two cheerful red pots perched on stands at each end, heated by small flickering silver cans underneath. The smell of warming cheese and wine, mellowed with the heat, rose languorously toward their faces, and they all found themselves leaning forward, hypnotized by the smell and the soft bubbling below them. Lillian took a long, two-p.r.o.nged fork and skewered a piece of baguette from the bowl nearby, dipping it in the simmering fondue and pulling it away, trailing a bridal veil of cheese, which she deftly wrapped around her fork in a swirling motion.

She chewed her prize thoughtfully and took a sip of white wine. "Perfect," she declared.

Helen prepared a bite and placed the fork inside her mouth, the sharpness of the Gruyere and Emmenthaler mingling with the slight bite of the dry white wine and melting together into something softer, gentler, meeting up with the steady hand of bread supporting the whole confection. Hiding, almost hidden, so she had to take a second bite to be sure, was the playful kiss of cherry kirsch and a whisper of nutmeg.

"When you live with your senses, your gestures don't need to be extravagant to be romantic. I had a student once who courted a woman with fondue made over a can of Sterno in the middle of a park," Lillian noted.

"How did that go?" asked Ian, curious.

"Rather well," Lillian noted casually, "he got the girl."

The cla.s.s cl.u.s.tered companionably around the two red pots; they fed themselves, they fed one another, stabbing their forks into the squares of bread and then submerging them in the fondue, laughing when the bread threatened to break free and their efforts at containment were not as graceful as Lillian's.

"Sacrebleu!" Carl exclaimed. "It is escaping!" Carl exclaimed. "It is escaping!"

"Let me help you, good man," declared Isabelle, who only managed to push the bread from Carl's fork down into the molten depths.

"Aren't we supposed to kiss everyone when someone drops a bite?" Claire inquired.