Tea and Crumples

by Kinard, Summer;

  “Dang,” Liz sighed. “I am so going to ask you for advice once I’m married. Now that you say it, I know what you mean. Children and love and intimacy aren’t like market goods. You can’t just go into a store and make an exchange. I suppose it’s because of that little quirk that I held out from marrying until Harold. When you’re single, everyone wants to tell you how to pick up the sex or the child or the love substitutes as though they are all the same. All those biddies asking me when was it my turn to get married or have kids—they came across as holding me cheap.”

  “And love isn’t cheap,” Deborah said, “But it is free.”

  “Exactly,” Sienna said. “And that’s the other thing. If it’s not integral, part of the whole of our lives and best choices, how could it be free? That’s how I first spotted the lie in Greg’s attentions. Neither of us were free. Of course, it didn’t stop my mind from playing through a few scenarios at the worst possible times.”

  “Exits are here, here, and here,” Deborah mimicked a safety announcement. “The body is that way. Always with the backup plan. Great in a fight, bad in an emotional crisis.”

  “Grief confuses our spinal cords, is what it is,” Liz said. “It’s in one of these articles I read this week—”

  “Instead of fiction,” Deborah interrupted. “Now, don’t start spouting the articles again. Sienna has to get back to work, and we never let her answer your question about the stationery swap.”

  “Right,” Sienna put down her teacup. “The swap will be of blank writing or correspondence cards or note sheets, all high quality. Everyone brings three sets, enough for three letters, and you leave with three new ones.”

  “Perfect for using up the end of a stationery set that familiarity has made contemptible,” Deborah said.

  Liz raised her eyebrow at Deborah. “You need to read more fiction, too. I think we both need a little flutter before we have to grade midterms and papers next week.”

  “We should do a book club here.”

  “Now, that’s an insightful idea!” Liz patted the table in excitement. “Sienna, is that something you all would allow? I mean, with the understanding that the book club would be made up of a bunch of loudmouth, educated women, half of whom only read along to see if there were any racy bits in the plot?”

  “Of course. Just pick a time, and we can reserve space for you.” The murmur in the store had grown louder while Sienna sat with her friends. She looked up and saw a few women gathered by the door. One of them seemed very familiar. “Excuse me, ladies. I have to see to some folks. Y’all tell me what you think of the tea once you’ve had a chance to really try everything together. And come up for a free refill.” She smiled at them, and Liz shooed her off with a friendly wave.

  “Good afternoon,” Sienna greeted the cluster of middle-aged women by the door. “May I show you to a table?” The women gathered closer at her greeting. There were five of them. One of the women smiled at her in recognition. Sienna smiled back, but couldn’t quite place the face.

  “Mrs. Raines?” Nina bustled up to a frosted blond woman with dignified eyeglasses on a chain and a pumpkin-colored tweed jacket over a crisp cotton shirt and wool trousers. The woman’s wizened face brightened into a huge grin, and she embraced Nina warmly.

  “Why, I didn’t know you work here! Nina, dear, it’s so good to see you. Is this what you’re doing during your gap year?”

  Nina blushed and tilted her head forward, not quite nodding. She turned to Sienna. “Miss, this is Mrs. Raines, my favorite teacher in high school. She taught me chemistry and home ec and business.”

  “AP chemistry, four years of home economics cooking, and advanced business accounting,” Mrs. Raines corrected. She beamed proudly at Nina. “Nina was my star student,” she said to the women with her. “I hope she goes back to school so she can apply all she learned.” She raised her eyebrows authoritatively toward Sienna. Nina glanced downward then recovered herself.

  “Mrs. Raines, this is my boss Sienna Bannock, the shop owner.”

  “Mrs. Bannock!” Mrs. Raines reached out and grasped her hand in a warm two-handed shake. “I have heard so many good things about this shop that I just had to come.”

  Sienna looked toward Nina and smiled. “I’m glad Nina has told you good things. We certainly love having her as part of our team here.”

  “Oh, not from Nina, though of course she’s wonderful and I’m glad you value her contributions.” She smiled again at her former pupil. “It was my dear friend Elsie here,” she gestured toward the familiar-looking woman in the group.

  Sienna felt a wave of shock. Elsie was the woman who had ordered the cream cheese and Brussels sprout quiche that had caused them so much chagrin online. Sienna managed a tight smile and nodded toward a table behind the women. “Please, sit here and rest yourselves. Nina can go over the day’s menu while I gather a few teas for you.” The women took their seats companionably while Nina and her teacher exchanged pleasantries.

  Sienna loaded a wide tray with four pots of tea, cream and almond milk, two types of sugar, a jar of honeycomb, and a few stevia packets. She breathed a quick prayer before she returned to the table and laid out the tea. Mrs. Raines watched her carefully as she placed the pots in front of three women and between the other two.

  “Well, that’s a very specific placement,” Mrs. Raines commented. “And very specific condiments. What inspired you?”

  “I told you they know what you want here,” Elsie smiled. “It must be a God thing, because last time I was here, they turned around one of the worst days of my life with just a mug and a slice of quiche.”

  Sienna gaped.

  “I see you don’t recall me, Mrs. Bannock.”

  “Oh, please, call me Sienna.”

  “Sienna. I came in a few weeks back to ask about a TEA sorority event. You all had thought I meant a tea party like we’re having here instead of donated goods, but you still treated me so kindly. I hadn’t eaten all day when I got here because my first sorority scouting appointment canceled last minute, and my mother, bless her heart, had just had another one of her spells, so I hadn’t slept much, either. I couldn’t even remember the name of the quiche y’all served me!” She chuckled. “But you fed me and gave me good strong black tea, and I came back to myself by the time I got home.”

  “She’s been pestering us ever since to come try out her magic teashop!” Mrs. Raines added with a wink toward Elsie. The other women at the table smiled or laughed. “But I think maybe we ought to call it a holy teashop instead.”

  Nina stood quite still beside the table, her arms filled with trays of pastries and a tea stand of rich sandwiches and cheeses. “But I thought you hated this place?” Nina blurted.

  “Beg pardon?” Elsie raised her brows in polite inquiry. “Oh, please, dear, go ahead and set those things down. I guess I shocked you a little, I was that out of myself that day.”

  “You had been running too fast, and your soul couldn’t keep up with your body,” one of the women said. “That’s wasiwasi, as they say in Swahili. You had to stop so you could literally get yourself together.”

  “Well, yes,” Elsie said, taking up the nearest teapot and pouring out a dark stream of rich tea. She added a couple of white sugar lumps and stirred. “But is it that surprising, dear?” She smiled at Nina, whose shocked expression must have answered her, but Elsie’s smile only warmed. “Or at any rate, can you forgive me that day? Look! I’ve brought you four more customers. Shaken together and running over, from your one day of being kind to me.”

  “I’m sorry for our confusion,” Sienna said. “It’s just, we thought perhaps, because of the negative reviews, that you had a bit of bad feeling toward us.”

  “Reviews?” Elsie blanched. Mrs. Raines reached across and grasped her hand to comfort her.

  “Oh dear,” Mrs. Raines whispered.

  “You didn’t write them,” Sienna said, realization hitting her.

  “My mother.” Elsie set down her teacup and c
overed her forehead with her free hand. When she looked up, her eyes watered with barely-contained tears. “I am so sorry. My mother suffers from early dementia. She heard me tell the story to my husband and must have gotten the wrong end of it. She still has lots of friends among the older generation of TEA alumnae.” She saw the tension ease from Sienna’s shoulders. “How many?”

  “Fourteen as of yesterday. All from women claiming ties to sororities, complaining of negative service experiences and food that wasn’t what was advertised.” Sienna stood still to let Elsie process the information, but she wanted to do something to comfort her. She decided to bring a new pot of tea, one with special orange blossom overtones. It was more in line with who Elsie really was, now that Sienna was seeing her in a truer light.

  “I will go through her address book tonight and try to find the women she called. I’m sure they’ll take them down if there’s a way. But last time she did something like this, we weren’t able to remove the reviews. My mother doesn’t understand a great deal about the Internet, but she’s heard us talk so much about consulting online reviews instead of looking in the paper that she remembers about them. I really am most terribly sorry.”

  “Tell you what,” Sienna brightened. “You ladies agree to spread good news about the shop by word of mouth, and we’ll forget all about it. Now, please, enjoy your tea. Mrs. Pinkwater, isn’t it?” she asked Elsie.

  “Call me Elsie, please.”

  “Elsie, I have another tea I’d like for you to try. On the house.” She smiled and went to the kitchen, leaving the table of women to their eager exploration of the tea treats.

  “But Miss,” Nina asked after following Sienna into the kitchen, “the cancellations? We are just going to forget about them, too?”

  “To be honest, Nina, those reviews not only hurt the business, they hurt my feelings. When Tovah and I envisioned this shop, it was with the idea that hospitality and graciousness would rise to the top of every experience here. The reviews Elsie Pinkwater’s mother influenced portrayed our business in the exact opposite light, and did so in public for strangers who didn’t know they were wrong. But holding onto hurt feelings isn’t going to help me get back to that vision of hospitality and graciousness.”

  “Aren’t you mad, though? Just a little? I mean, giving someone free tea when they’ve made your life miserable. That’s pretty weird.”

  “If we’re just people in the South in America in a business that has been slighted by a customer, though unwittingly, then it’s weird. But what if we’re an outpost of the kingdom of God? Then we’re perfectly normal. Everything weird we do here—your cooking, Cleotis Reed’s chess mastery, Tovah’s taste and organization, Lettye’s grace and creativity, Jessie’s music, my tea sense —is normal in the kingdom.”

  “Hmmph.” Nina did not sound convinced. “I like the idea, but it still doesn’t seem fair. I mean, she lost you so much money.”

  “It’s not Mrs. Pinkwater’s fault that her mother’s friends flamed us online, or that people cancelled.” Sienna turned toward Nina and nodded to the front of the shop. “Besides, it may be that God used this unfortunate event to bring about better things for us. Just think of how many opportunities we would not have pursued if this hadn’t happened. Would we have asked our investor for help? Would you have spoken to Mr. Reed about chess events?”

  “Mr. Reed! Oh, Miss, I have to take him a sandwich. I’ll be right back.” Nina rushed off to care for her favorite customer, and Sienna set about blending a fragrant orange and herbal Darjeeling for Elsie.

  By the time she returned to the front, the ladies were in full swing, cackling and giggling like girls over their enjoyment of the tea treats and sandwiches.

  “Do sit down, please,” Mrs. Raines demanded in a friendly tone, “and tell us how you knew just which tea to give each of us. How on earth did you know about Lynne’s diabetes?”

  “Her diabetes?” Sienna plastered a wary smile on her face as she ran through the tea tray inventories in her mind.

  “The sweetener packets, dear,” Mrs. Raines prompted.

  “Oh. Of course,” Sienna relaxed. “To be honest, I didn’t know about her diabetes. I only knew that I had to put it on the tray and that the lady in moss green needed to have the stevia packets alongside her orange spice tea and almond milk.”

  “You knew that how?”

  “Oh, you know as well as we all do how she knew it, Margaret,” Lynne, the lady in green, said. “It’s like Elsie told us. She has a gift. And I mean a real gift. Dear, I have taught Sunday school for longer than you have been alive, I reckon, and I have seen my share of spiritual gifts.” She touched the side of her nose and winked at Sienna. “Just keep asking God for wisdom when you use that discernment and knowledge, and I won’t worry over you knowing about me.”

  Sienna looked at Lynne and prayed. Sure enough, the gifts of teaching and exhortation and wisdom shone out at her, and with them, another strongly expressed grace. “You have a powerful, deep way with discernment yourself, ma’am,” Sienna demurred. “And you know why. God loves people.” Lynne answered with a knowing smile. She nodded around to the other women at the table, then at the shop in general.

  “I like this place,” Lynne said. “It will do very well indeed.”

  “I’m so glad to hear it,” Sienna said. She popped up as a stream of women dressed in warm, bright clothing walked in. “Please let me know if you need anything else.” She smiled. “Enjoy.”

  The brightly dressed group turned out to be chess enthusiasts. They clustered in the tables and chairs around the board and argued amongst themselves as to who would challenge Cleotis next. Sienna opted to bring them a group tray of cookies and Assam with milk and sugar rather than attempt to distract their attention from the current chess match. She went to the kitchen to pull the tray together.

  “What’s this?” Tovah indicated the two plates piled high with raspberry thumbprint cookies and mini ginger cream scones.

  “Cleotis has attracted a gaggle of young women followers. I figured a chess player rate of $5 per person should cover their stay. I’m giving them the big pots with Assam.”

  “I like the idea. Group rates for groupies. I’ll add it to our business prospectus for the investor.”

  “Is she still coming?”

  “Oh, yes. I mentioned that Cleotis was planning to pull together a last minute tournament, and she insisted on coming out that day to see who wins.”

  “She’s a chess fan?”

  “Seems so. Says maybe she’ll challenge the winner herself.”

  “So long as she doesn’t predicate investing on her ability to defeat Cleotis Reed, I think we can be alright with that plan.”

  “We’ll need to have everyone on call for the tournament. There may be a crowd.”

  “That’s a good problem to have.” Sienna smiled. She thought of the worse problems that had burdened her of late and sighed relief. “If we break fire code, we can always ask chess fans to watch through the window.”

  “I think you think you’re joking, Si, but that may happen. Apparently chess people talk. At least, they email amongst themselves. It may be last minute, but this tournament could draw hundreds of people a day.”

  “Hundreds? We max out at ninety-five.” Sienna smoothed her hair back from her face. “What should we do? Sell tickets?”

  “I have another idea. Is Deborah still out there?”

  “She and Liz never leave before an hour and a half or so. Why?”

  “The art gallery across the street. If we could live stream the tournament games, at least on the last day, I wonder if they would host an overflow site? We could ask the Hearth people to cater the food and have Jessie man a table with some of our big samovars. Deborah would probably help with the tech setup. When you were out so much with Peter, she helped me fix our Wi-Fi.”

  “I like it. Will you talk to Deborah?”

  “Of course. You take care of the groupies. And hey, Sienna, it’s good to see you agai
n.”

  Sienna’s heart clutched in bittersweet appreciation of the compliment. It was good to feel herself again, but the recent pain still smarted. She smiled with her eyes as she took up the tray. “Oh, Tovah, it’s good to be back.”

  Notes from Sienna’s Tea Files

  Elsie Pinkwater, bitter old crow: Lipton tea from bag. Or an astringent breakfast blend. Serve with white sugar. Puts teeth on edge but can be tolerated. Philanthropist, community and TEA sorority organizer, caretaker to aging mother: Elsie’s blend—my recipe (orange blossoms, top grade Darjeeling, a little orange mint, a sprig of thyme). Layered, gentle blend with astringent edge and sweet finish.

  Margaret Raines, public school teacher, philanthropist: Gunpowder green tea served a little hotter than most greens (190-200 degrees F). Serve with local honeycomb. (Clover honey is best.)

  Chapter Seventeen

  Sienna’s phone rang as she wrestled grocery bags from the passenger side of her car. “Hello?” She tucked the cell between her cheek and shoulder and walked toward the house, two heavy bags dangling from each hand.

  “Sienna!” Tovah nearly yelled. “What did you say to those women today? Did you have any idea who they were?”

  “Which women? The chess fans? Don’t worry. I didn’t call them groupies. They loved the group rate arrangement. In fact, Nina said they left a huge tip, too.”

  “Margaret Raines and that Elsie Pinkwater and company.”

  “Maybe Nina said something to them? Mrs. Raines was her high school teacher.”

  “I forget that you entirely lack social ambition. Sienna, every one of those women is on or chairs a board for one of the local private schools. After we closed, I received emails booking us for about $100,000 in business over the next six months.”