The Death of Mungo Blackwell

by Lauren H Brandenburg

  “… is for getting your insides all over my Easter dress!”

  Velveteen glared at her, refusing to blink, fighting back tears of frustration. She wouldn’t give Granny the satisfaction of seeing her cry again. Why did this old woman hate her so much? Did it have something to do with her son Shug and his obvious dislike of Charlie? Had she said something to the Blackwell matriarch that had offended her?

  “Here,” Granny said, shoving an empty stainless steel mixing bowl at her. “Recipe’s on the counter. When you get to the folding, be sure to scrape the sides, gently – too much and they’ll crack. Nobody likes a cracked macaron.”

  Surely this woman would not dare ask her to make the one thing that haunted her dreams – that element of her former life that, once a delicacy, was reduced in a moment of rage to a miniature tactical weapon. She had sworn to herself she would never set eye upon their defiance again! Was this old woman that hateful, that bitter, that vexed by the mere presence of Velveteen she would ask her to do such a thing? Velveteen had bared her soul, shared with her the darkest moment of her life. Why did the beast taunt her so?

  “Macarons, Miss Melba. I’m going to teach you, city girl, how to make a proper macaron. That way you don’t have to spend all of your husband’s hard-earned money on overpriced meringues from hoity toity no-flavor bakeries.”

  An angry, raging fire burned throughout Velveteen. What did Granny know about how she spent her money? She’d bought the macarons from Francine’s because she could. They had the money then. It hardly made a dent in their bank account. She couldn’t buy them now if she wanted to. They would be a ridiculous purchase and she would never spend her husband’s “hard-earned money” on anything they didn’t need. They had agreed upon their life then, just as they had before they moved to Coraloo. She would stay home with Gideon, manage the house. It was what they both wanted. She wasn’t ashamed of it.

  That was it – Velveteen had had enough. Granny had already stolen her book club, and now she was asking her to make… She tossed the apron on the floor, slammed the bowl on the counter, and turned to leave. But then she had a thought. That’s what Granny wants. The mule wants me to walk away. I won’t give her the satisfaction. Velveteen jerked the apron off the ground and tied it around her waist. How hard can it be? If the gun-toting granny can do it, then so can I.

  She studied the list of ingredients: almond flour, cream of tartar, powdered sugar… She carefully measured them out. Sift together dry ingredients twice and set aside. Whisk egg whites until foamy, add cream of tarter… medium speed.

  She would need a mixer; Granny’s large freestanding one stood on the counter. She hadn’t a clue how to use it. Granny had her back turned, rolling out pastry dough for the next day’s treats. Velveteen read over the directions once again – she definitely needed a mixer. Quietly, she searched the cabinets of spices, bowls, bakeware, and finally, small appliances until she found the hand mixer – still in the box.

  Relieved, she clicked the whisks in place, and then cracked the three eggs into a separate bowl. The yellow yolks stared at her bug-eyed. Those weren’t supposed to be in there. She attempted to carefully remove the centers with a spoon, but the blobs held fast. This wouldn’t work. She pulled up her sweater sleeve and reached into the bowl; the yolk split, spreading its ooze throughout the whites.

  “Ugh!”

  “Separate them before you put them in the bowl,” Granny giggled. “Use the shells.”

  Does my tormenter have eyes in the back of her head? Velveteen dumped the contents of her first attempt in the trashcan, wiped out the bowl, and tried again. Use the shells. She gently tapped the egg on the side of the bowl, and witnessed the clear fluid seeping through the cracks. “Ha!”

  She eased the crack open a little more to allow more of the white to fall out. When the yolk began to pop through, she shifted the egg. “Can you do that, Melba DuMont? Can you do that!” she said louder than she had intended.

  Velveteen glanced over her shoulder. The cantankerous market icon was busy stirring a concoction of blueberries and lime juice on the gas range and appeared to have not heard her.

  She separated the second and then third egg, added the cream of tartar, and carefully switched on the mixer. Gradually the blend began to foam, then took on a silky, glossy sheen. Per the recipe, she added the sugar one tablespoon at a time, increased the speed to medium high, and beat the mixture until hard peaks formed. Written in a beautifully scrolling handwriting in the margin were the words, Don’t over beat! “Now she tells me,” she mumbled. Then, add lime zest and coloring.

  Sift the dry ingredients into the wet. “More sifting? All right.” Gently fold the mixture. Run the spatula clockwise from the bottom, being sure to delicately scrape the sides, cutting the batter in half.

  As the mixture came together, Velveteen’s anxiety subsided, replaced by giddiness. She suddenly saw herself removing the tray from the oven, the tops and bottoms of her homemade macarons perfectly smooth and round with a slight sheen. The edges would be gently crinkled, exactly like the ones she bought from Francine’s.

  She wondered if the concoction in front of her tasted as good as it smelled. With a sideways glance toward Granny – was she actually measuring her pastry with a ruler? – Velveteen dipped her finger gingerly into the gooey concoction. Then she did it again, this time savoring the hint of citrus. She licked her lips.

  “Don’t eat it all.” It’s true – she does have eyes in the back of her head; or maybe the place is full of security cameras watching my every move! “On second thought, you could use some extra meat on those bones. You gotta give your man something to hold on to.”

  Velveteen whipped back around, her index finger still in her mouth. She had half a mind to do an encore performance of The Rooning, this time with the uncooked batter. For a moment she could almost taste the satisfaction it would bring her to scoop out a handful of the white goop and fling it at Granny’s head, watching it slide down the layers of her wrinkled neck.

  She returned to her happy place. Line pans with parchment paper… Pipe into one and a half inch concentric circles… “Pipe?” She had watched a baking show or two enough to know what this meant, but she had never done it. Why had she never done it? In fact, at this moment she wasn’t sure how she had found herself to be so inept in the kitchen in the first place. Maybe it was because her mother had never cooked, and once she married Charlie, she never needed to. She scoured the well-stocked kitchen once again until she found what looked like the cake decorating tools she had seen on television.

  She could do this. In one hand she clutched the plastic bag; in the other she held a silver nozzle. Before her stood the perfectly blended batter; she gazed from one to the other. Suddenly she felt a rush of anxiety, like she was a tenth grader faced with a quadratic equation: how was she going to get all that goo in the cone-shaped bag?

  “Put the nozzle in the bag,” Granny barked.

  Oh, this woman! Velveteen dropped the nozzle into the bag. “I would have figured it out.” And then proceeded to scoop the blend into the pastry bag.

  She squeezed the bag and allowed the green batter to flow into a splotch on the pan. Not exactly a circle. She tried again, and again, until she had twenty-seven roundish blobs on her pan. Her daydream began to fade as she realized her expectations of perfectly chic Francine’s-esque macarons were not in her future. She lifted the pan and tapped it twice on the counter as instructed, then thirty minutes of resting and then eighteen more to bake.

  Velveteen waited – excited, anxious, and nervous all at the same time, watching through the stove glass for the formation of the crinkled edge, distinguishing the iconic dessert. She stepped away to wipe down her work area, but then rushed back over, stooping in front of the stove once again to check in on her creations. It wasn’t looking good – the ruffled feet were bursting out of the bottom, the tops were textured and bumpy, and a rigid crack was developing down the center of each one. The timer buzzed. Velvete
en jumped.

  She frowned at the trays of a failed attempt in front of her. Why did I think I could do this?

  Granny stood on tiptoes looking over Velveteen’s shoulder. “Oven was too hot. And you over beat them.”

  “I followed your instructions!”

  “Not my job to tell you when it’s getting too hot. And not my instructions. Sometimes you gotta figure it out for yourself. Then next time –”

  “There won’t be a next time.”

  “Then next time, you’ll know what to do differently. There’s always a next time, Miss Melba. I’ve been alive long enough to know. Here.” She handed Velveteen a bowl of blueberry lime curd. “Finish them.”

  Velveteen carefully piped the blueberry-lime filling on top of a pastry and then placed another on top. Her thoughts drifted from the kitchen to her life – to Gideon, busy at school, and Charlie, trying his best to make things work for them – and soon she became lost in a rhythm of squeezing and stacking as the pastries filled the trays in rows of tasty green-purple filled circles.

  The room was quiet, still, refreshing. Despite the wonkiness of her creations, she was proud of what she had done. Granny was right – there would be a next time. She would do it again, and next time, even if there were a hundred next times, she’d get it right.

  “Granny Blackwell –” Velveteen set down the piping tool and wiped her hands on the apron. “I’m sorry I… I was sick… I didn’t mean…”

  “No harm. I smelled like sour sausages for a day, but I can’t blame that on you.” She turned and faced Velveteen, a mixing bowl in the crook of her arm and a spatula in the other. “I have more grandbabies than you have high heels, Miss Melba. I can handle it.” Velveteen considered correcting her, thinking maybe the elderly Blackwell had truly confused her with the heroine of their novel.

  The muffled voices of Granny’s Coraloo book club approached. “I’ll set these on a tray, Granny.”

  “No tray for you, Miss Melba. You’re taking them home. This,” she said, pulling from the oven the most beautiful latticed apple pie Velveteen had ever seen – not even Francine’s could make one so lovely – “is for our book club.”

  Velveteen followed Granny out of the kitchen to where three of the Blackwell ladies waited with their individual copies of The Heiress of DuMont resting in front of them. Velveteen’s book was lying somewhere in front of the ribbon shop.

  “Sit,” Granny instructed. Velveteen sat. “How’s that husband of yours? He seems changed these days.”

  After an hour and a half in the kitchen, with few words exchanged between them, Velveteen was uncomfortable, but not surprised. She’d almost forgotten about Charlie, left to fend for himself with Granny’s formidable son. Well, she hadn’t heard any screams of agony, so she could only hope that he’d emerged from his “talk” with Shug in one piece.

  Granny was openly discussing her personal life. “Changed?”

  Granny lifted an eyebrow, wiped her greasy hands on her apron, scraped the sweat off her forehead with the back of her arm, and sat down beside Velveteen. “Men are a squirrely bunch – you’ve got to watch them closely. They won’t tell you what’s on their mind. You have to figure it out yourself. He doesn’t like his shoes; he’s not comfortable in them. Can’t get them to fit right.”

  In the past, Velveteen considered having extra shelving added to their walk-in closet to accommodate her collection of shoes. Some might class her among those said to have a fetish, but she didn’t talk about them nearly as much as Granny. This woman was obsessed with shoes.

  “Charlie told you he didn’t like his shoes?”

  “Of course he didn’t tell me! What kind of man tells a woman about his shoes! Just pay attention, trust me. I’ll get you both sized up before I’m done with you.” There it was. Velveteen suspected the woman had some kind of motive. Granny Blackwell was playing tricks with their minds, twisting their intentions, dropping subliminal hints about shoes, and making her bake macarons, all for some sort of mental reprogramming. Next thing, Granny would be taking them shopping for a camper van. Velveteen gasped. Granny wants to turn us into Blackwells.

  “Velveteen!”

  “Yes?” Startled, Velveteen stood up and awkwardly accepted the welcoming hug of Clover.

  “How are you feeling?”

  “Better, I think.”

  A few of the other ladies came to greet her as well, withholding any conversation regarding the incident in the living room. Had Velveteen thrown up on one of the acquaintances, she would have been hot gossip for at least a month, and that was saying a lot since fresh gossip usually died within a week – unless something more intriguing came along – like Charlie Price’s termination from Heritage Financial. She had been at the salon when it happened, a hive of gossip if ever there was one. She’d already heard the news so wasn’t surprised to get Charlie’s call.

  “Can you meet me at the park?”

  Velveteen Price walked through the park fully aware of the stares. Still she held her head high. Her freshly highlighted locks glistened in the sunlight, the yellow chiffon, smocked waist sundress complementing her petite frame. The Heiress of Dumont peeked out of the Italian leather handbag in the bend of her arm that perfectly matched her nude pumps. She smiled when she saw Charlie and then let him tell her his terrible news.

  “I already heard. I’m so sorry, Charlie.” She hugged him, holding him to let him know she was not going anywhere.

  “How –”

  “Jennifer was at the salon today.”

  “Jennifer? How did Jennifer know?”

  “Jennifer’s nanny and Mary Beth Roger’s nanny bumped into one another at school. And you know how much Jennifer can’t stand me since Mary Beth and I became best friends at last year’s Christmas party – although obviously she still pretends to like me. Well, Jennifer’s nanny was going on about how I won’t let Jennifer in the book club, and Mary Beth’s nanny said there might not be a book club soon… and then the whole thing came out. So of course Jennifer’s nanny told Jennifer, who loathes me – it’s not my fault she refused to read the book. I asked her politely, truly politely, not to return if she felt so strongly about straining her eyes. Anyway, Jennifer walked into the salon and started running her mouth about Heritage and the whole salmonella incident. That’s when Carol… you know Carol… turned my dryer off, so I could hear the whole thing. Then, you called. Sweetheart, I am so sorry. We will get through this.” She touched his cheek with the palm of her hand and then kissed him, lingering with him to let him know she was his.

  “Did you hit her?”

  “Of course not, Charlie Price!”

  “But you wanted to, didn’t you?”

  “Hit? No. Accidentally pour my tea down her imported silk blouse? Yes. I showed restraint and politely asked if she had read anything good lately.” Velveteen grinned. “Enough about me, what happened, Charlie?”

  He told her the rest.

  Velveteen sometimes imagined the acquaintances were continuing to talk about the “fall of the Price family”, as though it was the next volume in a saucy series. Surely the elite had not bought her story about their impromptu move to Coraloo. But she’d been part of high society long enough to know all it would take was a slip-up at the cosmetic surgeon or for one of their nannies to land on a hidden gem of a scandal, and the Price family saga would vanish.

  “Velveteen? Are you okay?”

  “What?” Velveteen snapped from her reverie.

  “I lost you for a second. Is everything okay?”

  Is everything okay? Clover had no reason to be nice to her, no motive, no social ladder to climb. Why couldn’t Velveteen believe someone wanted to be more than an acquaintance? She started to answer, yes – a reflex, an insistence that she was perfectly fine and no further questioning was needed. But in truth, she wasn’t quite sure. So she simply smiled.

  Clover squeezed her shoulder kindly and then walked away.

  Velveteen sat at the table drawing imaginar
y circles with her finger as Granny rattled on about Melba’s misfortune. She picked at the crust of her pie – hungry enough to stuff every one of her boxed blueberry-lime macarons down her throat, but at the same time nauseous from the syrupy sweet aftertaste the pie left in her mouth.

  “The old count up and kicked her into the street!” Granny shouted, slamming her fist down emphatically.

  The older ladies nodded and shouted words like scoundrel and cad. It was not at all how Velveteen had run her book club. She had carefully studied the text, researched the author’s notes and lectures on the novel, and carefully prepared questions that aligned with the external and internal conflicts. The acquaintances never cursed or threatened to bring physical harm to the villainous Count Horace – unlike Aunt Sorcha, who implied she was talented in the use of a fileting knife.

  “But,” Granny continued, “she didn’t even fight back!”

  Velveteen remembered discussing this scene back in the city. Her discussion had centered around the demureness of Melba, her strength as she pulled her fallen body from the muck left by the spring rain, and how she had gathered her bags and did not consider for a moment to look back on her former life. Melba pressed on, forcing her feet to tread the path of hardship, her strength emerging, denying Count Horace the tears of her humiliation and embracing the challenge of the simple life before her. Simple. But while Melba’s cowardice had not come up in book club, Velveteen had thought exactly what Granny Blackwell had just said: She didn’t even fight back.

  Velveteen stared at a chink in the aged brick wall as Granny tried to convince the women that any kitchen tool can be used as a weapon, and had Melba DuMont been more concerned about herself and less concerned about the loose thread on her ball gown, she might have been able to knock Count Horace in his nether parts with a cast iron skillet.

  She smiled and returned her focus to Granny Blackwell.

  “I guess we’ll find out what missy frou-frou does next. Read the next two chapters and we’ll talk about it next week.”