A Long Line of Cakes
Page 13
“That’s not true, Leo,” said Arlouin. “What happens when you stay somewhere a long time is you have long, deep friendships with history and texture and meaning … and you watch the people you love become old … and you become old with them …” She trailed off, lost in her thoughts, which were also, she was discovering, her wishes. “You get to know a place.”
“I know this place well enough already,” said Leo in his weariest voice.
“It’s not time to move yet,” continued Arlouin. “You said yourself, weather patterns are stable right now.”
“There’s been a big rain,” said Leo. “It has brought in a new front, which can serve as a providential sign. It’s best to travel when the weather signs are fortuitous. We should have a place picked out, just in case, before we go.”
Arlouin reached across the table and took her husband’s hand. “Leo, these people in California. They have people. They have friends and families—an entire community—who will help them.”
“We’re almost done here, Arlouin, really we are. The Pine View is perking along, and Misanthrope has taught us all she knows about piecrust, and surely someone else will come along soon who can take over for us in the pie-making department.”
As Leo finished his sentence, Miss Mattie Perkins stormed into the café. She slammed the door behind her. Arlouin and Leo both jumped in their chairs.
Miss Mattie was furious. “Well, don’t just sit there!” she snapped.
“Mattie!” said Leo and Arlouin together.
“I’ll take ten of those applesauce muffins,” said Miss Mattie. “Not that anyone will buy them. What’s wrong with this town?”
“What’s the matter, Mattie?” Arlouin felt her face drain of color.
“There’s a boycott!” spit Miss Mattie. “You don’t know? You haven’t heard? A ridiculous, idiotic boycott!”
“Of what?” asked Leo, rising from his chair.
“Of you!” said Miss Mattie. Mary Wilson opened the door and, in her haste to get to her friends, left it wide open. “Are y’all okay in here?” she asked, anxious. “I just heard.”
“Why is there a boycott?” Arlouin asked. She stood up and removed her apron.
“It’s your pies,” said Miss Mattie. “They don’t taste like Misanthrope’s and they used to, and everyone can tell, and someone is afraid you’re trying to run him out of business. Someone idiotic. Pie is pie.”
“What?” Leo heard, but he didn’t understand.
“I can make a pie that ordinary at home,” said Clemmie Watson. She stood in the open doorway of the Cake Café. “I don’t need to go to the Pine View for it.”
“For heaven’s sake, Clementine,” said Miss Mattie, “it’s pie!”
“It’s not Misanthrope’s pie,” sniffed Clementine. She walked on.
Arlouin blinked at Miss Mattie. “I don’t know what to say.”
“Well, I do,” said Leo. “Those pies tasted like Misanthrope’s pies for the first week because they were Misanthrope’s pies. She was in our kitchen! She taught us how to make them! Her crust is especially tricky, but we think we mastered it. What’s the problem?”
“The problem is not you,” said Miss Mattie. “Ten muffins, please.”
The bottomless muffin basket suddenly held no muffins. It was a sad basket. “I could have sworn I filled it this morning,” said Arlouin.
“You don’t have to sell our muffins at your store, Mattie.” Leo took off his apron and pushed up his glasses. “Let me go talk to Jerome and settle this. No one is trying to drive business away from the Pine View. We came to help!”
“We are not pie people,” said Arlouin softly. “We are Cakes.”
“Suit yourself,” Miss Mattie said. “But I will gladly put some muffins at my register, in solidarity. I’m sure Dot Land will put some on the counter at the post office, and Pip will take a dozen at the barbershop. There are sane people in this town.”
“I’ll take at least a dozen,” said Mary Wilson. “And I’ll make sure they sell! I’ll make a sign: It’s Time for Breakfast in Bed! Then Send Us Your Sheets!”
“Let me know if you change your mind,” said Miss Mattie.
Miss Mattie and Mary Wilson swept out the door and Leo Cake locked it behind them. Enough visitors. Enough of everything. The Pine View was closed for the day, too. He would have to talk with Jerome in the morning.
“We’ve never been in competition in a town before,” Arlouin said. “I did think that was strange when we moved here.”
“Yes,” said Leo. “I did, too. It’s not what we usually do, or how we usually work. Still, we serve a mostly breakfast crowd, while the Pine View does a huge midday meal every day. We just serve some soup and sandwiches at lunch.”
“And cake,” reminded Arlouin.
“And cake,” said Leo.
The back door slammed open, and Van raced inside.
“We’re boycotted!” he yelled. He waved a flyer like a flag and shoved it into Arlouin’s hands as he ran back out the door yelling, “What’s boycotted?”
“Feed the dogs!” Arlouin hollered after him.
Leo took the flyer from Arlouin’s hand and read it. “Look at this,” he said, his voice laced with despair.
Arlouin read it out loud.
All customers who eat at the Pine View are asked to boycott the Cake Café, as they have been purposely making substandard pies for us in an effort to steal our beloved diners. In addition to the boycott, anyone interested in taking over for Misanthrope Watkins in the Pie Department is asked to report to the kitchen of the Pine View for a pie-making and tasting tryout tomorrow at four a.m.—YES, A.M.—when we open to audition pie chefs. Tasting to commence at six a.m. All are welcome.
“Four a.m.!” was all Arlouin could think to say.
“I got it wrong,” said Leo. He flopped back into his chair and Arlouin sat down again as well. “We weren’t meant to come here.” Leo took off his glasses and began to clean them with his apron.
Arlouin read the note again, to herself. Then she looked around the café at all their hard work, all the time they had invested in making themselves a place in this new town.
“You never showed me the letter that made you decide to move us here,” she said.
“I told you about it,” said Leo.
“That’s not the same,” said Arlouin. “You said it was compelling. That tells me nothing.”
“People here are right,” repeated Leo. “This town does not need two cafés. This town does not deserve two cafés. Why did I ever think it was a good idea to come here?”
“Yes!” said Arlouin. “Why did you! Why, Leo? Why?”
Leo took a deep breath and let it out in a long, slow exhale. He walked into the industrial kitchen, picked up a canister of baking powder, and brought it back to the little wooden table, where he opened it and took out a handwritten note. He shook off the excess leavening and handed it to his wife.
In a beautiful, flowing script was written two words:
Six children and one old dog were having the time of their lives in a weedy old garden, in a neglected old yard, near a dilapidated old house, protected by benevolent old trees, in a venerable old woods.
Ben stalked into the nearby forest and introduced House to the sport of peeing contests, because Gordon couldn’t wait for a bathroom. Gordon was giddy to be included with the big boys.
Emma and Ruby and Honey found treasures in the overgrown garden. A trowel, a shovel, a watering can, a plate, a pair of gloves, and a bunch of old bricks and stones that marked paths long ago.
“Here’s a volunteer tomato!” yelled Ruby. “You’re in such luck!” It was flowering but had not set fruit yet. Ruby marked it with a tall stick. “We’ll keep the chickens away from it with a little chicken wire,” she said. “Here’s some more!”
It was easy to pull up weeds after the rain, and soon they had piles where they stood. Emma’s muscled eleven-year-old arms would be useful in a garden. She was proud of that.
While House and Ben talked baseball, Emma remembered her index cards and pulled them out of her pocket. She borrowed Ruby’s pencil, turned over the card that read Ben has a terrible imagination, and drew a plan for her new turret room. On another card she drew a picture of the upstairs of the house and assigned bedrooms to her brothers. She even designed a bathroom with a deep tub for her mother’s soaking baths. Never mind that she hadn’t seen the upstairs of the house. Her imagination filled in the gaps.
Ruby pulled her reconnaissance list out of her overalls pocket. “I can see we need to make adjustments.” She took her pencil from Emma.
“The chickens will dig up that garden in no time flat. You’ll be ready to plant beans, at least, this summer, and all kinds of fall crops, like peas and greens and beets and carrots—even potatoes.”
Emma wondered how Ruby could know so much about gardening, in such detail, and then she realized Ruby was reading from a list her mother had given her.
“It might look something like this,” Ruby said as she turned over the reconnaissance list to draw on the back of it, “although I’m no artist.”
“Oh, that looks fine,” said Emma in a satisfied, happy voice. She had no idea what she was looking at, but it had rows and words on the rows and that was enough.
“There’s compost over here!” shouted Ben. He’d wandered to the far side of the garden fence. “It hasn’t been touched in a long time, but it’s full of good dirt and a ton of worms!”
“Look who’s a compost expert, all of a sudden!” Ruby shouted back. That boy.
“You would be, too, if you had Miss Mattie standing over you while you turned compost,” said Ben. This girl.
“Do you think it’s okay, House, to make a garden here?” asked Emma. She really, really wanted it to be okay.
“It’s not for me to say,” replied House, “but as long as you don’t damage anything, I don’t think Mr. Norwood would mind. He might like it that the garden was being used. Tell me again why you want to grow a garden?”
“So she doesn’t have to move,” said Ruby in her isn’t it obvious voice.
It wasn’t obvious.
“I want it to be a secret,” said Emma. “I want to get it just perfect and then tell my dad. If the garden is planted and we’re getting beans and peas and tomatoes for soups—”
“It’s past time for planting new tomatoes,” interrupted Ruby. “You can plant tomatoes and corn and okra and squash and peppers next year.”
Emma was fine with that, too. She was giddy with possibility. And by next year, they might be living in this wonderful house! It spoke to her, she was sure of it. It needed her. There was no doubt, none at all. And when her father saw the truth of it—the garden, the house, and Emma’s permanent plan—well, he wouldn’t want to leave again, ever. After all, she was giving him a house.
Ben offered to carry the sleepy Honey home and House accepted the help. The boys walked off with Honey and Eudora in one direction, and the girls took Gordon and walked in the other. The woods were darkening with the day and they wanted to get out of them quickly, but they didn’t tramp through the forest the way they had when Ben first led them to Emma’s magical house. They walked out through the big iron gates and down the orange-pebbled driveway and along the dirt road into town.
“We really need to get started,” said Ruby. “It’s already July. I’ll ask Miss Eula to help us tonight.”
Emma nodded. “I can’t help until we finish the lunch rush tomorrow. We bake pies for the Pine View before it’s even sunrise, and then cakes, and bread, and soup at the same time. I have to help.”
“I’ll leave you a note in our tree tonight,” said Ruby. “I’ll let you know what Miss Eula says.”
Our tree. Emma almost hugged herself. Our garden. Our house. In her imagination she was already moved in and rolling her Friend Atlas across the wall of her turret room, securing it to those turret walls forever, writing to all of her old friends to tell them about her new home, her new address, her permanent place in the world, and inviting them all to come visit.
“ ‘Come Now’?” read Arlouin. “Who wrote this, Leo?”
“I don’t know!” said Leo Cake. “And I don’t know why I answered it, Arlouin. Honestly, I thought I was replying to the letter asking us to help start a teaching bakery in a downtown elementary school with one thousand students!”
“Well, we’re obviously not doing that,” said Arlouin.
“Obviously not,” Leo agreed. “But the envelopes were similar—both of them yellow—and I think I wrote back using the wrong address.”
Arlouin licked her lips. “Or maybe you did mean to come here,” she said. “I mean, you hid the letter in the baking powder canister! You said this place felt familiar. You thought Norwood Boyd’s name was familiar. Honestly, Leo. What’s going on?”
Leo slid his hands up and down his face. His glasses swept to the top of his head and stayed there. “Maybe you’re right,” he said. “I was startled when I saw that handwriting, and I thought it looked familiar, and I think I had a gut reaction and answered that letter, even though—you know me—so many things look familiar to me, Arlouin, and here we came, in answer to Come Now, but nothing has happened by our coming now. I think I made a mistake!”
“So now what do we do?”
Leo reached for the pile of mail on the table, held it up, and let it fall dramatically through his fingers. Twice. It was a lot of mail. “All these people really need help!”
“Leo …” began Arlouin.
“No!” he said. “Coming here was a mistake. I see that now. And we haven’t been here long. We can fix this, and fix it quickly. I’m going to go next door before the post office closes and send an overnight letter to these California bakery people.”
“What?”
“That’s what we’re going to do. We’re going to go where we’re needed. Where there aren’t boycotts and naysayers and competition. Call in the kids. We leave in the morning!”
Emma left Gordon on the ball field with the boys and raced across the sandy lane to the back of the café. She threw open the red door just as her mother opened it from the other side.
“Emma!” Arlouin said in surprise.
“No time to talk!” Emma gasped. She took the stairs two at a time and ran into her tiny room at the back of the house, slammed the door, took her index cards out of her shorts pocket, and pinned them with Ruby’s red pin to her Friend Atlas. “There!” she said. “It’s real!” Ruby’s picture fluttered to the floor.
Emma rummaged at her desk for more pins. She pinned Ruby back on her atlas, took a fresh index card, and wrote on it, in red colored pencil:
She thought for a moment with her pencil between her teeth and added:
And then:
She heard a commotion outside and opened her window to see what was happening. The dusky night was filled with lightning bugs just beginning their glowing dances. She had missed dinner. Maybe they all had.
“What’s happening down there?!” she called. She felt like Ebenezer Scrooge calling down to the young boy, What day is it? Have I missed it? in A Christmas Carol, when he wakes up on Christmas morning to find out that the long night and the endless journey has been only a dream, and a new life awaits him. Starting now. Heavens! Where was that practical, reasonable, give-me-the-facts girl? She didn’t feel practical at all anymore. She felt …
“We’re moving!” shouted Jody and Van and Roger. Their voices were full of anguish. They were sobbing. They didn’t even try to hide their despair.
And the dogs. They drooped and sloped and rambled and swayed like they were on their last legs. Maybe they were.
Arlouin had Gordon in her arms. She looked besieged.
Gordon flai
led and howled like the world was coming to an end.
And that’s because it was.
Packing. Again.
All around Emma, boxes were being filled. Some had never been emptied. The upstairs kitchen, where Emma had first met Ruby Lavender, was once again full of taped boxes.
“The movers will be here in two days,” said Leo. “Let’s have everything shipshape for them to move us. We’ll be driving through Colorado by then. Who has seen my road atlas?”
No one spoke more than was necessary. The boys silently gathered their bicycles and packed their suitcases and had no energy for arguments. Arlouin was tight-lipped as she set out leftovers for supper. There was still pimento cheese, and day-old bread, and a soup Emma had experimented with earlier in the week, a Cold Cucumber Soup with Yogurt and Dill and Homemade Croutons. It was delicious but the boys wouldn’t touch it. Arlouin unearthed the peanut butter and jelly for them.
Ben arrived home to packing boxes.
“What! Again? Already? What’s happening?”
Now, thought Emma. Finally Ben gets it. But her heartbreak was so deep she couldn’t speak. She couldn’t be in the same room as her father. She couldn’t begin to explain it to her mother. She couldn’t even look at her oldest brother. They had shared something important earlier that day, and now it was gone. Forever. She walked upstairs and closed her bedroom door.
Now, thought Ben. Now I see why Emma hates it so much. But no amount of cajoling or explaining or questioning his father changed anything. They were leaving.
“We go when it’s time,” said his mother, without conviction. “You know that.”
“Good,” his father had said when he saw his son. “You’re here. Give me a hand loading the car, will you?”