Killing Thyme

by Leslie Budewitz

  “It’s changed a lot.” Sandra’s words held a note of regret. “More tourists. Fewer services, more gifts. Not so many locals doing their weekly shopping.”

  “Shopping’s changed,” I said. “Every suburb has its own farmers’ market. Grocery stores sell arugula now.” The sped-up pace of modern life was another factor. The Market had responded by creating weekly pop-ups in public plazas downtown, taking the farmers’ bounty to the office workers. Great idea, though it didn’t help the merchants—the “stores with doors.”

  “We can’t let ourselves get stuck in the past,” my mother said.

  “Never thought we’d be the older generation,” Sandra replied. She and my mother were kindred spirits—Seattle natives, of an age, who love food and taking care of people. When I bought the shop, they’d quickly discovered shared memories of shopping here with their immigrant parents in the 1950s. Historians may call that an ebb tide in the Market’s chronicles, but not if they heard these two women recall the aromas of fresh fish and fried chicken, playing games on the cracked floor tiles, and the sounds of a dozen mother tongues clucking.

  Was my mother considering coming home?

  “Do you think your sister-in-law will mind if I pick up a few groceries?” she said.

  “I think if you mess with her menu planning, you’ll be living dangerously, but if you bring treats for Carl and the kids, they’ll rally ’round you.” My sister-in-law is a lovely woman who firmly believes in the well-planned life. She is also a card-carrying member of the food police.

  Mom had barely cleared the door when I pulled Kristen into the nook. “The weirdest thing happened. Do you remember a woman named Peggy Manning? She’s got crazy blue eyes.”

  Kristen’s own eyes widened. “Go on.”

  “On our way to lunch, we detoured through the Arcade to drop off the pottery Cayenne brought in. And the potter, Bonnie Clay? She and Mom recognized each other in a flash.”

  I described the encounter and my mother’s refusal to tell me anything about Peggy, now Bonnie. The phone conversation in the alley I kept to myself. Something about it nagged at me, and I wasn’t ready to spill. Being each other’s shadows much of our lives didn’t mean Kristen and I didn’t keep a few things to ourselves.

  People assume Kristen is an airhead because she’s blond, pretty, and gets a weekly manicure. And because she lives in a great house in an old neighborhood and doesn’t need to work. I knew better. I watched her turn thoughtful.

  “That was a challenging time.”

  “You mean during the war? When our parents met?”

  “No. Later.” Kristen folded one arm across her body and rubbed her chin between her left thumb and forefinger.

  I didn’t remember any of that. Or rather, I didn’t remember anything out of the ordinary. Talk about principles and commitments, intention, and deliberate action was commonplace in Grace House. “Was there something specific—?”

  The door chimes rattled.

  “Oh, good, you’re both here.” Laurel Halloran headed toward us, her gray-brown curls trailing like a veil. “Don’t forget about tonight,” she said to me. And to Kristen, “Lemon thyme shortbread.”

  “Ohmygosh,” I said as Kristen asked, “What’s tonight?”

  “Chef’s dinner at Changing Courses,” Laurel said. “Pepper’s first class is graduating.”

  A longtime Seattle chef, Laurel had cajoled me into volunteering with a project that trains homeless and disadvantaged adults to work in the food service industry. Every week, I teach a new group of students about herbs and spices. Every Wednesday, a local chef coordinates a three-course dinner, open to the public, the students serving as sous chefs. The opening ceremony honors that week’s graduates. Even with my mother in town, I wouldn’t miss it. Besides, she was staying at my brother’s house, to spoil the grandchildren.

  “We need to finalize this menu,” Laurel told Kristen as she slid into the nook. “After that wet spring, the herbs are exploding, and I’ve got more thyme than I know what to do with.”

  “You’re the only woman in the world who can say that,” I said.

  “I found a recipe for thyme-flavored lemonade. For the adults, add tequila or gin.”

  Kristen shot me an over-the-shoulder look I couldn’t read. Did it say our conversation wasn’t finished, or that she was relieved to be cut off? She didn’t need to worry about the interruption—I give my staff leeway when personal stuff pops up during the day. And when your two best friends are planning a party together, that’s inevitable.

  Besides, the party was partly for me.

  “Too many choices,” I heard Kristen say, from the nook.

  “That’s the problem,” Laurel replied. “Time to choose.”

  Always the problem, isn’t it? I picked up where Kristen had left off, filling shallow wicker baskets with darling silicone tea infusers shaped like owls, gingerbread men, and musical notes. Talk about choices. (I’d passed on the sea creatures, doubting that my customers would find a green octopus floating in their tea as appetizing as the manufacturer hoped.)

  My pals finished their kibitz in time for Kristen to dash off and for Laurel to head back to Ripe, her deli, or home to her houseboat.

  “C’mon, Arf,” I said. “Let’s go stretch your legs.” He sat to let me click on his leash. I tucked a plastic bag into my apron pocket, and we headed north on Pike Place to Victor Steinbrueck Park, a haven of green named for the visionary architect who saved the Market from the ravages of progress in the early ’70s. Near one of the two totem poles commemorating the region’s Native heritage, Arf pooped and I scooped. Then we meandered over to the wrought iron railing to take in the view of Puget Sound.

  “’Lo, Miz Pepper.”

  I turned to see Hot Dog, a fortyish ex-boxer who spent most of his days enjoying the Great Outdoors, ranging from the Market to the waterfront to Pioneer Square and back again. A few weeks ago, he’d let slip that as a young man, he’d earned money for boxing lessons as a short-order cook in his uncle’s café, and I’d suggested he consider enrolling in Changing Courses.

  It was unusual to see him without his buddy Jim, and I said so.

  One shoulder rose and fell, his blue Seahawks jersey flopping loosely. “I got some thinking to do.” He rubbed Arf’s ear and fell in beside me as we headed back to Pike Place. “Miz Pepper, you honestly think that cooking school you and Miz Laurel work at would take me?”

  “I don’t know why not.”

  “You know I haven’t always been a Boy Scout,” he said.

  “Doesn’t matter,” I said. “Drop in and check it out.”

  We’d reached the arts and crafts tables, and I glanced over at Bonnie Clay. She held up a large platter for a customer to inspect, muscles straining against her thin T-shirt.

  “Be seeing you, Miz Pepper,” Hot Dog said, and he gave Arf a final pat on the head.

  Between the tourists and the regulars, the shop buzzed all afternoon. Sunshine in Seattle is a glorious thing, in more ways than one.

  The after-five mini rush wound down, and I stepped outside, iced spice tea in hand, for a quick breather before my closing chores. The farm tents in the street had come down, giving me a clear view. A riot of color spilled from the flower boxes mounted on the edge of the Arcade roof. The three men who sing in front of the original Starbucks, a block north of my shop, paraded by in the middle of the street, their voices in perfect harmony, and the last-minute shoppers slowed to drink it all in.

  This is why I love the Market.

  Shouts drew my attention to the North Arcade and the artists’ stalls. Heads turned. The singers blocked my view, and I couldn’t see the ruckus.

  The clamor stopped, and a moment later, a small figure emerged from the gap between the tables and marched diagonally across the cobbles toward my shop.

  Holy marjaroly, Mom. What’s up now?


  Three

  Araucaria araucana, the Chilean pine, got its common name when a nineteenth-century wit observed that “it would puzzle a monkey to climb that.” Now endangered, the living fossil and source of Victorian jet does well on the North American West Coast, and a few older Seattle homes still boast monkey puzzle trees in their yards.

  “Something weird’s going on,” I told Carl five minutes later after he closed Mom’s car door. “But she won’t talk about it.”

  “Five-two and a hundred pounds, Pep, but she can take care of herself.” He took Mom’s shopping bag from me and headed around the back of his white SUV. “See you this weekend.”

  Family. Where would we be without them?

  We closed up the shop, and Arf and I dashed back to the loft, he to settle in for a nap in front of the big west windows and me to swap my uniform of stretchy black pants and a black T-shirt for a fun pink-and-yellow tunic dress and my lucky pink T-strap shoes.

  The dress had been a good choice—festive, with no bothersome waistband. Three hours later, Laurel and I waddled out of the Changing Courses dining room, the flavors of North Africa rolling around on our tongues.

  “If I’d eaten one more bite, I would have exploded,” I said.

  “You practically licked your plate,” she said. “Me, too. That spicy lamb tagine was heavenly. You should create a harissa blend for the store.”

  “Chiles, caraway, coriander—what else?”

  “A touch of mint, a dash of salt. Add olive oil and lemon juice, and hello, Morocco! No passport needed.”

  “And no jet lag. Have I said thanks for roping me into this project? The food inspiration alone is worth every moment, not to mention seeing the changes in the students’ lives.”

  “You can never say thanks too often.”

  We hugged good night—gingerly, careful of our full stomachs—and she found her car. I declined her offer of a ride—after that feast, I needed the short walk home. All downhill, thank goodness.

  I hadn’t wanted to spoil the night sharing my doubts about my mother and her old friend. Besides, Laurel’s advice would only echo Carl’s.

  After another quick clothing change and a dog walk, I poured a glass of a crisp Italian white—a Bastianich Sauvignon Blanc from Venice, by way of Vinny—and settled onto the caramel chenille couch in my living room. The Viaduct, the elevated highway above the waterfront, blocked most of my view, its long-slated removal delayed yet again by problems boring the tunnel that would replace it. Still, the last rays filled the loft with an orange-pink westerly glow. No place I had ever lived had felt so much like home.

  I reached for The Reeve’s Tale by Margaret Frazer, from her series featuring Sister Frevisse, fifteenth-century nun and amateur sleuth. Fifteen minutes later, I was dreaming of giant jars of preserved lemons, cinnamon-scented couscous dotted with dates, apricots, and almonds, pigs made of salt, and a potter with startling blue eyes in her weathered face.

  * * *

  “They want me to teach a class on chocolate?” Mary Jean practically squealed at the news.

  At the Changing Courses dinner, the director of volunteers had said the regular instructor had a family emergency and did Laurel or I know who might step in on short notice. So first thing Thursday morning, I headed Down Under—the name for the Market’s lower levels—to twist an arm. Turned out, the chatty chocolatier needed no cajoling.

  “One hour. Monday at ten.” I handed her the outline the director had given me. “Keep it simple: types of chocolate, their uses, a few basic cooking methods. Your experience makes you a natural.”

  Plus her shop was new and, despite her blissful truffles, struggling. Heresy though it might be, I wondered if there wasn’t a limit on how much high-end chocolate one city could eat.

  And the HR pro in me can’t stop searching for solutions to problems.

  “Oh, Pepper! Thank you!” The petite redhead threw her arms around me, and I hoped I wasn’t sending a lamb to slaughter.

  * * *

  Midmorning, Kristen and Cayenne returned to the shop with the potter’s display models.

  “She almost didn’t let us take them,” Cayenne said. “She said maybe doing business with you wasn’t a good idea.”

  After what I’d witnessed the day before, she might be right. “Did she say why?”

  “Too much time, water under the bridge. I didn’t catch it all.” Cayenne handed me a lidded salt cellar, a black herringbone pattern on white porcelain. “Isn’t this fabulous?”

  “Mm-hmm.” I held the lid in place with two fingers and flipped it over. Two small diamonds had been scratched into the bottom. A fragment of memory gnawed at the back of my brain.

  “But then she asked about the house,” Kristen said, “so I invited her to the party. She hedged a bit—I could tell she wanted to go, but she’s a little shy. So I said you’d give her a ride.”

  No doubt I resembled a salt pig myself, my mouth hanging open. “But if there’s some tension between her and Mom . . .”

  “We’re throwing this party to honor the history of the house, and both Bonnie and your mother are part of it.” The door opened, and one of Kristen’s regular customers entered, a woman who counts on us to spice up her weekly dinner parties. “Be right there,” Kristen called to her. And to me, “Time for bygones to be bygones.”

  What bygones were we talking about?

  Cayenne and I arranged the crockery on a shelf, next to our favorite sea salts. We tucked Bonnie’s cards in an open jar, and Cayenne headed to the office to make a small sign.

  And then it was business as usual. We sold spice and served samples of tea. I told myself that Kristen was right and that whatever the old tensions were, Mom and Bonnie could work them out. Despite the shouts I—and everyone else on the street—had heard, no punches had been thrown. My mother had always advocated airing disagreements sooner rather than later, “so they can blow over.”

  And by a certain point in life, we all learn a few things about water and bridges.

  As if to prove the point, a set of bicycle wheels whizzed by the open door and screeched to a halt. The presence of a uniformed officer inside the shop can create a stir, so I marched to the door and met my ex on the sidewalk.

  “Hey, Tag. What brings you here?”

  “Just making my rounds, keeping the peace.” He adjusted his Ray-Bans. The shades hid his baby blues, but I knew they were teasing me.

  I spread my hands in a “what could be wrong” gesture. “The sun is shining, people are shopping.”

  “And your mother’s in town.”

  He knew me well. “I’m thrilled to see her, Tag, you know that. It’s just—well, I’m not entirely sure why she’s here. Yeah, she misses the family, especially the kids. But I get the sense there’s more going on.”

  “If you need an ear, or a shoulder, you know where to find me.”

  Even the sight of Tag’s backside in his regulation black bike shorts wasn’t enough for that.

  * * *

  And then, after a whirlwind of tourists, a late-night restocking, and all the daily dramas and traumas of retail life, it was Friday.

  Time to party.

  “Champagne?” The angled hem of Kristen’s gauzy blue dress swung as she grabbed two glasses from the tray her fourteen-year-old carried. Mother and daughter both wore flat black ankle-strap sandals, and their blue toenail polish matched. “No worries—the flutes are plastic.”

  “Wow.” Bonnie eyed the deep couches and rich mahogany woodwork. The once-drab room, home to a hodgepodge of mismatched furniture and lamps with perpetually crooked shades on wobbly tables, had been transformed into a warm, tasteful gathering spot. “This sure isn’t how I remember it.”

  Kristen laughed. “My parents were too busy saving the world to care about cracked plaster or that the living room only had one working outlet.”


  I raised my glass. “A toast, to a piece of Seattle’s history—and our own.”

  An arm slid around my waist, and I leaned into Ben’s embrace. He’d had his hair freshly trimmed, close on the sides, longer on top. A bit of gel darkened it—a wet look I found both appealing and a little silly. We were in Seattle, after all—why fake the wet look when it comes naturally so often?

  I’d warned my mother that we were bringing Bonnie, but she’d only said it would be good to catch up. And I couldn’t wait to be a fly on the wall.

  “These windows weren’t here, were they?” Bonnie asked of two stained glass windows, classic Victorian medallions with tulip edging and a shimmering blue border. Each stood above a bookcase, flanking the original tile fireplace.

  “No. My uncle put a baseball through one when he was a kid, and my grandparents replaced them with clear glass. We found one in the basement and had it fixed, and a twin made for the other side.” Kristen pointed.

  But Bonnie’s gaze was no longer on the windows. She was staring at Kristen’s wrist. Or rather, her bracelet, diamonds and sapphires set between twisted strands of silver and gold.

  Kristen held out her arm. “Isn’t it stunning?”

  “That’s what you found in the remodel? My best score was a 1918 silver dollar.” But then, I’d redone a century-old warehouse, not a semi-posh private home.

  “A family piece, I guess, though I don’t remember ever hearing about it. ‘The Case of the Missing Sapphires.’ Too grand for a casual summer party, but how could I not wear it today?”

  Beside me, Bonnie tensed. Did all this splendor give her revolutionary heart an attack? Had she been one of those angry hippies, declaring war on the middle class? Part of the faction that viewed home repair and decorating as signs of hopeless middle-class bourgeoisie, an evil to be avoided like locusts and Buick station wagons? I’d racked my brain last night, trying to place her or recall the name Peggy Manning, but while I could feel those eyes burning into my young soul, I remembered nothing more about her.