How Sweet It Is (5 page)

I
’ve decided I’ll try teaching the kids. Grandpa Ernest requested it, after all, and it was kind of him to give me this cabin. It’s peaceful here; I want to stay. And if teaching is what it takes, I’ll try it. I can’t go back to Atlanta.

Chef Bordeaux would beam with happiness if he found out I’m going to teach. His eyes would dance with excitement as visions of cherry strudels and minestrone sashayed through his culinary mind. His enthusiasm I cannot handle right now, and perhaps that’s why I haven’t called to tell him about my new surroundings or
situations
—the topic he said he wanted to hear about.

They are middle-schoolers, so I suppose I’ll start at the beginning and teach basic cooking. From a cardboard box labeled
Books
, I dig out one of my basic cookbooks. The lettering in the title,
Easy Cooking
, is made to look like yellow icing piped onto a creamy white cake. The only trouble with the cover is that forming perfect letters like that with frosting is not
easy.
I flip the first few pages and see the headline
How to Boil an Egg.
I don’t like boiled eggs, so I don’t consider them a basic cooking need. Besides, what would you use a boiled egg for? Chef salad. Cobb salad. Deviled eggs—or for those who don’t like the word
devil
in their culinary experience, stuffed eggs.

Thinking about teaching, coupled with last night’s restless sleep due to some disturbing noises outside the loft bedroom’s window, does not make me ooze with excitement. From the medicine cabinet in the bathroom upstairs, I reach for my bottle of Tylenol. As I take two tablets, I wonder why the doctor wouldn’t just let me get addicted to codeine.

In the living room, I note a charcoal drawing of an Asian boy in a straw hat riding on the back of a water buffalo. The boy has one hand on the wide back of the beast and the other raised as if he’s waving to someone. Maybe his mom is standing nearby and he’s waving and telling her that he’s okay this time, unlike last time when he slipped off and fell face-first into the rice paddy.

When my cell phone rings, I rush around the cabin, trying to find where I placed it before going to bed last night. I find it on the kitchen counter and answer just before it goes to voice mail.

The familiar voice of my dad is on the line.

“Hi, Dad. How are you and how are the pigs?” I picture him in his usual attire—denim bib overalls, red shirt, and a wide-brimmed straw hat he bought last year at the state fair.

“Grumpy today.” Even after nearly forty years in Georgia, his accent still sounds like that of western Pennsylvania, that Yankee state, where he grew up.

“And you?” My accent is Southern, and I don’t care what people say. I’m a Georgia girl.

“Grumpier.”

This is our typical greeting. My parents are pig farmers in Tifton, which is a small town near Jimmy Carter’s Plains, Georgia. All my life I’ve been the daughter of pig farmers, and I must say, I’m surprisingly proud of this heritage. My sister finds the comments she gets when she tells people what her parents do for a living embarrassing. To avoid these comments and cackles, she has shortened the truth to, “My parents have a little farm.” Quaint, cute. Most people don’t want to know more than that.

My dad asks about my trip, and when I answer, I omit the fact that I was almost too paralyzed to continue the drive once it started to rain.

I try to sound cheery and optimistic about beginning my new life in Bryson City. I tell him that the scenery is gorgeous and that the mountain air is almost as fresh as the air in Tifton.

Dad asks if I’ve seen the train that runs through the town. “Smoky Mountain Railroad has its headquarters in Bryson City,” he informs me like a travel guide would. “The train goes to Dillsboro, and they have gourmet meals aboard some of the trips.” I know he is tossing in the gourmet meal part to try to entice me.

“Oh?” I think I recall a set of tracks near the Methodist church along the steep, windy road up to this cabin. Trains do not impress me the way they do my father. He will stop whatever he’s doing whenever he hears a train whistle or sees a train coming down the tracks. He says trains remind him of his years as a hobo, but I know he’s only teasing about that.

Then my mother is on the phone, asking how long the trip took, if I have food to eat, if I took my vitamins this morning, and would I like her to send me some pickled pig’s feet? I have never liked pig’s feet, and I don’t know why she doesn’t remember that. Perhaps she thinks that for some reason they will taste more agreeable to me at this elevation. I expect to hear her tell me to sit up straight, and as we talk, my shoulders do rise and I stick out my chest.

“Sit up straight,” my mother once told me when I was growing up. “You don’t want to become hunched over. My aunt Lavonna Dewanna was
such
a hunchback.”

I never heard the rest of her reminiscing because I couldn’t believe that anyone would be named Lavonna Dewanna. I asked if that really was her name, and my mother said, “Yes, but we called her La De.”

“La De!” I laughed so hard that I rolled off the bed. I was only six, but after seeing my mother’s expression, I knew that I would never joke about her aunt La De again. Apparently, Mom didn’t think there was anything funny at all about her aunt’s name.

When I was in the hospital, sitting for any length of time, especially with my shoulders squared, was difficult, but Mom’s words rung out sharper than my pain.
Sit up straight, Deena.

I view my reflection in the mosaic mirror that hangs in the upstairs loft bedroom. I have no recollection of having climbed the staircase to the second story; my mother’s voice often takes away my own reminiscences.

“Is there a washer there? How about a dryer?”

Mom’s questions make me feel like I’m a child. I relax my jaw, trying not to grit my teeth, and then slowly answer her questions in the affirmative. I can tell that she is pleased to know her daughter will be able to wash and dry her clothing. When Mom and I hang up, I meander around the loft, and then make the bed, pulling the lavender quilt over the sheets. Someone made this quilt; I finger the fabric as I study the stitches. I wonder if my grandmother, Grandpa Ernest’s wife, was a quilter. She died before I was born, and I know almost nothing about her.

Downstairs, in the sunny living room, a scarlet quilt drapes over the back of the overstuffed sofa, and I note the pattern of leaves. Jeannie quilts and has tried to interest me, but I can’t say I really care to learn. There are things in life you hope to do some day—like ride in a hot air balloon or go to Paris—and then there are things that you know you will never do because, in a nutshell, the desire isn’t there.

On the wall behind the sofa are two pictures. The one that catches my eye is a framed print of a woman in a gold and deep-red kimono. The cloth of the kimono looks shiny and smooth. A bright fan the color of cherry blossoms covers the right side of the woman’s delicate face. I wonder why she has the fan in that position. Perhaps the right side of her face has a huge mole or wart. Or maybe she was in an accident and her face is scarred. Maybe she had to have 179 stitches. Perhaps she even had plastic surgery. Suddenly, I feel an attachment to this painting. I stand back and give it another look. Then my cell phone rings again.

“Where is the nearest store?” Dad asks anxiously.

“What?”

“Your mom wants to know what the closest grocery store to you is called. She forgot to ask you.”

“Ingle’s,” I say.

“Ingle’s,” Dad repeats, and I can hear my mother say, “Oh, okay.” I can’t tell whether she approves of this grocery store chain or not. I know her favorite place to shop for fresh produce is Publix. She will drive an extra ten miles for the opportunity to buy carrots, lettuce, red peppers, and peaches at Publix.

My dad says that Mom thought this was Piggly Wiggly country. I wonder why she makes such a fuss over supermarket chains.

Dad tells me he loves me, and suddenly I wish I were in Tifton, walking with him in thigh-high black rubber boots, feeding slop to the newest batch of rosy piglets and listening to him talk about the latest gadget he might buy. His “I love you” is tender, just like it was when he first came to see me in the hospital after the accident. There I was a mass of white bandages, and he found my cheek and gave it his signature kiss.

I tell him I love him, too, and when he hangs up I still feel the warmth of his voice through the phone.

I forget the kimono woman and her hidden face and head up the stairs to the bathroom by the loft. Earlier, I had my first breakfast (wheat toast with butter) in the cabin and I’m about to take my first shower.

The bathroom is painted forest green with tan molding along the ceiling. From the window I see the gravel driveway where my Jeep is parked and the thin, winding road that took me up here yesterday afternoon. I shudder and back away from the view. Sometimes it’s best not to see just how high up the mountain you are.

After my shower, I dry off using a towel I brought here, even though the cabin’s closets are stocked with fluffy, soft towels and rose-scented sheets and pillowcases. As usual, I’m trapped into looking at my ragged scars. I can cover the one on my abdomen with clothing and avoid short skirts or shorts so that the ones on my thighs are hidden. I wonder how I can make it through a summer without exposing my arms, though. I follow the deep indentations with my finger. Train tracks—I have my own set. Two long lines run from just above my wrist up to my bicep on my right arm. Sometimes I think of them as the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.

“Do people ever name their scars?” I asked Dr. Bland one afternoon as the clouds filled the sky and the weatherman predicted snow by midnight.

He smiled and told me my scars would fade.

Chef B joked that it was good that Dr. Bland was a doctor and not a restaurant owner because who would want to eat at Bland’s Restaurant? “Not good for the business,” the chef said in his Spanish accent. “People think food won’t be spicy or very flavor.”

I am still in my bathrobe with my wet hair dripping down my neck when Sally calls. At first I can’t find my cell phone again. I rush down the stairs to answer before it goes to voice mail. I have no idea when I placed my phone on the kitchen counter.

“Glad you made it to North Carolina,” Sally says. “You sound out of breath. Are you okay?”

“So far, so good.”

“How’s the cabin?”

I think of the first thing that came to my mind when I entered the cabin yesterday. “Sunny,” I say. Sunlight had filled every inch of the downstairs area as it poured through the windows, even the windows in the sloping ceiling. Light streamed across the hardwood floors—floors partially covered by a collection of round and square throw rugs. Even the purple Mexican hat with yellow tassels hanging by a nail on the wall by the hallway glistened festively. I was so glad to see the sun after the downpour I’d experienced when leaving Georgia. “There’re windows along all the living room and dining room walls,” I tell Sally.

“Is there a fireplace?”

I know Sally thinks a fireplace makes or breaks a place. She told me that during her years at the veterinary school in Vermont, her apartment’s ceiling leaked whenever the upstairs tenant ran his dishwasher, the pantry had a live-in mouse, the odor of fried fish permeated the walls, and yet there was one saving factor: the apartment had a fireplace. Sally lit a fire every night during the cold months—of which apparently there are many in Vermont—and studied by the glowing flames.

“Yeah,” I tell her as I walk over to the white stone fireplace. “And even a hot tub out on the deck.” I push a blue drape back from the window to view the hot tub. Actually I don’t even know if it works. The thick tan cover spreads over it like a skin, and it looks too heavy for one person to remove. Maybe my aunt can help me with that, I think. Then, like a bolt of lightning, a memory hits me. The last time I sat in a hot tub, Lucas was with me. He asked what kind of engagement ring I wanted. He took my hand, caressed my fingers, and then kissed each fingertip. “When we get married,” he said, “let’s get a hot tub.”

“So”—Sally bursts into my thoughts—“what’s next? How are the brochures?”

The brochures are part of my plan to start my own cake-decorating business here in the mountains. Eventually, I want to expand to a full-fledged catering business, but I’m going to start with cakes and see how it goes. I did a mockup of the cover weeks ago, but I still need to work on the inside copy. Sally wants to hear something positive, so I say, “It’s so beautiful here. I know I’ll be inspired to work on the brochures.”

She sounds relieved. And I’m grateful I can protect her from how I really feel. I don’t want her to worry. Let me be the one who worries in this friendship. There’s no point in both of us filling that role.

When the conversation ends, exhaustion fills me, as though I’ve just made a five-course dinner in record time. I slide onto the bar stool. Resting my chin in the palms of my hands, my elbows supported by the counter, I stare at nothing. Then I feel warm tears fall along my fingers. Growling like a captured animal, I start to form the words. “I hate him.” The sound of my own voice scares me; the tears fall faster. “I hate that he left me,” I cry to the walls, the kitchen utensils, and the pictures. I turn to see the woman with the fan hiding half of her face. Annoyed that the picture is there and that I have no idea why she has that fan covering her, I yell, “I hate you, too!”

I don’t even know her.

My gaze rests on my right arm, and although my arm is fully covered by the sleeve of my terry-cloth bathrobe, I know what lies beneath. I shouldn’t take a shower or bath. There is just too much damage to see. Who knew a Mustang was so sharp? The word
shattered
comes at me like a large grizzly, teeth bared and ready to pounce.

————

As I pull on a pair of khakis and a pink long-sleeved shirt, I remind myself that I won the Georgia Teen Cook Award at the state fair when I was a senior in high school. This reminder is supposed to make me feel better—alive, worthy, and capable. The mayor presented me with a gold-embossed certificate and a check for fifty dollars. He told me that my winning entry—a strawberry cream pastry—was surely a sign that my life would be filled with “everything sweet from here on out.” Easy for him to say; he was the mayor of Atlanta.