The Perfect Blend (13 page)

Not even in sonnet form

S
aturday morning, Diane dumps half a cup of cream into her mug. The woman puts so much cream and sugar into her coffee it's hard to even call it coffee anymore. “So.” She plunks herself down backward in a kitchen chair, staring at me with inquiring eyes after I've told her the entire coffee-tasting and dinner-eating story. “You chickened out. Will's right, you know, you should tell your family. I mean, if not now, when?”

I evade the question. “He invited me to tea. I don't know if it's a date or a beverage rebuttal to my coffee demonstration, but I'm supposed to meet him at The House of Blue Leaves on Tuesday.” I pour my own cup. Yes, that's right, tea. Hey, look, if you'd have seen the way he looked at me when he said it, you had said yes to anything. He could
have asked me to a beef-jerky tasting and I'd have consented.

“Do I get to voice my concerns here? I know what I said earlier, but I thought you guys were going to be more careful, not spend more time together. Are you sure you know what you're doing? Why are you having tea with your banker Tuesday night?”

“Because I want to.”

“Fine. Be that way. Go for the supremely complicated relationship. Me? I've changed my mind. I think you should go with Nate. He likes coffee. He understands coffee. He doesn't hold your credit rating in his tight British fists. Date Nate. Hey, that rhymes.”

I glare at Diane. “No. I will not date Nate, even if it rhymes. Not even if you put it in sonnet form. He's a nice guy but it's purely friendship.
Friend
-ship. You can have male friends, Diane. You are aware of that option?”

“I'm just saying he could be more than just a friend.”

“No,” I say firmly. “Friend. Friend only. There's no
zing
there, not even a shred.”

Diane takes a deep drink of coffee and starts rooting through the tin of cookies Mom sent home with me last night. As if I don't already spend my days surrounded by baked goods at Carter's. “Does there have to be zing right away? Working up to zing is good. Probably smart. Instant zing gets lots of people into trouble.”

“Can we please drop the subject?” I moan, refilling my mug.

Diane doesn't actually drop the subject, just twists it around a bit. She's good at that. “You didn't really get him to do the whipped cream thing, did you?”

“I most certainly did,” I reply, snagging my favorite type of cookie out of the tin. “He was fabulous at it. The way his Brazilian accent sounds saying whipped cream should be illegal. The woman practically walked out of the store on air.” I chuckle. “Renato,” I say, rolling the R for effect, “has a new secret weapon and, trust me, he's not afraid to use it.”

Diane eyes me over her cookie. “When's your shift today?”

“Two to ten.” I pop a second cookie into my mouth. “Why?”

“I think I should drop by and test the theory.”

I glare at her, stifling a giggle. “You wouldn't. I couldn't keep a straight face.”

“I would,” Diane confirms. “And I will.” She shoots up off the chair with new enthusiasm. “Gotta go. Thanks for the coffee and—” she points at me “—I'll see you and your whip-cream-toting friend later.”

You know, I was thinking work today was going to be boring. I doubt that'll be the case now.

 

Downtown, the Saturday afternoon-evening shift at Carter's is always kind of dry. It picks up just around eight, but in the early afternoon there isn't a lot of business in a downtown location. I'll have
to remember to add some kind of entertainment, book signings or something, to bring in the Saturday-afternoon crowd to my place. Maybe even a children's story hour. With extra whipped cream on every hot chocolate.

Speaking of whipped cream, I hope Nate hasn't noticed me keeping an eye on the door all day. It's three-thirty now and I've been working since two. And every time a female walks through the door my pulse skips. I don't know how I'm going to keep from laughing when Diane walks in. I'm pretty sure Nate won't recognize her—Diane usually meets me outside.

4:06 p.m., the door swings open. It's Diane. She's put on what I secretly know to be her “extra cute” outfit. She's carrying two shopping bags, but if I know Diane they're just stuffed with empty boxes for effect. Diane is the only ex-theater-major nurse I've ever met. It makes for an odd combination, but I've seen her do funny voices to calm down hurt kids so God must have known what He was doing.

Right now, she's playing the part to the hilt. It's killing me to keep a straight face. I feel a giggle coming on, so I purposely spill a handful of coffee beans on the floor. It gives me a chance to look down and forces Nate to pull her drink.

“What'll it be?” Nate has his smooth voice on. I turn away and roll my eyes.

“Tall hazelnut latte please. Skim milk.”

Here it comes. I cough, just to keep the laughs at bay.

“You want whipped cream on that?”

“Ooo,” Diane coos, “maybe just a smidge.”

You know, there are days where I love this job. I keep my head down, because my face is contorted from suppressing a laugh. I hear the steam go, hear the milk pour and see him reach down into the fridge for the whipped cream canister. Ten, nine, eight, seven…

“Whoa!” From my hiding spot under the counter I hear the sound of rampant dairy product. “That's a bit more than you asked for. I could pull another drink for you, if you want…” That man's voice hints at everything when he says it like that.

“Oh, no, that's okay.” I can hear the laugh tickling the edges of Diane's voice. Nate probably thinks she's flirting. This is Diane we're talking about. I'm not sure she knows any other way to talk to a guy. God needs to send that woman a husband, pronto. Her biological clock isn't just ticking, it's registering on the Richter scale.

I've resorted to picking up the coffee beans one by one just to buy myself some time because if I stand up now, I'll blow the whole covert operation. Nate and Diane make small talk for a few minutes while I invent reasons to stay down behind the counter. Finally, I hear the door close behind Diane and I pull in a deep breath. That was just too much fun.

Suddenly I feel Nate squat down beside me. “You got any more tricks like that up your sleeve? That thing works wonders.”

The agony and the ecstasy

F
unky—elegant. That's how I'd describe this place. The House of Blue Leaves is amazing. I don't know how Will found it, but this is the teahouse I'd open if I ever opened a teahouse. Hip. Sophisticated in a clean-lined, Oriental style but with a dash of artistic flair. The decor is a combination of light wood and black lacquer. Intricate Japanese silk prints hang beside bright red ceramic sconces. A huge Chinese-dragon kite circles around the iron fireplace in the corner. Fascinatingly foreign music wafts underneath the animated conversation going on at a dozen or so intimate tables.

Behind the red-tiled counter, the wild pottery vase doesn't look odd next to the delicate porcelain cups—somehow they go together.

“Hello, William” a man in a black Chinese jacket greets us, bowing three times.

Will bows back. “Hello, Longwei. This is Maggie. I'm teaching her about estate teas tonight.”

“Ah. Very good.” Longwei hands Will the equivalent of a wine list. I watch Will scan it, running one finger down the list until it stops at something with a price tag higher than the last really good dinner I had. Tea gets that expensive? Tea gets this complicated?

“
Kung Fu Cha,
please. The
Pur-eh
tea. I see you have the 1996
Mengahai Beeng Cha
on this list,” Will says, the Chinese rolling off his tongue with astounding ease. “Have you got 1992 by any chance?”

The server smiles, impressed. I have to say, I'm impressed.

“We keep that in the back.”

“We'll have that,
M goi nei sin.
”

“This way, please, and I'll get it ready.” All he did was order tea, right? I know he just ordered an impressive kind of tea, but for all I know he could have just asked Longwei to bring us fuchsia rain boots with a side of caviar.

“You speak Chinese?” I gasp as we settle into a little corner alcove behind a white paper screen. A table and two crimson cushions are artfully arranged so that we have privacy but can still see the room around the fire. The corner booth is one thing. But our own little teahouse? How much cooler is that?

I have to admit, I love this place. The clientele is
all across the board: tattooed biker couples in booths next to organic-intellectual types. Artistic black-clad poet-types next to upscale executives. Elderly Chinese couples next to two women laden with shopping bags. Every ethnicity, every social status, casual drinkers and people who seem to really know their stuff. No one would ever feel out of place here. The crowd is the very definition of the word
eclectic.

“I spent a year in Hong Kong when I was young. One of—” he hesitates a second “—my father's many adventures. I couldn't negotiate a peace treaty, but I can hold my own in a restaurant. When your boss in the flower shop laid into Art on your behalf, I'm afraid I understood most of what she said. I might have gotten the rest if she had slowed down a bit, but what I did hear was already burning my ears off.”

I can only imagine. Nancy's told me off in English more than once and I can guess how much more apt she is in her mother tongue.

This is so far from the ruffle-laden tea stunt I put him through, I can't even begin to make up for my bad behavior. I admire the elegant flower arrangement on our table. “This place is absolutely amazing.”

“And, I might add, not a speck of chintz in sight. Sometimes the American version of high tea just makes me laugh. It's as though you've created a tea theme-park ride. All fluff and doilies and bitty sandwiches.”

“Yeah.” I wince. “Sorry about that. But you handled it really well.”

“You're not the first to try that, you know. I'm forever telling people that most British don't do high tea the way you all think we do. Actually, a British tea is much closer to the Asian tea concept than to
Mary Poppins
or
Alice in Wonderland.
” Will gestures around the room. “I think this place does an excellent job. On Saturdays they have live music—everything from jazz guitars to classical sitar. It's become rather a favorite of mine—I hope you can see why.”

Longwei slides back the screen and presents us with a mini-brazier, setting it carefully in the center of the table. He places a large iron kettle on the brazier, then bows at each of us. Will lowers his head in reply and I follow his lead. I'd noticed the same kettle on several other tables when we came in.

Me. Looking forward to tea. Could you ever imagine that'd be the case?

“Hot water,” Will says after Longwei leaves. “The temperature of the water is absolutely essential to good tea.” His voice is formal, but his eyes sparkle. He's enjoying this immensely. He pushes up the sleeves of his shirt, flexing his fingers in readiness. “The point of all this is to achieve excellence. To create superior tea. Under superior circumstances. Surely you can appreciate that.”

I can. I do. The water's not even hot yet and I'm enjoying myself immensely. What if I hate the tea? I mean, I don't much care for tea under mediocre circumstances. What if he goes through all this and
I still hate it? Deceptive or not, I'd probably fake it just to keep that look on his face.

Longwei returns, bearing a slotted wooden tray filled with all kinds of objects: a small, squat teapot and matching pitcher, half a dozen assorted china cups and bowls in different sizes and shapes, a wooden container of odd-looking tools and a dish of something black and crinkly that I think is the tea but looks like a freeze-dried shrub.

“Now, as I said, temperature is the key. So we heat up the pot.” Will pours water from the now-hissing kettle into the teapot and keeps pouring.

“It's going to run over,” I say, reaching to stop his hand.

“It's supposed to run over. That's part of the ritual. It's a symbol of abundance. ‘My cup runneth over' and all. The box is designed to hold the extra water. This way every inch of the pot is heated and cleaned.”

It sounds Zen, but he just quoted a Bible verse. My head is spinning—and you know, I've decided that's not all bad.

Will pours the water from the pot into one set of bowls, then another. “The cups come next. Inside and out, like the pot.” He pours the water over the cups, then uses the wooden tongs to dip the cups into each other, heating the outside. Concentrating, but glancing up every now and then with a dashing look in his eyes. “When I'm all done, you'll never look at a teabag in the same way again.” The man is fired up, ready to change my mind.

“You never want to touch the tea with your hands.” He loads the tea into the center of the pot with a wooden implement. “And you never want to shock it, so you pour carefully.” He pours the water around the pile of tea, then raises and lowers the pot three times while he finishes pouring. “It's like the bow. Three times for respect. But we don't drink this one. It's called the foot water, and it's mostly to wash the tea and get it ready.” He does the whole thing again, slips the lid on and lets it steep for a few seconds. Then, his eyes widening, he picks up the lid. “Now look.” I lean in to see inside the pot and he leans in as well. We're so close to each other I can feel his hair brush my tumbling curls. “It unfurls.” He almost whispers and I feel the word
unfurl
in my stomach. Slowly, gracefully, the leaves emerge from their crumpled pellets. “They call it the agony of the tea,” Will says as if revealing a secret, “but I've never quite seen it that way.” The heady scent of the tea, the nearness of this extraordinary, surprising man—it's so much to take in.

For the next hour, Will goes through a complicated, almost choreographed ritual of pouring and serving this extraordinary thing called tea. Wow. I couldn't have been more wrong about this. It's nothing short of chivalrous and it's the furthest thing from sissy I can imagine. It's like, well, the Kung Fu name makes sense now: it's like a martial art. Clean and solid with a sense of purpose so sharp it takes your breath away.

He explains each step in exquisite detail, catching my eye every now and then. After all the
preparation, the single act of him handing me a cup of tea—the way he looked at me, the way he placed it in my hands, the way our fingers touched for far longer than they needed to—it all made my head spin.

The most astounding thing was that when I stole a look around the room, I saw the same thing going on at table after table: dreamy-eyed women accepting cups of tea from men of every shape and size. Even the biker dude had his date absolutely smitten over teensy china cups. I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes.

“Well?” Will inquires after we finish the first cup (he tells me the ritual involves three cups—oh, boy), “What do you think?”

What do I think? I'm having trouble thinking clearly at the moment, that's what I think.

“I'm surprised,” I reply, because it's true. Is it my new favorite drink? No. Do I care right now? No. Will I stick around for two more cups? You betcha. “The tea's okay, but it's about so much more than just the tea.”
Oh, Maggie, is that the best you could come up with? Even Diane would groan at that one and she'll fall for any line.
“I can see why wome—people like it.”

Will stares for a moment. “You'd be mobbed in Hong Kong, you know.”

“Really?” I reply. “Brutal to coffee-lovers over there, are they?”

“No.” Will laughs, shaking his head as he puts his tea cup back onto the ornate wooden tray. “The
ginger hair. You hardly ever see that color over there. You'd stand out like a torchlight.”

“The ginger-haired woman,” I say, feeling an urge to toss my hair, “I like the sound of that. Sounds like an epic novel. Much better than redhead.”

Will leans on his elbow. The light green shirt he has on makes his eyes come alive. “I've never seen a family of all ginger. Do you get lots of stares when you go out?”

“I don't know. I never even think about it. Dad and Mom, of course, are more gray than red now. Even when she started to go really gray, Mom wouldn't dye her hair. She said no one ever got it right except for God when it came to red hair.”

Will nods over toward the biker couple—more specifically, toward the candy-apple-red hair of the woman in the pair. “I'd have to say I agree with your mom on that one.”

“It has it's downsides. Any Irishman will tell you that the fiery hair comes with a fiery temper.”

“Oh,” Will replies, “I think I can attest to that. I have had that fiery temper corner me in the office, remember.” He smirks, remembering the scene. “And the rows you all got into that night at your house.”

“Rows?” I tease him. “Yeah, we row all right. We give row a bad name.”

You can see Will recalling the madness in his head. “I used to imagine having those when I was a kid. You can guess family dinners at my house were a far…quieter affair.”

“All one lump or two?” I adopt a pathetic English accent.

“Not quite that bad. But definitely on the stodgy side.”

“I don't mind the noise. Dad always said our family was loud with love. My brothers tease me mercilessly, but they'd be there for me in a heartbeat.”

“I can see that.” Will's voice and his eyes are so far away, I'm reminded again of the differences between our families. We couldn't have come from more contrasting homes. My family is loud, annoying and in my face, but there's so much love behind the commotion. I look at Will's face and I see the reflection of a home that was neat, clean, considerate…and cold. “It's nice,” he says softly.

“It is,” I say softly, meaning it, “even when it drives you nuts, it's still nice.”

There is a long moment of quiet between us. Will pours more tea.

“Maggie, why haven't you been able to tell your family about Higher Grounds? Honestly,” Will grins as he toasts me with the last cup, “your large family provides you with a ready-made customer base.”

Now whose turn is it to go places I'm not ready to bring him? It takes me a minute to decide how to answer. “Have you ever had something so important to you that you can't bear even the slightest opposition to it? So you keep it close—really close—until you know you're ready? Even if you're not sure you'll ever be ready?”

I think I expected him launch into a speech about how I need my parents' backing. “Maggie Black,” he says softly instead, “you continue to surprise me.”

“I'm a wimp,” I blurt out over my own breathlessness, “what's so surprising about that?”

Will smiles. “Because you seem to me be the kind of person who'd be shouting about Higher Grounds on street corners.”

I feel the blood rush up to my face. “Not this.” I hadn't even realized until just this moment what a confession that is. I'm suddenly acutely aware—intimately, completely aware—that Will is the only man on Earth who knows my dream.

As if reading my thoughts-or the dumbstruck look that must be on my face-Will leans in and says, “Maggie, how many people know about Higher Grounds?”

I feel like the answer will take us down a path neither of us will be able to stop. Part of me is ready to go there, while another part of me is scared to death. “Not counting class? Me, Diane, God—” I hesitate what feels like two hours before I finish “—and you.”

Will stares into my eyes. “I'm honored,” he says and the tone of his voice washes over me. Physically. I mean it. A million sensations hit me in those words.

Without meaning to, maybe without even being able to help it, we just crossed a line.
The
line. It's not a line in the sand that corporate policies draw like a touch or a remark. Those are external things. You can go back on those. Apologize for inappropriate banker-client relations and so on.