But she didn’t. She continued to spin me in a circle. My eyes pinballed in my head. My braids whipped my cheeks—right, left, right, left. I didn’t ordinarily wear braids, but cleaning up a shop that closed thirty years ago, over a year before my birth, was almost as dirty a business as having a garage sale. I had dressed for the occasion: cutoffs and T-shirt, so I wasn’t worried about my clothes.
“Stop,” I repeated.
My aunt cackled with glee. “Jenna Starrett Hart, I am so excited.”
Because I had established myself in the advertising world as Jenna Hart, I had used my maiden name even after my husband and I got married. I decided not to change it to his, which was Harris. Hart . . . Harris. They were too close to mess with.
“So excited,” she repeated.
No kidding. The striped walls of the bookshop blurred together; I felt trapped in a kaleidoscope. Chipped walls painted baby blue, olive green, and a weird fleshy pink color flashed around me. Normally, I liked twirling and dancing. I adored music—rock and roll, country, and big Hollywood musical classics. My mother used to play the radio full blast when she drove me to art classes, and we would sing and cardance to our hearts’ content. But I had returned to my childhood town of Crystal Cove less than an hour ago, and I hadn’t found my sea legs yet. Warmer than normal August temperatures weren’t helping my equilibrium.
“Too-ra-loo,” my aunt sang merrily. Her turban flopped to and fro. Copious strands of beads clacked against her phoenix amulet. Her royal blue caftan flared out around her large frame. “I have such a good feeling about our new venture. Sing with me. Too-ra-loo.”
“Too-ra-loo,” I croaked as I tried to slow her down by skidding on my heels. Three-dollar flip-flops didn’t win the prize for gaining traction. Why couldn’t I be a tennis shoe person? Except when exercising, I never wore them. “I’m feeling seasick.” The breakfast burrito that I had wolfed down on the short drive south from San Francisco was rebelling.
“Oh, my, you do look a little pookie.” Without warning, Aunt Vera released me.
Like a top, I gyrated out of control and landed chest-first against the shop’s ancient oak sales counter. Air spewed out of me. My butter yellow T-shirt inched up over my low-slung cutoffs. I wriggled the T-shirt down and checked my body for broken bones—none as far as I could tell, but my abdominals would ache for days.
Aunt Vera clapped. She wasn’t a sadist; she was ecstatic. “I’m so glad you said yes.”
Yes, to moving back to Crystal Cove. Yes, to moving into the cottage beside her seaside home. Yes, to helping her revitalize the aging cookbook shop that resided in the quaint Crystal Cove Fisherman’s Village.
“Now”—she pushed a plate of oatmeal caramel cookies that sat on the counter toward me, nabbing one for herself—“let’s discuss you.” Aunt Vera had no children; she had
adopted
me, by default. She nibbled and assessed all five feet, eight inches of me. “Cookie?”
How could I resist? My aunt excelled as a baker. She had perhaps the largest collection of cookie cookbooks I had ever seen. A favorite I loved to browse was
One Girl Cookies.
The history of the beloved Brooklyn bakery enthralled me, and the pictures were luscious. I popped a bite-sized cookie into my mouth—the caramel chips added just the right amount of yum—and I brushed what had to be an inch of store dust off my nose. After swallowing, I said, “You meant, let’s discuss my vision, didn’t you?”
Aunt Vera clucked her tongue, which sent apprehension zinging through me. A week ago, I had sent her a business plan that she had gushed over. Was she changing her mind? Granted, I was not a cook. Far from it. But I was not inept in the kitchen . . . exactly. I wasn’t afraid to boil water. I knew how to make the basics: Jell-O, meatloaf, a cake from a mix. I could read a recipe, and I appreciated the nuances, but my talent ended there. On the plus side, I enjoyed an educated palate. I had tasted everything from fried alligator to raw eel, and I had savored many bottles of fine wine. Perhaps a few too many. Could my blithely carefree aunt finally see my shortcomings? Was she having doubts about me?
“Aunt Vera, speak.”
She arched a dyed red eyebrow.
“What are you sensing?” I said. “Disaster?”
Aunt Vera spent her days giving psychic readings, hence the turban and caftan getup, not that she could tell people much more about their futures than I could; she didn’t have a direct connect to the other world—no ghosts pals, no spirit guides. On the other hand, the way she looked at me gave me the creeps.
“Aunt Vera, c’mon. What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong.”
“You’re frowning.”
“So are you. It’s the dust. Be gone!” She swatted the air. To my surprise, she didn’t add:
Bibbidi-bobbidi-boo,
like Cinderella’s fairy godmother. I remembered prom night when she had surprised my date and me by arriving with a horse-drawn carriage. She swore she’d conjured the rig out of mice and a pumpkin.
“Truth, how do you feel about my vision for the shop?” I said.
“It’s brilliant. You’re a wizard. Problem solved.”
Phew. Prior to returning to Crystal Cove, I had worked in advertising. Therein lay my talent. Art, conceptualizing, and glib wording. The dancing, singing popcorn campaign for Poppity Pop? Mine. Little bursts of sunshine doing cartwheels above an orange grove to promote the citrus industry? Mine.
“But I didn’t say, let’s discuss your vision,” Aunt Vera went on. “I said, let’s discuss
you
. You weren’t thriving in . . .” Her cherub face flushed radish-red. She wasn’t the kind of person to say anything without enhancing the statement with optimism, but words had escaped her lips, so she finished, “In the City.”
The City, San Francisco, the gem of the West. A city filled with life and laughter and high times. Super if you’re single. Great if you’re married. Not cool if you’re a widow.
Aunt Vera petted my dusty cheek. “How are you?”
“Fine. Dandy. Ready to thrive.” Choosing action over pondering life’s losses, I smacked my hands together and said, “I see you have everything we need to start painting.”
“I followed your list to the letter.” Aunt Vera may have been the owner of Fisherman’s Village, but she made me the manager of the cookbook store. Pushing sixty-five, she didn’t want the added burden. “And surprise, surprise”—she twirled a finger at me—“your father is coming to help.”
I gulped.
Put the past behind, behind, behind.
“How is Dad?”
Aunt Vera sidled behind the cash register, an antique National with honeysuckle inlay, and pushed the buttons like a little kid on an elevator.
Ping, ping, ping
. She slammed the drawer between each ping.
I raced to her and gripped her wrists. “Stop.”
“It’s sticking.”
“We’ll fix it.” I should have purchased a new digital register, but the antique one looked handsome on the sales counter. I repeated, “How is Dad?”
“Your father? He’s great. Wonderful. He’s in need of a new project.”
A little over two years ago—in March, to be exact—my mother and my husband died . . . within days of each other. My husband first. My mother next. She, who was never a smoker but perished from lung cancer, had been the gem and light of my youth. I attended her funeral, but I had to leave the next day to return to San Francisco so I could deal with the details of my husband’s premature demise. I know, I know. I was a horrible, neglectful daughter, and I owed my father better. My pragmatic sister, who lived in Los Angeles, was a saint and stood by Dad’s side. Even my hippie-dippie brother was on hand for Dad more than I was. Since the funerals, Dad and I had spoken a couple of times, but never with the same warmth. Currently, I was off all antidepressants—for three months I had taken the herbal kinds with Latin names I couldn’t pronounce; I stopped when I decided life, even alone, was still worth living—but I still hadn’t found my true smile. I came home to Crystal Cove to see if it was hiding there.
“You look worried, dear. Please don’t be. He’s not coming until the day before we’re set to open. Besides, forgive and forget, that’s your father’s motto.”
Since when?
I wondered.
“He’s in good shape. When he’s not running his hardware store or offering his services as a handyman, he’s busy with a food collection project. But he’ll need a new project soon, ergo, The Cookbook Nook.”
Ergo, me
. Dad’s career as an FBI analyst hadn’t padded the coffers; his post-retirement work as an FBI consultant had. However, ten years into his retirement stint, he grew bored with consulting, and in addition to buying Nuts and Bolts, which the previous owner sold for a song, he devoted himself to all sorts of humanitarian projects. A man of his vim and vigor needed to keep busy.
“His hair isn’t as black as yours any longer,” my aunt went on, “but he’s still got the Hart bright eyes and the Hart wit. He’s standing tall, shoulders back. No osteoporosis for him, no sir.” She demonstrated and saluted.
Was I slumping? Why was I reading hidden meaning into everything she said? Because I lacked vim and vigor, that’s why. I straightened my spine.
“There are quite a few women in town who wish to attract my little brother’s eye,” Aunt Vera said, beaming like an older sister should. “But it’s way too early for that. He was devoted to your mother.”
Theirs had been a love that had set the standard.
“By the by, your father adores your suggestions for the shop’s design.”
“He does?” That surprised me. Dad always offered pointers. I had settled on a sunset-colored theme of coral and aqua. Aunt Vera suggested we add pale cream seashells. She had already sketched them on the walls. The café that connected at an angle to the shop would be painted a soft peach. I chose a border of pastel boats for the upper rim of the café; it would give just enough splash without being garish.
“Did I tell you your father walks every morning?” Aunt Vera said. “Same as you.”
“I run occasionally, too. And ride the bicycle.” The bike I rode, an old relic with a basket and hand bell, had belonged to my mother. In the City, I trekked from my apartment to Golden Gate Park. A challenge but worth it. “Say, you should stroll on the beach with me.” The ocean was a stone’s throw from Aunt Vera’s back porch.
“Oh, my, no. Exercise and I don’t mix.” My aunt swirled her spacious caftan. “It messes up my chakras.”
I grinned. “Let’s get to work.”
We swept and vacuumed the floors, counters, and shelves, and we dusted and stacked the old cookbooks in boxes. Many of the once-beautiful cookbooks could be salvaged, but in my business model, I planned to have lots of fresh new titles. Ours would not be a store where only your mother’s
Betty Crocker Cookbook
would be sold, though we had plenty on hand. We would also sell books by Ina Garten, José Andrés, and Bobby Flay. I wanted cookbooks that featured recipes that sounded exotic or fun: grilled corn poblano salad with chipotle vinaigrette,
tournedos à la béarnaise
, beer and bison burgers with pub cheese, brandy black bottom chiffon pie. We would also stock specialty books that dealt with allergies, food restrictions, and sustainability gardening. I had picked up a few rare books, including an original copy of
The Physiology of Taste
by Brillat-Savarin, the famous cheese maker, and a first edition of
The Joy of Cooking
by Irma S. Rombauer
.
The bindings for both were in perfect condition. Dreaming big, bigger, biggest, I intended to feature celebrity chefs as well as local and celebrity cookbook authors. We would have food tastings in the café and perhaps throw a cookout for the town and sit-down dinners for food critics. A few weeks ago, before moving to town, I started generating buzz about The Cookbook Nook. I created a web page. I posted on social networking sites. As I had hoped, locals and tourists were chatting on blogs about The Cookbook Nook.
Aunt Vera said, “I want our little venture to be such a success.”
“I know you do.” I laid out tarps and opened cans of paints. “Tell me something.”
“Uh-oh.” She wagged a finger. “Do not glower at me like your father does. What do you want to know?”
“What’s the history of this place?” Once before, I had broached the subject with my mother, but in a matter of seconds, she had snapped the lid closed on that line of query saying:
It’s your aunt’s private business.
“I know you purchased Fisherman’s Village in the seventies.” The L-shaped two-story village, with its elegant columns, white balustrades, boardwalk-style walkways, and brick parking lot had to have cost a pretty penny.
Aunt Vera pressed her lips together.
“I heard a rumor that you bought it so you could specifically own The Cookbook Nook and café. If so, why didn’t you ever open the store?”
Aunt Vera looped a finger under her strands of beads. She twisted them into a fierce figure eight.
“I’ll probe until I find out,” I said. “I’m good at probing.”
“Not now, dear.” She released the beads. “Now is all about you. You are my niece. My beautiful niece. And it is your time to shine. I want to make this exactly like the store you envision, with cookbooks, gadgets, children’s cooking toys, and culinary mysteries and fiction.”
I planned to set up a vintage kitchen table with funky chairs where our guests could sit and pore over recipes or have fun piecing together jigsaw puzzles of delectable food. We would have a reading alcove for fiction enthusiasts, too; I was an avid reader. I adored the smell of new books; some might call it a fetish. I didn’t digest as many books in a year as a librarian, but I could read a book a week. My nightstand to-be-read pile stood eight to ten books high at all times. Also, if we found the right chef for the café, we might even offer cooking classes.
So many ideas; lots of time.
“By the by,” Aunt Vera said, “I expect the shop to thrive. I don’t want to be giving psychic readings well into my golden years.”
“Like you need to.” A fact I did glean from my mother was that Aunt Vera had made a killing in the stock market way back when.
Aunt Vera didn’t blink an eye. “I want to rest and relax and drink in the scent of the ocean.”