The Other Boy (18 page)

But she couldn’t, so instead she poised her knife as she had seen David do, and brought it down on one of the eggplants with a resounding whack. The vegetable split into two pale halves, which lay in front of her on the cutting board, rocking slightly. Maddy leaned forward to examine them. All sorts of little seeds were suspended in some sort of spongy, stringy stuff in the middle. What did you do with those? Could you eat them? She shrugged and chopped four others into halves and the halves into pieces. That should do it. It looked like kind of a lot, but there were five people eating.

The fennel was even more daunting.
Eat the tops? Cut
the tops off? Eat the thing raw? Cook it?
Finally, she just sliced the whole thing up, feathery tops and all. The tomatoes were easy, although two had worms in them, which was
revolting
. She accidentally dropped some pieces on the floor and then stepped on them, which created tomato slime all over the place that she had to stop and mop up.

The peppers were the nicest looking—dark green, slender, and shiny. The onions, though, made her eyes tear.

While she was blundering to the sink to splash water on her face, she knocked the entire cutting board, heaped with sliced vegetables, onto the floor. Damn it! She forgot her stinging eyes and knelt quickly to gather up the scattered pieces. What David didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him. She picked the biggest pieces of dust off the pile and then put the spill out of her mind. It was already twelve thirty. How the hell had that happened? The only lunch in sight was a battered pile of raw vegetables. She flashed on the image of David standing at this very counter, his knife flashing like magic, transforming a pile of olives into tiny bits, chatting effortlessly the entire time.
Well, you’re a beginner, Maddy, but you can do it. Just
think of his face when he realizes you cooked this whole lunch.

She wiped her arm across her forehead, grabbed a large pot out of the cabinet, dumped every last piece in, and then turned the burner on. There. Now, what went with cooked vegetables? Well, she knew how to make pasta. And they could spoon the vegetables over the top.

Maddy searched through the pantry but couldn’t find any of the familiar blue-and-red boxes. She shut the door and stood tapping her fingers on her cheek, thinking. They’d had pasta just the other night. Maddy remembered seeing a pile of it on the counter. In a flash of inspiration, she opened the refrigerator door. There it was—a plastic bag of noodles sitting right in the front.

She grabbed it, filled another pot with water and set it on a high flame.

The smell of smoke distracted her from the pasta water. Damn! She peered into the vegetable pot. Some of the veggies were burning and stuck to the bottom of the pot, but other pieces still looked alarmingly raw.

Maddy grabbed a long wooden spoon and poked at the mess. Maybe she should take it off the burner and switch to the microwave or something. Before she could do that, she was interrupted by a splashing, sizzling sound.

The pasta water was ready—boiling over, in fact. She turned down the flame and dumped in the noodles.

They looked strange—soft instead of stiff. But, it was twelve forty-five, and she still had to set the table. She thought again of the long table set among the cool green leaves of the field. Well, she wasn’t doing that. The table out on the lawn would be fine. The kitchen was like a circle of hell right now. There was no way they could eat inside. Maddy pulled a stack of plates down from the shelves and added silverware. Paper napkins would have to suffice—it was just lunch. If anyone (
David
) didn’t think that was classy enough, tough. Except there weren’t any napkins—at least, none that she could find, and she didn’t know where her mother kept the cloth ones. She grabbed a roll of paper towels. Why had she ever thought that this little enterprise would
improve
her foul mood?

She banged out the back door and across the lawn. It wasn’t much cooler outside, and the picnic table at the rear of the lawn was baking in the sun. Maddy didn’t really have time to think about it, though. She hurriedly dealt out place settings for five and dashed back across the lawn.

The kitchen smelled ominously of burning, and smoke was beginning to wisp from the vegetable pot.

Crap!
Maddy realized she’d forgotten to take it off the burner. She quickly set the vegetables aside on the counter and peered anxiously into the pot of noodles.

Something wasn’t right. Instead of the nicely al dente strands she expected, the surface was covered with broken-up pieces of noodle, and the water was all cloudy. She looked at the clock—she hadn’t screwed up this time. It had only been eight minutes since she put the pasta in the water. So why did it look so weird? She stabbed a fork at the mess, but only succeeded in breaking up the depressingly mushy noodles into even smaller pieces. It looked years overdone. Lovely. Just lovely.

Maddy stood staring at the pot, breathing in the smoke that hung in a little cloud around the kitchen ceiling until she heard her mother’s voice on the porch.

“Need any help?” She turned around. Her mom was peering through the screen door.

“No!” Maddy leaped at the door. “Go sit down outside. I’m almost ready… .”

“Oh, good. Dad and Fred are back and they’re starving.” Her mother trailed off. Maddy turned her attention back to the more urgent tasks at hand. She gingerly tried to pick the noodle pieces out of the water with two big salad forks and managed to transfer most of them to a bowl, though they were dangerously fragile. The vegetables looked completely bizarre. For the most part, they were an indistinguishable, blackened stew, but for some reason, the onion stood out in big, raw-looking pieces. Maddy scraped it all on top of the noodles and, in a pitiful attempt to make the dish attractive, picked a sprig of Mom’s fresh basil from the pot on the windowsill and stuck it in the middle, where it looked gar-ishly green in contrast.

Maddy picked up the giant bowl and a serving spoon and headed toward the door. Damn.
Drinks
. She set the bowl down and opened the fridge. The tea pitcher was about an inch full. The entire family had drunk it by the gallon all summer and Mom had picked today not to make any? Maddy looked around wildly and spied a packet of Crystal Light sitting on the counter. Mixed-berry flavor. Fine. She filled a pitcher and dumped in the powder. It turned the water a thoroughly unnatural red.

Maddy loaded the whole business onto a tray. This is the lunch she was going to win David back with? One bowl of mush and red-40-laden water. She gritted her teeth and pushed through the screen door toward the table on the lawn.

Everyone was already sitting around the table. Maddy tried not to notice David’s figure at one end. The lawn seemed very long as she bore her tray in front of her like some ridiculous offering. She looked like hell, too—dirty, smelly, and unshowered. The thought occurred to her that she matched the food—
totally
unappealing
.

She looked everywhere but at David as she set the tray down on the table.

“What’s this dish called, Maddy?” Fred asked. He looked very different in his neatly pressed slacks and sport shirt. She’d never seen him in anything but jeans.

“Ah … Eggplant Surprise.” She sank down into a chair and sneaked a hopeful glance at David. He was staring at the empty water glass in front of him, a studiedly casual expression pasted on his face. Maddy turned her gaze to the table. It looked dismal. The sun was beating down on everything in sight. Her father had almost sweated through his shirt. Maddy’s mind flashed on the image of her birthday dinner, the gracefully set table, the platters of luscious dishes, the glasses and china glittering in the flickering candlelight—and David’s proud, smiling face. She almost had to shut her eyes against the scene in front her. Before her sat a hurriedly set table in the harsh glare of the noon sun, complete with one roll of paper towels and a lonely bowl of vegetables.

Fred lifted the pitcher of red liquid. “Can I pour anyone some … Kool-Aid?” He paused quizzically on the last word.

“Crystal Light,” Maddy muttered. Fred looked at the pitcher more closely.

“Right! Crystal Light, anyone?”

“Sure.” Her dad gamely held out his glass.

Maddy could barely keep from dropping her eyes as her mother’s spoon dipped into the serving bowl. The heat from the vegetables had continued cooking the pasta even more, which was unfortunate—it looked even more like mush than it had in the kitchen. Plus, now that some of it was ladled out, she could see that she had grossly overestimated how much five people could eat.

The huge mound of the stuff in the bowl was easily enough for twenty. Her father looked at his plate as if something on it was about to jump up and bite him, but he quickly recovered. Maddy watched in anguish as David’s plate was filled.

Everyone at the table gradually fell silent as the food was handed around. David was the last to get his portion. Maddy could hardly look at him, but he accepted his plate of the frightening substance readily and then, to her surprise, looked directly at her. He shot her a disarming smile. Maddy’s pulse shot into the stratosphere and she felt her face turn flaming red. Ohmygod. What did that mean? He didn’t hate her? No, he was probably feeling sorry for her and her hideous attempt at cooking.

It’s a look of pity,
Maddy told herself glumly.

“I think that David, as the Ironstone Vineyard resi-dent chef, should try the dish first so he can give us his professional opinion,” her father said brightly.

Lovely, Dad. Thank you very much,
Maddy thought.

David obligingly raised his heaping fork and took a large bite. He chewed for a minute, frowning slightly.

Maddy found herself holding her breath. She couldn’t tear her eyes away from his face.

David erupted in a convulsion of coughing. Everyone started in alarm.

“David!” Maddy’s mother exclaimed. “Are you all right?”

Instead of answering, David leaped up from his chair, knocking it over, and raced toward the house, where he disappeared inside the kitchen. The group, sitting in stunned silence, could hear the faucet running in the kitchen and loud slurping sounds. After a long moment—approximately seven or eight years, in Maddy’s estimation—David appeared on the porch again and walked slowly toward the table. He stopped when he reached them, his face a slightly more normal shade of pink.

“Okay?” Fred asked cautiously.

“It’s good,” David said in a strangled voice. He picked up his overturned chair, and sat down. Maddy couldn’t resist. She reached for her own fork and ever so carefully placed a tiny bit of eggplant in her mouth. The effect was instantaneous—heat exploded down her throat, her lips and tongue turning numb almost immediately. It took all of her willpower not to repeat David’s performance. She coughed violently and chugged twelve ounces of Crystal Light. She set her glass down with a shudder and looked around the table. Now everyone was staring at her.

Maddy’s mother finally broke the silence. “You know,” she said, poking at a piece of green pepper with her fork, “just out of curiosity, did I
happen
to mention that we’re growing jalapeño peppers as well as sweet peppers in the garden?”

Maddy flopped back in her chair, her cheeks burning now instead of her mouth. She recalled the beautiful little dark green peppers she had admired. She had chopped up nearly a dozen.

“I’m impressed, though, Mad, that you took a stab at the pasta. It’s so delicate,” her mom hurried on.

At the other end of the table, David spoke for the first time. Maddy jumped at the sound of his voice.

“How long did you boil it for?”

“Eight minutes.” She stared determinedly at the planks of the table.

Her father cleared his throat. “Well, that might be why it’s a tad … soft. You’re only meant to boil fresh pasta for a minute or two at the absolute most.”

Fresh
pasta? That explained why it was in the fridge.

Staring at her wrecked attempt at cooking, Maddy could feel the tears prickling behind her eyes. No.
No
.

She would not start crying like a little kid in front of David because her lunch was not the perfect representa-tion of New Maddy.
No
. But it was useless. She could feel red patches start to form on her face, like usual, and her throat swelled and ached. She blinked furiously and stared up at the sky.

“Mads.” Her mom reached over to pat her arm. “It’s okay.” Maddy moved away.

“I’m fine,” she said, hearing the thickness in her voice. The first tear dropped onto a piece of onion on her plate.
Stop it, you idiot,
she ordered herself furiously.

Another tear splattered onto her wadded-up paper towel.

“Excuse me,” she said, standing up abruptly. She had to get out of here or she was going to bawl in front of everyone. Her parents were looking at her with concern. Fred was politely gazing at a beetle wending its way across the planks of the table. And David stared right at her, his brows knit. Maddy turned and fled across the lawn to the house, her humiliation complete.

✦ ✦ ✦

Maddy stood in the spray of the outdoor shower at the side of the house. From her bedroom window, she had watched everyone trickle away after lunch—her parents and Fred to the vine fields and David (her heart sank) toward the cottage. It was just as well, she thought. She needed to be alone. The cool spray felt incredible after the hot, dusty morning she’d spent in the garden and the sweaty episode in the kitchen. Around her the redwood walls of the little enclosed cubicle were glistening wet. Maddy’s feet stood on another platform of redwood. The sun poured through the open top, splashing shadows onto her body. She leaned back to let the water soak her hair and worked in a dollop of Kiehl’s sham-poo. She scrubbed herself all over with lemon-scented soap and let the water sluice it off.

Maddy sighed and shut off the shower. All she wanted to do was go straight upstairs to her room and fall asleep for about three hours—no, make that three years. She patted at her hair and wrapped herself in a thick white towel. She opened the door. David was standing immediately outside.