13

“Lainey? Is that you?”

Who else? I throttle back the urge to snarl as I close the hallway door behind me. My mother has a heavy grasp on the obvious.

The mail is full of junk circulars and advertising, a King Arthur Flour catalog, and nothing from the Just Tomatoes recipe contest I entered two weeks ago. I throw everything on the kitchen counter and stomp up the stairs.

“Come here,” Mom calls from her room. She sounds excited. “I’ve got something neat to show you.”

I mutter expletives. It’s been a horrible day already, and Mom’s voice is so light and cheerful I know this “something neat” is going to be one of her Good Mother ideas. In the land of Mother-Daughter Quality Time, so far we’ve gone to Dea’s church and fed the homeless, toured vineyards and art galleries in the Napa Valley, and even gone to Bingo Night at Dea’s senior club. Mom tried to get me to go to a Women’s Health fund-raiser at St. Joseph’s with her and Mrs. Haines, but she let me get out of that when I said I had too much homework. I can’t go anywhere anymore without her poking her nose in, smiling at everyone. When I’m at the restaurant, I see her watching me. She’s even come to my gym, just popped in one day while I ran faster and faster on the treadmill, trying to get away.

I grind my teeth at her cheery little voice and clomp up the stairs to her doorway.

“Look!” My mother excitedly points to her computer screen. “It’s the Elderwood Estates Cooking School. They have an opening during your spring break for a Wednesday-to-Friday course.”

“Uh-huh.” Sighing inaudibly, I glance at the computer and make my way down the hallway to my room.

“They’ve got vineyards and orchards and their own herb garden!” Mom continues. I can hear the exclamation points. I keep walking.

“Does that sound like someplace where you might like to intern?” Mom calls after me, oblivious to my disinterest.

I turn back to her room. “Maybe. I don’t know. Why?”

Mom is typing something. “Well, I told you that you ought to be looking for places where you can get in and get a different kind of experience than you would at school,” she says. “A cooking school like Elderwood is just one of many options for your summer.”

My stomach curdles. “I said I’d find something for myself for summer.”

Mom swivels around in her chair and sighs. “Well, get to it, Elaine. I need to know you have a plan.”

“Why?” I look at her, bewildered.

Mom shakes her head. “It looks like this is going to be a busy summer. Pia’s afraid we’re going to get audited this year, and they’ve just announced that the Michelin Guide is coming back to the Bay Area—really, when Pia and I got into this, we made a decision to be in a partnership with this restaurant…and I’m not holding up my end. And since we debuted the new menu, we’re getting reviewed again, and there’s always so much to do this time of year…I just need to make sure everything’s covered.” Mom sighs a little and turns back toward her computer, looking pensive.

I turn down the hall and go to my room, opening the door, taking off my jacket. In a moment, Mom follows and props herself in the doorway.

“So, we need to explore internship opportunities for you,” she continues as I plop down on the bed and stretch out.

“Whatever.” I yawn. I’m tired, but I have miles to go before I sleep. The midsemester schoolwork crunch has been kicking my butt lately, and I’ve got to catch up on my studying. Somehow with one thing and another, school’s been the last thing on my mind.

“Laine.” My mother sounds suddenly suspicious. “You don’t have plans for spring break that I don’t know about, do you?”

I open my eyes a crack. Is she joking? Isn’t this the woman who’s always complaining I have no social life and should cultivate more friends like the ever-wonderful Lorraine?

I stretch my arms over my head and sigh. “Of course, Mom, I’m going to Botswana on a safari. What makes you think I have a life all of a sudden?”

Instead of showing irritation at my snarky response, Mom’s face clears of a tension I didn’t know was there. She nods. “Well, that’s good…. That’s what I told Mrs. Keller. Their investigator is of the opinion that Simeon will be contacting friends over this break. I expect that little gray car will be parked out front again all week.” She flashes me a humorless smile.

“Oh, great.” I toe off my shoes and flop over onto my stomach. “Like our own Neighborhood Watch.”

My mother sighs. “Well, Laine, that’s how it goes. I’m not sure what good it will do them, but eventually, they’re going to find out what they need to know.” She pauses a moment. “I hope you’ve told Mr. Keller everything.”

I feel a flash of annoyance. “Mom. You’ve been in my face practically every second for the last three weeks. You could tell Mr. Keller yourself: there’s no one hiding under my bed. I already told you everything I knew.”

My mother is silent for a moment too long. I look up at her and catch a weird expression on her face, part anger, part something else.

“What?”

Mom just shakes her head. “We’re going back to the restaurant. Grab your books.”

I sigh. “Mom…”

“No negotiations, Isabelle Elaine.” Mom’s voice is stiff. “This is the agreement.”

In return for her not pressuring me about spending time with MaDea’s sister in Baton Rouge, I agreed to find a summer internship and be “supervised” when I was outside of school. That means going to the restaurant with her, doing prep work, and doing homework in her office. It’s not as bad as it sounds. When I get sick of it, I can stretch out on her love seat and plug in my music, but today I’m so tired not even that has any appeal.

“Fine.” I sit up and slide my feet into my shoes. “This is the agreement, but it doesn’t last forever, okay? It’s not fair that I’m being punished when I haven’t done anything wrong.”

Mom gets a strange look on her face again and turns to go. “Just get a move on, Elaine.”

Ms. Dunston is still sipping her coffee, and “Deep River,” the spiritual we’ve been working on, is echoing in my brain. I’m humming along to myself, digging in my book bag for a highlighter, so Christopher Haines standing next to me barely registers.

“Hey, Elaine.”

“You want something, Chris?”

Christopher jams his hands in his pockets and leans against the wall. “You’re never going to call me Topher, are you?” He sighs, looking aggrieved.

I stifle the urge to laugh. Even with the baby dreadlocks in his curly dark hair, the faded jeans, and the striped vintage shirt, Trendy Topher still looks like the clumsy little junior high kid I remember as Chris. Even though he was at Sim’s party and supposedly got busted like everyone else, he’s still geeky Chris to me.

“All right, Topher. What d’ya want?” I pull out the novel we’re reading for English and hope I have a free moment to finish the assigned chapter. After getting yelled at some more by Stefan last night, I didn’t feel like doing anything but flopping down and watching TV. The trend on cooking shows now is to convey the “reality” of a “real” kitchen. There’s a lot more drama on TV: people get yelled at, and the whole kitchen goes quiet. Stefan yells at me so often nowadays that not even I notice it that much anymore.

“…and so I thought I’d ask if you were busy.”

Chris—or Topher, actually—is still talking. “Wait, what? You’re going where?”

“Yosemite,” he repeats patiently. “You know, the national park? I wondered if you wanted to go over break.”

“Oh.” I give up on finding my highlighter and frown. “Thanks, but I’m going to be busy.”

“Right.” Topher is deflated. “You’re going to Santa Cruz with everyone else.”

I blink. Since when do I hang out with “everyone else”? “Nope. Mom’s making me check out internships.”

“Oh!” Christopher grins. “Interning. Always a good plan.”

“Yeah. Lovely. I’d rather go to Yosemite.”

“Really?” Chris’s, no, Topher’s carefully crafted cool wavers. Something sparks in his eyes. “You’re serious?”

I notice with relief that Ms. Dunston has set down her coffee cup. “Uh, yeah, Yosemite’s great, Chris. Have fun. Look, class is starting, so…”

“I’ll talk to you after school,” Chris says immediately, digging his cell phone out of his pocket. He flips it open importantly. “Your digits?”

How very Topher. I sigh noisily. “Um, your mom has it, right? I mean, it’s the same number I’ve had since the fourth grade, Chris.” No way does he need my cell number.

Chris sighs and flips closed his phone. I give a barracuda smile. “Sorry, um, Topher.”

Chris/Topher looks resigned. “Never mind. Nobody remembers. Anyway, I’ll call you.”

“Whatever…,” I say, and shoo him toward his seat.

 

The sad thing is that Christopher Haines is the one to point out that something big is going on. When I actually take a listen to my classmates, I realize that people are excited about spring break. There are people going to Santa Cruz for a massive house party the first few days, and it hits me that if Sim were here, this is the kind of thing he’d be all over. He’d know the details, and he’d probably be going, and I could be assured of knowing all the dirt that went on there. It would be almost as good as going.

Study hall is full of people whispering, eating, laughing, text-messaging, passing notes, sleeping, and slumping with earphones in their ears. Except for the stoners spacing out and the three people actually studying, everyone else is interacting and interested in each other. It hits me how much of an outsider I am. Sim was into everything, and I’ve spent my time just watching, looking at the action. Even now, he’s off having an adventure, and I’m home waiting for him to at least send a postcard and tell me what’s up. And what makes it worse? It’s my own choice.

Throughout European history, every time Mr. Fritz walks near my desk, I snap to attention as if I’ve just wakened out of sleep. Are the Kellers right? Will Sim be showing up somewhere during spring break to reconnect with his friends? Am I one of the ones who will hear from him? What if he’s going to be at this big house party in Santa Cruz? Wouldn’t he call?

Maybe not. Maybe he’s really all the way in Alaska by now.

I pick up my pen and doodle a few notes, wishing Chris Haines hadn’t even told me about the house party. I mean, how does Christopher know anything, anyway? It’s not like getting busted at Sim’s party has made him popular, is it? He’s as vanilla-plain boring as I am. Chris has always been kind of on the edges of Sim’s and my friends, and he’s always wanted to hang out with me. With us. Honestly, when he got in trouble at Sim’s party, it was probably because he was just there, not because he was involved in anything. Chris probably only found out about the house party lurking on somebody’s blog, not because anyone invited him. I mean, people would think to invite me before they invited him, right?

The thought is so petty it makes goose bumps stand up on my arms. My head hits my desk with a thud. I am jealous of Christopher Haines. I am brain-dead. It’s official.

“Reason, thought the sages of the eighteenth century, would cure fear, superstition, and prejudice, and in the case of Ben Franklin, it was hoped that it would even conquer death.” Mr. Fritz is standing behind me. I get a tighter grip on my pen and frown, trying to look studious and attentive.

“But there was only so much that reason could do. There is a difference between Enlightenment and the enlightened age. And who said that, Elaine?”

“Uhh…Immanuel Kant?”

“Are you asking us or telling us, Ms. Seifert?”

Sigh. “Telling you, Mr. Fritz.”

“Excellent. So, Immanuel Kant, insofar as it could be said that any of the social engineers of the Enlightenment in the new Europe had a common goal…”

 

Mom’s upstairs when I come home, on the phone with Pia or somebody, and I breathe out a sigh of relief. I go straight into the kitchen, washing my hands and tying on my apron. I can’t remember the last time I got in here and did anything. Saint Julia has probably forsaken me. Since Sim’s been gone, there’s been nobody to eat my experiments. I haven’t baked for Vocal Jazz or added to my recipe notebooks for weeks. And since Mom’s always dragging me to the restaurant in the afternoons, I don’t make my own dinner now, and we usually eat something there. I miss cooking for me.

Banging around with the pots and pans and the food processor, getting out the good knives, and hunting around to see what’s new in the cellar drawer is satisfying, and soon I’m humming along. Mom comes down after a while and leans against the counter watching as I brown the hamburger rolls in the broiler for our hummus burgers and grill some extra onions and mushrooms to go with the tahini sauce.

“Had a good day?” she asks finally.

“It was fine,” I say, trying to figure out if the pineapple salsa in the fridge would go with the burgers. I decide no and opt for tomatoes and avocado instead.

“The new menu got reviewed in the Metro,” Mom offers after a small silence, and I look up at her. She’s still wearing her loose cotton work clothes and looks tired.

“Yeah? How’d it go?” My mother asks me every day how my day went, and I don’t often ask her anything about hers. I feel a little sliver of guilt.

“It was a really solid review, a really good one. Pia thinks that will start to show in our numbers.”

“Cool.” I smile at Mom so she knows I really mean it. “Good for you.”

Mom pulls out a stool and motions for my tomatoes. I slide her a cutting board and a knife so she can begin slicing.

“Actually, I wanted to talk to you about this. It poses a little bit of a problem for you and me,” Mom continues. “One good review usually means that we’ll be reviewed by others—some food magazines, larger local papers, that kind of thing. Things are really starting to change for us now. I feel like I need to get more involved with the restaurant. I may not be able to spend much time finding an internship for you.”

I shrug. “Okay.”

Mom looks unhappy. “Elaine, I’m really going to need you to follow through on this one for yourself. The way things are going—we’re going to seriously need to look at hiring another manager, a real one. I’ve taken human resources classes, but really—this is all over my head. If we’re going to be a success—a real success—it’s time to take some big steps.” Mom’s shoulders seem to slump a little beneath the weight of her words.

“Oh.” I wonder if any other response is required.

“Well, don’t sound so broken up about it.” Mom straightens and rubs a hand over her face and sighs. “You’re going to find an internship and let me know. And we’re still going to take time to do something together over your spring break, even if it’s just a day trip.”

The phone rings, saving me from having to defend my lack of enthusiasm. Mom wipes her hands quickly and snags the cordless from the cradle on the kitchen counter.

“Vivianne Seifert.

“Oh, Ana, hi!”

Mom’s face lights up and her voice gets louder in that happy way I haven’t heard in ages. She picks up the knife again and cocks her head to hold the phone against her ear with her shoulder.

“No, we’ve been fine! Thank you! It was a good review, wasn’t it? Pia and I are really thrilled.”

I kind of tune out as Mom keeps talking, slicing tomatoes deftly while she chuckles. I wonder if there’s a way to talk Mom into going to Santa Cruz. Maybe I can tell her something about seeing UC Santa Cruz. It’d be educational, after all.

Mom’s been breathing down my neck so much I just need to get away. I wonder if this is how Sim felt all the time while he was here. Though if it weren’t for him, Mom and I wouldn’t have this tension between us at all.

As soon as I think the thought, I feel guilty. It might not be true. Maybe if it hadn’t been Simeon, something else would have pushed us in different directions. After all, people grow up….

Mom’s still talking, but she looks up at me, her brows quirked into a pantomime of surprise. “Really? She didn’t say….” She slices the last tomato, then sets down the knife, holding out her hand to stop me from leaving. I wait, fiddling with my apron strings.

“Ana, that’s really gracious of you, but we just couldn’t. We…” A long pause. “No! No, of course not. No, it’s not that at all. Well…Well, if you’re sure it’ll be no bother…. No, it sounds like it would be really wonderful. All right, let me look at my calendar, and I’ll give you a call tomorrow. And, Ana, thank you. I appreciate this so much. It’ll be nice to catch up with you and Kevin.”

I give Mom a curious glance and lean against the counter as she hangs up. “Kevin who?”

Mom gives me a bemused look. “Kevin Haines. That was Ana.”

“Haines?” A terrible suspicion clenches my stomach.

“She and Kevin are going up to their cabin at Yosemite and they invited us up. You know, I remember the year they bought that thing! You and Chris were just—”

I am so far beyond horrified that I can hardly even form the words to interrupt. “Christopher Haines? Mom, we’re not going, are we?”

My mother gives me a look.

“Mo-om!” I know before the word is out how middle school I sound, but I can’t help it. This is more than I can take.

“Mom, no. I don’t want to spend my whole vacation with Christopher Haines!”

My mother’s eyes narrow. “I, I, I, and me, me, me is all I hear from you these days. You’re not the only one in this family, Lainey.”

I sigh and prepare for a long lecture. “Well, I’m sorry. Mrs. Haines is nice, but Chris is kind of a dork. What am I supposed to do with him for a whole week?”

My mother shakes her head, closing her eyes. She must be more tired than I thought. “Tell me, Lainey. Has this boy who’s such a ‘dork’ got parents saying they’re going to sue me? Does he lie to them? Has he run away from home?”

Shocked, I suck in a breath through my teeth. “Mom! That’s not fair. Chris isn’t Sim! And anyway, it’s only been one time something like that has happened with Simeon, once.”

“Elaine, all it takes is once.” My mother’s voice is clipped.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Tension crowds my stomach.

My mother cocks her head. “Did you think I didn’t listen to what you said? Did you think I wouldn’t look at my bank records, at the dates? You haven’t been totally straight about what went on with Simeon, Elaine, and I’ve been waiting and hoping, but…” She shrugs.

“Mom—” My stomach clamps with dread. “Wait. Let me—”

“You said you didn’t give Simeon ‘much’ money, and I find a five-hundred-dollar cash withdrawal from my account….”

“But, Mom, that was just—”

“You said he came to this house for dinner on Friday, but you made him sandwiches on the rolls I brought home from the restaurant well after you were in bed asleep on Friday night.”

“Mom, I can explain—”

“You said you don’t know where he went, and you know what, Laine? I don’t believe you. I’ve always been able to trust you before this, and now that I’ve found that I can’t—well, you can look forward to me being a whole lot more skeptical of what you say, Miss It-only-happened-one-time. Once is enough to break a trust.” My mother sets down the knife firmly.

“Mom.” I’m groping for words. “This…it isn’t a big deal! That was my money from Grandma Muriel. You said that. And anyway…I never meant to lie to you.”

“Oh no, of course not,” Mom says acidly. “But you opened your mouth and did it anyway, didn’t you?”