CHAPTER 23

Remy sifted through a cardboard box full of recipes, looking for her mom’s recipe for chocolate glaze. Martha had always kept her recipes in an old L.L.Bean shoe box. She’d also kept recipes that had been cut from magazines, as well as recipes that had been given to her over the phone and jotted on scraps of paper—like the one Remy was looking for now. In her mind’s eye, she could see it written on a scrap of blue-lined notebook paper—but Remy had already been through the box once, and now, she was nearing the bottom again. She knew it couldn’t be that far down because she’d just made the glaze when she’d made cream puffs for Easter.

She started at the top again and slowly looked through each piece of paper. “Someday,” she murmured, “I’m going to get rid of all these recipes that I’ve never made and put the rest on cards in a recipe box!” It was a project she’d been planning to do for years. Every time she had trouble finding a recipe, she’d renew her resolution but she still hadn’t found the time.

She sighed, and then along the front edge of the box she suddenly spied the familiar blue-lined paper. “Here it is!” she said, relieved. She pulled it out, closed the box, and promptly forgot her resolution. She glanced at the recipe, then measured the cocoa, water, oil, and corn syrup into a small saucepan, turned the flame low, and stirred all the ingredients until it was a smooth mixture.

Years ago, when their mom had stopped baking, Remy had taken it upon herself to carry on their birthday traditions. Birdie’s cake was Boston cream pie—hence the need for chocolate glaze; Sailor’s was devil’s food with a homemade orange frosting—the recipe for which was even older and written in her grandmother’s handwriting; Piper’s was German chocolate, the frosting for which—a homemade buttery coconut and pecan—was to die for! Remy would’ve gladly made her own cake too—angel food with fresh strawberries and whipped cream—but her sisters insisted on taking turns making it.

Remy added a teaspoon of vanilla and a dash of salt to the cocoa, and as she stirred, she thought about Easton’s cake—the yummiest cake of all. His had been a four-layer chocolate cake with a creamy chocolate mousse filling in between each layer and a luscious whipped cream frosting on top. Her mom had been making the cake the night they’d gone for a hike on the beach, but they’d never eaten it, and the carton of black raspberry ice cream had just sat in the freezer for months until, one day, she saw it in the garbage. Remy never knew what happened to the cake she’d been making that night and they’d never had it again—it was as if the recipe had been purposely forgotten. It had always been that way in her family—anything that reminded them of Easton was shut down or silenced. Remy had grown up feeling as if they weren’t even allowed to say his name. Often, she’d wondered if this was why she had such a hard time letting go of Jim’s memory. She’d loved Jim and her brother so much and she could never understand why God took them away.

Remy added a cup of sifted confectioner’s sugar and continued stirring. The recipe called for her to remove the pan from the heat, but over the years, she’d discovered that leaving it on low heat until the glaze was smooth and warm made it easier to pour.

She picked up the pan, turned to the waiting cake, already cut into layers that had been spread with creamy vanilla pudding, and poured the warm chocolate over the top, letting it drip down the sides. Then she licked the spatula and stood back admiringly. “It looks like a picture, Mom! You’d be proud!”

She heard the stove click, realized she’d left the burner on, and turned it off. It wasn’t the first time she’d forgotten to turn one of the burners off, and she often worried she’d leave one on and leave the house. She also worried that the pilot light would go out and she’d have a slow and potentially explosive leak. Maybe it really was time, like David suggested, that she thought about getting an electric stove.

She set the pan in the sink, filled it with hot sudsy water, and rummaged through her junk drawer, looking for candles. She took out three candles—one for the past, one for the present, and one for the future—and fit them into three little plastic holders. She and her sisters had decided long ago that they were getting too old to light a candle for each year.

She pushed the candles into the cake and set it back on the counter. Just then, Edison wandered in and Remy eyed him. “You stay off the counter, mister,” she said warningly as he swished through her legs.

Remy shook her head and pulled open the napkin drawer, looking for birthday napkins. She had napkins for nearly every occasion—from New Year’s Eve to Christmas, and from someone turning twenty-one to someone turning sixty, but she didn’t seem to have any plain birthday napkins—how could that be? She dug a little deeper and found a small stack of Over the Hill napkins, pulled them out, and wondered if Birdie would be offended—it didn’t take much! She sighed. The old girl really needed to get a sense of humor . . . and she needed to stop living in the past. Remy set the napkins next to the cake and looked at her to-do list to see what was left. She pulled out her old perk pot from under the counter—just in case someone wanted coffee—and untied her apron. All she had left was wrapping Birdie’s gift—a lovely book about an owl named Wesley that she’d found at the Birdwatcher’s General Store.