Even before I felt his warm breath soft against my neck, I knew he’d been watching, his dark eyes focused on my back as I hovered over the baking pan. Now one arm snaked around my waist while the other made an end run for a meatball, but I was too quick for him. I rapped his hand with the wooden spoon I was using to stir an egg into a mixture of ricotta cheese and shredded mozzarella. ‘Don’t you dare!’
Paul withdrew his hand, winced unconvincingly and began to lick cheese off his knuckles. ‘It’s irresistible,’ he said.
‘There are only so many meatballs to go around,’ I pointed out, waving the spoon for emphasis. ‘Eight people, twenty-four meatballs. You do the math, professor.’
‘You’re irresistible,’ he said, pulling me closer in a one-armed hug.
‘I know, I know. Dab a bit of garlic behind my ears and you’ll follow me anywhere.’
He laughed, then brushed my cheek with his lips. ‘How can I help you, Hannah?’
‘You can set the table. Use the red-and-white checked tablecloth and white napkins.’
‘Like a bistro?’
‘No, silly. Like a trattoria. Next month is French. This month we’re eating Italian.’
‘Right.’ He tossed the word over his shoulder as he crossed the kitchen to the silverware drawer. ‘The lasagna should have been a clue.’
‘Italian night I can deal with,’ I said as I spread tomato sauce evenly over the bottom of the pan. ‘Bobbie’s spanakopita last month was brilliant, of course, but if I ever volunteer to make dolmathakia again you’ll know that aliens have landed and taken over my body.’
‘Who knew stuffing grape leaves could be so labor-intensive?’
‘Ugh,’ I said. ‘If there’s ever a next time, I’ll buy them in a can from Trader Joe’s.’
Paul held an assortment of silverware with both hands, like a bridal bouquet. ‘So, who’s bringing what?’
‘Bobbie and Ed volunteered to make an antipasto platter, Ruth and Hutch are in charge of salad and focaccia, and Trish is whipping up tiramisu for dessert.’ I glanced up from layering lasagna sheets in neat rows over the sauce. ‘Trish came over last night to pick up some Ghirardelli cocoa powder I promised to lend her.’
‘Hershey’s wouldn’t do on Italian night, I suppose.’
‘Trish aims for authenticity,’ I said with a grin.
‘How are they doing, anyway? You’d think living just across the street we’d see more of the Youngs, but I haven’t laid eyes on either one of them since last month at Ed and Bobbie’s.’
I shrugged. ‘I see Trish a couple of times a week, but Peter’s been busy at the store, I guess. Speaking of which, when are we going to replace this stove?’
‘With a fancy-dancy one from Executive Appliance?’
‘That’s exactly what I mean,’ I said as I twisted the dial on my elderly Hotpoint electric to 350 degrees. ‘This stove came with the house, so who knows how old it is.’
‘It works, doesn’t it?’
‘Of course, it works, Paul, but I’m lusting after one of those luxury gas ranges Peter carries in his shop. A Viking maybe, or a Wolf.’
‘I like our stove, Hannah. It’s so old, it’s retro. You pay extra for that.’
Both hands were busy assembling lasagna or I would have tossed a dish towel at his head. ‘Go away,’ I said. ‘Get busy on the table.’
‘How about wine?’ he called back from the dining room. ‘Valpolicella with the lasagna, I presume?’
‘That will do nicely. Prosecco with the appetizer, of course, and we’ll pair the tiramisu with a nice Asti Spumante. I’ve got them chilling in the basement fridge.’
‘I’m on it,’ he said.
You could set a watch by my sister. The mantle clock had chimed only four of the required six when Ruth swished through the front door, calling out a cheerful, ‘Yoo-hoo! Where do you want the salad?’ Unsurprisingly, she was dressed like a well-to-do Central American peasant in a vibrant, ankle-length, woven skirt and a gauzy blouse, cinched in at the waist with a wide, tooled, leather belt.
‘Where’s Hutch?’ I asked.
‘Parking the car,’ she explained as I relieved her of the salad.
Hutch, predictably attired in a polo shirt and khakis, followed almost immediately in his wife’s considerable wake, carrying the foccacia in one hand and a chainsaw in the other.
‘Whoa!’ I said, taking a step back from the chainsaw. ‘Expecting trouble? Or is that for slicing the bread?’
With a chuckle, Hutch handed over the bread. ‘I’m lending it to Peter. Says he’s got a poplar in the backyard that needs to go.’
Hutch propped the chainsaw up in a corner behind the coat tree, then turned to greet me with a hug.
‘How’s the lawyerly biz?’ I asked, keeping one cautious eye on the chainsaw and the other on my recently refinished oak floors.
‘Taxes, elder care planning strategies, a hotly contested divorce or two … it can get depressing.’
‘Have some Prosecco,’ I suggested. ‘Things will start to look up.’
‘I doubt it,’ he said. ‘My clients are fighting over custody of the damn Pomeranian.’
‘Have a Scotch, then,’ I said. ‘Paul’s in the kitchen.’
Seconds after I handed my brother-in-law off to Paul, the doorbell rang. I opened it to admit Ed and Bobbie Collins, old friends in both senses of the word. Ed had served in the Navy with my father; their duty stations often overlapped. And when retirement finally caught up with them, both officers had bought homes in the Providence Community on Mill Creek just outside Annapolis.
‘How’s your dad?’ Bobbie asked as I followed her and the antipasto platter into the dining room. ‘We miss him at happy hour. His mocktails were legend.’
My father, George Alexander, had embraced his hard-won sobriety by serious experimentation with non-alcoholic cocktail recipes. No Shirley Temples or cranberry spritzers in this captain’s repertoire, no sir. Daddy’s mocktails utilized exotic ingredients like Seedlip Grove 42, palo santo syrup, açai and chamomile. My favorite, the Mango Mule, would make even a Skid Row wino fall down on his knees and worship him.
‘Neelie signed Dad up for a birdwatching trip to Madagascar,’ I told Bobbie. ‘Three weeks of birdwatching.’
‘I didn’t know George was interested in birds,’ she said as she centered the platter on the dining table.
‘He’s not, in particular, but Neelie’s passionate about her feathered friends. According to a brochure she showed me, there are five avian species unique to Madagascar. She’s hoping to add the short-legged ground roller to her life list.’
‘Who knew?’
‘Well, exactly. They were supposed to take a trip to Cuba this fall, but when Scott died …’
Bobbie steered me away from the painful topic of my brother-in-law by laying a gentle hand on my arm. ‘How’s your sister doing?’
‘The last time I talked to her, Georgina was toying with the idea of signing up with an Internet dating website.’
Bobbie frowned. ‘Caveat emptor.’
‘Georgina doesn’t need advice from me,’ I said with a grin. ‘She’s getting it in spades from her kids.’
‘They don’t approve?’
‘You might say that,’ I said. ‘Dylan says parental controls ought to apply to parents as well as kids.’ I shrugged. ‘Not much I can do about it. Prosecco?’
Bobbie nodded, so I poured a glass of bubbly, shoved it into her hand and shooed her off to join the others in the living room. ‘I’ll be with you in a minute. Just need to take the lasagna out of the oven.’
While the lasagna sat on the counter to rest, I returned to my guests. Ruth was trying to interest Bobbie in a shipment that had just come into Mother Earth, the New Age shop she owns on Main Street, Annapolis. Bobbie listened politely, of course, nodding and sipping her Prosecco, but I knew that as my father had done not long after the death of my mother, she and Ed were downsizing from their waterfront home. Twig and mudcloth wall hangings from Guatemala, no matter how fair trade and fabulous, were going to be a hard sell.
Clutching a freshly opened bottle of Prosecco, Paul huddled in a corner by the fireplace with Ed and Hutch speaking together in fluent stock market. Ed had just bought IBM and it ran up three sticks, I gathered, while Hutch admitted to staring at the squiggly lines all day while something else was crunching through the price level. It made my head hurt.
‘Where are Peter and Trish?’ Ruth wondered aloud.
I glanced at the clock on the mantel. Fifteen minutes after six. ‘They’re running late, I guess.’
‘Are you sure they got the day right?’ Bobbie said.
‘We’ve been meeting the first Thursday of every month for gourmet night for two years. How can they not get the day right?’ Ruth said.
‘Besides,’ I added, ‘Trish popped over last night to discuss dessert.’
‘It’s not like her to be late,’ Bobbie said.
Silently, I agreed. I didn’t want to admit that I was worried. I hovered nervously between the two groups, interjecting a comment from time to time but never stopped wondering what was keeping the normally punctual Youngs.
At twenty minutes after the hour, while Ruth nattered on about the virtues of woven yoga mats, I retreated to the dining room and made the call. After four rings, Trish’s cell went straight to voicemail. ‘Italian night!’ I chirped after her cheerful message and the beep instructed me to go ahead. ‘Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten.’
With a ‘see ya soon’ and a sigh, I pocketed the phone. The Youngs hardly ever picked up on their landline, but I tried it, too. No dice.
‘Hey, how long do we wait?’ Ed appeared at my elbow, eyes straying hungrily to the antipasto platter. ‘I put that platter together myself, my love. Bought everything from the Italian Market on Defense Highway, of course, but the arrangement is pure Collins.’
‘It’s a masterpiece,’ I said, admiring the thinly sliced sopressata, salami and prosciutto fanned out on the platter. Ed had framed the platter with artichoke hearts and red peppers, dotted it with cubed pecorino, pepperoncini and peppadew peppers, and strewn mixed olives and miniature mozzarella balls on top.
‘I’d been holding back, but …’ Ed leaned over the table, stabbed a slice of prosciutto with a toothpick and raised it in the direction of the house across the street before popping it into his mouth. ‘You snooze, you lose, Peter.’
‘While you were setting up, I nipped across the street and knocked,’ Paul informed us breathily from the archway. ‘Definitely not home. How long do you want to give them?’
‘Another ten minutes?’ I suggested. ‘The lasagna will be just fine, and it’s not like the antipasto’s getting cold.’
Paul nodded and turned on his heel. ‘OK. More bubbly, anyone?’ He made the rounds, topping off glasses, while more minutes ticked by.
I took a seat on the sofa between Bobbie and Ruth and feigned interest in beaded African spirit ornaments. When that discussion petered out, Ruth drained her glass and set it down on an end table. ‘Well,’ she said, checking her watch, ‘I don’t know what’s keeping them, but I’d vote for getting this show on the road. I’m starving.’
I frowned. ‘She didn’t call. She didn’t text. That’s not like her.’
Paul extended a hand and helped me to my feet. ‘I’m sure there’s a reasonable explanation, Hannah.’
‘Some emergency,’ Ruth suggested. ‘Trish will explain it all in the morning.’
‘What do we do about dessert?’ I said, feeling guilty about worrying over a stupid pan of tiramisu when our friends might be in trouble.
Bobbie stood and smoothed the hem of her gaily printed tunic over her navy blue slacks. ‘I don’t know about you, ladies, but I can certainly skip dessert!’
‘Last time I looked,’ Paul said, ‘there was some rum raisin ice cream in the freezer.’
‘Not very Italian,’ I grumbled.
‘Theme, schmeme,’ my husband said as he escorted me to the dining table.
‘Should I clear their places away?’ Ruth wanted to know.
‘No!’ I snapped. ‘They could show up at any minute.’
Ruth raised her hands in self-defense. ‘Don’t bite my head off.’
‘Sorry,’ I said, taking my seat.
And so dinner proceeded glumly with two empty chairs, reminding us of absent friends.
In the end, everybody got an extra meatball, not that I had any appetite for it.