very next week we’re sitting across from each other in a booth at the café and I’m a nervous wreck about what to order that will look normal. Tell him about my fat problem and surgery? Not on your life. Anyway, he orders short ribs with mashed sweets and fried okra and a Coors, which almost make me drool, but I just get a Waldorf salad and Diet Coke.
“Is that all you gonna eat?” he asks with this big frown on his face.
“Yeah,” I say, “I go pretty easy at lunch so I don’t get sleepy at work in the afternoon. And you know how us girls gotta watch ourselves.”
“Married?” he then asks all of a sudden.
“Yeah, but now divorced,” I say without any further explanation.
He wants to know if I like my part-time job at the SPCA, and asks how long I’ve been there, and what have you. I tell him how much I’ve always loved animals and about my two Lab mixes, Sugar and Spice, and how I also love to cook and would like to do some real catering. But what really makes us hit it off is when he tells me how much he loves country and blues music and I tell him I blow tenor sax most weekends in the dance band at Ziggy’s over on Navigation to make a few extra bucks. Clint Black, John Lee Hooker, Vince Gill, Al King—he knows ’em all and can even run off a few lyrics.
“‘Will the Circle Be Unbroken,’” he then tests me, humming.
“Nitty Gritty Dirt Band,” I say as I pretend to finger my sax and hum along too. “Love ’em. Everything they do.”
“Well, I’ll be damned, gal,” he says as he reaches over and smacks me real friendly-like on the arm, which I hope and pray doesn’t look or feel too flabby to him. “I gotta get over there one night and hear you play.”
Time comes for dessert, and he says 20 Carats’s chocolate cheesecake is the best in Houston and that I have to order it. Of course I’d give my eyeteeth for a wedge but tell him what I really want is one scoop of cherry vanilla ice cream I saw on the blackboard up front.
“I love a cheap date,” he jokes, and when the waitress brings his cheesecake, I notice he waits till she serves my ice cream before he takes a big bite and rolls his eyes like he’s gone to heaven. Vernon’s a gentleman like that.
“Here, little lady, take a taste with your spoon,” he then says as he pushes the plate over. “You just gotta taste this cake.”
This was one of those times I always knew would come and always dread, but I didn’t want to act like a jerk, and am finally used to taking little tastes of things when I cook, so I cut off a smidgen with my spoon, and press it up on the roof of my mouth, and yeah, it was out-of-this-world delicious. Lord, I could have eaten that whole goddamn cheesecake, and make no bones about it, but didn’t think anybody wanted to watch me vomit.
“I can tell you know good food,” Vernon then says, which really upset me for a second till he went on to ask what I liked to cook most.
“Oh, mainly just honest Southern food. Spareribs, squash soufflé, smothered chicken, shrimp creole, persimmon pudding—things like that. And I’m not too bad at Tex-Mex either.”
“Gal, you’re right in my bull pen,” he says with this big grin on his face. Vernon has a cute scar or something on his cheek, but his skin is smooth as a jalapeño. “Maybe you’ll cook up something for me sometime—if I ain’t being too pushy.”
Since it’s pretty obvious he’s as crazy about food as I am, I just can’t resist asking if he never gains weight eating like he does. He waits a second like he’s surprised, then says, “Never gave it much thought. Just eat normal—anything I want. Don’t you?”
Well, I could have told him a thing or two, believe you me, but instead just changed the subject and asked him about his wife.
“Oh, Mona was a great gal, and we had a good marriage and lots of plans. Losing her was a real shock. Lightning, like I said. Killed instantly on the job with no warning. A real healthy gal, and so unfair at her age. And these last few months—been kinda rough for me, ya know. What about your own marriage, if I can be so nosy?”
“Fair enough,” I say. “Lyman’s not a bad man, and I don’t think I’m a bad woman. We really tried to make a go of it and had some good times the first year or so. But I guess our differences and financial problems and what have you got too much and, well, things just didn’t work out the way we hoped.”
Vernon sits staring at me with this really intense look in his eyes, then says, “Some things just ain’t in the cards—like what happened to Mona and your marriage. But I can tell a little bit, it was Lyman’s loss.”
Him saying something that sweet really made me feel good, and it also made me want to reach over and rub the soft hair on his strong-looking arm.
“Hey,” he then says as he snaps his fingers for the waitress and pulls this fifty-dollar bill off a roll held together with a big money clip with the head of a steer. “I promised to get you back to the shelter by two, and I’m a man of my word. Plus I gotta check on Daisy before getting back to this job over at Texas Life.”
I thought that was so gracious and was reaching in my purse for my lipstick when Vernon says, “Hey” again. “You like Italian food?”
“Sure,” I say.
“You know Amalfi Garden off Richmond?”
“I’ve heard about it, but hear it’s high as a cat’s back.”
“Bull! Whatcha doing Friday night? Wanna ramble over there with me after I finish up? Great manicotti.”
See there. Vernon’s got style. And there’s something else I like about him, and that’s the way he don’t mince words and just comes out with what’s on his mind. Anyway, I found it pretty exciting him asking me out a second time, so even though I’d told Mary Jane I might drop over to taste her new Texas caviar recipe and watch a Comets game on TV, I said I’d love to go to Amalfi Garden.
6
HANKY-PANKY
I’m fixin’ to do something about this stupid apartment I’m renting and find me a decent little house that’s more in line with my new life. Of course the apartment’s not as embarrassing as that tacky mobile Lyman and I had over off Memorial, but it’s not a place where I can feel proud to have a few friends over, and it’s sure not right for two large dogs and a cat. Moved in with Mama for a few months to save money and pay the bills while I was going through my banding ordeal, but that was a big mistake. Oh, I worry myself sick about Mama being in that old house all by herself, but, I mean, who wants to live like trash way out near Hobby in that low-class neighborhood, and spend an hour driving back and forth to work, and listen to Mama ranting on and on about how I’m starving myself to death? Just this morning at the gym it dawned on me that if I ever plan to do any serious catering, I’ve gotta have a bigger kitchen. No question about that.
And if I’m convinced of anything, I’m convinced I could be one of the best caterers in Houston if I play my cards right. I know that, and Billy Po Cahill has told me so a hundred times. Billy Po’s the special events coordinator at Mutual Savings and Loan downtown, and that’s not chicken scratch. He’s also on the vestry at our Hawthorn Presbyterian Church, and it all began when Billy Po raved about a turkey and ham casserole and chocolate pecan pie I brought to a church benefit. Not that I myself have been exactly high on faith the last few years, but I do try to help out on benefits when I think the cause is right, and this time Billy Po was so impressed with my food he asked me if I’d be interested in fixin’ some goodies for a snazzy bank reception he was setting up. Three hundred bucks for a shrimp creole, and a Lady Baltimore cake, and a few platters of cookies and pralines. Well, that was the most money I’d ever made at one time in my life. Then Billy Po hired me a second time for another promotion he was doing, and the next thing I know the phone’s ringing, and this classy lady over in the Galleria who was at the gig is praising my crabmeat balls and lemon bars to the sky and wondering if I’d like to do some things for a private