Lost Art of Mixing (9781101609187) Read Online Free PDF Page A

whatever these lunches added to his side of the equation could only be subtracted from hers.
    And yet he needed them—the food, the conversation, the feeling of communion they brought into his day. They were like perfume slipped behind the ear of a beautiful woman, or wine with dinner—nothing you had to have to live, and yet nothing felt more like life than the experience of them.
    So when a child-woman dressed in a big gray sweatshirt and worn jeans came dashing into his office ten minutes late for Lillian’s appointment, a large manila envelope in her otherwise empty hands, he could only be disappointed.
    â€œI’m Chloe,” she said. “Lillian’s sous-chef. She asked me to bring these—she’s sick today.”
    She saw his downcast expression. “Oh, damn it,” she said. “I forgot the food in my car. I’ll be right back.”
    There was the sound of tennis shoes pounding down the stairs that led to the street, a door slamming. And then a tide pool of fragrance coming up the stairs—butter and bay leaves, thyme and cod and onions.
    â€œHere we go.” Chloe entered the office, breathing hard, a bag in her arms. “Don’t worry; it’s good. I just finished off what Lillian started.”
    She looked around the office expectantly. “Where should I put it?”
    â€œOn the desk, please. Thank you.”
    Chloe unpacked a round metal container and poured the soup into a large white bowl, which she set on Al’s desk next to a white linen napkin and a big, round spoon. She stepped back and observed the place setting, considering.
    â€œOh, hell,” she said. “The bread.” And she was gone again.
    Al waited a moment, and then picked up the spoon and carefully tasted the soup. It smelled good, but he wanted his first reaction to be unobserved.
    The taste flowed across his tongue, a mix of sea and sky, warm cream and softened onions. Al found himself remembering an afternoon, not long after he and his mother had moved to Los Angeles. They had been on their way to look at an apartment when his mother suddenly turned the car away from the freeway on-ramp and took them instead to the beach. They had sat on the sand, looking out over an enormous expanse of water, unlike anything Al had ever seen. He tried to count the waves but finally had to give up. He asked his mother if they ever stopped, maybe at night, and she said no, and he thought—that’s what infinity sounds like.
    â€œDo you like it?” Chloe asked anxiously as she entered, bread in hand.
    â€œYes,” he said. “Very much. Here, sit down. You should have some.”
    They ate in silence. After a while she looked up from the bowl and glanced around Al’s desk.
    â€œWhat’s this?” she said, reaching over and picking up the big book of rituals that was resting on top of a short stack of file folders. “Doesn’t look like a tax book.”
    â€œJust something I’ve been reading,” he said quickly. He took it from her and started to walk over to the bookshelf.
    â€œWait,” Chloe said.
    Al looked at her for a moment. She sat in the chair, swallowed up by her sweatshirt. She reminded him of a 4, Al thought. Not the kind where all the lines meet up with each other, clean and straight, but the kind where there was a break at the top, a space where life poured in, for better or worse. What ritual might help her navigate the floodtides of her life?
    â€œWhy do you have that book?” she asked.
    And Al sat down, and leaned across the desk, the book open in his hands.

The
RED SUITCASE

    C hloe stood at her front door, looking out at the dark. It was New Year’s Eve, almost eleven, and the neighborhood was far from silent. She could hear a party down the block to the right, probably the Morgans, famous in the neighborhood for their raucous, extended-family celebrations. Chloe could hear their voices now when she listened,