Death is Semisweet (2 page)

Silence again, but only for a couple of seconds, while Heaven figured out her next move. “Well, then, shall I book him a room at the Fairmont Hotel?” she asked archly, knowing she was fighting a losing battle.

This time there was a good solid pause on the
other
end of the line.

Heaven didn’t want this to become a battle royale but the idea of that aging rock star and her daughter sharing her daughter’s childhood bedroom was pretty hard to take.

“Why is it just fine for you to have a boyfriend just a few years older than I am, but I can’t have a boyfriend in your age category?” Iris asked bluntly.

“Hank is a perfectly respectable doctor, thank you very much. Stuart Watts, on the other hand, is the most flagrant violator of every rule in the book and then some. He makes your father’s escapades look tame.”

“He used to act like that but he doesn’t now. Father too. Everyone has a past, Mother,” Iris said with a very sharp edge to her voice. “Do you want me to start in on yours?”

“No, but—”

Iris broke in before her mother said something that really made her mad. So far the conversation had been
entirely predictable. “Good. Then let’s just discuss what a wonderful time we’re all going to have. Stuart will fly in with me, stay at our house until the 24th, then fly to San Francisco where, yes, like the devoted father and grandfather he is, he will have Christmas with his daughter Lana and her husband and his darling granddaughter, Lucretia, who will be one year old the day after Christmas. His son Webb, the director, will come up from LA. His other daughter, the older one, you know, the one that’s actually thirty, is doing some relief work in Ecuador or someplace. He’ll see her later. Are you still paying attention?”

“Like a teacher’s pet,” Heaven snapped.

“Then Stuart will come back to Kansas City so we can spend New Year’s Eve together. He wanted to go to Bali for New Year’s but I said it would be more fun to be with you, that you always had something wild going on at the restaurant and then everyone came over to our house and danced and carried on until dawn. So we’ll go to Bali on the third or fourth of January. So there.”

“Talk about having your cake and eating it too,” Heaven cracked, trying to pout but not really having the heart for it. “When do you have time to write, missy? What with Kansas City in December and Bali in January. What happens in February, a space shuttle trip?”

Iris, relieved the boyfriend issue had been supplanted with the when-are-you-going-to-get-a-real-job issue, ignored the travel schedule jab. “I have a new piece that will be in
Tattler
next month. You remember I covered Iris Murdoch’s memorial service at school? I wrote about how you and Dad had named me after her and how it had had a profound effect on my life and about meeting her and all.”

“Where is my copy of the article? I want to have it bronzed,” Heaven said, only half joking.

“I’ll bring one to Kansas City if it’s out. I can’t believe it takes two weeks for the Brit magazines to get there. But my next piece will be easy for you to go buy for yourself. It’s going to be in
Rolling Stone,”
Iris said with triumph.

Heaven didn’t want to spoil Iris’s moment by saying something mean like, of course
Rolling Stone
would give the daughter of Dennis McGuinne a shot at writing something. They both knew that was how the world worked. She also knew Iris had the talent to do a good job and get the second assignment on merit. “Congratulations, honey. What are you writing about?”

“I’m going on tour with two new English bands, kind of retro punk with some world beat thrown in. I know it sounds like a bizarre combination but actually it’s quite brilliant. I’ll do the on-the-road piece. Then I get to do a Jazz in Paris piece, because of the Kansas City connection, by the way. I may need your help on that, since you know more about jazz than I do and you helped with that big jazz party last spring.”

Heaven looked at the clock. It was a little past eleven and she had to meet Stephanie Simpson on the Plaza at noon. “We’ll look up Jim Dittmar when you get here. He’ll know what’s going on if he isn’t over in Paris playing gigs himself.”

“Isn’t that the piano player you thought was a jewel thief, Mom?”

“It’s his shifty friends that led me to that conclusion. You see, just another reason not to get involved with a musician. Bye, honey. I’m going out to shop for twin beds for your room now. I’ll talk to you next week.”

“Mother!” Iris thought her mom was kidding about the beds but you could never be sure.

“I really am looking forward to you being home for Christmas, and old what’s-his-name, too. I’m hanging up now,” Heaven said and she did.

Heaven raced for the shower and after a good ten minutes of various shampoos and antioxidant scrubs and loofah rubs, she was positively a new woman. Even though she’d rinsed off in the shower when she got home from work the night before, her hair had still smelled like a pu-pu platter of the cafe’s menu selections, at least to her. She was very sensitive to food smells on her clothes and hair and body. Hank always said she just smelled like someone who worked around food and that he liked it. Hank was always so positive.

Now came the task of finding something clean to wear. Laundry was definitely on the agenda for the afternoon. Heaven had purchased new underwear last week, instead of doing laundry. She had to face the music this week. Pulling a big black cashmere turtleneck sweater out of a drawer, her only expensive sweater, she found a pair of ribbed leggings, some red cowboy boots to celebrate the season, and she was set, except for her hair, which was drying in an unruly red mop. She spent a few minutes with the hair dryer, then decided to go all the way and put on lipstick and mascara. It was during this last delicate procedure that a crash from the first floor made her blink, causing a deposit of black gunk on her face under the lashes. “Damn,” Heaven exclaimed.

“Heaven, are you all right?” Hank yelled from the kitchen. “And if you are, can you come help me?”

“Just a second,” Heaven yelled as she quickly repaired the damage she’d done to her face. She’d just never
really gotten the hang of the makeup thing. It was a good thing too, as she’d chosen a career that required a clean face most of the time. Makeup just melted in a hot professional-kitchen situation.

Heaven grabbed a black leather jacket and an orange wool scarf and headed downstairs.

“You look nice. Very festive,” Hank said as he surveyed her, then looked back at the problem. A giant Christmas tree was wedged half in the door, half out in the garage. “I think this is a two-man job,” Hank said. “I’ll go out in the garage and manage the heavy end if you’ll pull on the top.”

Heaven looked at the tree with mixed feelings. “It looks magnificent. It’s probably at least twenty or thirty years old. And now it’s dead so we can have a place to put our stupid Christmas presents.” She stood with her hands on her hips and gave one stomp with a red cowboy boot.

Hank rolled his eyes and put his hands on Heaven’s shoulders, pulling her close. He had on a beautiful vintage gabardine overcoat from the 1950s, gray, and caramel colored leather gloves that looked vintage but weren’t, the kind with the stitching on the outside. His long black hair was loose on his shoulders. “We’ve been through this for the last four years. You agonize over whether or not to get a tree and then at the last minute you want one and we end up with some freak of nature with branches on only one side, like the one last year. I decided to go to the city market while there was still a good selection and get the kind of tree you should have—and magnificent is the word for it, just like you.” He had been addressing her like the slow girl in the class. Now he bent down and kissed her.

Had it really been four years that Hank had been
around at Christmas? That couldn’t possibly be right. “Doesn’t this killing of trees bother your ancient Buddhist sensibilities?” she asked, pulling out of the embrace reluctantly.

Hank laughed and let go of her, heading for another route to the garage through the front door, since he couldn’t get back out the way he came in. “Even though I’m from Vietnam, I was raised a Catholic, remember. We love to celebrate Christmas. It’s little Jesus’ birthday.” He stopped and turned back to Heaven. “Think about the food that you serve in your restaurant. It was raised for a purpose. The cattle, the pigs, the carrots, the lettuce, even the grains. It was all raised to be consumed, to be fuel for another life-form. These Christmas trees were raised on a farm, just like wheat. They were raised to be consumed. Just because they take longer to get to harvest, doesn’t mean their purpose on earth wasn’t clear from the start.”

Heaven gave up. “Then let’s get the damn thing in here. I’m supposed to be on the Plaza in ten minutes.”

Hank grinned. “I’ll get the decorations out of the basement while you’re gone. Then tonight, we’ll trim the tree, just the two of us.”

“How corny,” Heaven said, and rolled her eyes at Hank. In truth, she could hardly wait.

E
verywhere you looked, there was another Santa. Dozens of them were trooping along in front of the café. Some of them had on the typical Santa Claus costume: red suit, white fur trim, black belt, freshly groomed white beard and portly tummy. But others were trying a cutting-edge approach. There were red tights instead of trousers, a tie-dyed tunic, one Santa with dread locks, and several with bizarre accessories like rhinestone belts, small dogs with Santa hats, and one bratty child dressed up as an elf who stuck her tongue out at Heaven and Stephanie Simpson inside the restaurant as she marched past outside.

The Plaza, a faux Spanish shopping center built in the 1920s and ’30s, was Kansas City’s pride and joy. Long brick buildings with red tile roofs and fronted with elaborate statuary housed Gap and Barnes and Noble stores. There were European streetlights and a slightly shorter rendition of the Tower of Seville, Spain, the sister city of Kansas City. The Plaza was known nationwide for its
elaborate Christmas decorations, which involved outlining every building for several blocks with lights. This year, that obviously wasn’t enough. The Plaza seemed to be recruiting Santas by the dozens.

“I’m stuffed,” Stephanie moaned as she pushed back her plate. “I can’t believe I ordered dessert after corned beef hash.”

Heaven had finished her own order, eggs Benedict. She took her fork and pointed it at Stephanie’s plate. “You’ve always had a sweet tooth and you never put on a pound, you dog. Maybe I’ll just have a bite of this chocolate bread pudding. So go on with your tale. Your new boutique, gourmet, fancy-schmancy chocolate shop is doing great, you’re so tired you can’t move because this is your first Christmas with a retail business. By the way, I’ve being meaning to ask you this and I always forget: Why did you decide to do this?”

Stephanie paused with her coffee cup halfway to her mouth. She thought better of it, put down the cup and picked up her champagne glass instead. She sipped her mimosa and shook her head. “Earth to Heaven, so to speak. I got dumped by my dog of a husband, remember? Even with a hefty financial punishment for breaking my heart…”

“And running off with his receptionist,” Heaven added.

“Yes, let’s not forget that. It couldn’t be his assistant or a paralegal, God forbid. It had to be the receptionist, not that it isn’t a perfectly good job. Men really do go for the most geographically available and the easiest, don’t they?”

“What they can reach out and grab,” Heaven quipped. “No, I realize you probably couldn’t make a living just doing food styling here in Kansas City. But when faced
with the inevitability of having to get a real job, why did you choose opening a chocolate shop?”

“The blimp,” Stephanie said, waving toward outside. A large pink blimp was floating over the Plaza, as large as the Goodyear blimp only shocking pink. It was painted, “Season’s Greetings from Foster’s Chocolates” on one side and “Foster’s Chocolates 50 Year Anniversary” on the other.

“Yeah,” Heaven said, not looking up. “I’ve seen it the last couple of days. It hovered over 39th street Friday at rush hour. What does Foster’s blimp have to do with you opening a chocolate shop?”

“Oh, I forget you didn’t grow up here, Heaven. I’m a member of the family that owns the number one boxed chocolate candy company in the country. The poor side of the family, as luck would have it.”

“Foster’s?” Heaven finally looked out the front glass doors of the Classic Cup, her friend Charlene Welling’s restaurant. The tail end of the blimp gracefully disappeared from view.

“Celebrating their fiftieth year,” Stephanie said with an affirmative nod.

“Well, hell then, why didn’t you go to work for your family if you wanted to be in the chocolate business?”

Stephanie was a petite blond fashion plate. Known for her incredible wardrobe and her red nails before the divorce, she now looked down at hands with dozens of little nicks and scrapes on them. No nail polish. Hardly even any nails, as Stephanie was using her hands to dip chocolates, bake brownies and clean out espresso machines. She studied her disastrous cuticles a split-second more, then looked up at Heaven and smiled wanly. “Here’s the short version. The long version we don’t have time for until Christmas is over. When the first
snow falls in January, we’ll get drunk and I’ll have a ball feeling sorry for myself, telling you not only how my mother was swindled out of a fortune, but how my husband hid his assets in the Cayman Islands. I’m a second-generation patsy. The short version of my mother’s disaster is, there were five children in my mother’s family, the Foster family.”