Love Letters from Ladybug Farm (33 page)

Bridget ran her kitchen with an efficiency the top chefs in the world would admire. The menu was taped on the wall above the stove and the recipes for each dish were encased in clear plastic holders and propped up in sequence around the prep station. Ida Mae was on sauces and sautés; Bridget finished and plated each dish; Lori was stationed at the “pass”currently the kitchen table—to garnish and polish each plate before it was placed on the serving tray to leave the kitchen. Noah was responsible for loading the two dishwashers as the courses were cleared, and for keeping the workstations clean and free of clutter as food was plated. The kitchen was hot and steamy, redolent with the flavors of garlic, butter, herbs, and roasting meats, and—for the time being anyway-running like a well-oiled machine.

Lindsay burst through the swinging door. Her hair was starting to escape its neat bun and catch in curls in the sweat on her face, and her eyes had a slightly wild look to them. “Okay,” she said. “The groom just announced that he’s ordered a foosball table for the honeymoon suite. We need to get the first course out there now.”

Bridget thrust two fruit-filled martini glasses into her hands. “Get these to Lori and help her sprinkle gorgonzola and toasted walnuts on top. Lori!” she exclaimed as she watched Lori dip a spoon into one of the glasses she had just garnished and take a bite. “What are you doing?”

“No good chef lets a dish leave her kitchen without tasting it,” Lori said.

Lindsay delivered two glasses of fruit to the table and went back for two more. “Where did you hear that?”

“Food Channel.”

“Hey,” Noah complained, “sounds to me like you got the best job. When do we get to eat, anyway?”

“Well?” Bridget demanded, handing off two more glasses. “How is it?”

Lori shrugged, and that was all it took for Bridget to snatch up her own spoon and taste the fruit. She whirled on Ida Mae. “This is syrup!” she cried. “You dressed the fruit in syrup!”

Ida Mae scowled at her. “So? You always make your fruit salad with a sugar sauce, just like I do.”

“Not this time! This time it’s a vinaigrette! Didn’t you read the recipe?”

“Do you want my help or not?”

But Bridget was already dumping the contents of the glasses into a colander. “Quick,” she commanded Lindsay, thrusting the fruit at her, “rinse this off while I make the dressing.”

The swinging door swooshed as Lindsay rushed to the sink with a colander full of fruit, and Cici demanded, “What’s the holdup? If these people get any drunker we’re going to have a riot!”

“Wrong dressing,” Lori informed her. And she grinned. “Hey, Mom, it’s kind of nice to have Dad around again, isn’t it?”

“I love you beyond all measure,” Cici replied distractedly, and rushed to the refrigerator. Noah helped himself to the fruit that clung to the bottom of the colander when Lindsay dumped it into a bowl.

Bridget was frantically chopping garlic when Cici whirled with a bottle of store-bought vinaigrette in her hand and dumped the contents over the berries Lindsay had just transferred to a big bowl. “Problem solved,” she declared to Bridget’s horrified look. “Now for heaven’s sake
hurry up
.”

Bridget, with no time to argue, took the cheese biscuits out of the oven as Cici let the door swing closed behind her. “Two on each serving plate,” she told Lori, “with a sprig of rosemary.” And then, with only a moment’s hesitation, she picked up one of the biscuits and tasted it. Almost immediately she started to cough and choke, fanning her mouth with her hand.

Ida Mae gave her a quelling look, and Lindsay rushed over with a glass of water.

“Cayenne!” gasped Bridget. “It was supposed to be roasted red pepper puree, but it’s cayenne!” She turned an accusing gaze on Ida Mae, who was oblivious. “Could she be trying to sabotage me?” she whispered to Lindsay.

Lori took a small taste of the biscuit. “I kind of like it,” she said. Then she took a quick sip of water. “Maybe one per plate, though.”

Bridget ran to the pantry and was back in an instant with a jar of strawberry champagne jam. “Quick,” she commanded, tugging Lindsay into the chair beside Lori. “Spread jam on each of the biscuits, it will cut the heat. Lori, back to staging. Gorgonzola, walnuts, move, move!”

The ten-minute delay in serving the first course was far more excruciating to those in the kitchen than it was to those in the dining room—with the possible exception of Cici, who returned after serving the fruit cup to report in a dull, stunned tone, “Richard is telling the story about Harrison Ford and the chimpanzee. Is there anyway under heaven we could serve dessert and coffee now?”

“I like that story,” Lori protested.

To judge from the burst of laughter that came from the dining room, so did everyone else.

The good humor lasted through the soup course, when Lindsay reported that the best man—the groom’s brother-had just presented the groom with two tickets to a baseball game in Richmond tomorrow night as a wedding present. The bride objected that she did not intend to spend her wedding night at a baseball game, to which the groom replied that was just fine because he was taking his brother. High fives and laughter all around, and Lindsay was extremely concerned about the fate of the glassware within the bride’s reach.

Bridget discovered that the cherry conserve was, in fact, cherry sauce, but managed to rescue it with mustard, horseradish, chopped spring onions, and a prayer. Similarly, the green beans lacked thyme and the almonds hadn’t been roasted, but—Lori declared—they tasted fine.

“Believe me,” Cici assured her as she left with her tray loaded down with entrées, “the last thing anyone in there is interested in is food.”

Lindsay noticed Bridget’s heartbroken look as she picked up her own tray. “But they loved the cheese biscuits,” she assured her. “And thought the fruit cup was wild!”

Noah, leaning against the counter as he helped himself to a plate of sliced turkey and potatoes, added, “What they don’t eat, I will.”

Bridget rallied herself for a smile and gave Noah a quick kiss on the head in passing as she went to place the strawberry crumble in the oven.

Cici returned with her empty tray and sank down at the table beside Lori. “They’re discussing politics,” she said. “The groom thinks we should invade China.”

“What for?” Lori wanted to know.

“Spite.”

Lindsay came in and deposited her empty tray on the counter with a loud clatter. “The father of the bride,” she reported furiously, “just pinched my butt.”

“Ya’ll need to try this,” Noah said, going for more turkey. “It’s great.”

Bridget sat down at the table beside Lori and Cici. “This marriage,” she declared unhappily, “doesn’t exactly sound as though it was made in heaven.”

“He’s a Neanderthal,” Lindsay said, kicking off her shoes as she dropped into the chair opposite Bridget, “and she’s an idiot. You tell me.”

“We worked so hard for this.” Bridget’s gaze, as she turned it toward the closed door to the dining room, was more than a little resentful. “I can’t believe it’s all going to waste.”

“Don’t think of it like that,” Cici said, trying to comfort her. “Think of it as ... a dress rehearsal for the next time.”

Bridget looked glum. “Like I would ever do this again.”

“Come on, Aunt Bridget,” Lori said, “I might get married one day, you know. And I wouldn’t let anyone cater the wedding but you.”

“You,” Cici informed her, pointing sternly, “are going to elope. Promise me.”

Ida Mae slapped plates down in front of each of them. “Better eat fast,” she advised sourly.

Cici picked up her fork and added casually, “Speaking of which, you never told me—how is Sergio?”

Lori smiled at her mother. “That was the sweetest thing ever, Mom. Thank you. Sergio thanks you, too. And we’ll keep in touch. I really like him. But...” She examined her plate thoughtfully before cutting into her turkey. “Sergio is a fantasy, you know. And since I’ve been home I’ve come to realize that even that kind of fantasy has a hard time competing with my real life.” She grinned and waved her fork to indicate the room beyond. “Besides,” she added, “I invited Mark to the wedding tomorrow.”

“Mark?” Lindsay asked.

“He’s the boy who ran her down,” Cici explained with an approving smile toward her daughter.

Lindsay raised her palm for a high five. “You go, girl.”

Lori slapped Lindsay’s hand, and Bridget tasted her turkey. “This is delicious,” she said, looking surprised.

“Told you,” Noah said.

Bridget took another bite. “Those people are Philistines.”

Richard pushed open the door. “So, this is where the help comes to eat,” he said. Lori, with her mouth full, pointed happily to the chair across from her, and he took it. Cici avoided his eyes. “If there’s coffee,” he said, “I’d serve it if I were you. The bride’s mother just called the groom’s mother pretentious and tasteless, and the bride refused to drink to the toast her future brother-in-law just made.”

Cici swallowed quickly and wiped her lips with her napkin, getting to her feet. “Make out your bill,” she instructed Bridget.

“But we haven’t even cleared the table!”

“We’re clearing it now.” She caught Lindsay’s arm. “Serving dessert. And no one is leaving this house until the bill is paid.”

“So,” Richard observed, pulling Cici’s unfinished plate in front of him and taking up her fork, “this is what you girls do for fun?”

The table was cleared, the dishwashers were running, and the bill was paid—surprisingly, without comment. The last bit of drama had come when Traci had refused to get into the car with the groom, or with her mother, or with the bridesmaids who had delivered her. “I can’t even look at your ugly face right now,” she told her betrothed. And she expanded her vitriol to include everyone who was gathered in the spill of porch lights upon the gravel drive in front of the house where Noah had lined up their cars. “I can’t look at any of you! You’re ruining my wedding! My one day, and you’re ruining it!”

“Ah, come on, honey,” the groom offered weakly, perhaps beginning to realize he had gone too far. “We’ll go back to the hotel, have a few drinks ...”

“And if you,” she declared, pointing a furious finger at him, “have one more drink I’m not marrying you. You’re going to be all hungover for the wedding pictures!”

“Well, maybe there just won’t be any wedding pictures!” he told her.

“Maybe there won’t! Maybe there won’t even—”

And that was when Bridget stepped forward, touched Traci’s arm gently, and said, “You know, it’s really bad luck for the groom to see the bride before the ceremony anyway, so why doesn’t Traci just stay here tonight?”

Of course Traci’s mother objected to that, and the maid of honor complained that it would mean they would all have to get up early to have their hair and makeup done, and Traci, apparently pleased with the amount of inconvenience she was causing everyone, declared that she was, in fact, spending the night at Ladybug Farm—and this despite the fact that Lindsay and Cici practically tied their eyebrows in knots trying to signal Bridget to retract the invitation. Finally the groom drove off with a spray of gravel and the bride screaming after him, “You’d better be here at eleven thirty in the morning for pictures if you know what’s good for you!” and Traci stomped up the stairs to her room.

Now, however, it was blissfully quiet. Richard sat with Lori on the porch, where a surprisingly brisk breeze had blown up to cut the humidity. Paul and Noah finished putting away the bar supplies and carrying the cases of wine for the reception up from the cellar. Noah set up another ten decorative tables on the porch. It was just after ten o’clock when Cici, Bridget, and Lindsay joined the others on the porch.

“Richard,” Cici said wearily, “what are you still doing here?”

“He’s staying over, Mom,” Lori declared cheerfully.

“We don’t have any extra rooms,” Cici told her flatly.

“I’ll sleep on the sofa.” Richard smiled.

“Fine.”Neither Cici’s tone or expression changed. “You’re in my chair.”

He politely stood up and offered her the rocking chair.

“Whose chair am I in?” Paul wanted to know.

“Mine.” Lindsay sat on his knee and leaned back. “What a night.”

“I made seventy-five dollars in tips,” Noah said, practically chortling as he counted it. “And that was just for thirteen cars! Wait till tomorrow.”

Bridget sat down thoughtfully in one of the folding chairs that had been set up for tomorrow’s guests. A gust of wind blew her hair across her face and she absently pushed it back. “I think I’ve figured it out,” she said.

“Thank God,” muttered Cici, with no idea what she was talking about.

“No, I mean about Ida Mae.” She leaned forward earnestly and lowered her voice. “I think the problem is—she can’t read.”

“How can that be?”

“That’s not possible!”