Susan Mallery - Barefoot Season

The room was different—bigger, with longer counters and more windows, but the heart was the same. Damaris still ruled from her eight-burner stove, and servers and helpers jumped when she barked their names.

Michelle watched as the cook flavored eggs with her secret spices and flipped pancakes. Diced vegetables and cheese were added to omelets, blackberries added as a side to everything. Toast popped, the juicer whirred and the ever-present slap of plates was accompanied by the call of “order up.”

Her head hurt nearly as much as her hip. A testament to the aftereffects of too much vodka and too little food. But as she watched Damaris, the pain faded to the background. Here, in the chaos, she was finally home.

“Last order,” Damaris called, slapping down another plate.

Michelle glanced at the clock. It was nearly nine. This time of year the breakfast crowd faded early with most of the customers heading off to work. Midweek inn visitors were usually purposeful, with plans and itineraries to be followed.

“Morning,” she said as Damaris turned off burners.

The cook spun and pressed a hand to her heart. “When did you get here?”

“A few minutes ago.”

Damaris hurried toward her, wiping her hands on her white apron. “It’s so good to see you,” she said, pulling Michelle close and hugging her. “You’re hungry.” Damaris released her. “You must be. I’ll make your favorite.”

“You don’t have to.”

Dark eyebrows rose over the frame of her glasses. “You think I don’t know that? Sit.”

Michelle limped over to the stools by the counter and sat. Damaris poured her coffee and passed it over, then studied the ingredients on the counter.

“You didn’t stay here last night,” she said, slicing cinnamon bread. “I asked.”

“I didn’t want to.” An almost-truth. “It’s strange being back.”

“That’s because you waited too long. What were you thinking? Ten years? In all that time you couldn’t come back once to see me?”

Michelle didn’t answer. Her reasons for not visiting had nothing to do with Damaris and everything to do with Carly and Brenda.

“What do you think of the changes?” Damaris kept her attention on the eggs she whipped.

“That they’re more than you said. The whole inn is different.”

“I didn’t want to upset you. Carly suggested the remodel, but then your mother ran with it. The contractor was from Seattle. God forbid Brenda should hire local. I think she was sleeping with him.”

“My mother?”

“He took advantage of her, if you ask me. The new roof and kitchen remodel became what you see. I almost felt sorry for her. He left when he was done and never came back. Such bad luck with men.” She looked over her glasses. “Like I said, I almost felt sorry for her.”

Michelle couldn’t summon even that much compassion. “She should have known better. The inn didn’t need to be different. It wasn’t hers. She didn’t have the right.”

“Did you think that would have stopped her?”

“No.”

The pounding was back in her head. The hip ache had never gone away. She supposed she could take one of the pain pills the doctors had given her but she didn’t like how they made her feel. Loopy.

Talk about irony. She had no problem washing away her life with vodka but resisted pain medication. Of course, in the scheme of things, that contradiction wasn’t even a footnote when compared with the rest of the jumble in her head. She had a feeling she was one step away from being a case study in some medical magazine. Or maybe she was giving herself too much credit.

Damaris set a plate in front of her. Cinnamon French toast with sausage. And blackberries on the side.

“Really?” she asked, nudging one of the berries until it threatened to roll off her plate. “Even with me?”

Damaris grinned. “Habit.”

Because all food was served with blackberries here on Blackberry Island. When she was little, her dad had teased that they should be grateful they didn’t live on Broccoli Island or Spinach Inlet. She remembered laughing and laughing, then drew in a breath and tried to remember the last time she’d found anything remotely funny.

She sliced off a small piece of the French toast. The edges were crispy, the cinnamon visible through the layer of egg. Once on her tongue, the flavors mingled, sweetened by the maple syrup. The bread itself, light yet substantial, had what those in the business called “mouth feel.”

Most people believed that scent memory was the most powerful but for Michelle it was taste. She could remember this breakfast from what felt like a thousand years ago. Could remember where she’d been sitting, what the conversation had been about. Damaris had made this exact meal for her on her first morning working for the inn.

“God, you’re good.”

Damaris laughed. “At least that’s the same.”

She poured herself coffee and pulled up a stool, watching as Michelle devoured the food.

Michelle finished the French toast, then went to work on the sausage. It was exactly as she recalled, made locally by organic farmers at the north end of the island. She ended with the blackberries.

“Are they from Chile?” she asked. It was way too early in the season for them to be local.

Damaris’s eyes widened. “Shhh. That’s practically blasphemy. Everything we serve is local.”

“You’re such a liar. Is that what we’re saying now?”

“No, but people assume.”

“It’s fifty degrees outside and the first week of May. No one thinks these are local.”

Damaris sniffed. “There’s a greenhouse on the far side of the island.”

“It’s the size of a toaster. They could plant maybe two bushes in there.”

“Still.” Damaris reached for her own cup of coffee. “What happens now?”

Michelle had a feeling the cook wasn’t asking if she planned to take her plate over to the sink or not. The question, and answer, was more complicated than that.

“I return to my regularly scheduled life. Run the inn, like I did before.”

“You can’t do it by yourself.”

Michelle glanced at her, wondering if she’d heard about what had happened with Carly the previous night.

“It’s bigger now,” the cook continued. “Thirty rooms. The summer’s coming. You know what that means.”

Crowds, tourists and a houseful of guests.

I fired Carly.

Michelle thought the words, testing them, enjoying the sense of satisfaction they produced.

Reality would be different, she thought, gripping her coffee. Reality was hard work and long hours. With her hip and the physical therapy that would require, not to mention the fact that stairs were going to be a nightmare, Damaris was right. She couldn’t do it on her own.

This close to the summer season, finding a replacement for someone who knew the inn would be difficult. While the words had come from her heart, she knew letting Carly go would be stupid.

“You’re saying I have to keep her.”

No need to say who “she” was.

Damaris shrugged. “For now. She won’t want to go. She has her daughter. Gabby. A sweet girl, considering.”

Damaris had always been an ally. Impulsively, Michelle stretched her arm across the stainless counter and squeezed her friend’s hand.

“I missed you.”

“I missed you, too.”

The door to the dining room swung open and a dark-haired woman a little younger than Michelle entered. She wore a pink blouse tucked into black trousers. Her hair had been pulled back into a ponytail.

“Isabella, come. This is Michelle. Michelle, my daughter-in-law. Isabella is married to Eric.”

Michelle smiled. “I can’t believe he finally got married.”

“Four years ago,” Isabella said.