No Place I'd Rather Be

  At the same time he said, “You are so beautiful. You walk in and it’s like I have sunshine in my life again.”

  “Oh. Thank you.” That was so romantic. And it hurt. “You are, too, Jace. I mean. You are . . .” Smokin’. Sexy. Huggable. “Healthy.” Healthy? What? “Like a rancher. A cowboy.” A cowboy and a rancher? Say something normal, please, Olivia. Please.

  He actually winked at me. “Thank you. This cowboy feels healthier now that you’re here.”

  Get it together, Olivia. Get some cement in your spine, some steel in your sternum! “So, Jace. You may know at Larry’s. Uh. Hmm. There was a small incident.”

  “Sounds like Gary Simonson ended up with a neck injury when you defended yourself against him.”

  “Right.”

  “I will shoot him if he comes near you again.” His face was thunderous.

  Would I be a damsel in distress if I let Jace shoot Gary instead of shooting him myself? He looked princely on a horse. I got all confused thinking about Jace riding a horse and forgot what I was going to say next, so I smiled . . . and kept smiling . . . “Oh! Right. Because of that unfortunate incident I don’t have a job.”

  “Yes.”

  “And I was wondering . . .”

  “Yes.”

  “Yes what?” A yes to work at the ranch?

  “Yes, come and work here. My pregnant chef left yesterday.”

  I about cried. I wanted to cry. My chest got tight. My eyes filled with hot lakes of tears. Was he rescuing me again? Yes. He was. Whatever. I had loved working here.

  “Thank you.” Whoosh. I could breathe again!

  “Thank you, Olivia. I’m glad you’re coming back. This is a lucky day for me.”

  My chin quivered. I tried to stop it. Stop that, I told myself. Stop that and be a Montana cowgirl, not a wuss.

  He told me how much he would pay me, so gentle, he saw the tears.

  That amount was overboard. “Too much, you know it.”

  “It’s not too much at all. You’re worth it and you’re a half owner. You bring people to the ranch with your cooking, babe. We were written up several times, in national magazines, because of you. Hasn’t happened since you left. The food is not at the level it was when you were here, especially the desserts. You’re a world-class chef, and I have truly missed your soups and sauces and those cakes. I have never had a better cake than what you can make. In fact, I don’t eat cake anymore because it’s not made by you.”

  “Thank you, but I’m not worth that.”

  “Comes with health insurance for you and the girls, too. And if you and the girls ever want to stay over, you can stay in one of the guest houses. You can have a guest house if you want as a permanent residence, too. Let me know what works.”

  “That’s very generous.” I took a deep breath and focused my eyes on the view of the blue and white mountains out his window. “Thank you, Jace.” I cleared my throat. Must change topic or will jump on husband and take off his cowboy clothes. “So, for the dinners here, what do you think of . . .”

  And we talked. Like before. About dinner and lunch and breakfast, warm cookies, pasta primavera, onion rings, and cakes that would be rich, fluffy, and delectable.

  It was easy to be with him again. It was always so easy to be with Jace.

  I smiled at him. He smiled back. I forgot what I was going to say again. He is yummy.

  We cannot be together.

  * * *

  My mother picked up the girls from school and took them to the clinic. She had bought them white doctor’s coats.

  They loved the clinic, but Lucy said, “Grandma Mary Beth talks rough to her patients sometimes. She tells them what to do, and says don’t give me a headache, but they still seem to like her because they usually give her a hug.” She paused. “I think they might be a teeny-weeny bit scared of her. She told one patient that he was a stubborn old goat.”

  Stephi said, “But twice the people that Grandma Mary Beth was talking to said, ‘Can I talk to Mrs. Gisela and see what she thinks?’ So we had to go and get Grandma Gisela.”

  “And a whole bunch of people come in just to see Grandma Gisela. They said she knew all about healing nature. Did they mean, like, trees, when they’re sick?” Lucy said. “Do you know about Saint-John’s-wort, Aunt Olivia? I do. Grandma Gisela told me it can help with not being sad. Do you know about marigolds? I do. They help with stomachaches. When I told Grandma Mary Beth that I’m going to be a doctor, she shouted, ‘Praise the good Lord.’”

  * * *

  The next afternoon I saw my grandma in the gazebo. She was leaning against the post, her eyes closed, a smile on her face. She was wearing her white scarf with the pink cherry flowers on it. I didn’t make a sound as she raised a hand and waved toward Montana’s eternal blue sky.

  * * *

  “You can do it. You can, you can, you can.” I said this out loud to myself as I drove to Jace’s ranch the next morning.

  It was snowing lightly, the snowflakes delicate, peaceful. Inside my car I was wrestling with mental chaos.

  “You can work with Jace,” I murmured, trying to sound Zen-like. “You’re at the ranch to cook. And bake. And make everything delicious. You know how to do this. You’ve been doing it for years.” I tried to suck in air. What was wrong with the air in my car? Why was there not enough?

  “Don’t let Jace make you nervous . . . Why would he make me nervous? Because he’s smokin’ . . .

  “Don’t let him make you think about getting naked with him . . . I won’t. I can control myself . . . Probably. At least I’ll try. But those shoulders, and that butt . . . Don’t think of yourself as anything but an employee, not his wife . . . If you feel lustful, shut it down, think about playing chess. If you feel like hugging him, don’t. If you feel like reenacting that time on the kitchen table at midnight, don’t . . . And please stop talking to yourself. Please, you loon, stop.”

  Where was the air in this darn car? I rolled down my window and was hit with snowflakes. I kept the window down.

  I had deserted Jace. I had abandoned our marriage. We had no future, he and I. Yet here I was, hired by Jace and going back to Martindale Ranch.

  My nerves were jangling and jumping.

  And I was so happy. Happy to my bones.

  * * *

  It was as if I’d never left Martindale Ranch.

  Everything in the kitchen had been left where I’d left it. Mostly. Here and there pots and pans and utensils had been moved, but the kitchen, with its six-burner gas stoves, multiple stainless steel ovens, walk-in refrigerator, and the extra storage we’d designed still felt like my kitchen, it still felt like home. I stood in the middle of it and enjoyed the views of the mountains out a wall of windows.

  I had hired Dinah, Earl, and Justin for Jace’s ranch. Better salary than at Larry’s, plus health insurance. Jace had lost his pregnant chef and two other people. One had decided to go back to college to study chemistry and become a dentist, and the other left because she wanted to trek across America on her bike.

  We worked quickly with the other staff members, most of whom I knew. We all introduced ourselves, smiled, laughed. I told them the menu for the day, and we got to work.

  I have been in enough kitchens, around the world, with chefs who had all sorts of issues.

  One chef, in China, used to throw knives. Honest to God. He never aimed them at anyone. When he wasn’t losing his temper he was a kind, compassionate soul, but when one of those knives stabbed the wall three feet from me, when he had another fit, that was it. I walked out that minute, him trailing after me, begging me to stay in Chinese and broken English. I loved learning how to make Chinese food like kung pao chicken, ginger beef, pot stickers, and Chinese fried rice, but it was not enough to make me stay and risk being cut in half by a knife-throwing chef.

  I was in another kitchen, in Thailand, a fancy place, with a British chef. He would periodically lose his mind. Truly. He would start to rant and rave, nonsensical stuff. We
’d come in and he’d be gone, committed for a couple of weeks, and I would take over. He would come back, steady on, hugging people, we would chug right along, but then he’d hit a bad place again and start crying into the soup, yelling at the soup, and he’d have to be recommitted. He was one of the most introspective, most unselfish, smartest people I have ever known, and his drunken noodles were spectacular, but the kitchen would be in an uproar, often.

  A third chef, in Paris, was a woman named Dominique. My French is conversational only, but I understand enough to cook. She used to sing songs, laden with French swear words. Eating her entrées, especially her coq au vin and her ratatouille, was like eating heaven. But she struggled with obsessive-compulsive disorder. She would take all of our spice jars, which were in alphabetical order, off the shelves and cooking areas, mess them up, and put them back in alphabetical order again until she felt better.

  In my kitchen, it was friendly. I am the boss, but I am a boss who takes suggestions, and I give people a lot of free rein. If Justin wanted to flip our Giddyap Horse Strawberry Crème Crêpes, we made them. If Dinah felt like grilling Gut-Busting Bacon-Wrapped Burgers, we did it. Same with the other employees, if they had a request.

  I think cooking should be joyful. It should be near spiritual. It should be done with love and a true desire to nourish and nurture other people.

  So that’s how we cooked at Martindale Ranch. Goal: Make people’s lives better, through hearty, tasty food, every time they came in to eat.

  * * *

  It was a fast-paced morning. We whipped and stirred and sautéed and baked. The hours flew by. The dining hall, where the kitchen is located, is rustic, homey, and bright. Jace and I had told the builder what we wanted. It’s a Craftsman-style building, with a huge stone fireplace, windows, and French doors all around. Pitched roof, open beams, lighting in the shapes of lanterns. Fishing poles, nets, skis, and ski poles hung on the walls for décor, and a red canoe hung from the ceiling. There were long wooden tables so everyone could eat together, family style, candles down the middle, flowers in the center.

  In the middle of breakfast, Jace walked into the kitchen. I didn’t see him, but I sensed him at the door, watching me. I finally got my courage up, turned, and smiled at him. He smiled back, tall and handsome in jeans and a blue sweater and a cowboy hat.

  A half hour later, Jace gently dragged me into the dining area. “May I have your attention?” All the guests turned toward Jace. Mothers and fathers, singles and dating couples, grandparents, and kids. One man was ninety-four. The youngest was two. We are a family-centered business. “This is your chef, Olivia Martindale. I hope you liked what she made today.”

  Oh, they did. They truly did. They gave me a standing ovation and cheered. One man held up his cinnamon roll, my grandma’s recipe that she got from her grandma, Ida, and yelled, “Best ever, honey. Best ever.”

  I glanced up at Jace, black-haired and towering over me. I liked his hips. I liked his shoulders. I liked him. He winked at me. I smiled.

  It felt like home.

  Jace felt like home.

  * * *

  After the lunch shift, with the dinner ready to go for the next shift of people, I left. I stopped on the wraparound deck of the dining hall and told myself I would climb up the hill and watch a magical sunset.

  Very soon. I wanted to.

  I had to.

  * * *

  The three teenaged thugs at school continued to harass Kyle, despite the principal threatening, and then carrying out, a three-day suspension. Chloe went to the homes of all three boys, even Jason’s, who lived in a scary trailer with a rabid father who openly carried his rifle in town and got drunk.

  She told the man to keep Jason away from her son or she would knock him clean out of Montana. Jason Senior showed her his gun, cigarette hanging out of his mouth, gut flowing out of his shirt, dogs chained up beside him barking, and hollered, “Get off my property, Chloe. My son can do whatever he wants to your pansy-ass boy.” Chloe kept stomping toward him. Not scared at all.

  “Ya wanna piece of me? Do ya? Do ya? Take a shot, Jason. You look like a beaver with those buck teeth, but you will become someone’s girlfriend in prison by noon tomorrow. You will have to watch your butt in the shower. You will have to learn how to like laundry duty. You want that? No, didn’t think so. Put your gun down, you tiny-balled vermin, and when your brainless son crawls out of his hole, tell him to back the hell off.”

  During school the next day, Eric, Jason, and Juan pushed Kyle, grabbed his backpack, and dumped out all of his art supplies, which he had been using to draw portraits of other kids. They ran off, probably afraid that he would use his karate on them again.

  Over brownies with extra chocolate chips at my house, Kyle told me that when he was on his hands and knees, grabbing for pencils and paper, the revenge plot began. “Intellectual dialogue should solve problems, not violence or vengeance. I want to assure you that I know that, Aunt Olivia. But this time, with my art supplies being scattered, I feel I have no choice. My art supplies allow me to talk to my peers and to build fulfilling social relationships that are not based on confusing mockery and sarcasm that is often incomprehensible.” He paused. “Not being called ‘freak’ or ‘shithead’ has made school more relaxing. Now my fellow students often call me ‘Kyle the Artist.’ I prefer that to the profanity.”

  I patted his back, handed him another brownie, and cursed the kids who were so mean.

  “A most surprising thing happened, though. My fellow students helped me pick up my art supplies. Together we returned my pencils back into their organized containers and my drawing paper back into its folder.”

  “The other kids were nice, then?” Hopeful sign!

  “Yes. At study hall I drew two students. They seemed pleased as they said, ‘Kyle, I love my drawing. Thank you.’ Two people—one boy, one girl—hugged me. Mother said I must allow that, or I will appear to be a ‘cold, repressed reptile,’ her words, not mine, and so I did and I patted their backs. Three times, to show reciprocal affection. Mother always knows what to do.”

  Kyle told me about his plan for revenge. I laughed until tears came out of my eyes. “Aunt Olivia, legally speaking, this is breaking and entering, trespassing, and possibly vandalism. You are now associating with a known criminal. I want you to be aware of this.”

  I told him I was cool with that.

  Kyle’s creative vengeance began after school closed for the weekend. Kyle propped open the back gym door with cardboard and snuck back in that evening when it was dark.

  He had recently begun studying caricature. “Another form of art, although with humor, exaggeration and, often, politics imbedded within.”

  My sister knew what he was doing. She had helped him with his drafts.

  A mother’s love is endless.

  * * *

  My mother flipped part of the deer she’d shot last year during hunting season onto our marble island at the farmhouse. Good thing that oak tree island was strong. “One merciless shot.” She mimed shooting. “My aim was true.”

  “I’ll make venison stew with bouillon and potatoes and onions.”

  “That’ll warm my bones, Rebel Child. Disappointing you aren’t a doctor, but your cooking skills are unparalleled. We’ll take some of this to Herbert and Joey Cattlickson. Joey’s refusing to come back in for his medical appointment because he has a paper due for one of those pretentious, snobby research journals that no one reads except the writer and his mommy and he says he doesn’t have time.”

  “What’s wrong with Joey?”

  “Joey went to Africa for his work with the university as an epidemiologist. He picked up all sorts of vermin and bacteria and yucky stuff from the water out there. Twisted his insides up, rotted things from the inside out. I’ve got him on meds, but Herbert called and said he seems sicker, so we have to go out and see him and make sure he’s not being eaten alive by some African bug or worm.”

  “And he won’t come in to the
clinic because he’s too busy researching?” I admired my mother’s cowgirl boots. Turquoise, with a silver toe.

  “Yep. Stubborn son of a gun. Won’t come to see me even when I said that his symptoms indicated his condition was worsening. He said he was on the verge of a breakthrough, and I said, ‘Look, Jingle Bell Joey, do you not see the irony here? You have a disease. You are sick. You need a doctor, you may need hospitalization, but you’re so weirdly interested in writing about diseases you’re dumping your own health in the bucket as if you’re your own petri dish,’ and he said, ‘Mary Beth, I cannot possibly stop now,’ and on and on. He’s obsessively nerdy. So is his brother. They have nerdiness seeping out of them. I’ve told them that, too. ‘Joey and Herbert, you two are the crack bomb biggest nerds I’ve ever met in all of Montana.’”

  “You’re so friendly to your patients, Mom. Your sensitivity is touching.”

  “It sure as hell is.” She believed that “being sensitive” meant that she should be blunt with her patients and not coddle them, especially when they said, “Now, Mary Beth. What does Mrs. Gisela think about all this?”

  “Let’s get going to Joey and Herbert’s. Your grandma will be back with the girls from the movies in a couple of hours and I want to talk to Lucy and Stephi about not fearing the cadavers they’ll be working on in medical school. I have a plastic human body I want to show them.”

  “Cadavers, Mom? They’re young children.” At the same time, I thought: My mother is the best. Her love is true for her new grandchildren.

  She shrugged. “It’s part of their training.”

  “Let’s stop by my house. I’ll grab Joey and Herbert some of my cinnamon sugar cookies. They love those.”

  * * *

  The Cattlickson brothers are longtime friends of my mother’s. They spend evenings together playing Scrabble and watching the History Channel. I’d played with them a few times and was boggled by those brainiacs. A few of the words those two came up with during our last Scrabble game, two plus years ago? Hypoxic. Lockjaw. Jackpot.

  As an epidemiologist, Joey likes studying diseases. Ask him any question about any sort of disease, and he knows it all from elephantiasis to fop to kuru disease.