Read Online Love & Darts (9781937316075) by Nath Jones - Free Book Online Page A

counterclockwise.
    “So you cut the oranges. Lots of them. Let
the juice run in too. Then the apples. I like the Gala from
Washington State, but you can be more flexible with the apples.
Just don’t use those big red ones covered in soapy wax from the
store. They’re mealy and awful. Use a good baking apple over a good
lunchbox apple. They won’t take on as much fluid and mush down on
you. I’ve even used the Granny Smith. They are tart but firm and
get balanced by so much soft sweetness in the salad. The Golden
Delicious is fine if you can’t find the Gala and don’t want the
tart zing of the Granny Smith. But the Golden will get soft after a
while.”
    Mrs. Swindan only asked to be polite. She
drifts off from the kitchen to get the three-tiered cake plate from
upstairs. But. The young woman keeps listening.
    Mrs. Hamel folds more napkins. “After the
apples go in, squirt it with some lemon juice to prevent all those
apples from browning. The orange juice just isn’t acidic enough.
Then the maraschinos. Halves or quarters, whichever you have time
for. Lastly, the coconut. Best to grate it fresh yourself from the
meat of a coconut. But I’ll admit I’ve only done that once. It was
such a mess getting into that thing! It took a screwdriver and a
hammer and a lot of words that I’d rather not employ to get that
sucker open. The blessed thing rolled off my counter so many times
that I ended up on the floor with it. My legs holding it steady
then hacking at it with that screwdriver and hammer. Awful. And the
milk got all over my shoes and dress when I finally did get it
open.
    “So I do recommend the store-bought,
fully-processed, shredded coconut. A quarter to half a bag. A good
fistful is about right. And really it works out better than the
fresh coconut because the dry coconut takes up the maraschino juice
and the orange juice for blended flavor. But that coconut is mainly
for texture and looks. You can leave it out if you must. It’s a
great salad Christmas morning with breads and spreads. Stollen and
cream cheese every year at our house.” She smiles. “The key is high
quality oranges. A definite must. Not worth making with crap
oranges.”
    “Thank you, Mrs. Hamel. Someday I’ll try it
out.”
    “Well, not until you tell me how you come up
with these beauties year after year.” Mrs. Hamel gestures toward
the deviled eggs. It’s clear enough that Mrs. Hamel hates deviled
eggs. But one’s recipe is never just given away. It must be
exchanged for another equally as good. And everyone says that these
particular deviled eggs are as near to perfection as Icarus ever
was to the sun, which is much too close for Mrs. Hamel’s comfort.
She slams the salt and pepper shakers down against the table in
three different places. Nowhere seems right.
    But. The young wife didn’t make the deviled
eggs. So she shakes her head and points to a tray of cookies that
she only had to bake in ready-made batches for eight to ten
minutes. She says she thinks one of the neighbors made the deviled
eggs and cranes her neck inside to ask. But the neighbors have
their backs turned, still throwing the doll’s head, and are also
distracted from her uninvolved incursion by watching the middle
school boys’ well-matched race in a video game. So the story of the
deviled eggs is never told.
    Mrs. Hamel is glad not to have to listen to
such rot about whoever thinks she can make the best plate of
deviled eggs but also demonstrates a sort of disappointed disgust
in the girl’s inability to assert herself.
    The young new wife of one of the older
grandchildren is not just a girl and doesn’t think it is her fault
that the row of neighbors can’t hear her asking for the deviled egg
recipe. And why should she interrupt them when Mrs. Hamel doesn’t
even want to listen? Still, it’s true enough that she isn’t quite
sure which one of the neighbors made them. So there is no one in
particular to ask. She wanders away from Mrs. Hamel, opens