Doug skimmed over the review. “This doesn’t have your usual…flair. Style.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean The Phantom Foodie is no fun if he likes the restaurant.” Doug’s face twisted in thought, his lips pursed.
“But I did like it.”
“Yes, yes. But there’s something missing. Surely they did something you didn’t like.”
“You want me to look for problems?”
“Yes!” Doug crowed gleefully. Addison wondered if he’d been hitting the sauce. He usually saved it for the hours with two digits at least. “You’re a critic. Criticize!”
“And if I don’t find anything to criticize?”
Doug leveled him with a sober stare. “Then perhaps we’ll find someone who will.”
Addison sighed.
A puppet. That’s all I am. To my mother, my fiancée, my boss. A goddamned puppet.
* * * *
Sheets of soaking rain sluiced down L’Osteria’s windows. Frankie looked out into the gloom. His dining room was slow, practically empty. Too bad, really, because he’d outdone himself with the gratin he’d made that day. It burst with layers of potatoes and zucchini coated in Parmesan and bread crumbs, paper-thin slices of sweet Italian sausage, and loads of fontina cheese oozing lusciously between the cracks and bubbling all over the top—the perfect comfort food for a chilly, rainy day.
He sat on the kitchen counter, eating a giant chunk of caramel bread pudding and taking a breather for the first time in weeks. Owen came in with his tray. He looked out of sorts, but for Owen that was typical.
“What’s up, O?” Frankie tried to keep the kid on his toes.
“Um, there’s a situation, and um, me and Bethany don’t know what to do.”
Bethany was his hostess, less flustered than Owen but a bit of a lost cause on her own, constantly moping about whatever loser of a boyfriend she’d managed to pick up that week. Frankie put down his dessert. “What is it?”
“Well, this woman, at table four”—just in case Frankie couldn’t tell her from the six other people in the room—“she’s been crying, and we don’t know what to do.”
“Did you ask her what was wrong?”
“Bethany said she was talking on the phone to a friend. Her husband just left her.” Owen stuck his head out through the doorway. “Oh, her friend just walked in. They’re hugging, and the woman is—”
“Owen.” Frankie had to interrupt the play-by-play before it lasted the rest of the afternoon.
“Yes, sir—Frankie?”
Sir, Frankie. Mom oughta love that.
“Go offer those women a dessert. On the house.”
“Y-yes.” Owen gave Frankie an owlish look and turned heel for the main room.
Frankie sliced off two squares of pudding and placed them on plates. He lifted the old, pitted wooden spoon Dom had found the day he’d first bought the place. After he’d thoroughly sanitized it, the spoon had become his favorite tool. With a smile, he dipped it into the caramel sauce.
He didn’t even think about it, just concentrated on a good feeling—fulfillment, hope, maybe a touch of laughter. The feelings came from his chest and traveled down his arm.
“Better. Everything is better,” Frankie whispered as he let the caramel sauce stream off the wooden spoon until it drizzled over the puddings and onto the two plates. He thought it might have worked—but no one ever accused him of being a spell expert. He started to laugh at himself for being dumb. All of a sudden, though, Frankie felt an odd electrical sensation on his hand, like his palm was being soldered to the handle of his spoon. It wasn't particularly unpleasant, but it was oddly…permanent. He shook his hand a few times, but the tingling sensation never completely receded.
Just then, Owen came back in and said the two women would love the dessert. Frankie nodded and then shook himself to get rid of the last few strange moments. Owen looked at him.
“Take the desserts, Owen. It’s fine. I just got a weird chill.”
Owen nodded, picked up the two puddings, and carried them to the dining room. Frankie hopped back up onto the counter with a glass of water and his pudding to finish.
“
François Vallerand! Qu'est ce que tu as fait
?”
Frankie jumped and nearly spilled his water.
“Hello, Mother,” he answered in English. He knew it irritated the hell out of her.
Jesus, is she always watching me?
Frankie hated the fact that she could jump into his head at will. He wasn’t powerful enough to do it back to her… Even if he’d wanted to, which he didn’t. She could transport physically too, with a bit more effort on her part. Frankie tried his best to avoid any situations that would cause her to do that. He wondered what he’d done this time.
“Do you have any idea what you’ve done? Merde!”
Done? “I didn’t do anything.”
“What are you holding in your hand?”
He looked down. His favorite spoon was still clutched in his tingling fingers. “A spoon, Mother.
Pourquoi
?”
Frankie felt a bone-jarring jolt, and then his mother stood glaring daggers at him in the restaurant he’d tried to make Vallerand-free. No such luck.
Brigitte Vallerand was tall for a woman, and imposing—formidable, as the French would say. She looked Frankie right in the eye, and he was nearly six feet himself. She'd swept her hair off her face in a high ponytail. Frankie thought the severe hairstyle, black slacks, and sleeveless tunic were a bit much if she was going for witch chic, but he knew it was best to keep his opinions to himself.
“Why are you here?”
His mother yanked the spoon from his hand and examined it closely before making a disgusted sound. “You’ve fused with a spoon.” She ground the heel of her hand into her forehead. “A spoon, for Christ’s sake! We’ll be a laughingstock.”
“What are you talking about?” She smacked him with said spoon on the side of his shoulder. It stung through his shirt at the point of contact.
“Would it have killed you to pay attention when you were a boy? Always dreaming of leaving, never learning what you can do.”
“Mother. Quit with the lectures. What did I do?”
“No matter how much you wish not to be a witch, you are one. And you’ve just made this disgusting old wooden spoon into your wand, of all things!
Quel idiot
,” she spat and shook the spoon in his face.
Frankie grabbed his spoon from her. He felt protective of it all of a sudden. That probably meant she was right about what he’d just done. Shit.
Just then a wide-eyed Owen came shuffling into the kitchen. “The two women are laughing now, Frankie. What did you do?”
Seemed like everyone wanted to know that. Frankie sighed.
Owen noticed Frankie’s mother and jumped back. “Who are you?”
Frankie imagined “and where the hell did you come from” would’ve come out of Owen’s mouth next had he not bitten his tongue.
Frankie sighed. “Owen, this is my mother. She came in…the back door.” He gestured to the rusty door next to the oven, the one that looked like it hadn’t opened since the Eisenhower administration.
“Brigitte Vallerand.” She stuck her hand out, palm down, ever the aristocrat.
Poor Owen didn’t know what to do with it. Frankie made kissing gestures from behind her. He finally got the picture and took her hand but shook it instead. It was better than nothing.
“Well, I’d better be going, darling.”
Darling? I’ve never been “darling” a day in my life.
Frankie’s mother gave him a long look, one that said “you’d better not screw up again,” and turned to go. At least she left though the door (which she had to pry open) instead of vanishing into thin air. Frankie would’ve had to scrape Owen off the floor otherwise. He was already looking at Frankie like he wanted to drop his tray and take off.
“Um, Frankie? Seriously. What did you put in the bread pudding? Those ladies are laughing like they’re at a comedy show. It was like crying one minute, and now, boom, instant good times.” He sniffed the air. “It’s not, you know, special pudding, is it?”
Damn, maybe a bit too much with the mojo
. “I didn’t put anything unusual into it, especially not that.” He chuckled casually and leaned close, like he was about to share a grave secret. “Sometimes women are kinda nuts,” he whispered.
Owen smiled uncomfortably and then turned to plate another slice of the pudding without further comment. He went to use Frankie’s spoon for the caramel, but Frankie stopped him.
“Here, use this instead.” He handed Owen a regular metal ladle.
Frankie didn’t want his spoon—
oops
—wand, to fall into the wrong hands. Jesus.
Frankie couldn’t resist checking on his handiwork, though. The women were indeed perched on two plush velvet ottomans he’d found at a thrift store on Ashbury Street, giggling happily. He wandered over to their table.
“How is everything, ladies?”
“It’s wonderful,” the crier said. Her eyes were still red-rimmed, but more from tears of laughter than anything else by that point.
Frankie smiled. “I’m Francois Vallerand, the owner. Please let me, Owen, or Bethany know if you need anything else.”
Both women gave him a long look and then burst into giggles. As he walked away, he heard one of them whisper to the other, “We have to bring Cynthia and Nikki to this place. He’s gorgeous.”
“And that accent. Pure Southern sex. I can practically feel the bayou sliding over my skin.”
Frankie had to bite his lip to keep from laughing. Yes, definitely a bit too much of the mojo. He’d have to practice.
* * * *
Addison wanted to quit his job. Right then. He wanted to walk into his pudgy boss’s office and slam down the favorable review he’d written about L’Osteria di Pomodoro and tell his boss to take the snark and shove it up his ass. Not that Addison would ever say anything like that without keeling over. He sure liked to think it, though.
The food is simple, yet mouthwatering, the atmosphere friendly and homey…
Shit.
The food is boring, unpretentious to the point of mediocrity…
He didn't think he could do it. It seemed so wrong.
The atmosphere could be called homey but felt more like a mismatched set of socks to The Phantom. He wondered if he was at a Victorian rummage sale.
Addison felt like shit, but he managed to go through his review, line by line, and change each sentence of description to match his usual sarcastic style. He hated doing it and hoped no one would read his review (not likely). L’Osteria was magic. He’d wanted to go back. Now it seemed like that would be impossible.
* * * *
“I don’t like this, Doug. It’s not right.”
Addison’s editor rolled his eyes. “What do you care? It’s just another flash in the pan. These little restaurants come and go all the time.”
“This place is special.”
“Are you drunk? You don’t say special. Listen, we like ratings. Our readers like snarky Phantom. End of story. You’re going to that fish-and-chips place Monday, okay? The one you were going to hit yesterday.”
Addison sighed. “Fine.”
He plodded back to his cubicle after that, strangely deflated. His phone lit up with a voice message from Julia:
“Hi, Addie. I know we had plans for movies tonight with Tim and Caroline, but I’m going to have to take a rain check. I think I’m coming down with a cold. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
No “I love you.” No emotion. But also no double date for the evening. Addison’s relief filled him, quick and palpable.
“Hey, Albright, a few of us are going to that new wine bar right off Hartford and 19th. You wanna go?” He looked up. It was Jillian, one of the features writers.
“You know that’s in the Castro, right?”
“Is that a problem?” She looked like she was waiting for him to be judgmental.
“No, actually, I only live a few blocks from there.”
Live a little, Addie
. “Sure, I’ll go. What time?”
“Really? You’ve never accepted one of my after-work invitations before. Well, anyway, we were thinking eightish.” Jillian smiled, girly and surprised.
Addison nodded. It was nice to make people smile. Perhaps he should do it more often. “I’ll be there.”
* * * *
Four hours later Addison stared at the shirts in his closet. What did one wear to a wine bar in the Castro? Huge butterflies beat around his stomach, wings flapping hard. Addison felt ill. It was just a wine bar, damn it. He could do this. He’d been wanting to go out without Julia and her perfect-matched-set couple friends, right? He needed to let go, to see if he could feel something even remotely close to what he’d witnessed that night outside his building. Addison wasn’t planning on doing anything. Not really. It wouldn’t be fair to a whole list of people. But it sure was nice to dream, to plan something that wasn’t really going to happen. It added a bit of excitement to what even he could admit was a pretty bland life.
If anyone needed a bit of excitement, it was him. He picked a shirt, telling himself not to obsess about it, and jammed that and a jacket on. Then he walked out the front door and locked it before he could talk himself out of going.
The street was colorful and bright with its rainbow flags flapping and neon signs flickering in the dimming twilight. Sidewalks were lined with Friday-night diners, couples holding hands, friends laughing. Addison drank it in with a smile. The club crowd wouldn’t be out for a few hours yet. Those boys in tight pants and short shirts were too much for Addison. He liked to look, but he couldn’t imagine touching. He needed someone more masculine, lithe but strong, a deep voice, wide shoul—was he fantasizing about men again? It was a part of him that he tried to squelch as much as possible. A large part.
Julia would be horrified. His mother would have to be hospitalized.
Addison’s desire for men was something he’d pushed back into the far corners of his psyche only to come out when he was alone in the dark and dreaming quietly of things that were never to be.
He found the wine bar that Jillian had been talking about. A small group of employees from the paper sat at a corner table, talking and laughing. Jillian waved him over with a smile.