The Blue Bistro

9

Phosphorescence

The Inquirer and Mirror, Week of July 15, 2005

“HERE AND THERE” column

There have been several reports of phosphorescence in the water at beaches along the north shore this week. Phosphorescence is caused by a type of algae called dinoflagellates, which are capable of bioluminescence when the water they reside in is disturbed.

Sports Illustrated cover story:

“THE HEROES OF AMERICA’S HEARTLAND:

CAN THE WHITE SOX WIN THE PENNANT?”

TO: Ade12177@hotmail.com

FROM: kyracrenshaw@mindspring.com

DATE: July 13, 2005, 9:02 A.M.

SUBJECT: Things I can’t believe

I can’t believe you’ve traded in the cushy life of the hotel front desk for the restaurant business. I can’t believe you’re dating your boss. I can’t believe you’re living with my dreamboat Duncan. You should thank me for recommending Nantucket. You should remember me in your will.

TO: kyracrenshaw@mindspring.com

FROM: Ade12177@hotmail.com

DATE: July 13, 2005, 10:35 A.M.

SUBJECT: Thank you

Thank you for recommending Nantucket. I am in a much better place, following my new rules, feeling good about myself. I paid off both Mr. Visa and Ms. MasterCard and I have a positive bank balance. I am in a relationship with a real, live, grown-up man. I sing in the shower.

It is amazing, Kyra, the way that happiness changes a person.

TO: Ade12177@hotmail.com

FROM: kyracrenshaw@mindspring.com

DATE: July 14, 2005, 8:41 A.M.

SUBJECT: the way that happiness changes a person

Is happiness contagious? Can you send me some spores in the mail?

When Fiona returned from Boston, Adrienne studied her for signs of illness, but Fiona had never looked better. One very busy Thursday night, the kitchen was waist-deep in the weeds. The kitchen had so many tickets, there wasn’t enough room for them above the pass. The Subiacos were sweating and cursing and busting their humps to keep up. Fiona slid behind the line to plate soups, sauce pasta, and sauté foie gras while singing “The Sun Will Come Out Tomorrow.” Every time Adrienne peeked her head in, she found Fiona in soaring good spirits.

“One plate at a time,” Fiona called out. She even helped Jojo, the youngest Subiaco, load the dishwasher. She was a general in the foxhole with her men, but singing, gleeful. It was strange. Adrienne thought maybe the hospital had given Fiona a personality transplant.

It didn’t take Adrienne long to figure out that Fiona’s improvement in attitude had nothing to do with the hospital or facing her own mortality. It had, very simply, to do with love. Right after first seating, JZ walked in. Shaughnessy was away at camp and he had rented a house on Liberty Street. Today was Day One of a week’s vacation.

Fiona and JZ were inseparable. By Day Three they had established a routine: They did yoga together on the beach in the mornings, and then JZ helped Fiona in the kitchen. One morning Adrienne found him pitting Bing cherries and joking with the Subiacos. (The Subiacos were in a collective good mood because the White Sox had won eleven straight and held first place by a game and a half.) Fiona and JZ escaped from the kitchen by noon with a picnic basket and off they would go in Fiona’s Range Rover to secret, out-of-the-way beaches where no one would ever find them. JZ ate dinner at the bar and spent the hour after second seating in the kitchen-and Adrienne knew that after eating with Thatch, Fiona drove her Range Rover to the house on Liberty Street and spent the night.

Was happiness contagious? By Day Four, it was safe to say that the food at the Bistro had never been better and Adrienne wasn’t sure how to explain that. How did the best get better? It just did. Every single guest raved about the food. Perfectly seasoned, perfectly cooked, the freshest, the creamiest, the most succulent. The best I’ve ever had. Adrienne noticed it, too, at family meal: the Asian shrimp noodles, the Croque monsieurs, the steak sandwiches with creamy horseradish sauce and crispy Vidalia onion rings. Are you kidding me? Adrienne thought as she stuffed her face. She thought: JZ, never leave.

On Day Five, Adrienne was working reservations when the private line rang. By this time, Adrienne realized the private line could be anybody: Thatcher (who was at an AA meeting), Cat, Dottie Shore, Harry Henderson, Ernie Otemeyer, Leon Cross, Father Ott.

“Good morning, Blue Bistro,” Adrienne said.

A woman’s voice said, “This is Jamie Zodl. I’m looking for my husband. Have you seen him?”

Adrienne found herself at a loss. “I’m sorry? Your husband?”

“Jasper Zodl. JZ. There’s no need to play games. I know you know who he is and I know he’s there. Or if he’s not there now, he’ll be there at some point and I want to speak to him.”

Adrienne wrote JZ’s name at the top of her reconfirmation sheet. She thought of Shaughnessy at summer camp and all the things that might have gone wrong: sunburn, mosquito bites, sprained ankle, homesickness. “He normally delivers here at ten,” Adrienne said. “But he’s on vacation this week.”

“You can cut the crap,” Jamie said. “I’m not stupid. Have him call me. His wife. At his house. He knows the number.”

“Okay, if I see him-”

Jamie Zodl hung up.

Adrienne passed on the message that evening when JZ came into the bar for dinner. He was wearing a dolphin-blue button-down shirt and his face and forearms were very tan. He and Fiona had rented a Sunfish that afternoon and sailed on Coskata Pond. Adrienne delivered the bad news with his chips and dip.

“Your wife called this morning,” she said.

“Here?”

Adrienne nodded. “She wants you to call her at home.”

“It can’t be important,” he said. “Or she would have called me on my cell. I had it on all day. She probably just called to make a point. To let everyone know she knows I’m here.”

“Okay, well,” Adrienne said. “That was the message.”

Later that night as they lay in bed, Adrienne asked Thatcher what he knew about Jamie Zodl.

“She’s unhappy,” he said. “She’s one of those people who thinks the next thing is going to save her. When I first met her twelve years ago, she was desperate to marry JZ. They used to come into the restaurant all the time. He proposed to her at table twenty.”

“Oh, you’re kidding,” Adrienne said.

“After they got married, Jamie wanted to be pregnant. That didn’t happen right away and they went to Boston for fertility help and it worked, obviously, because they had Shaughnessy. But then Jamie realized how hard it was to be a mother. So to afford a live-in, she and JZ sold their house here and moved to Sandwich. Jamie had an affair with the guy who owned the gym that she joined, and JZ found out. Jamie promised to break it off, they went into counseling for a while, and JZ took a job driving for another company so he wouldn’t have to be gone every day. We didn’t see him here for two whole summers. But then he found out Jamie was back with the guy from the gym and he gave up. Got his old job back and he’s been trying to file for divorce, but Jamie won’t let him. She threatens to take Shaughnessy away and she disappears to her mother’s in Charlottesville, and once she and Shaughnessy flew to London for the weekend. The only way JZ was able to find them was by calling his credit card company. Jamie has run them into mountains of debt on top of it all. Pretty woman, gorgeous, but what a disaster.” Thatcher rubbed his eyes. “JZ used to talk to Fiona about the whole thing. It was strange because Fiona and I and the staff had watched the relationship from the beginning-the courtship, the proposal, the wedding, the child, the breakup, and the next thing I knew Fiona and JZ were in love.”

“When was that?”

“Two years ago.”

“So what do you think will happen, then?”

“What do I think will happen?” Thatcher repeated. He was lying on his back, arms folded over his chest like someone resting in a coffin. “Nothing will happen.”

“What does that mean?”

“JZ won’t leave Jamie. He’s too cowardly.”

“He’s worried about his daughter.”

“That’s what he says.”

“You don’t believe him?”

“JZ is a good guy,” Thatcher said. “But he’s not going to risk anything for Fiona. Leave his wife and lose his daughter for someone who’s going to die?” Thatcher rolled onto his side, away from Adrienne. “That would take a hero. JZ is nobody’s hero.”

Happiness might be contagious, but it was also fleeting, delicate, mercurial. On Day Six, Jamie called again, in the middle of second seating. The restaurant was loud, but Adrienne picked up a new tone in Jamie’s voice. She sounded manic and untethered, like someone who had pounded six shots of espresso.

“This is Jamie Zodl,” she said. “ISJZTHERE?”

“Yes,” Adrienne said. “Please hold on one minute.”

“You hold on one minute,” Jamie said.

“Excuse me?”

“I know Fiona’s sick,” Jamie said. “I know all about it.”

Adrienne said nothing. Across the room, a table burst out laughing. Rex played, “In the Mood.”

“Let me get JZ,” Adrienne said.

“I have a phone number,” Jamie said. “For a journalist who wants to write about her. He wants to talk to me about Fiona and JZ. The question is, do I want to talk to him?”

“Let me get JZ,” Adrienne said again, though she was afraid to put Jamie on hold. Bruno swung by the podium.

“I need your help on ten,” he said. “Can you pull a bottle of the Cakebread?”

Adrienne’s ears were buzzing; she felt like she had a bomb threat on the phone.

“Get JZ,” Adrienne whispered to Bruno. “His wife is on the phone.”

Bruno wasn’t listening closely-what he heard was Adrienne asking him for something in response to his asking her for something. He wagged a finger. “Honey, I’m slammed. Can you get the wine for me, please?”

Adrienne searched the dining room for Thatcher. Her eyes snagged on table ten, a deuce, a middle-aged couple, fidgeting, glancing around. They wanted their wine. Adrienne snapped back to her senses. This was a restaurant! She put Jamie Zodl on hold, zipped into the wine cave for the Cakebread, then she shouted into the kitchen, “JZ, call for you on line three!” By the time Adrienne opened the wine for table ten and made it back to the podium, the phones were quiet. Jamie had hung up.

Adrienne didn’t see JZ on Day Seven, but she gathered he had packed up and left. Fiona took a day off; when she returned, she was back to her old sarcastic, scowling self. The White Sox lost a double-header to the Mariners. Adrienne stayed out of the kitchen.

TO: kyracrenshaw@mindspring.com

FROM: Ade12177@hotmail.com

DATE: July 21, 2005, 10:35 A.M.

SUBJECT: happiness

Not sending spores. You don’t want them. Happiness is fickle. Plays favorites.

A couple of days later, Adrienne was working the phone when a man walked in dressed entirely in black. Black jeans, black shoes, black dress shirt open at the neck. Bulky black duffel bag. He was a young guy who had shaved his head to hide his baldness, so all Adrienne could see was something like a five o’clock shadow where his hair used to be. New York, Adrienne thought, and immediately her guard went up. The press. Who else dressed in black on a hot July day at the beach?

“Can I help you?” Adrienne said.

He offered her his pale hand. “Lyle Hardaway,” he said. “Vanity Fair magazine.”

Yep. Adrienne eyed her phone. If he didn’t leave when she asked, she would call the police.

“I’m sorry,” Adrienne said. “You don’t have an appointment and our owner isn’t here.”

He held up his palm. “I have a meeting scheduled with Mario Subiaco. He said he’d be working. He said I should come here.”

“He did?”

“Yeah. Mario, the pastry chef. This is the Blue Bistro?”

“It is.” Blue Bitch voice. She pointed a finger at his raised hand. “You wait right here. Don’t move. Is there a camera in that bag?”

“Yes,” he said.

“No photographs,” she said. “Understand?”

“Okay,” he said, and he smiled like maybe this tough act of hers was supposed to be funny.

Adrienne marched into the kitchen. She heard Fiona’s voice in the walk-in; she was making an order list with Antonio. Adrienne slipped into pastry. Mario was all gussied up in his houndstooth pants, washed and pressed, and his dress whites-the jacket with black piping and his name over the chest pocket. He was rolling out dough.

“You have a visitor,” Adrienne said.

He didn’t look up. “Do I?”

“Lyle somebody. From Vanity Fair.”

“Okay,” Mario said.

“He’s not coming back here,” Adrienne said.

“Yeah, he is,” Mario said. “He wants to watch me work. I’m making my own pretzels today. For chocolate-covered pretzels. It’s a special on the candy plate.”

“I thought there was no press allowed in the kitchen,” Adrienne said. “I thought that was a law.”

“This isn’t the kitchen,” Mario said. “It’s pastry.”

“Does Fiona know this guy is coming?” Adrienne asked.

“Not yet.”

Adrienne watched Mario fiddle with the pretzel dough, twisting it into nifty shapes. “What’s going on?” she said.

“They’re doing an article about me,” he said.

“Just about you?”

“Just about me. I hired a publicist.”

“You did what?”

“I hired a publicist and she sent out my picture and my CV and Vanity Fair called. They’re doing some article about sex and the kitchen. You know, sexy chefs. Rocco DiSpirito, Todd English, and me.” He raised his face from his work and mugged for her.

“Now I’ve heard it all,” Adrienne said. “You hired a publicist and you have a writer from a huge New York magazine in the bistro with a camera to take pictures of you making chocolate-covered pretzels because you’re sexy.”

“King of the Sweet Ending,” he said. “They loved the name.”

“Yeah, well, Fiona doesn’t know. And guess what? I’m not telling her.”

“No one was asking you to.”

“So you’ll tell her yourself?”

“Tell her why? It’s my business.”

“It’s not your business,” Adrienne said. “It’s her business.”

“Just send the guy back, please, Adrienne.”

As Adrienne returned to the dining room-Lyle Hard-away was right where she’d left him-the phone rang. Darla Parrish, bumping her reservation to three people. Adrienne asked cautiously, hoping, praying, “Not Wolfie?”

“No, it’s our youngest son, Luke. I can’t wait to introduce you. Oh, and Adrienne, dear, will you put us at that new table?”

“Sure thing,” Adrienne said. She made a note on her reconfirmation list. The writer was watching her every move. She hung up the phone, then said, “Follow me.”

Adrienne and Lyle Hardaway made it three steps into the kitchen before Fiona stopped them.

“Whoa,” she said. “Whoa. Who’s this? Not a wine rep back here?”

“His name is Lyle Hardaway.” Adrienne was afraid to say more.

“Is he a friend of yours?” Fiona asked.

“No,” Adrienne said.

Suddenly, Mario appeared from the back. “He’s here for me.”

“What is he, your new dance instructor?” Fiona said. She glared at Lyle Hardaway. “Who are you?”

“I’m a writer for Vanity Fair,” he said. He offered Fiona his hand. “You’re Fiona Kemp? It’s an honor to meet you.”

Fiona pointed to the door. Her cheeks were starting to splotch and she bent her head and coughed a little into her hand. Antonio spoke up from behind the pass.

“Get him out of here, Adrienne,” he said. And Adrienne thought, Yes, get him out before he sees Fiona cough.

“Fuck off, Tony,” Mario said. “He’s here for me.”

Antonio said, “What are you, crazy?”

Fiona spoke to the floor. “I have to ask you to leave,” she said. “I don’t allow press in the kitchen.”

“Come on, Fee,” Mario said in a voice that normally got him whatever he wanted. “He’s here to take pictures of my pretzels.”

“No,” Fiona said.

Lyle Hardaway held his arms in front of his face, like the words were being hurled at him. “Maybe I should wait out front while you work this out.”

“Wait outside,” Fiona said. “In the parking lot.”

Lyle Hardaway disappeared through the door.

Fiona slammed her hand on the pass. “And now there will be a line in Vanity Fair or one of the other magazines they’re sleeping with-you can bet on it-about what a bitch I am.” She glared at Mario. “What were you thinking? You invited him into our kitchen?”

“He wants to write an article about me,” Mario said.

“No,” Fiona said.

“You can’t tell me no,” Mario said. “The article is about me. It’s not about you, it’s not about the Bistro.”

“That’s where you’re wrong,” Fiona said. “He told you the article is about you. But that was just so he could get through the door. Did you hear him a second ago? ‘You’re Fiona Kemp? It’s an honor to meet you’? He’s using you to get to me.”

Mario laughed and looked around the kitchen at his cousins, and his brother Louis, who was filling ravioli and pretending not to listen. Only Adrienne was captive, rooted in the kitchen, afraid to leave lest she attract attention to herself, or worse, miss something.

“I cannot believe how self-centered you are,” Mario said. “You think the world revolves around your tiny ass? It does not. You think people care so much about you? They do not. That man came here to interview me. And I’m going to let him. Because my career isn’t over in September, Fee. I have to move on, I have to build my prospects, increase the value of my stock. So maybe I get investors and open my own place. Maybe my cousin Henry gets investors for his root beer. We have to move on, Fee. Move forward. We aren’t quitting at the end of the summer.”

“I’m not quitting, either,” Fiona whispered.

“The Bistro is closing,” Mario said. “That’s a fact. The building is sold, it’s torn down, it’s rebuilt as somebody’s fat mansion. There is no more Bistro. So what do you expect us to do, lie down and die with you?”

“Mario!” Antonio said.

“Get out!” Fiona shouted. She whipped around and caught Adrienne standing there, but she didn’t seem to care. Her eyes were ready to spill over with tears. Was Adrienne going to see Fiona cry? “Get out! Get out of my kitchen!”

Mario ripped off his chef’s jacket and threw it to the floor. “Fine,” he said. “I’m finished with you.”

He stormed out the door, leaving the kitchen in a stunned silence. Adrienne felt a strong desire to run after him. She liked Mario and she saw his point-once the Bistro closed, everyone had to fend for himself. Fiona would be four million dollars richer, but where would the rest of them be?

Fiona retreated to the office and slammed the door.

Adrienne heard the faint ringing of the phone. She went out front to answer it. That was her job.

That night, there were 244 covers on the book. Family meal was pulled pork, corn muffins, grilled zucchini, and summer squash. At the menu meeting, Thatcher announced that there would be no desserts. All Antonio had been able to find back in pastry were a few gallons of peanut butter ice cream, a tray of Popsicles, and the unfinished pretzels.

“I’ll say one thing for my cousin,” Antonio said. “He works fresh.”

No one knew where Mario was; at last report, he hadn’t checked in at the Subiaco compound. Adrienne wondered if he had flown off-island in search of another job. She wondered if she would ever see him again.

“What do you think?” Adrienne asked Thatcher at the podium as they awaited first seating.

“I stay out of the kitchen’s business.”

“Yeah, but what do you think?”

“Fee’s afraid,” he said quietly. “And fear does strange things to people.”

“It’s too bad,” Adrienne said. “They’ve been friends a long time.”

“They’re still friends,” Thatcher said. “This is just a fight.”

“So you think he’ll come back?”

“Where’s he going to go?” Thatcher said.

“I don’t know. Chicago?”

“Ha!” Thatcher gave her the laugh, and Adrienne felt better. She was smiling when the Parrishes walked in.

“Halloo,” Darla called out. She was holding a young man by the hand, pulling him along like he was Wolfie’s age. “Adrienne, this is my son, Luke Parrish. Thatcher, you remember Luke.”

Thatcher shook hands with Luke and patted him on the back. Luke smiled shyly at the floor. He was the exact opposite of what Adrienne expected a Parrish son to look like: He wore tiny frameless glasses and had long brown hair that spilled over his shoulders and down his back. He wore a blue blazer over a white T-shirt, jeans, and sandals. Between the lapels of his jacket, Adrienne could only read a single word printed on the front of his shirt: CASTRO.

“It’s nice to meet you, Luke,” Adrienne said. “Let me show you to your table.”

As she walked the Parrishes out to the awning, Rex launched into “Hello, Dolly!” Adrienne heard Darla behind her. “Isn’t she just lovely? Isn’t she exquisite? She used to live in Aspen. And Hawaii. Adrienne’s a real adventure girl, aren’t you, Adrienne?”

Adrienne pulled out a chair for Darla. She handed Luke and Grayson their menus. “Just to let you know, there aren’t any desserts tonight. Our pastry chef is on vacation.”

“On vacation in the middle of July?” Grayson said. He leaned closer to Luke. “That must mean they fired him.”

“So I’ll get your drinks, then,” Adrienne said. “Stoli tonic and Southern Comfort old-fashioned. Luke, what can I bring you?”

“A beer, please,” he said.

“We have Cisco Summer Brew on tap. Is that okay?”

“Perfect,” he said. “And a shot of tequila, please.”

“A beer and a shot of tequila,” Adrienne said. “I’ll be right back.”

She put in the drink order with Duncan and went back to the kitchen to give Paco the VIP order. Antonio was expediting.

“Where’s Fiona?” Adrienne asked Paco.

“Lying down,” he said. “She’s upset.”

“About Mario?”

“No,” Paco said. “Something about JZ. Eddie got the story.”

“Have you heard from Mario?” Adrienne asked.

Paco scoffed. “He’s out getting drunk somewhere. Getting drunk and looking for ladies.”

“You think?” Adrienne said. She seemed to be the only one who was worried about him. She couldn’t bear to peek around the corner and see the abandoned pastry station.

Back in the dining room, she sat tables: the local author was in; Mr. Kennedy; a real jackass named Doyle Chambers; and one of the local contractors with a party of twelve. Adrienne opened a bottle of champagne for Kennedy-his wife, Mitzi, was now a devotee of the Laurent-Perrier-and then she swung back into the kitchen to pick up the chips for Parrish and put in two more VIP orders. She headed for the Parrishes’ table. From behind, Luke looked like a girl in men’s clothing. But that wasn’t quite right; his hair wasn’t feminine so much as biblical. He looked like the original Luke, the one who wrote the Gospel. But this Luke had inherited the Parrish demeanor. Adrienne found the three of them sitting in silence, sipping their drinks. The shot of tequila had been drained and pushed to the edge of the table. Adrienne scooped it up as she set down the chips and dip.

“Another?” she asked Luke.

“Please,” he said.

This seemed to startle Darla from her reverie. “Oh, Adrienne, honey, won’t you please stay and chat with us for a second?”

“I’d love to.”

“I told Darla that arranged marriages have been out of fashion for over a hundred years,” Grayson said. “She refuses to believe me.”

Darla laughed and threw her hand in the air. “I just thought they might have something in common. Luke loves to travel. After Amherst, he spent a year in Egypt.”

“Egypt?” Adrienne said. “I’ve always wanted to see that part of the world. I had a boyfriend once who offered to take me to Morocco, and at times I regret not going.”

Luke tented his fingers. He was looking at Adrienne longingly, she thought, but then she realized that he was eyeing the empty shot glass in her hands. He wanted his tequila.

“How old are you, Adrienne?” Darla asked.

“Twenty-eight.”

“And Luke is twenty-nine!” Darla said. “He’s our youngest.”

“And our nuttiest,” Grayson piped in. “It was a hard lesson but I finally learned that our three boys were not mined from the same quarry. This guy”-and here he pounded Luke on the shoulder-“is a free spirit.”

“Josh and Timmy are more traditional,” Darla said.

“They’re into wearing suits and paying alimony,” Luke said.

“Okay, well,” Adrienne said. “I’ll get you another tequila. Darla, Grayson, can I bring you anything else right now?”

“Just yourself, when you have a minute,” Darla said.

Adrienne stopped at the bar to order another tequila and then met Thatcher at the podium. Everyone from first was down.

“I think Darla is trying to set me up with her son,” Adrienne said.

“Oh, I know she is,” Thatcher said. “For years she’s been wondering if he’s gay. She told me on Tuesday that it was her intention to introduce him to you.”

“And what did you say?”

“I said, ‘Good luck. I hear she’s very picky.’ ”

Adrienne swatted him. “Not picky enough.”

“I want to have a meeting after closing tonight,” Thatcher said.

“A meeting?”

“On the beach outside my office.”

“Because of Mario?”

“Morale booster,” he said. “It’s mandatory. Please spread the word.”

No one on the staff expressed enthusiasm about a mandatory meeting at one o’clock in the morning. Joe looked at Adrienne cross-eyed; Spillman claimed he had a date with his wife at Cioppino’s.

“Morale booster?” he said. “What are we going to do-have a sing-along around the campfire?”

Caren, who was standing right there, said, “Thatch likes to give a little speech when the first person burns out.” She nudged Spillman. “Last year, remember, when Bruno lost his shit on that woman with the alligator shoes, Thatch gave us the talk and we all got a raise?”

“True,” Spillman said.

Tyler Lefroy asked if there would be beer. Adrienne was too afraid to tell anyone in the kitchen about the meeting; she would make Thatcher handle that.

Between their appetizer and entrée, Adrienne visited the Parrishes again. She had to admit, Luke Parrish fascinated her, not because of anything he said or did, but because he was so different from Darla and Grayson. He was a revolutionary. He’d ordered the mixed green salad with beets, and the ravioli; he was a vegetarian. And now, after two beers and three shots of tequila, Adrienne could tell he was getting drunk. His posture was falling apart. He was slumped in his seat.

“How’s everyone doing here?” Adrienne asked. Again, the empty glass of tequila had been pushed to the edge of the table, and Adrienne picked it up and held it discreetly at her side. “Would you like another?” she asked Luke.

“No more tequila,” Grayson said.

Luke sank a little lower in his chair. Adrienne was afraid he might slip under the table. Darla, for the first time ever, seemed distressed. She looked at Luke imploringly, as though she wanted him to speak. He was not picking up whatever signal she was trying to send. She laughed.

“Well, I suppose I might as well say it. Adrienne, Luke would like to take you out to dinner on your night off. He’d like to take you to Cinco.”

Luke put both his hands on the table and Adrienne noticed he was wearing a silver pinkie ring. What to say? That she didn’t normally go out with men who had their mothers ask? Luke pushed himself out of the chair. “I have to piss,” he said, and he propelled himself toward the men’s room.

Darla pretended not to have heard this last declaration. She smiled at Adrienne. “I hear Cinco has wonderful tapas.”

Adrienne glanced around the dining room. There were no emergencies calling her name, and there was no one available to save her. She lowered herself into Luke’s vacant seat.

“Thank you for thinking of me,” she said. “But I’m already seeing someone.”

Darla put her hand to her throat. She looked stunned. “Who?”

Adrienne took another look around. She felt the way a criminal must feel just before breaking the law. She was going to tell Darla and Grayson the truth-tell them because she wanted to-even though she could feel indiscretion coating her tongue like a film.

“Thatcher.”

“No!” This came from Grayson.

“Thatcher?” Darla said. “You and Thatcher?”

“That’s a dead-end street, my girl,” Grayson said. “A dead… end… street.” He picked up his wineglass and swirled his white burgundy aggressively. “Let me ask you a question. Why would someone as beautiful and smart and charming as yourself pick someone like Thatcher? Don’t you want stability? A house? Children? Don’t you want, someday, to be one of these soccer moms with everything in its place?”

“I thought you liked Thatcher,” Adrienne said. “I thought you loved him.”

Darla put her hand on top of Adrienne’s hand. “Thatcher is a dear, sweet fellow and one of our very favorites. But he’s a restaurant person.”

Adrienne felt her temper rear up, though she knew they had arrived at this place in the conversation because of her own stupidity. “So am I.”

“Why, one of the first things you told us is that you’ve never worked in restaurants. You said this was just another adventure. You aren’t like the other people who work here. You aren’t like them at all.”

“Restaurants are as risky as the theater,” Grayson said. “They’re as derelict as television. It’s a volatile and transient life. It’s goddamned make-believe.”

“Honey, now you’re being dramatic,” Darla said.

“Am I?” Grayson pitched forward in his chair. “What do your parents think of this?”

“My parents?” Adrienne panicked. She didn’t want to answer a question about her parents. She wanted to defend restaurant people and restaurant life and all the exciting, diverse, and enriching aspects of it. She wanted to tell them that she was as happy as she’d ever been in her life because of this restaurant. But instead, Adrienne did what any good restaurant person would have done. She salvaged the moment.

“I really love you two,” she said. She flashed them her biggest, toothiest smile. “Thank you for the vote of confidence. And if I ever come across a good prospect for Luke, I’ll let you know.” She stood up and touched Darla’s shoulder. “Your dinners will be out shortly.”

Adrienne dropped off the empty glass at the bar, picked up her flute of Laurent-Perrier, and returned to the podium. The podium was her home.

At twelve thirty that night, Thatcher slipped through the throng at the bar holding the cash box and wad of receipts close to his chest.

“I’m going to eat,” he said.

Adrienne had just finished a stack of crackers. Hector had brought them out to her, along with the news that Mario was still MIA.

“No news is good news,” Hector said. “They find him in his Durango at the bottom of Gibbs Pond, that’s bad news.”

Forty minutes later, Duncan rang the hand bell. The decibel level in the bar increased; the frenzy for one more drink looked like the scenes shown on TV of the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. Guests’ hands shot in the air, waving money. In her change purse, Adrienne had four hundred dollars in tips. Two hundred of it had been palmed to her by Grayson Parrish, possibly as an apology for his tirade, but more likely an apology for Luke’s bizarre and ultimately miserable behavior. He hadn’t returned from the men’s room for a long time and Grayson was forced to check on him. Luke had vomited and was trying to clean up the mess with toilet paper. Adrienne sent Tyler Lefroy into the men’s room with the mop (why did he get all the foul jobs, he wanted to know) and Grayson led Luke back to the table, where he stared down his ravioli but didn’t eat a bite. This is who you want me to go out with? Adrienne thought. This is your idea of stability?

After last call, the bar crowd thinned and eventually disappeared. Duncan cashed out, tipped his sister, and poured drinks for the waitstaff and Eddie and Hector, who were waiting around for the meeting to begin. Eddie filled Adrienne in on the story circulating about JZ and Jamie: Jamie had found out from a Realtor friend on the island that the house JZ rented on Liberty Street went for three thousand dollars a week. In furious revenge, Jamie had bought a hot tub from Sears. Meanwhile, the director of Shaughnessy’s summer camp called threatening to send Shaughnessy home because her tuition had yet to be paid. JZ was, in Eddie’s words, “wickedly screwed” because Fiona had paid for the house on Liberty Street but JZ didn’t want to admit that to Jamie, and Jamie had spent Shaughnessy’s camp money on the hot tub. JZ had gone home to straighten out the mess and in the end, Fiona had paid the summer camp.

“Because she’s cool like that,” Eddie said. “She’s the coolest.”

Adrienne checked her watch. It was twenty of two. Her feet hurt. “Okay, people, let’s go,” she said. “Beach outside Thatcher’s office.”

They exited through the dining room and walked around the restaurant to the back door of the office. There they found Thatcher and Fiona eating Popsicles at a plastic resin picnic table. Fiona was wearing jean shorts and her chef’s jacket. Her hair was down-it was lovely and wavy released from its braid-but her face looked drawn.

Adrienne and the rest of the staff plopped down in the sand and Thatcher called for the remaining kitchen staff-Antonio, Henry, Paco, Jojo. When everyone was seated in the sand, he did a strange thing. He lifted Fiona up out of her chair and carried her toward the water.

“Follow me,” he said.

The staff followed, including Adrienne, who couldn’t help feeling stupidly jealous that Thatcher was carrying Fiona. Fiona screamed in protest, her head thrown back, her hair streaming in the breeze. It was a beautiful night, moonless, still. The staff trudged to the water’s edge but Thatcher plunged right in until he was up past his knees. He let Fiona go and she splashed into the water and the water lit up around her like a force field.

“Whoa-ho,” said Paco. (Adrienne knew he and Louis had been smoking dope back in pastry.) “That’s cool.”

Delilah was the next one in because she was young and unabashed about swimming in her clothes. She dove under, and again, the water illuminated around her.

Soon the whole staff, including Adrienne, was in the ocean, marveling at the way the water sparkled and glowed around their arms and legs.

“Phosphorescence,” Adrienne heard Thatcher say. In the dark, she couldn’t tell which body was his. “I didn’t want any of you to miss it.”

Thatcher had called this a morale booster, but Adrienne’s heart was aching, for reasons unknown. She put her head under and opened her eyes as she waved her hands to light up the water around her. For weeks, she had been so happy she felt like her life was phosphorescent, like the space she moved about in glowed and sparkled around her. But now, this minute, that notion seemed silly and wrong. You’re not like the other people who work here. You’re not like them at all. The Parrishes were right, though Adrienne didn’t know how she was different or why that bothered her. Her eyes stung from the salt water. She wanted to be swimming next to Thatcher, and what she really wanted was for it to be her and Thatcher out here alone. Just the two of them, floating in the sea of light. But Thatcher had brought them all out here for Fiona’s sake. Fiona came first, and she should come first. She was a good person, better than anyone knew, paying for Shaughnessy’s camp, tolerating JZ’s manipulative wife. She was good. And she was sick.

The staff horsed around. Adrienne saw Duncan and Caren kissing. Paco grabbed Adrienne’s ankle and tried to tip her over but she squirmed from his grip and dove under, feeling the material of her red T-shirt dress swirling around her. There was something about being underwater that made her feel lonely, even amid a group of people. When she surfaced, it was quiet, and Adrienne checked to see who was nearby. A man she didn’t recognize was treading water next to her, and Adrienne became confused until she realized it was Bruno without his glasses. Bruno pointed at the shore and then Adrienne heard some of the Subiacos murmuring in Spanish.

A man stood on the beach, silhouetted by the light of the office. He just stood there at first, hands on his hips, menacing. Police? Adrienne thought. JZ? Drew Amman-Keller? But then, very slowly, the figure started to sway and the swaying became dancing. The figure was dancing in the sand and the Subiacos laughed and catcalled and Adrienne heard Fiona shout, “Get in here, Romeo!”

He came running toward the water, and Adrienne caught a glimpse of his face before he dove into the light.

Mario.