Grandma Lied to Me

Grandma Lied to Me

For the third time that morning, Charlie found himself chasing the mixing bowl around the kitchen. It had broken out of the stand and was making a lazy loping circuit around the island. He looked up, casting his gaze through the ceiling in an effort to communicate directly to the great beyond.

“Would it have killed you to write down just one recipe?”

A small voice in his head answered with it’s own question. Would it kill you to think before you run your mouth? It was the little voice that often spoke up just after he said or did something thoroughly stupid and undeniably avoidable. It sounded a lot like his Grandma.

It would have been a simple Christmas cookie party, but he had to go and turn it into the Charlie show. His bravado and tongue wagging had put him on the hook for a batch of his Grandma’s famous double chunk mint melt away cookies. He’d talked them up until his mouth was dry, making half-baked promises before remembering that he didn’t have a clue how Grandma actually made the cookies.

He picked up the bowl, studied the mix for foreign contaminates and tried to stick an exploratory finger into the batter. Concrete slurry was more flexible. He scraped the mix out into the trash where it landed with a meteoric thump, and began rinsing the bowl.

His mother had to know the recipe. She’d gotten all of her mother’s cookbooks when Gram passed, but she wasn’t available to interrogate. Unfortunately, she was somewhere off the coast of Alaska with his step-father and wasn’t answering any of his frantic emails.

Charlie eyed the phone. There was one other person who might help. She’d been in the kitchen with Gram same as Charlie. He looked at the clock. He had six hours to get this right and he’d already failed thrice. He swallowed his pride and decided to call for reinforcements.

She picked up on the third ring.

“Can’t you text like a normal person?” was all she had to say before the line went dead.

Charlie would have preferred texting, but she’d just made it a requirement. That made it impossible for him to do. He called again, this time putting her on speaker.

“God, you don’t learn.”

“I need your help!” He shouted before she could hang up again.

Silence filled the kitchen.

“Say it again. Slower.”

“I. think. That. I Might. Could. Maybe.”

“That is painful to listen to.” She cut him off with a dramatic sigh. “What kind of trouble did you get into this time?”

“Do you remember Gram’s double chunk cookies?”

This time there was no teasing in Kate’s silence. When she spoke, she sounded much younger.

“I remember.”

“Did she ever give you the recipe?”

“You cannot be trying to bake those. You’ll murder them.”

“Yeah,” Charlie thought about the last lump he’d tossed in the trash. “So far that’s exactly what I’ve done. So did you get the recipe?"

"No. I think Mom might have it.”

“They’re on that cruise.”

“Oh, yeah.” Silence stretched long. “As many times as she had us help, you should be able to remember. It can’t be that hard.”

“Are you busy?”

“You mean can I come make cookies for you? Yeah, I am too busy for that.”

“I need these for tonight. I can’t remember everything. I thought, maybe, if you helped…”

“I have to work later.”

“So you’re not busy now then, right?”

She gave him another dramatic sigh. “You owe me big time.”

Two hours later they both stared together at the far too thick glob of putty that was supposed to have been cookie dough.

“Obviously,” Kate said, pushing a curly strand of her dark hair behind one ear with a flour covered hand, “this is not right.”

“I think I did better by myself,” Charlie admitted. “I don’t understand. We both remember the same steps.”

“Mostly.” Kate scraped the latest failure into the trash.

“We only have one more shot at this. I’m almost out of flour.”

“We still don’t know when she added the mint chocolate chunks.”

“We can’t even get the batter right. That’s got to be the priority. Besides, Grandma always added those without us. It can’t be that hard to add chocolate.”

“You know what kind she used?” Kate’s eyes were wide with surprise.

“Sort of.” Charlie pointed to a green box next to the fridge. “Andes mints taste close enough to me. It doesn’t matter if we can’t get this part though.” He gestured at the garbage which had been heaped with lumps of brown cement.

“Now you kids run along while I add the secret ingredient.” Kate’s voice was an eerie approximation of Grams and they both laughed at the accuracy.

“What secret ingredient!” Charlie bellowed up at the ceiling.

Kate laughed, and the truth in it reminded him of when they had been much younger. They were not those people anymore. Life had jaded both of them around the edges, but her laugh brought some of their closeness back.

“You should come over for Christmas.”

Kate looked up from where she’d been googling cookie recipes.

“Seriously, don’t you ever miss being a part of…” he trailed off, gesturing wildly at the mess the two of them had made.

“Don’t you ever not talk?”

“I mean it. Why don’t you ever come over for the Holidays?”

“I don’t know,” she said in a sarcastic sing-song. “Will Chad be there?”

Charlie started to shut down his invitation. She’d brought up their step-father, knowing it was the one thing he was guaranteed not to talk about. Knowing she knew this frustrated him. He turned away, anger welling inside him. He was mad at Kate for her obstinacy, mad at himself for promising to make cookies when he’d never actually baked anything that wasn’t breaded, and angry at his mother. He was distracted by hating in every direction, so his mouth did what came naturally.

“He’s not that bad a guy, not really.”

“Please don’t tell me you’re on team Chad now.”

“You left so soon. Too soon. Have you ever actually talked to him? Like had a real conversation?”

Kate began measuring out the last of the flour.

“When you left it was just me and them when Dad-”   

Kate slammed the glass measuring cup down so hard the report echoed back across the room. The shockwave caused the strings on his guitar to sing out ghostly harmonics from it’s place in the corner.

“Don’t do that! Don’t you put this on me!”

Charlie was stunned by her ferocity. He leaned away, letting the words she’d never been mad enough to say wash over him.

"SHE cheated on Dad! SHE did that. SHE broke his heart. And When Dad left, SHE moved HIM into the HOUSE! I couldn’t stay with that, especially not after…” She trailed off into a choked sob, then hung her head. One hand toyed with the flour that had spilled when she’d slammed the cup down.

“He didn’t kill Dad.”

“He didn’t help.” There was still anger dripping from her words, but it had lost its edge. She seemed to know this and batted a small pile of flour, spraying it into the air and across the kitchen island.

“That was a drunk, Kate. Neither Mom nor Chad was anywhere near that bar.”

“But why was Dad there, huh? Why do you think he was at that bar that night? Don’t tell me you haven’t thought about it. About what if…”

 “Did I ever tell you about the plaque?”

Kate’s brow furrowed. She turned away from him and rummaged in the fridge for a moment.

“Where’s your butter?”

Charlie sighed and pointed to the last two sticks, already on the island top.

“About a month or so after Dad’s funeral one of the guys from The Corner Pocket stopped by the house. Mom was out with Chad. I think she was getting groceries or something. Anyway, this guy stops by, really big guy with a beard. Not one of those cool bushy ones though, it was all wiry and mostly neck hair. But he knocks on the door and when I open it, he just holds out this plaque. They had Dad’s name engraved on a plaque to hang on the wall over his favorite pool table “in memoriam.” He told me this like I would be proud. The bitch of it is, I was. I still kind of am.”

“Is that supposed to make me like Chad, because they hung a plaque on a wall at Dad’s favorite bar?”

“No probably not. But, I’ve been there. They actually named the pool table after him. The Frank Hawkins Memorial pool table. How much time did he have to spend there to get his name engraved on not one, but two bronze plates?” He held up a hand to forestall her answer. “Yeah, Mom did him dirty and Chad was a part of that, but he was already going to be at that bar anyway. That’s what he did.”

Kate opened her mouth to protest, closed it, and started measuring out the sugar instead.

“I hated Chad at first too, just like you. I just wasn’t old enough to leave. And then two things happened. That guy showed up to show me that stupid plaque, and Chad showed up at my graduation. It hurt, because it wasn’t Dad, but Dad didn’t make it to your graduation either, Kate. And he could’ve.”

Kate stopped measuring. The wooden spoon handle Charlie had been using for mixing stuck out of the bowl, bits of previous batters crusted along it’s length. Kate gave the shaft of wood a gentle flip and then went to the sink.

“Why am I making your cookies, again?”

“Because I talk too much and get myself in trouble and you are a good big sister and like to bail out your baby brother?”

“I don’t think we’re getting anywhere with this. Just buy some cookies from the store. I’m sure you can talk your way out of this as easily as you got into it.” She started running water and then shut it off. “We’re a mess.”

“You’re a mess.” He gestured to the smudge of flour in her hair and the ghosts of batters past that still clung to her shirt in places. “I’m just festively decorated.”

“You’re so full of shit!” She laughed again, and for a time it was better.

“So will you come for Christmas?”

“If we can get these cookies right,” she sighed, “then I guess so.  I’ll come.”

“Stop playing in the sink then. We have work to do.”

They poured out the ingredients just as they remembered, adding a little extra butter to hopefully keep it from cementing so completely.

“Moment of truth,” Kate said, her finger poised over the stand mixer’s on off switch.

As Charlie started to nod his phone let out the piercing tone of a desktop bell. He had an email.

He held up one finger in Kate’s direction and then went to his phone without a word. She stayed poised, a go to hell smile spreading across her face, her finger inching inexorably toward the switch. She stopped when Charlie started laughing.

“Seriously?” He looked up and bellowed through the ceiling. “Seriously!”

“What is it? Is it from Mom?”

“I can’t believe I have to say this, but you were right.”

“Right about what? Giving up? Being better than you? Or did Chad do something? What is going on over there?” Kate abandoned the mixer and stalked toward Charlie. Before she got to him, he began to speak using the same voice he’d always used to imitate their mother.

“Oh my goodness. I had forgotten all about Mom’s double chunk cookies. Lol. She used to love making those with you and your sister. Are you sure you’re ready for the secret ingredient?"

He paused and looked up at Kate, speaking in his own voice. "She put a billion spaces in here so I had to scroll, for suspense I guess.” He returned to his mom voice.

“She would always make that mix with you guys and send you out to play. Then she threw that away and opened a package of soft batch cookies. She put two pieces of Andes mints upside down on top of each one and warmed them up just enough for the chocolate to melt.”

“Are you serious with this?” Kate interrupted. Charlie held up one finger and finished.

“I can’t believe you wanted to make these. How fun. Speaking of fun Chad and I are having a blast, it’s so pretty up here. We saw a whale! We’ll have lots of pictures to show you. Also, if you see your sister, tell her we’re fine. Love, Mom.” He finished with a flourish of eye blinks.

“It’s all been a lie.” Kate sat down on the stool she’d brought over when they first started. “My whole childhood was one big lie.”

“Yeah, but now I have a new problem.”

“Aside from the fact that you talk too much?”

“I have these mints, see. What I need is somebody to go buy some cookies for me to melt them on top of while I get ready for the party.”

“Must suck to need stuff. I have work.” Kate started washing her hands. “What are you going to do with that?” She gestured at the unmixed batter, drops of water baptizing the room in tangential arcs.

“Garbage, I guess.”

“I’ll take it.”

“What could you possibly want with that?”

“It’ll make great lumps of coal.”

They laughed.

“So you’ll come to Christmas? A deal’s a deal.”

“A deal’s a deal.” She raised a finger. “If I can bring the coal.”

“Are you still here. Shouldn’t you be going to get my cookies?”

She grabbed her keys, tucked the mixer, bowl and all, under one arm,  and flipped him the bird.

“So, that’s a yes, right?”

She closed the door on her way out, a go to hell smile spreading across her face.

Charlie looked up at the ceiling. “Thanks, Grandma.”