The Monday Night Cooking School - By Erica Bauermeister Page 0,45

drips from the tomato juice and butter land on the white china. The class was quiet, absorbed in the food in their hands. Abuelita and Lillian stood at the counter, leaning into each other, talking quietly, while Antonia removed the last of the tortillas from the griddle and placed them on the stack underneath a white kitchen towel to stay warm.

It was like a picture, Chloe thought. A recipe without words. She stood still, sensing the kitchen around her, feeling the energy the room held, would hold until the next afternoon when the cooks and bussers and patrons arrived and it would again become something more than the accumulation of its bustle and ingredients, and the food they cooked would become laughter and romance, warm and bright and golden. She smiled.

Lillian walked over and pulled one last tomato from the bag and handed it to Chloe. “I think you earned this,” she said.

CLASS WAS OVER. Abuelita had gone home, claiming with a laugh that she was too old for late hours. The others had left one or a few at a time, Claire begging some tortillas to take home to her children, Ian dragging Tom outside saying he wanted to ask him a question, Helen and Carl offering Isabelle a ride.

It was quiet in the kitchen, the only sounds the rattling of the bowls as Chloe put them away, the swish of the towel as Lillian cleaned the last of the counters. The door clicked shut behind Antonia as she carried the last of the wooden folding chairs to the storage shed just outside.

“Can I ask you something?” Chloe met Antonia at the door as she reentered.

“Certo.” Of course.

“You are so beautiful,” Chloe stumbled. “I’m not…”

“Ahhh…” Antonia smiled and turned to Lillian. “Can we borrow your restroom for a moment?” Lillian nodded, and Antonia grabbed a clean kitchen towel and took Chloe by the hand, leading her through the restaurant dining room and into the tiny green women’s restroom. Standing in front of the mirror, Antonia took the clip that had been holding the waves of her black hair, and then deftly pulled Chloe’s brown curls away from her face.

“Good,” said Antonia, as she secured the clip in Chloe’s hair. “Now, water.”

“What?”

“Your face, please.” She turned on the hot water.

Chloe filled her cupped hands with warm water and brought it up to her face. She could feel the heat meeting her skin, the smell, slightly metallic, green as the room around her. It was quiet in the space created between her hands and face, clean, safe.

“Now soap.”

Chloe rubbed the soap bar between her hands, the scent of rosemary tickling her nose, then she scrubbed, rinsed, and wiped her face on the towel Antonia handed her, appalled when she saw the thick black streaks across the white.

“Ancora.” Again. Antonia smiled.

“She’s going to kill me for that towel.”

“Use more soap this time. And no, she won’t.”

Finally, Antonia relented and Chloe looked up into the mirror. Her face gazed back at her, open, her eyes huge and blue, her hair barely restrained.

“Essential ingredients,” Antonia observed, “only the best.”

“But you are beautiful,” Chloe insisted.

Antonia laughed softly. “I used to say that to my mother all the time. She would be standing in the kitchen or digging in the garden, and I would think she was the most beautiful person I had ever seen. I was not a pretty teenager. And do you know what she would say to me?”

Chloe shook her head.

“She would say, ‘Life is beautiful. Some people just remind you of that more than others.’ ”

WHEN ANTONIA AND CHLOE got back to the kitchen, they saw Lillian had pulled a tray of chocolate éclairs out of the walk-in refrigerator.

“Stacy’s specialty. There are a few left over from Sunday. Care to join me?”

“Really?” Antonia and Chloe eagerly settled in around the counter. Chloe picked up one of the éclairs and set it on a white plate that Antonia handed to her. She ran a finger along the top and felt the thick, heavy chocolate as it melted from her finger in her mouth.

“Uhmmmm. Tell Stacy these are wonderful.”

“I like the filling best,” Antonia remarked, delicately breaking the éclair in half and dipping the tip of one finger into the cream in the center. “My mother always scolded me for eating the inside of my pastries first.”

Antonia’s cell phone buzzed, and Antonia looked at the screen.

“How is it you say? Speak of the angel?” She saw their puzzled faces. “My mother,” she explained. “Excuse