Pasta Imperfect - By Maddy Hunter Page 0,44

like a denuded rabbit, and she'd been cut and styled by a pro.

"How did this happen?" Mom asked, giving me a motherly pat on the back.

So I told her the whole story about the incident at the leather market and when I was done, she shook her head and offered me a grim smile. "You've started smoking, haven't you?"

"No! That's the truth! I even have a witness!"

"Accidents like that don't happen in real life, Emily."

"They do to me!"

"Really, hon, maybe you should put the escort business on hold and try something else. You were always good in English, and you have your grandmother's beautiful penmanship. Maybe you could write a novel. I'd have an easier time reading a manuscript handwritten by you than by the person I'm reading now. I think it must be a doctor. Tell me, does this sound right to you?" She pushed her glasses higher up on her nose and angled the paper in her lap toward the bedside light. " 'She gently caressed his cork with her lily white hard.' 'Hard' could be 'hand,' but I don't know where the cork comes in. They weren't even drinking wine."

Euw boy. I returned to the other bed and began sorting through my clothes. "Maybe she caressed his 'coat.' "

"Coat?" She chewed on that for a while. "Hunh. Coat might work, but this person really needs help with syntax."

"So how are the entries looking?" I asked as I noticed a huge coffee stain on my yellow sundress. Damn!

"These are the ones I've read," she said, sweeping her hand over the neat piles on the bed. "There are entry numbers instead of names on them, so I've arranged them alphabetically by title to keep them in order. And I have to give these people credit, Em. Some of them are really talented. And their stories are so original."

I inspected my rosebud sheath to find the zipper slide off the track and the tape pulled away from the fabric. Keely had obviously been in a huge hurry to get out of it, but how was I supposed to wear it with a broken zipper?

"There's one about a pirate who kidnaps a headstrong Irish girl off a sailing ship and takes her to his pirates' den in the Caribbean, where they eventually fall in love. And one about an Indian who kidnaps a headstrong Irish girl off a wagon train and takes her to his village on the plain, where they eventually fall in love. And one about a highwayman who kidnaps a headstrong Irish girl from her carriage on the moors and takes her to his cottage in Cornwall, where they eventually fall in love."

I examined tops, pants, cardigans, and dresses to find jam stains, split seams, cigarette holes, lipstick stains, missing buttons, and broken snaps. How could they have been so careless? I couldn't wear anything now! I dug through the pile again. Where was my one-shoulder sweaterdress with the leather shoulder strap?

"And this one's really original, Em. It's about a Montana cowboy who kidnaps a young woman from her best friend's wedding ceremony and takes her to his cabin in the Rockies! Isn't that different?"

I threw her a confused look as I tossed my stuff right and left in search of my coral sweaterdress. "I don't think I get what's so different. Is this one where they don't fall in love at the end?"

"Ofcourse they fall in love, Emily. But she's not a headstrong Irish girl. She's Lithuanian!"

No sweaterdress. Unh. I pouted in complete despair at the clothes on the bed.

"You could do something like this, Em." Mom waved a page at me. "I know you could. Have you ever dreamed of writing a book?"

I sank down on the bed. I dreamed about Etienne...and obscenely large body parts. "Can't say that I have."

She clutched the page to her chest, looking suddenly nostalgic. "I probably never told you this, but when I was younger, I dreamed of becoming a stewardess. There was nothing I wanted more than to fly the friendly skies in a stylish little uniform and matching cap."

Mom had wanted to be a flight attendant? Serving peanuts and beverages to people? Showing them how to fasten their seat belts? Instructing them what to do should the plane lose cabin pressure? Who knew? But her revelation gave me pause. I guess I'd never really looked at Mom as being anyone other than my mom. "So why didn't you follow your dream?"

I caught a twinkle in her eye behind