sewing bag, tucking her lunch inside.
“What are we having?” Harriet asked.
“I brought cheese quesadillas, pork tacos and chicken burritos and, of course, chips, salsa and guacamole and…” He paused to take a plastic box from his big container. “…a chicken salad for Señora Robin.”
“Thank you.” Robin sounded surprised.
“You think I don’t notice what everyone eats?” Jorge said with a wink.
“What are you doing for the festival?” DeAnn asked.
“I’m doing what I always do,” Jorge said. “Making food. My restaurant is timeless, so I don’t need to do anything there. I’m on the food committee for the festival. We’re having a food court at the community center in the walkway between the exhibit hall and the auditorium where the music will be. I guess they’re going to have the high school bands from Foggy Point and Angel Harbor playing music a couple of times a day before the big concerts at night.”
“What sorts of food will be available?” Carla asked.
“We’ll have tacos and hamburgers and hotdogs, but also we’ll have a cart of foods from the era—fondue, peanut butter and Marshmallow Fluff sandwiches, on soft white bread, of course. We’ll have spaghetti from a can, little pizzas made from round crackers with a slice of pepperoni and mozzarella cheese…” He paused to think. “Instant breakfast in a can, vegetable sandwiches with sprouts—that was toward the end of the era. Twinkies, Ding-Dongs, HoHo’s, if we can find some.”
He ticked these items off on his fingers.
“We’re having brownies, but not with anything special in them, we’ll have cans of Fresca soda, someone is bringing that gelatin that separated into three layers. And I’m sure there is more I’m not remembering.”
“Lots of us were cooking perfectly normal food every day,” Mavis said, “But those meals weren’t especially memorable—or tied to a single point in time, for that matter.”
“Isn’t that when we got our first Julia Child cookbooks?” Aunt Beth asked.
“Maybe,” Mavis looked at her longtime friend. “Or that could have been in the seventies.” She sighed. “It all runs together after a while. In any case, Twinkies and Marshmallow Fluff were much more memorable.”
“Can you stay and eat with us?” Harriet asked Jorge.
“I think I can spare a few minutes to eat,” he said and glanced at his watch. “I don’t have to sew anything if I stay, do I?”
Chapter 2
“Who needs a wig?” Harriet asked as she set a large shopping bag on the cutting table in her quilting studio.
Mavis and Beth sat in the two wingback chairs by the bow window in the reception area, each holding a mug of steaming tea. Jenny was in a folding chair to their left, a large black tote at her feet. Robin and DeAnn stood with Lauren at the short end of the cutting table, a pile of clothing between them.
“Sorry I’m late,” Carla said, stripping off her wet rain coat as she came in from the outside parking area. “I’m sorry, did I interrupt?” Her cheeks, red already from the cold, reddened further.
“Harriet was just asking if anyone needs a wig,” Beth told her. “And I’m pretty sure we were all going to say yes.”
“Ewww, where did they come from?” Lauren asked. “You didn’t get them from the thrift store, did you?”
“Maybe,” Harriet said evasively. “I got a deal from a wholesale wig place in Seattle for six of them. I got four more from DeAnn.”
She paused, and DeAnn took up the story.
“When Nana first got dementia and we didn’t know what was going on, she went on a huge catalog shopping spree. It didn’t matter what sort of catalog came in the mail. If she got it, she ordered something—or many somethings. She must have gotten a wig catalog at some point, because we found a box with five brand-new ones in it.”
“That’s handy,” Lauren said. “What about the thrift store?”
“Okay, I did find three killer wigs at Trash and Treasures.” Harriet reached into her bag and pulled out a handful of black fluff and held it up. “I found this afro, and it was too perfect to pass up. I washed it three times.”
“Toss it over,” Jenny said and held her hands up to receive it.
Harriet carried the wig around the table then lobbed it. Jenny caught it then turned it in her hands to orient the cap before pulling it onto her head.
“Is it me?”
“Tuck your hair in around the back,” Lauren suggested, “unless you like looking like a skunk.”
“Let me help you,” Carla offered. She set the mug of tea