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- Story Listed as: Fiction For Adults
- Theme: Love stories / Romance
- Subject: Character Based
- Published: 07/31/2024
Food Frenzy
Born 1945, M, from Boston/MA, United States“You insult me then ridicule my husband!” Yvonne Blackstone bolted upright almost tipping the Windsor chair over. Several startled customer at the restaurant looked up from their food, but there wasn’t much to see as Yvonne hurried out of the dining room like a mortally wounded animal, leaving Leslie Holbrook nursing a glass of pink Chablis.
No sooner had Yvonne exited, the food arrived. The maitre d’, a diminutive man with a pencil mustache, approached. “Your friend seems to have left prematurely.”
Leslie tilted her wine glass at a sharp angle and sipped the chilled liquid. “Yvonne always had a flair for the theatrical.” She spoke in a relaxed, unhurried manner. “I’m assuming that, once she regains her composure, she’ll return to the meal.”
The maitre d’, who wore a tuxedo and pleated shirt dimpled with a row of black onyx studs, stared uncomfortably at the uneaten food. Angelique’s was a gourmet, five-star restaurant. Leslie’s tuna tartare with the avocado, citus ponzu and herb pasta ran forty-five dollars. “And if she doesn’t return?”
“I’ll pick up the tab for both meals,” she assured him. Hurrying off, the thin man looked much relieved. Once alone, Leslie breathed a sigh of relief and attacked her meal with hearty appetite.
* * * * *
Yvonne had chosen the restaurant. The woman always went lavish, never spared expense. The twosome had gone to high school together twenty years earlier. Yvonne was the dark haired, Rubenesque sex goddess. Her chocolaty brown eyes and pearlescent skin only added to the seductive aura. Next to her, other girls faded into a drab nether world, a black hole of sensual obscurity. A few years out of school she married, Eddy, an ambulance-chasing, slip-and-fall trial lawyer who earned six figures and drove a Jaguar convertible. “I invited you here under false pretenses,” Yvonne announced when they first arrived. “This is really a family intervention.”
Leslie unfolded her napkin and laid it beside the silverware. “I thought interventions were for drug addicts and recovering alcoholics who fell off the wagon.”
“Silly you!” Yvonne patted her on the wrist. “Your husband – may he rest in peace – has been gone six months now and it’s time for you to climb back on the horse.”
“Which horse are we talking about?”
“Dating… you need to find a significant other to fill the void. Someone to snuggle up with on late December nights when the temperature dips below freezing and a nor’easter is thrashing about.”
“I’m in no great hurry to change anything.” In early December Leslie’s husband, in seemingly good health, suffered a massive heart attack. Following the autopsy, the doctor said Connor was probably dead before the body even hit the ground. “I loved my husband.”
Yvonne waved a manicured index finger in the air for dramatic effect. “What,” she countered with a supercilious inflection, “and I don’t love my Eddie?”
As they sat there surrounded by the opulence of a five-star, gourmet eatery, Leslie recalled a rather unsettling vignette regarding Yvonne’s spouse. Eddie once defended an employee of the Mass Transit Authority who had been arrested for embezzling money from train station fare boxes. A hundred and fifty thousand dollars – that’s how much he pilfered over a six-year period. There was never any doubt about the worker’s guilt, but the attorney general’s office withheld key evidence and Eddie managed to get the case thrown out on a judicial technicality.
Leslie assumed that, through a circuitous route, a good portion of the stolen revenue probably ended up in Eddie’s wallet by way of legal fees. No matter. Yvonne felt no ambivalence. The notion that her husband aided and abetted a remorseless felon was of no great consequence.
Leslie lowered her eyes and stared at the elegant silverware. Everything at Angelique’s from the place settings to the plush carpeting was top shelf. They would pay dearly for this luxurious self-indulgence. But then, Yvonne was always rushing about frenetically like the Mad Hatter in search of distractions, a myriad of titillating and meaningless diversions. All this pointless activity had rendered her once radiant smile a glacial morass, a harsh caricature of her former feminine loveliness.
“How many evenings this week have you spent at home curled up on the sofa with a good book,… in the back yard watching humming birds feast off cardinal flowers and bee balm or simply sipping a cup of herbal tea with your spouse?”
Momentarily flustered, Yvonne was saved from the futile effort of dredging up a suitable answer by the waitress arriving to take their orders. “I’ll choose the Wagyu beef carpaccio.” Leslie, who also intended to try the Wagyu beef, switched her choice to the tuna tartare with avocado and citrus ponzu. Collecting their menus, the waitress hurried off to place the orders.
“I loved my husband.” Leslie repeated what she had said just a few moments earlier. “Do you love Eddy?”
“What?” The strange remark struck the woman like a sniper’s bullet.
“A year ago before he died, I was out on the town with my husband,” Leslie continued. “Eddie was sitting at the bar with a woman young enough to be his daughter, and by the look on his face they weren’t discussing the Red Sox’s chances for a pennant victory.” “Eddie married you because he was an elitist, a self-promoting social climber, an admiration seeking braggart. And you latched onto him because you’re no better.”
Yvonne’s mouth fell open. The lipped fluttered like the useless wings of a mortally injured pheasant riddled with buckshot. Sitting there in the dining room of Angelique’s Restaurant, Leslie no longer cared one iota about political correctness. For twenty years she held her tongue, never once shared her true feelings with effete snobs like Yvonne. Only now in her early forties the dam burst apart, all her innermost feelings gushing out in a maelstrom of unapologetic candor. “Your husband’s a misogynistic creep and you’re his trophy wife!”
* * * * *
Leslie finished her meal. As wonderful as her food was, the Wagyu beef carpaccio resting two feet away smelled even more tantalizing. She reached across with a forked and speared a paper-thin slab of beef drizzled with lemon juice and finished with capers and onions. Yvonne had definitely chosen the tastier dish. Snaking her fork across the tablecloth a second time, she speared another succulent morsel.
Leslie glanced surreptitiously about the room. The wait staff had retreated to the kitchen and all the guests were preoccupied with their own meals. With a lightning fast maneuver Leslie switched plates, depositing her empty dish where Yvonne’s previously sat. Five minutes later her former friend’s plate was completely empty.
“Would you like the bill?” The maitre d’ had returned.
“No, not yet.” Leslie dabbed her lips with the ornate damask napkin. “I want to see the desert tray.”
The man glanced at the empty plates once again with mild confusion. “Yes, of course… the desert tray.”
A moment later a waiter appeared pushing a small, metallic cart with an array of creamy pastries, pies, cakes and puddings. There was a tiramisu with espresso soaked lady fingers topped with mascarpone cream, an affogato, baked Alaska, a passion fruit crème brulé with strawberry-mint baked meringues plus a white chocolate cheesecake steeped in blood orange curd and pistachio crumble.
“The baked Alaska looks quite delicious,” Leslie said.
“I’ll get that right out to you.” The waiter began wheeling the cart away.
“I’m not finished.”
“Excuse me?”
Leslie pointed at the empty chair opposite. “Did you forget about my friend?”
“But I thought…”
“She might return and it would be in bad taste not to have some delicacy waiting for her.” Leslie pointed at the cart. “Let’s add a tiramisu along with the baked Alaska.”
* * * * *
One night shortly after their honeymoon, Leslie noticed a wispy slip of paper sticking out from beneath her bed pillow.
… I do not know any other way of loving
but this, in which there is no I or you,
so intimate that your hand upon my chest
is my hand, so intimate that
when I fall asleep your eyes close.” – Pablo Neruda
When Connor entered the room, Leslie said, “I found the slip of paper you left under the pillow.”
Not a man of many words, his features dissolved in a laconic half-smile. “What slip of paper?” he replied “What pillow?”
“How terribly sweet!” She kissed his cheek.
“I knew how much you loved Neruda’s poetry so it seemed the perfect choice.” Without further elaboration, he climbed into bed next to her and promptly drifted off to sleep.
A month later as she was putting cutlery away after the evening meal she found a similar slip of paper wedged beneath a pie tin.
“Love: a temporary insanity,
curable by marriage.” – Ambrose Bierce
“The droll humor caught my eye,” Connor explained. There was no maudlin melodrama; he always chose his words scrupulously.
“How many poems or quotes did you read through before settling on this one?”
Again, there was the wispy sliver of a grin but nothing more.
The following week Leslie learned that her daughter was pregnant with their first grandchild. Reaching for a pair of knitting needles resting on a shoe box in the hall closet, a tattered slip of cream-colored parchment fell from the amber yarn and drifted to the floor.
“I saw that you were perfect, and so I loved you.
Then I saw that you were not perfect and I loved
you even more.” – Angelita Lim
Connor’s love was palpable. It was a living, breathing, unwavering entity. It matched Neruda’s lyricism, Bierce’s humor and even went a bit further than Lim’s ironic paradox. There was something reverential, sacred in his inconspicuous devotion. In most instances, words were meaningless They cluttered and obscure They became overly sentimental, mawkish and maudlin. Connor never told his wife he loved her. When he was gone, she had twenty years of fond memories and two-hundred and thirty-five, raggedy slips of paper.
Food Frenzy(Barry)
“You insult me then ridicule my husband!” Yvonne Blackstone bolted upright almost tipping the Windsor chair over. Several startled customer at the restaurant looked up from their food, but there wasn’t much to see as Yvonne hurried out of the dining room like a mortally wounded animal, leaving Leslie Holbrook nursing a glass of pink Chablis.
No sooner had Yvonne exited, the food arrived. The maitre d’, a diminutive man with a pencil mustache, approached. “Your friend seems to have left prematurely.”
Leslie tilted her wine glass at a sharp angle and sipped the chilled liquid. “Yvonne always had a flair for the theatrical.” She spoke in a relaxed, unhurried manner. “I’m assuming that, once she regains her composure, she’ll return to the meal.”
The maitre d’, who wore a tuxedo and pleated shirt dimpled with a row of black onyx studs, stared uncomfortably at the uneaten food. Angelique’s was a gourmet, five-star restaurant. Leslie’s tuna tartare with the avocado, citus ponzu and herb pasta ran forty-five dollars. “And if she doesn’t return?”
“I’ll pick up the tab for both meals,” she assured him. Hurrying off, the thin man looked much relieved. Once alone, Leslie breathed a sigh of relief and attacked her meal with hearty appetite.
* * * * *
Yvonne had chosen the restaurant. The woman always went lavish, never spared expense. The twosome had gone to high school together twenty years earlier. Yvonne was the dark haired, Rubenesque sex goddess. Her chocolaty brown eyes and pearlescent skin only added to the seductive aura. Next to her, other girls faded into a drab nether world, a black hole of sensual obscurity. A few years out of school she married, Eddy, an ambulance-chasing, slip-and-fall trial lawyer who earned six figures and drove a Jaguar convertible. “I invited you here under false pretenses,” Yvonne announced when they first arrived. “This is really a family intervention.”
Leslie unfolded her napkin and laid it beside the silverware. “I thought interventions were for drug addicts and recovering alcoholics who fell off the wagon.”
“Silly you!” Yvonne patted her on the wrist. “Your husband – may he rest in peace – has been gone six months now and it’s time for you to climb back on the horse.”
“Which horse are we talking about?”
“Dating… you need to find a significant other to fill the void. Someone to snuggle up with on late December nights when the temperature dips below freezing and a nor’easter is thrashing about.”
“I’m in no great hurry to change anything.” In early December Leslie’s husband, in seemingly good health, suffered a massive heart attack. Following the autopsy, the doctor said Connor was probably dead before the body even hit the ground. “I loved my husband.”
Yvonne waved a manicured index finger in the air for dramatic effect. “What,” she countered with a supercilious inflection, “and I don’t love my Eddie?”
As they sat there surrounded by the opulence of a five-star, gourmet eatery, Leslie recalled a rather unsettling vignette regarding Yvonne’s spouse. Eddie once defended an employee of the Mass Transit Authority who had been arrested for embezzling money from train station fare boxes. A hundred and fifty thousand dollars – that’s how much he pilfered over a six-year period. There was never any doubt about the worker’s guilt, but the attorney general’s office withheld key evidence and Eddie managed to get the case thrown out on a judicial technicality.
Leslie assumed that, through a circuitous route, a good portion of the stolen revenue probably ended up in Eddie’s wallet by way of legal fees. No matter. Yvonne felt no ambivalence. The notion that her husband aided and abetted a remorseless felon was of no great consequence.
Leslie lowered her eyes and stared at the elegant silverware. Everything at Angelique’s from the place settings to the plush carpeting was top shelf. They would pay dearly for this luxurious self-indulgence. But then, Yvonne was always rushing about frenetically like the Mad Hatter in search of distractions, a myriad of titillating and meaningless diversions. All this pointless activity had rendered her once radiant smile a glacial morass, a harsh caricature of her former feminine loveliness.
“How many evenings this week have you spent at home curled up on the sofa with a good book,… in the back yard watching humming birds feast off cardinal flowers and bee balm or simply sipping a cup of herbal tea with your spouse?”
Momentarily flustered, Yvonne was saved from the futile effort of dredging up a suitable answer by the waitress arriving to take their orders. “I’ll choose the Wagyu beef carpaccio.” Leslie, who also intended to try the Wagyu beef, switched her choice to the tuna tartare with avocado and citrus ponzu. Collecting their menus, the waitress hurried off to place the orders.
“I loved my husband.” Leslie repeated what she had said just a few moments earlier. “Do you love Eddy?”
“What?” The strange remark struck the woman like a sniper’s bullet.
“A year ago before he died, I was out on the town with my husband,” Leslie continued. “Eddie was sitting at the bar with a woman young enough to be his daughter, and by the look on his face they weren’t discussing the Red Sox’s chances for a pennant victory.” “Eddie married you because he was an elitist, a self-promoting social climber, an admiration seeking braggart. And you latched onto him because you’re no better.”
Yvonne’s mouth fell open. The lipped fluttered like the useless wings of a mortally injured pheasant riddled with buckshot. Sitting there in the dining room of Angelique’s Restaurant, Leslie no longer cared one iota about political correctness. For twenty years she held her tongue, never once shared her true feelings with effete snobs like Yvonne. Only now in her early forties the dam burst apart, all her innermost feelings gushing out in a maelstrom of unapologetic candor. “Your husband’s a misogynistic creep and you’re his trophy wife!”
* * * * *
Leslie finished her meal. As wonderful as her food was, the Wagyu beef carpaccio resting two feet away smelled even more tantalizing. She reached across with a forked and speared a paper-thin slab of beef drizzled with lemon juice and finished with capers and onions. Yvonne had definitely chosen the tastier dish. Snaking her fork across the tablecloth a second time, she speared another succulent morsel.
Leslie glanced surreptitiously about the room. The wait staff had retreated to the kitchen and all the guests were preoccupied with their own meals. With a lightning fast maneuver Leslie switched plates, depositing her empty dish where Yvonne’s previously sat. Five minutes later her former friend’s plate was completely empty.
“Would you like the bill?” The maitre d’ had returned.
“No, not yet.” Leslie dabbed her lips with the ornate damask napkin. “I want to see the desert tray.”
The man glanced at the empty plates once again with mild confusion. “Yes, of course… the desert tray.”
A moment later a waiter appeared pushing a small, metallic cart with an array of creamy pastries, pies, cakes and puddings. There was a tiramisu with espresso soaked lady fingers topped with mascarpone cream, an affogato, baked Alaska, a passion fruit crème brulé with strawberry-mint baked meringues plus a white chocolate cheesecake steeped in blood orange curd and pistachio crumble.
“The baked Alaska looks quite delicious,” Leslie said.
“I’ll get that right out to you.” The waiter began wheeling the cart away.
“I’m not finished.”
“Excuse me?”
Leslie pointed at the empty chair opposite. “Did you forget about my friend?”
“But I thought…”
“She might return and it would be in bad taste not to have some delicacy waiting for her.” Leslie pointed at the cart. “Let’s add a tiramisu along with the baked Alaska.”
* * * * *
One night shortly after their honeymoon, Leslie noticed a wispy slip of paper sticking out from beneath her bed pillow.
… I do not know any other way of loving
but this, in which there is no I or you,
so intimate that your hand upon my chest
is my hand, so intimate that
when I fall asleep your eyes close.” – Pablo Neruda
When Connor entered the room, Leslie said, “I found the slip of paper you left under the pillow.”
Not a man of many words, his features dissolved in a laconic half-smile. “What slip of paper?” he replied “What pillow?”
“How terribly sweet!” She kissed his cheek.
“I knew how much you loved Neruda’s poetry so it seemed the perfect choice.” Without further elaboration, he climbed into bed next to her and promptly drifted off to sleep.
A month later as she was putting cutlery away after the evening meal she found a similar slip of paper wedged beneath a pie tin.
“Love: a temporary insanity,
curable by marriage.” – Ambrose Bierce
“The droll humor caught my eye,” Connor explained. There was no maudlin melodrama; he always chose his words scrupulously.
“How many poems or quotes did you read through before settling on this one?”
Again, there was the wispy sliver of a grin but nothing more.
The following week Leslie learned that her daughter was pregnant with their first grandchild. Reaching for a pair of knitting needles resting on a shoe box in the hall closet, a tattered slip of cream-colored parchment fell from the amber yarn and drifted to the floor.
“I saw that you were perfect, and so I loved you.
Then I saw that you were not perfect and I loved
you even more.” – Angelita Lim
Connor’s love was palpable. It was a living, breathing, unwavering entity. It matched Neruda’s lyricism, Bierce’s humor and even went a bit further than Lim’s ironic paradox. There was something reverential, sacred in his inconspicuous devotion. In most instances, words were meaningless They cluttered and obscure They became overly sentimental, mawkish and maudlin. Connor never told his wife he loved her. When he was gone, she had twenty years of fond memories and two-hundred and thirty-five, raggedy slips of paper.
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Meena
08/03/2024Your stories were long but it have intresting meanings ,and i love to read your wording kept me reading till the end,
And again a very good story
I cheer your stories
Help Us Understand What's Happening
Barry
08/03/2024Thank you Meena. This was a story about people saying what they really feel in their heart of hearts both when they deeply love and when they are filled with blinding rage. I learned to write by reading the great writers of the past: Tolstoy, Maupassant, Chekhov, etc. Words are magic. They take us on a lonely, roundabout journey to wisdom.
Help Us Understand What's Happening
Denise Arnault
07/31/2024So many wonderful things to love about this story. Barry, you have done it again! Once again you wrapped your message with a delicious cast of characters. I could go one, but I have to go get a cookie. ;)
ReplyHelp Us Understand What's Happening
Barry
07/31/2024Denise
Thank you for the kind words but I didn't really write this story or, as Yvonne might have said, "I wrote it under false pretenses." Once I started writing, the main character, Leslie, took hold of the pen, pushed me aside and wrote the whole damn thing! Seriously, there are some stories that either write themselves or are conceived by a higher power separate and apart from the writers original intentions. This one most definitely falls into that borderline supernatural category. But, in the end, it worked out reasonably well.
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