“So did they change the reopening date?” he asked, sounding worried.
“No. I just don’t see how they can do it in three months. He still thinks they can, or in four. But he promised we’d be open again by Labor Day.” She sighed. It seemed an eternity to her. Four endless months.
“Why don’t you try thinking about it as maternity leave? That’ll give you two or three months with the baby while they put Humpty Dumpty back together. It’ll be over before you know it. And summer is always a little slow.”
“No, it’s not.” She sounded insulted. “We get all the people who don’t go away for weekends. And even our regulars come in during the week.”
“Sorry. Well, you’re just going to have to take the summer off this year, or the better part of it. The baby will keep you busy. Maybe we can go to Long Island for a couple of weeks in July.” He was trying to make suggestions to comfort her, but she would have none of it. She wanted April in New York open again, as fast as it humanly could be done.
“I don’t think so,” she said cautiously, not wanting to hurt his feelings, but she was a woman of determination, with a plan. “I should be here to oversee the work.”
“I’ll bet you will.” He laughed. “Just try not to overdo it for now. You can watch, but don’t lift anything. I don’t want you to get hurt, April.” They both knew she was in the home stretch, so to speak. The baby’s due date was in just over four weeks. Now that they were together, time was moving fast. It had been two months, and he couldn’t have been more loving to her if the baby had been planned. He was still nervous about it, but much less so than he had been before. The therapist he was still seeing had helped. Mike was totally on board. He talked to his friend Jim about it frequently, and he said he was proud of Mike. “See you tonight,” he said, and signed off.
Mike had called his parents about the baby too. It was the first time he had called in years and predictably, it was a disaster. His mother was drunk when he called, didn’t recognize his voice, and didn’t care about the baby. She didn’t even ask if he was married. His father was out, and he left his cell phone number, and they never called him back. Mike talked to his therapist about it and decided to close the door on that part of his life forever. They hadn’t changed, and he had April and the baby now, and the opportunity for a happy life with them.
April went back to Larry and the electrician, who said he could give her a better electrical setup than the one she’d had before. He told her where and how. It would be slightly more expensive, but she thought that it was worth it. He wanted to give her more built-in safety features, and greater electrical capacity than her old system had allowed. He said it would take two months to do the work, and he could start in two weeks, after he finished a job he was working on right now. Larry had put pressure on him to help her out. He had made a point of saying that she was unmarried, pregnant, and the restaurant was her only means of support. He was willing to play the violin if he had to, to help her get the job done, and she thanked him warmly after the electrician left.
“What do you think?” she asked him honestly. “You think we’ll really get it up and running again?” He didn’t doubt it for a minute, knowing her. She was a woman who, when she set her mind to something, would stop at nothing and overcome every possible obstacle in her path.
“It’ll be even better than before,” he promised, and he assured her again that it could be done in the time that he’d allowed. “I know you,” he teased her, “you’ll have the baby, put the restaurant back together, run for mayor, and open in the Hamptons in July. Maybe this would be a good time to look into that second restaurant you want, April. You can check out locations and see what’s around.”
“I just want to get this one going again,” she said, looking anxious. Her mother called on her cell phone while she was talking to him, and she told her where she was.
“Aren’t you supposed to be home in bed?” She was upset to hear what April was doing.
“Yeah. Sort of,” she admitted, “but it’s driving me crazy. We’ve got so much work to do, and I wanted to hear what the electrician said. He says it’s going to be okay.”
“Yes, but you and the baby won’t be if you don’t stay home and rest.” She sounded like Mike, and April knew they were right. But it was too much to ask of her to stay away, with all of this going on.
“I won’t do anything stupid, Mom. I promise. And I feel fine.” She was still a little hoarse from the smoke inhalation, but otherwise she was okay, and she felt strong. And the baby was kicking her mightily again. In spite of the trauma she’d been through, her belly had grown again. She really did look now like she had a basketball under her shirt. The rest of her looked no different than before. Her constant moving around and hard work at the restaurant had kept her in shape.
When April asked, Valerie said she was having fun in Europe with Jack, and a few minutes later, April went to find Larry, who was studying the damage in the kitchen. None of their equipment could be saved. The hoses had finished off whatever the fire hadn’t.
“I’m going to get the place cleared out by next week,” he told her. He had looked at everything and already had a plan. “Then we’ve got to get it dry. You’d better start looking at new equipment. It’s going to take time to find everything you want.” She nodded. She had already been through it when she set April in New York up the first time. This time would be harder, because they had so much damage to undo first. But Larry promised her they would be fast. He was meeting several more contractors there the next day. April promised to come in. He hadn’t let her move anything heavy, but just being there in the heavy smell of smoke in the aftermath had made her feel a little sick.
She thanked Larry, they locked up, and she took a cab back to Mike’s apartment. She was lying innocently on the bed when he got home at eight o’clock that night. She had washed her hair and scrubbed herself to get the smell of smoke off her, and added a dash of his aftershave. She had almost nothing at his apartment, everything she owned was still in the apartment above the restaurant, and most of that was going to have to be thrown away too. It reeked of smoke. She knew her mother would be thrilled to see the Goodwill furniture go.
Mike smiled at her as he walked into the bedroom, and bent down to give her a kiss. He instantly made a face. “You stink!”
“I beg your pardon?” she said, looking insulted. “That’s your aftershave I’m wearing.”
“You smell like Smokey the Bear. Don’t tell me you’ve been in bed all day,” he said, scolding her. But he had guessed it anyway. He would have had to tie her down to keep her away from the restaurant.
“I’m sorry.” She looked at him apologetically. “I just can’t not be there, Mike. There are so many decisions to make.”
“So what did Larry say?” he asked, as he sat down in a chair next to the bed.
“He still thinks we’re on track for Labor Day, and we met with the electrician. He’s going to give me all new panels in a different location that’ll work better for us, and give us more voltage. He says it’s safer.” It hadn’t been an electrical fire, but it could have been, and that would have been worse. April brought him up-to-date on everything that had happened, and told him she had checked her wines and they were safe. And when she finished, he tossed some papers at her. She caught them in midair. “What’s that?”
“Read it. See what you think. It’s for Sunday’s paper.” She knew that was the most important day to run the restaurant reviews he wrote. There were three pages printed out from his computer, which she knew was a column that would run the full length of the page. Sometimes he used his column to cover two restaurants, but when he loved it or thought it warranted the space, he would write about only one. “I made full disclosure to my editor about our relationship. He got clearance from the editor in chief. It’s all aboveboard.”
“The following is a news item as well as a review,” the column began.
For those of you who are not aware of it, there was a kitchen fire at April in New York this week. No one was injured, although the premises were damaged. The restaurant is already under repair and will be open for business again hopefully in August, and no later than Labor Day weekend. For those of you addicted to the food that master chef and owner April Wyatt serves there, even a three-month hiatus will be upsetting news.
Last September, I wrote a review of April in New York, which was less than complimentary. Knowing the credentials of Ms. Wyatt, I was irked by what I considered the plebeian fare she offered. Everything from melt-in- your-mouth mashed potatoes to traditional mac and cheese, meat loaf the way Hall of Fame Super Bowl stars like Jack Adams like to eat it, and pancakes for both adults and kids. I smirked at the root beer float on the menu, and had been told that the burgers and fries were good. If I remember correctly, I think I commented (in fact I know I did) that it was like Alain Ducasse, where she trained for two years and became his main sous-chef in Paris, cooking for McDonald’s. What kind of restaurant was this? Pizza? Banana splits? Matzoh-ball soup? Okay, also steak tartare and gigot and escargots the way you only get them in Paris. This reviewer stands corrected. As those of you who practically live there know, I missed the point. April in New York is not only a place to find an exquisite dinner — perfect lobster, the finest sole meuniere, osso bucco the way only an Italian can make it (she trained in Italy too,
