The initial adrenaline rush and shock had blocked Daphne’s emotions, but now tears of wounded pride slithered down her cheeks. Her relationship with Paul was a lie. She was just a cover, the good girl he presented at work and to parents while escorts and prostitutes fulfilled his real desires. Aunt Gavriela had been right.
“Here’s your coffee, little mama,” said Gavriela, startling Daphne. Her aunt had entered silently and now stood behind her, staring at the photos of Luciana. “Now there’s an artiste if I ever saw one.”
“Paul’s new girlfriend.”
Gavriela hissed like a snake. “I hope you told him to eat shit?”
Daphne picked up her cell phone. “Right now.”
“That’s my girl. Send him to the devil and then come out for more tsoureki. It’s absolutely divine.”
As soon as Gavriela had left the room, Daphne called Paul. Despite his being a tango night owl, he hadn’t been answering late calls for the past week. So Daphne was surprised when he picked up after only three rings. Juan d’Arienzo’s “El rey del compás” was playing in the background.
“Where are you?” said Daphne.
“The Biltmore.”
That was where they had met. At a tango lesson Lidia had dragged her to. Daphne remembered how courteous Paul had been in comparison with the other tango leches. She recalled the wainscoted walls, the portable dance floor that kept coming apart; Paul had carefully led her away from the gaps so that she wouldn’t trip.
“Do you have something to tell me?” she asked, after the long pause.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Paul.
“Luciana.”
“That again? She’s just somebody to dance with.”
“Is that what you were doing at La Rosa Negra?”
“Nothing happened.”
“Do you know she posted photos of you on Facebook?”
“Yes.”
“Do you know that she has her bust size on her site?”
“Yeeees.”
“And that she’s done soft porn?”
“She’s a dance partner, for Christ’s sake!”
“I’m not that stupid, Paul.”
Silence.
Daphne said, “If you want someone else, fine. But why the lies? Couldn’t you at least have had the respect to—”
“We’ve become so different. And you’re not so into tango anymore.”
“So you got yourself a whore?”
“A dance partner.”
“I’m not even going to ask if she was the first.”
A woman shouted in the background: “Paulito! Is that you over there?”
Daphne wanted to throw the phone out the window. “Go make your date for the evening before somebody else reserves her. I’ll send my dad for my stuff.” She hung up, closed her laptop, and went to find her aunt.
Gavriela was sitting in a living-room armchair with her pudgy legs crossed. She took a sip of coffee from a gold-rimmed demitasse cup, turned her face into the bright light streaming through the sheer curtains, and said, “Did you shit on him well, little mama?”
Daphne collapsed onto the footstool beside Gavriela. “Yes.”
“Enjoyed it?”
“Not at all, Auntie.” Daphne whimpered. “I knew it was over, but now it’s like it was all a lie from the very—”
Gavriela set her coffee on the side table. “Stop it right now. You’ve been with Kosmas all week.”
“I know, but that woman . . .”
“Would you have preferred a man?”
“If she’s what he really wanted—a porn star with fake boobs—then why was he ever with me? It’s my self-image.”
“Ay, siktir,” Gabriella hissed. Like most Rums, she preferred the Turkish phrase for fuck to the Greek. “This is ridiculous. Your self-image comes from yourself, little mama, not from any Paul, nor any Kosmas. Who cares whom that monoglot American is doing? You gave him the road, now shut the door and move on. A man with such bad taste is not worth any woman’s tears. So stop that sniveling, make yourself pretty, and go see Kosmas. He’s the perfect cream for your sunburn.”
That same afternoon, Kosmas took a short break while waiting for Mr. and Mrs. iPhone’s icing to set in the refrigerator. He made himself a double Turkish coffee, took the first volume of Recipes of Hamdi the Pastry Chef from the safe, and set it on the office desk to peruse while he sipped his coffee, but he soon found himself lost in a labyrinth of recipes without any sort of organization. Some of the titles and directions were blotted out by liquid and food marks, and what Kosmas could make out was so interesting that he couldn’t resist taking notes. Losing track of time, he studied the recipes of mysterious confections such as a thirteenth-century quince murabba preserve and a Crimean kaysefe made from fresh apple boiled in water and butter along with dried white mulberries, figs, raisins, and cinnamon. Kosmas was completely taken in by a recipe for memuniyye: fried dumplings made from shredded chicken, almonds, rosewater, rice flour, and honey. Mehmet the Conqueror had so enjoyed memuniyye that they had become a standard dish at Topkapı Palace and the crowning delight of a banquet given in honor of the Venetian ambassador, Andrea Badoero, in 1574.
“How’s it going?” asked Uncle Mustafa, poking his head into the office.
Kosmas jumped to his feet. “What time is it?”
“Twenty past four.”
“Damn it. I’m going to be late with that cake.”
Kosmas wheeled the cake trolley out of the freezer, drove lollipop sticks into the fourth tier, settled the fifth on top, and gave the cake a slight jiggle to test its structural integrity.
“Finding that recipe is going to take a while,” said Kosmas to Uncle Mustafa. “It’s almost impossible to skim Hamdi’s books because you might miss something, so you have to really read, and his writing is so fascinating that you get swallowed up by the palace history and completely forget what you’re looking for.”
“All things in good time,” said Uncle Mustafa. “Except that cake. If you’re late with that, we’re in big trouble. Because we want to expand, remember?”
Kosmas
