Chapter 15
“So,” James said from where he sat on his marble countertop, staring at his phone. “How’s Freddie?”
Anne almost dropped the bag of flour she was pulling down from the shelf as her heart plummeted to the kitchen floor.
James had called her a few hours before, asking if she had any cake pans, and now she was upstairs in his kitchen mixing the dry ingredients for a chocolate cake, while James pored over his monthly horoscope.
“What?” she asked, feigning ignorance as she did a survey of the array of measuring cups and ingredients laid out in front of her, the bright orange stand mixer and attachments at the ready.
“Freddie Wentworth,” he repeated, looking up from the astrology app. “Has he come by the apartment looking for Cricket since she’s moved on with Glen Rinnard?”
“No, I haven’t seen him,” she said, ignoring the annoying disappointment that accompanied the statement.
“Poor guy probably has whiplash,” James said with a snort. “She was making the full court press the night of her play, then bam! She gets arrested and starts shacking up with her lawyer.”
Anne threw him a disapproving glare over her shoulder. “She’s not ‘shacking up’ with Glen.”
“Oh really?” James cocked an eyebrow at her. “And when exactly was the last time she was home?”
Anne opened her mouth to answer, then considered. She wanted to defend Cricket’s honor, but at the same time realized she hadn’t actually seen her roommate all week.
James watched her expression change and let out a self-satisfied sigh. “Like I said, shacking up.”
“Well, I’m happy for her,” Anne said, thankful that the cake recipe propped up on her phone gave her something to concentrate on right now.
“So am I!” James countered. “But it’s weird, right? The guy hasn’t stopped talking about his ex-wife all year, and now Cricket’s practically moved in.”
Anne turned to him, offering him a slight smile. “Which one of them are you slut-shaming again?”
James did his best impersonation of someone truly offended. “In this house, we don’t slut-shame, Anne. We slut-celebrate.”
Anne laughed and turned back to the recipe. “Okay, I need you to focus, James. This is a surprise birthday cake for your husband, not mine.”
“Right. Yes. Okay.” James set his phone down on the counter and focused his attention on where Anne had meticulously lined up the ingredients on the counter. “What do we need to do next?”
“Once the oven is preheated, we need to mix the dry ingredients together, then the wet—”
James snickered.
Anne threw him a look, then continued. “And then we bake for thirty minutes.”
“Perfect. Ellis is at work and I told him I was finishing up the Christmas decorations, so he’ll probably avoid home for ages,” James said with an eye roll. “He hates decorating.”
From the looks of their apartment, Anne would not have guessed.
It might have been the day before Thanksgiving, but James and Ellis’s apartment was already decorated top to bottom for the holidays.
Their wreath went up on the door on November first and, inside, their tree was set up in the living room just a few days later.
The balsam was twelve feet tall and apparently from New Hampshire, with branches completely concealed below a layer of carefully curated ribbon and ornaments that coordinated with the room’s décor.
James caught her expression. “What?”
“Nothing,” she said, eyeing the plastic mistletoe hanging above the door. “I just usually wait until after Thanksgiving to tackle Christmas.”
“I love Christmas. So sue me.”
“Aren’t you Jewish?” Anne asked.
Now James did, in fact, look offended. “This is a Chrismukkah household, Anne. There’s a menorah on the mantel.”
She smiled. “Well, it’s great to see interfaith representation in the building. Even if it’s a month early.”
“It brings me joy,” he said, lifting his chin defiantly. “And you should never delay what brings you joy.”
Her head cocked to the side as she considered. “That’s a good line.”
“Thanks. It’s my therapist’s,” he said with a wink. “But enough about her. We have a surprise birthday party in two days and all I have to show for it is a deconstructed cake.”
“Which will be constructed soon,” she reminded him.
“Right. Good.” James let out a long breath. “So, Friday afternoon while he’s at the gym, I’ll go up to the roof deck and set up the table. The heaters are still working up there, right?”
She nodded. “They replaced the fuel a few weeks ago.”
“I don’t know what to order for food, so I thought I’d just get everything on the menu at Dim Sum Palace and pick it up an hour or so before the party. Can you lay it out upstairs?”
Another nod. “I’ll use the freight elevator so I won’t risk running into Ellis.”
“And I texted Cricket to remind her to be up there at seven,” James mused. “God, do you think she’ll bring Glen?”
Anne cringed. “She might.”
“Fine,” James said with a sigh. “At least people will be there. I have residual trauma from the last time Ellis’s birthday fell on the day after Thanksgiving and no one showed up to his party. We were eating canapés for a week.”
“James. Focus.”
“Right.” He clapped his hands, causing his collection of rings to clink together. “Are you sure it’s okay that we’re baking the cake two days early?”
“Totally fine,” she assured him. “Just keep it in the freezer until you want to ice it.”
He nodded. “And how do I make that?”
“It’s simple. Do you have any powdered sugar?”
He looked up, eyebrows knitted together. “You can powder sugar?”
She opened her mouth, ready to ask him if he had ever baked a cake before suggesting they do this one, when the faint ding of the elevator in the hallway sounded.
They both stilled, listening carefully to the barely perceptible sound of footsteps approaching, keys jangling. Then the distinct slide of the apartment’s dead bolt.
“It’s Ellis!” James yelped, shoveling up all the ingredients from the counter. “Hurry! Grab the evidence!”
“I’m hurrying!” Anne pushed the mixer back into place, then grabbed the lone box of baking soda James had left behind and shoved it in a nearby drawer.
“He wasn’t supposed to be home until five!” James hissed as he threw everything in his arms into the cabinet above the sink. “What are we going to do? All we’ve done is line up the ingredients! I don’t even have batter!”
“We can bake it down at Cricket’s. Just come by later,” Anne whispered.
“Yes! Right! Good plan.”
Anne did a final survey of the kitchen just as Ellis called out. “Honey, you home?”
James looked around wildly, finally pulling a French cookbook from the shelf and pretending to read. But as soon as he cracked it open, he looked up, his face ashen.
“Oh God. What about the powdered sugar?” he whispered.
“I’ll run out and pick some up,” she replied. “It’s fine—”
The kitchen door swung open and Ellis entered. He stopped in the doorway when he saw Anne and James huddled close over the cookbook, covered in flour and looking frazzled.
“Everything okay?” he asked. It looked like he was battling a smile.
“Hi, babe. You’re home early,” James said, his voice casual as he flipped to the next page, like this scene happened every day.
“The Jeselsohns canceled their showing, so I thought I would come home and help in case you were having another one of your tinsel emergencies,” Ellis said warmly, then he turned to see Anne. “Hey, Anne. Are you staying for dinner?”
While James continued to feign interest in the text in front of him, Anne grabbed her bag from the counter and headed for the door as she stumbled over her words. “Nope, I have to go. Lots to do… around. You know how it is. Bye!”
“That’s upside down, you know,” Anne heard Ellis challenge James, before she shut the front door and hurried to the elevators.
Even though she knew exactly what she needed to get, Anne felt oddly unprepared when she walked into Helwig Deli a few minutes later.
The bodega was her usual go-to for quick grocery items, along with a surprisingly wide variety of Korean snack foods, but usually she arrived with a detailed shopping list, or at least a Post-it.
Walking the narrow aisles empty-handed felt unnatural, even though she found herself discovering things she had never noticed before.
Had there always been a collection of toiletries on the wall?
Fifteen minutes later she had a bag of powdered sugar in hand at the register. She swiped her card, bracing herself until the small screen announced it was approved, when her phone started ringing in her bag. She pulled it out and saw her mother’s picture illuminating the screen.
“Hi, Mom,” she answered, holding the phone to her ear with one hand, as she grabbed her canvas shopping bag with the other and walked outside.
“Hello, darling!” Bianca replied, then paused. “Where are you? It sounds like a war zone.”
Anne smiled, stealing a quick glance across the street at the workers struggling to control the tall pine tree now standing in the middle of Tompkins Square Park.
Their truck was beeping, a steady anxious tone as the men yelled obscenities at one another, each with their own view of how to get the tree level.
It was the same struggle every year, the East Village’s own unique start of the Christmas season.
“They’re putting up the tree in the park.”
“Ah.” Her mother knew the scene well. “Well, very apropos, because I wanted to touch base with you about Christmas.”
Of course. How could Anne forget about Bianca’s annual trip to Manhattan?
Regardless of where she was traveling, her mother spent the month of December at the Carlyle Hotel on the Upper East Side.
She usually had a packed social calendar upon arrival, slotted appointments with old friends and even older colleagues that were precisely scheduled, and then systematically checked off.
It was a system Anne had observed every year since her parents divorced.
From the age of ten, she had spent the holiday season sipping Shirley Temples at endless fundraisers and luncheons, trying desperately to blend into her mother’s shadow.
Thankfully, Anne was able to opt out of most of it now.
Instead, she and Bianca usually planned a few excursions of their own, a dinner or two here or there.
Just as long as it was in the schedule well in advance.
Her mother listed a number of dates, different events she had already planned. Then came one that required Anne’s attention. “Oh, I have an event at Lincoln Center that Wednesday night, too. Black tie, very elegant. You should come.”
Anne laughed softly, her eyes following the pine tree now listing dangerously far to the left. “No thank you.”
“Fine,” her mother sighed. “Then let’s at least schedule our standing lunch at Le Bernardin for that Saturday. And Christmas we can do at the hotel like we usually do. Oh, and what about that Tuesday night? I have an invite for drinks at the Beekman.”
Anne was about to offer her standard decline but paused, suddenly remembering the text she had gotten from Sophie the day before. She wanted to schedule the flower shop’s launch party for that same night. For the first time in years, Anne had a conflict. “I can’t. I actually have plans.”
Silence. Her mother was as stunned as Anne. “A date? With who?”
“It’s not a date. I just… I’m working with a friend to help her open her business.”
“What kind of business?”
“A floral shop.” Anne was aware of just how clipped her words sounded, how carefully she was parsing out the information to give.
“Well, that sounds interesting. Don’t fifty percent of floral shops close after a year? Though if she can get a foot in the wedding market, she’ll be set.”
“Right.” Anne nodded. Then another thought popped into her mind. “Would you want to come?”
“To pitch weddings?”
“No, to the party.”
“I can try. Send me the details.” A moment passed before she continued. “Who is this friend again?”
“Sophie,” Anne replied, and clamped her mouth shut. There was no reason to keep Sophie’s last name a secret—Bianca hadn’t met her. She probably didn’t even know Freddie had a sister. Still, Anne was hesitant to share more.
“Sophie,” her mother repeated slowly. “Well, I hope this Sophie knows how lucky she is to have you. Now, what about Thanksgiving? Your father isn’t expecting you to go all the way to Brooklyn, is he?”
Anne took a deep breath, letting the cold air fill her lungs.
To be honest, she had no idea what she was doing for Thanksgiving.
The last text her father had sent her was about getting the contact information for all the network execs in charge of Divorce Divas.
She had tried to dissuade him, but in the end he had gotten frustrated with her and stopped replying.
She understood why her mother assumed she would spend Thanksgiving with her father—that was the holiday he had locked in for years, thanks to their custody agreement.
But as an adult, it suddenly occurred to her that the continuation of the invite had more to do with her proximity—and access to the caterers’ numbers—than affection.
“I’m not sure yet,” she replied, hoping her voice sounded breezy, as if she hadn’t considered it yet. In essence, as if she were an entirely different person.
Her mother hummed to herself. She likely suspected that Walt was being difficult, but she chose not to prod. “Well, how’s the tree looking now?”
Anne glanced across the street and cocked her head to the side, considering its current angle. “Conflicted.”
Bianca hummed. “I still don’t understand why they put it up so early. It’s not even December yet.”
More yelling, then the tree lurched sideways, standing straight at a right angle, beautiful and perfect.
“Maybe they’re trying to spread some joy,” Anne said, remembering James’s words.
“That sounds like something my therapist would say,” Bianca murmured. “All right, I have to go. See you soon!”
She hung up before Anne could say goodbye—not that she would have anyway. She was too entranced by the tree, how even unlit, it triggered a warm glow in the center of her chest.
Maybe James was right. Why delay joy?