Chapter 34
“ S top here!” I shriek as Erica enters our street. I almost forgot the parking risk. I explain my need to stay away from our neighbor cop.
“He can’t be that creepy, Atta,” she says and slows the car to a stop to let me out. I successfully avoid a cop encounter by entering through the backyard sliding door, but I’m exposed shortly after.
The man waiting inside the house is my grandpa, Pops. He looks so young; it’s astonishing.
“Hey, Atta!” Pops says.
“Pops!” I run over to him and he wraps his arms around me in a big hug.
“Pops?” he says and smiles like I’d made a joke. Did you miss me or did you think your old dad would never come home?” Then he whispers in my ear so that the others hovering over the counter next to the oven on the other side of the room can’t hear. “Looks like you found my hideout while I was away. You left a trail; your crossword and a phone I’ve never seen on my desk.” A clever grin sits on his face beneath his long nose and wide-rimmed coke-bottle glasses. I’d been caught. Doubly so. I’d called him “Pops,” which was probably what I called his dad in this time. And he knew I’d been to the secret room behind his closet door and by the way he phrased it, it seemed like 80s-Land me had never been invited in.
At this realization, I’m certain my expression turns apologetic. In Non-80s-Land I’d been sneaking through the coat closet for years, invited in after asking why his closet had a door behind it. He told me I was too curious for my own good but let me treat it as my own Little Narnia ever since, escaping many family board games and awkward conversations, rummaging through his knickknacks, comic books, and memorabilia from hiking across twenty-some countries.
“You’re welcome to it any time as long as you keep it a secret, too. If everyone knows your hideout, what fun is it anymore, you know?” he continues.
“I won’t tell a soul. I promise,” I say with a reassuring smile.
“Start making your dough, Atta! We don’t want to be waiting on you at the end,” Marcie hollers from the stove. Her hands pick at the sticky, wet dough. Davy and Steven coat their hands in it beside her.
“What’s the recipe?” I say taking off my bags and sliding my thick socks gracefully against the hardwood kitchen floor toward the kitchen island.
“You know the rules. You’ve got to memorize your own recipe. No extra help. This is a contest to see who makes the best pasty.”
I’m suddenly annoyed at this added bit of information. My parents had never made a contest out of pasty making. For the few years that my dad was alive, he would add chicken and chilis to half the pasties so they took on the characteristics of an empanada. They’d ask me if I liked the beef, potato, and onion pasty better than the chili pasty peppered with thyme, lemon juice, and parsley, and since I was a child with sensitive taste, I chose the less spicy one every time. After my father passed, my mother continued making them for me, except every single pasty was stuffed with chili and chicken every year thereafter, celebrating his heritage, in his memory.
“I’m collecting the bid. Coming around with the jar,” Erica says, wearing an apron over her habanero red sweater. White powder disguises her hands. They look as if they’ve been dunked in the flour bag. “Starting bid is $15 per person.”
Davy and Steven pull out cash from their pockets, dropping clumps of dough in the mason jar as they let go of the cash. Marcie points to the money on the table. When Erica holds the jar out to collect my money, I tell them I forgot and excuse myself to my room. I know there’s no cash left in there, but I do recall some paper bills in Pops’ filing cabinets.
Pops sits at the head of the table with our names written across his notepad. By the looks of it he must be the judge. I slip past the rest of the family who’s migrated to the sectioned-off quarters that Marcie’s designated for kneading and punching.
I turn the corner, tiptoeing on shag carpet until I reach the closet door to Little Narnia. I open the door and artfully climb past the hanging shirts, careful to not catch the attention of anyone in the household. Atop Pops’ desk is a stack of Tanzanian maps underneath a wedding invite, and to my delight, Marcie’s recipe for classic potato, beef, and onion pasties—the little recipe note card is dirty with edges browned from use and oil drops settled across the old paper. Pops must have been prepared in case he was picked for pasty making rather than judging.
It’s a miracle really. Even if this is considered cheating, I’m using it. It’s better than having Pops taste-test a piece of dough made with the incorrect units of measurement. I quickly memorize the list. On my way out I grab cash from the metal cabinet drawer and head back into the kitchen.
I gather my ingredients as the rest of the crew pinches the edges of their moon-shaped pasties together to keep the contents from oozing out.
One can, out of all the cans on the shelf, calls out to me. Chilis! Marcie has a can of green chilis in the cabinets.
I feel a sense of excitement at the prospect of trying out my Non-80s-Land father’s Spanish pasty dupe. But since there’s only cooked beef on the stove and no chicken in this kitchen, I decide to try something new—a mix of Spain and Scotland if you will.
After adding the inside ingredients to the dough, I pray that the combination of salty pasty batter, beef, potatoes, and green chili tastes alright once baked. I sprinkle in thyme before pinching the ends together as best I can.
Marcie’s pasties are the first to come out of the oven, looking perfectly crafted, each half-moon laying on the tray bed with proportions just as congruent as the next. The boy’s pasties are cooling on the island table, and Erica’s uncooked pasties are glazed in golden butter, creating a reflecting shine like a broken glass mosaic, on the thinly folded meat pockets. Each one of them is dainty and delicate with beautifully sliced air pockets that make them look like little art pieces next to my dough rocks that would only pass if the judge tonight was an ogre.
Marcie puts my tray in the oven and I begin to second-guess the green chili addition. The air slits are leaking green chili juice and it’s being absorbed by the pinched dough, producing a soggy combination that I know I’m not coming back from.
Marcie places Erica’s tray beside mine and turns, giving me a pitiful look while I try to clean up the tray of oozing juice with a few scrapes of my spatula.
“Make sure your little monsters keep a healthy distance from mine,” Erica says as her mouth twists into a devilish smile. She knows she’s already knocked me out of the competition even before the baking’s begun.
Marcie reaches for the Minute Minder kitchen timer that sits next to the bulky phone book on the island counter, setting the ticker for forty minutes.
I take a second glance at the phone book—so thick it looks like it covers the entire state of Colorado—then scurry on over to the counter and jumble through its pages until I find the Schills and Sons address. I find it easy enough, then look to see if Deanna Hurley, Robert Schills’ assistant, the woman Officer Berrett asked about on our second encounter, is listed in the phone book as well.
I almost squeal in excitement when I find Deanna. I check the Minute Minder to see how much time we have left. Twenty minutes. The family’s engrossed in a card game, drooling over pasties they aren’t allowed to touch, so I take the chance to sneak into Little Narnia for the second time this afternoon.
The five-pound book slams onto Pops’ desk with a small thud, making a few papers fly to the floor. I hurry to pick them up, not wanting Pops to become suspicious that I’ve made another mess in his secret area, and notice the gold-laced wedding invitation in the clutches of my hand.
The invitation has the couple’s names on it, a reception date, and Coors Brewery listed as the location. Someone must love Coors enough for them to want to exchange vows next to a factory full of tubes, wires, and barrels.
I connect the phone up to the phone cable with ease—I've conducted this operation before after all, jerry-rigging what I thought would be a successful time hop back home.
I give my plan a go with a few punches of my thumb. The phone rings and connects me with a lady who's voice is as raspy as the static from the line connecting us.
“Hello, Schills & Sons speaking. How may I help you?”
I ask if Robert Schills is available for an interview this weekend, claiming I’m a reporter from The Denver Post wanting to do a follow-up article discussing his progress since our last 1983 article—the article mentioning his transition from golf professional to business man.
“What time?” She says matter-of-factly.
“Three o’clock on Saturday,” I say, throwing out a random time. There is no plan. I'm just shooting my shot where I can. If I felt ballsy enough I might even attempt the interview.
“It looks like Mr. Schills is attending a wedding this weekend at Coors Brewery around that time. Would you be able to request a different time for an interview?” she asks.
Wedding at Coors Brewery. My eyes hit the fancy invitation on the desk before I answer. The invite announces a four o’clock ceremony for all the attendants of Celia Tigard and Bob Garret’s wedding.
I don’t need an excuse for an interview at all. I need to tag along with Pops to this wedding!
“Let me ask my team. I’ll give you a call back tomorrow to schedule another time,” I say before hanging up.
I beam for a moment, feeling like I’ve made considerable progress, then figure I have enough time to sneak in a short call with Ben. I don't know how long this family competition will last tonight and I promised I'd at least call him, but when I dial his number I'm met with a disconnected dial tone followed by a “We’re sorry, you have reached a number that has been disconnected” message.
When I make my way back to the kitchen Marcie is shoveling our pasties off the sheets. It smells amazing. The crisp, flaky, scorched, and buttery crusts smell like baked beef and salted potato. Erica hovers around Pops as he tastes her dish. Her concerns seem to grow as my scorched blocks of burnt green goo threaten to tango with her flawless pies.
“I think we can all agree Atta’s should be fed to the dog—if we had a dog,” Steven says. The table erupts in laughter. My Spanish-Scottish pasty dreams die in humiliation and Pops chooses Erica to be the winner of the mason jar full of money.