Killer Pancake

“I’m okay, I’m okay,” gagged a still-shivering Julian. “I want to get up. Don’t make me stay down here.”

Tom ordered the cop to get a stretcher in. Two more paramedics appeared and lifted Julian, moaning, to a stretcher. As they moved off, I felt suddenly bereft.

“Where are you going?” I called after them. “When will I hear if he’s okay?”

Tom was at their heels. “Across the street, Southwest Hospital. Don’t tell anybody what happened. I’ll call you later.” And he was gone.

The next two hours passed in a fog. I barely noticed the women I served. I found I could block out the day’s events by focusing, focusing, and focusing again on the food, on the job at hand.

Mercifully, the steamer had stayed closed when I’d heaved it at the angry demonstrator. The bowl of greens was also intact. Without the roast vegetables to garnish and dress the salad, I thinned out the carrot dip with olive oil and balsamic vinegar. The resulting dressing was delicious. I had the ridiculous thought that I should have written down how I’d done it. It was such a trivial thing after what had happened to Claire. Hit-and-run. I wondered who would contact her parents in Australia.

I knew Tom was right, that he could not make a public announcement of Claire’s death to her coworkers at Mignon. Since Julian was the closest American to Claire, Tom was duty-bound to inform him. But Tom had to keep news of the death under wraps in the hope that Claire’s family could be notified by the authorities rather than a journalist in search of a juicy story. The sheriff’s department had a hierarchy of people to notify in the event of sudden death, and they stuck to it. The only folks who managed to screw this up were from the media. One of Arch’s young friends had heard over the radio of his father’s death in a plane crash. The poor child had immediately gone into shock.

Speaking of which, I couldn’t bear recalling Julian’s disbelieving face and his stricken What? What? I felt his absence by the extra amount of work I had to do: clearing dishes, refilling platters, wiping spills off the granite bar. Sometimes engaging in a load of work heals the heart. In this case, it didn’t.

The lunch took an eternity. When it was almost over, a slender, elegant woman with long raven-black hair that contrasted with her sleek beige dress and pale orchid corsage got to her feet. Sending a twinkly smile in the direction of the guests, she announced breathlessly that Mignon was going to show slides of the new line of cosmetics for autumn, and then we would have dessert. The spotlights dimmed, and soon we were looking at the luminous, enlarged faces of stunning women. Then we saw the same lovely females with their fingers caressing suggestively shaped plastic bottles. The bottles were filled with stuff you were supposed to put on your face: Magic Pore-closing Toner with Mediterranean Sea Kelp. Extra-rich Alpine Nighttime Replacement Moisturizer with Goat Placenta. Ultragentle Eye Cream Smoother with Swiss Herbs. It sounded like makeup by Heidi. Then we saw the same dramatically made-up women modeling colors of foundation, blush, lipstick, eyeshadow, and mascara. Strawberry Sundae lipstick. Hot Date blush. Foreplay eyeshadow. S’More mascara. The models’ eyes were half closed and their lips were pursed, as if they were trying to kiss the air, or at least seduce it. When it came time for the lipstick, out came the models’ tongues, just touching the tops of their mouths. The message wasn’t exactly subliminal: Buy these cosmetics and you will get sex. When the slides were over and the lights came up, there was so much clapping, you would have thought they’d just announced the Nobel for Makeup.

I wondered how Julian was doing. I wondered what phase of the investigation the police were in now. Tom had said the state patrol handled traffic, which included hit-and-run. I wondered if the driver who had struck Claire had turned himself in. I tried to imagine where Tom was, what he was dealing with….