Distemper by Beth Saulnier Read Free Book Online Page A

totally.”
    I turned around to see what he was leering at. Emma. “You picking favorites?”
    “Me? Never.”
    “Look, I don’t give a damn who you’re banging. But would you please not make my life a living hell?”
    He kept looking over my head at her—this wasn’t hard, since he’s thirteen inches taller—and raised his wineglass toward her
     in a come-hither toast. “Me? Never.”
    “I would appreciate it if you didn’t turn my living room into a singles bar.”
    “Me? N…”
    “Oh, shut up, Mad. You know the drill. To wit: you drill her, she gets all grabby, you flee, I pick up the scraps.”
    “What if I have serious intentions?”
    “You? Never. Now would you hand me the linguine?”I threw four pounds of pasta into my big Calphalon pot with the built-in strainer. It’s worth more than my car.
    “Yo, who’s got the vino?” O’Shaunessey said as he sauntered into the kitchen. “And how about some food action? Children are
     starving someplace.”
    I’ve been feeding most of the
Monitor
newsroom every Thursday night for the past couple of years. At this point, it’s kind of gone beyond tradition into obsession.
     I start getting menu requests on Monday, and when there’s some big story that keeps us at the paper until deadline, the thing
     has been known to start at midnight and go until four A.M. I warned my housemates about it when I moved in, and they said
     it was fine with them as long as they got to eat free. Journalists are creatures of habit, though, and my old roommate Dirk
     and his partner still have to put a sign on the door every Thursday that says BERNIER FOOD ORGY AT NEW LOCATION .
    That night I was trying a new recipe for diavolo sauce, which, as the name implies, is hot as hell. I’m physically incapable
     of cooking for less than twenty people, so I’d quadrupled the recipe. This meant four full heads of garlic and eight teaspoons
     of dried pepper flakes. I tested the pasta to make sure it was done and had Mad pull the strainer out and shake off the excess
     water, since my left wrist was still out of commission. He mixed it up with the sauce, put it on the counter with a stack
     of bowls and silverware, and grabbed the six loaves of garlic bread out of the oven with his bare hands, as oven mitts are
     for wimps.
    “Thanks for helping.”
    “Emma says chicks think cooking is sexy.”
    “I see.” I went over to the far side of the living room and yelled that the food was ready. This kitchen is waysmaller than my last one, and I learned the hard way that once the hordes start coming in, there’s no getting out until they’re
     done. Everybody made for the food so fast the house practically tilted. Along with all three of my female housemates, there
     was Melissa, a
Monitor
photographer who likes to shoot things from weird tilty angles, which makes them art; the Dixie-born business writer, Marshall,
     and his wife, Charlotte, who is presently out-to-here pregnant; the two guys who make up O’Shaunessey’s entire sports staff;
     Wendell, the photo editor, who spends most of his time at the local Buddhist temple but occasionally eats with us if we promise
     to cook vegan; Maggie, who just got promoted to anchor for the local TV news but would give a major organ for a slave job
     at CNN; a couple of radio reporters; and various interns, spouses, and significant others.
    Okay, it was a mob scene. But it was
my
mob scene.
    Everybody eventually settled throughout the living room, and those who got stuck on the floor had to eat with one hand and
     fend off dogs with the other. Shortly thereafter most of them were begging for Kleenex and gulping down their wine. I was
     wondering if maybe I’d put just an eensy bit too much pepper in when the doorbell rang and Marci got up to get it. The dogs
     glanced back and forth between the door and the food and decided to stick with a sure thing.
    “Hey, where’s Junior?” I asked. “Anybody seen him? Don’t tell me he’s bailed