Lovesick by James Driggers Read Free Book Online Page A

assortment of biscuit cutters.”
    â€œYes,” he said. “Those are easy enough to come by. In a pinch, you can use the lip of a cup, but a sharper edge is better. Cuts the dough instead of pressing it out.”
    She copied the recipe from his notebook. His script was straightforward, without flourish—practical. She had no difficulty in reading it. Nevertheless, he kept looking over her shoulder to make sure she had the measurements correct. “Now, my mam, she could mix and measure in her hands—had the feel for it. That’s how she taught me. I can do it, too, but that takes time to learn. So I figured all these out for you. Did the measurements till you learn. Made sure they were right. You have some room to vary a bit if you’re making a gravy or a stew. But not with baking. Plus, you can taste a stew. With a biscuit, you can mix it up so it looks just like it did every time before, but if you got one or two things off, you might as well bake a pie made of road apples. Taste will be about the same.”
    Before they ever began to bake, he had her learn the measurements by heart. She would pour a tablespoon of salt into her palm. “Feel it. See how it looks when you cup your hand or if you have your hand held flat.” Then they would pour the salt back into a bowl and she would scoop what she imagined was the same amount. When she would get it wrong, he would chastise her: “You have to know this, Miss Virginia. Like when I was in the army. They had us put together our rifles and take ’em apart again a hundred times. So you could do it in your sleep. Then they took ’em all away from us when we left basic. It’s one thing to teach a colored man to put together a gun, it’s another to let him have one in his hands.”
    She practiced the measurements daily for the entire week after her first lesson, and he seemed pleased enough with her when he returned. The making of the biscuits proved more difficult. The lard had to be chilled, cubed, chilled again. It took a while for her to get the sizes correct. And then there was the cutting in. He sifted flour, sugar, salt, and baking powder into a bowl and crumbled the chilled white lard on top. “Some will want to use self-rising flour,” he said. “I don’t believe in it myself. Like to add my own salt and my own baking powder.” When he spoke about the ingredients, he seemed somehow to be more alive, like each element’s purpose was special to him.
    Then, picking two dinner knives from the drawer, he began crisscrossing them rapidly, the gentle zing of the blades barely touching as he incorporated the lard into the flour. When he handed her the knives, he indicated she should repeat the motion.
    She tried, but failed miserably at it. After a half-dozen botched attempts, Mona pulled a small pastry blender from the drawer.
    â€œIt’s what I use,” she said. “It’s what they will use. Stop being such a show-off.”
    George relented. Virginia couldn’t help but notice how he deferred to Mona in such details, acted as if he wanted to please her, win her approval. It bothered Virginia that he was twice the girl’s age, but there was nothing she could do about that. Mona had been the go-between in arranging the cooking lessons. She would carry a note to the Residence with a request for a cake or a pie—usually one George had prearranged with her. George would bring the item at an appointed time and then give Virginia a lesson. Mona would sit watching, slunk into a chair, drinking coffee or nibbling at the cake or pie George had brought. An ill breeze hovered in the air between Virginia and the girl. Virginia knew that Butcher could feel it, and worked hard to include her in the conversation. Whenever he asked whether she liked it, she would shrug. “I like store bought,” she would say sometimes, and Virginia had the distinct impression it was meant just to