Sweetbitter(26)

“Did you want one?”

I shook my head though I very much wanted Jake to make me tea the way I liked it.

“Ah. Well. Do you know what abundance is?”

I shook my head again and plucked another grape.

“You have been taught to live like a prisoner. Don’t take, don’t touch, don’t trust. You were taught that the things of the world are flawed reflections, that they don’t demand the same attention as the world of the spirit. It’s shocking, isn’t it? And yet, the world is abundant—if you invest in it, it will give back to you tenfold.”

“Invest what?”

She spread some cheese on a cracker and nodded while she chewed.

“Your attention, of course.”

“Okay.” I looked closely at the cheese, the grapes. The grapes had a veil of dust on them, the cheese a veil of mold, reminders of the elements that shaped them. The kitchen doors swung open. Jake had not only made it, he’d brought it himself.

“One Assam,” he said. He had brewed it in a tall water glass and lightened it with milk.

“Thank you, darling.”

He surveyed the food Simone had laid out and smirked. He took a grape.

“Is school in session?” he asked, looking between us.

“We’re just having a chat,” she said smoothly.

“A chat over Camembert.” He spit the seeds onto the floor next to my feet. “I wouldn’t trust it, new girl.”

“My love, aren’t you needed?”

“I think I ought to stay put to protect this one. She’s already got quite an appetite for oysters. Ten more minutes with you and she’ll be reciting Proust and demanding caviar for family meal.”

My heart stopped. I thought those oysters were ours. But Simone betrayed nothing. She wore the same satisfied face she had when she accepted compliments from guests at the end of the meal. He was fearless with her. I couldn’t imagine anyone else in the restaurant teasing her to her face.

“I don’t need protection,” I said suddenly. Stupidly. They turned on me, and I shrank.

The same thin-lipped, austere smiles. But through Simone’s eyes, as she appraised him as having the potential to be related to her, I saw a streak of adoration pass and land on him—it was so unmistakable it was almost hued.

“Sometimes I feel like you guys are related or something.”

“Once upon a time,” he said.

“Our families were close,” she explained.

“She was the girl next door—”

“Oh Jesus, Jake—”

“Now she’s my warden—”

“I’m quite benevolent—”

“And omniscient, omnipotent—”

“Yes, it’s quite a burden—”

“And now I’ve got a classic case of Stockholm syndrome.”

Their laughter was closed, held back from me, laughter that ran along a private line. He left abruptly and Simone looked at me.

“Where were we?”

“You’re the girl next door?”

Any lingering lightheartedness faded. That was reserved for him.

“We’re from the Cape. We grew up together in a way.”

“Okay,” I said. “Do you like his girlfriend?”

“Jake’s girlfriend.” She smiled.

“Yeah, that Vanessa or something.”

“I do not know a Vanessa or something. Jake’s a private man. Perhaps you should ask him.”

I reddened and put my hands in my apron, mortified. “I just thought it must matter. If you thought she was cool or whatever. ’Cause you guys are close.”

“Have you thought about what you want from your life?”

“Um. I don’t know. I mean, honestly…”

“Do you hear yourself?”

“What?”

“?‘Cool or whatever,’ ‘Um, I don’t know,’ ‘I mean, honestly.’ Is that any way to speak?”

God, I was melting. “I know. It’s a problem when I’m nervous.”

“It’s an epidemic with women your age. A gross disparity between the way that they speak and the quality of thoughts that they’re having about the world. They are taught to express themselves in slang, in clichés, sarcasm—all of which is weak language. The superficiality of the language colors the experiences, rendering them disposable instead of assimilated. And then to top it all, you call yourselves ‘girls.’?”

“Um…I don’t know what to say now.”

“I’m not attacking you, just calling your attention to it. Isn’t that what we are discussing? Paying attention?”

“Yes.”

“Did I scare you?”

“Yes.”

She laughed and ate a grape.

“You,” she said. She grabbed my wrist and pressed two fingers onto me as if taking my pulse and I stopped breathing. “I know you. I remember you from my youth. You contain multitudes. There is a crush of experience coursing by you. And you want to take every experience on the pulse.”

I didn’t say anything. That was in fact a very eloquent expression of what I wanted.

“I’m giving you permission to take yourself seriously. To take the stuff of this world seriously. And to start having. That’s abundance.”