The Chicken Sisters(42)
Mae considered this statement. Was Barbara about to pull back? She had this sense of balancing on a fine wire, unsure of what lay beneath. So far, Barbara had wholeheartedly and without hesitation bought into Mae’s vision for a quick overhaul. Yes to painting the walls and counter front, yes to carrying everything out of the tiny dining area and deep cleaning it, yes even to dumping the assortment of mismatched paper goods her mother collected.
When Mae suggested they start by sprucing up the patio, Barbara called her friend Patti, now working in the Home and Garden department at Walmart, and asked her to take care of them; now Patti was out there, dropping fresh soil all over the place. Aida, after a warm hug for Mae, was supervising, pointing vigorously with her crutch, avoiding any actual work by gesturing dramatically to her broken foot, which she made look like a stylish accessory.
“We’ll talk later, polpetta,” she said, and hearing her great-aunt call her little meatball—like Grandma Mimi and Mary Cat once did—made Mae blink and look away. Aida reached out to her all the time, actually, asking her about her book, about Sparkling, offering advice from her own TV career that was mostly wildly off base but occasionally on point. She even texted, and Mae suspected her great-aunt had bought the phone purely to communicate with her. Why hadn’t Mae taken the time to answer more often? She would, from now on.
For now, though, Aida’s enthusiastic presence, along with Barbara’s strange mood of cooperation, were far more difficult to manage than Mae’s original plan, which involved something like sending her mother on an errand and then doing everything herself, quietly and without all this input from the peanut gallery. Having more than one cook in the kitchen was every bit as problematic as the proverb said.
But this cleanup was clearly not going to be a solo act. Andy reappeared, followed by Zeus. “How about we paint, and you ladies sort through all the stuff outside?”
Mae glanced at Barbara and saw that her momentary mutinous look was fading. Andy painting was probably the best use of time—if Andy would paint right. She held up the rags and the roll of painter’s tape. “You’ll use these, okay?” She didn’t care if she offended Andy.
Andy took the tape from her hand. “Well, I was planning to just slop paint all over the windows and paint over the dead fly on the sill, but if you insist.”
Mae, already running out of patience, glared at him and held on to her side of the tape roll. “Seriously. The details matter. I want this job done right the first time.”
“He’ll do it right, Mae,” snapped Barbara, and Andy, with a smirk, pulled the tape from Mae’s hand, then relented. “I really will,” he said, too softly for Barbara to hear. “You help your mom sort through stuff, okay?”
When they got outside, though, Barbara didn’t seem to want to go through the things they’d pulled out. She left Mae to it, wandering around instead, helping Patti for a moment, putting her head back into Mimi’s to ask Andy a question, then coming back before wandering off again, often with Aida trailing after her. That was fine, if a little odd. It gave Mae a chance to fill a trash bag with paper plates intended for a child’s birthday party—technically usable but completely unappealing—but it also made her nervous. Could her mother not just settle down, or go somewhere else? Maybe Mae could send her for more coffee, although coffee seemed to be the last thing Barbara needed.
Finally, her mother came and stood next to her for more than an instant, holding the dog-shaped plastic bank the Humane Society provided for gathering contributions. “Do you really think we can win?” she asked softly.
Oh no. No, Mae did not think they could win. She hadn’t even been considering winning. Frannie’s was bigger. It had a full menu, not just five uniformly unhealthy items plus doughnuts on Saturday mornings. It had a bar and a full staff. It was open for regular hours and everything was always available, unlike Mimi’s, where hours and pie choices were subject to Barbara’s whim. Mimi’s had appeal, yes—in Brooklyn it might win a cult following—but here, in the land where Applebee’s ruled, Frannie’s was the Goliath and Mae was short on slingshots. Mae would make Mimi’s look its best, show off what she could do on live camera, and boost her own brand. She did think it would help Mimi’s, but winning? No.
“I don’t know, Mom,” she said carefully. If wanting to win was behind Barbara’s mostly cooperative spirit, Mae didn’t want to tear that down, but neither did she want to set her mother up for a fall. “I didn’t know you were worried about winning.”
“Of course I want to win, Mae. Why else would we do this? That’s a hundred thousand dollars. I’m not just helping the Pogociellos take that home on a silver platter. They don’t need that money, never have. And we do, Mae.” Barbara looked at Mae intently. “We do.”
“Just being on Food Wars will bring more people to Mimi’s, Mom. It’s basically a win even to be asked.”
“That’s not the kind of win I’m talking about, Mae. All this cleaning, painting—this is going to get us a real shot, right? Our food is better; everyone knows it. Theirs is—half of it is frozen. I see that big Sysco truck there all the time. And now Mimi’s will look like it should. So we should win.”
Case closed, apparently. Mae hesitated. Could they win? Last night, looking around, she had spotted families she knew had been eating Mimi’s chicken for generations making the effort to come out for Food Wars. Her mother’s high school baseball sweatshirt had, she knew, been given to her by a grateful team: Barbara had donated the food for a fund-raiser again this year, and not just because baseball was Gus’s sport, and Gus was hands down her favorite family member. She did the same for every team, every year. Frannie’s was more polished. But Mimi’s was special, if Mae could just help the judges see it. And if Frannie’s really served frozen food to the judges, they wouldn’t like that one bit.