Granny’s West was every bit as good as Granny’s original restaurant, except it wasn’t quite the drive for locals. It was somewhere you could get a meal that felt home-cooked. Our House was a touch more upscale. Over the past year, Mary Dole had tweaked the menu. One item she added was pizza.
She’d done it right and gotten a brick oven to cook the pizzas. Monical’s used a conveyor-style oven that was very good at creating a consistent pizza. You simply put the raw pizza on the conveyor, the belt would pull the pizza into the oven, and the pizza would come out the other end baked. We’d talked about getting one, but Mary said she wanted the flavor a brick oven added. The crust picked up a smoky, grilled-like taste.
The downside of a brick oven was twofold. First, it took almost an hour to get it to heat up. The cook also had to have more skill to cook in a brick oven because you had to watch it. The upside was that it baked a pizza in about half the time, and I felt it produced a superior pizza. Now, I would be the first to tell you that I absolutely love Monical’s pizza. It’s what I grew up on because you got a lot of pizza at a reasonable price, two things a growing boy can appreciate. Our pizza ran more to the higher end because Mary was a stickler about what ingredients she put on them.
With that said, Monical’s was never going to go out of business. It was better than most other pizza places. And it was family oriented with their Family Pleaser special. That meant another generation of Monical’s fans were growing up on their pizza. At some point, they would have their own families, and the cycle would continue.
“You see that we came here tonight,” I pointed out.
“No, I’m thankful you’re here. I was wondering if you were hiring?” she asked.
“I’ll give you Caryn’s number,” Brook said. “She does all the hiring. Just tell her David sent you.”
“What she said,” I assured her as she looked back and forth between Brook and me.
“Thanks, I’ll do that,” she said and left us to have a good time.
Tami and Sarah showed up. They’d come down from Wesleyan for the weekend. Tami walked up to Tim, kissed him, and then gave him the stink eye.
“What’s this I hear that you plan to help David take pictures of naked girls?”
I played it cool so that Tim wouldn’t know it was me who had sent her a text. That’s when my little plan fell apart.
“What’s she talking about?” Brook asked.
“I, uhm. Well, uhm,” I stammered.
“David has a photography project. It’s supposed to be close-ups of nipples,” Phil said, and then looked nervous. “He made a bunch of the team take their shirts off. I’m a little worried about him.”
I have to give my brother high marks on that one. As guilty as Tim and I acted, I could see Tami and Brook give us both the stink eye.
“Glass houses, dumbass,” I hissed.
Phil stiffened and gave Jill a sheepish look. As I said, he’s a work in progress.
I had to explain what my project was and my brilliant solution. I was happy I’d finished it already.
“What about us?” Jill asked.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“How come you didn’t ask us to be models?”
I blinked a couple of times before I figured out that Jill was teasing me.
◊◊◊
Chapter 47 – Stroke Saturday November 19
Temperatures had plummeted last night, and I woke to dark, angry skies. It was cold enough that there was frost on the grass when I let Duke and Precious out. My pup thought it was the greatest thing. Precious, not so much. After she did her business, she ran to the apartment door and started to meow. I let her in and got Duke’s tennis ball to throw for him.
We played ball until he finally had had enough. By the time we were done, it felt colder out, and it started to snow lightly. It would really suck to play football if it was freezing out.
Everyone must have decided to sleep in because it was just Duke and me in the kitchen this morning. I felt like something hot for breakfast, so I decided to make grits. Mary had suggested that I make them with chicken broth instead of water to give them more flavor. I added heavy cream and shredded cheddar cheese towards the end. The restaurant made a breakfast grit dish topped with crumbled bacon, over-easy eggs, and chopped-up parsley for color. I was about to start the eggs when everyone came downstairs. I think they smelled the coffee and bacon.
Mom got everyone else coffee and me tea. The front gate buzzed, and Dad went to see who it was. He came in with two people I didn’t recognize, but Mom and Peggy smiled when they saw them.
“This is Aaron and Melanie. I believe you’ve met everyone but David,” Dad said.
They must be the help we’d hired. Aaron seemed shy and hesitant; he looked pretty average and must have been right out of college. Melanie was slightly overweight but appeared to be a bundle of energy. She was in her late twenties or early thirties. She walked up to me and smiled.
“Want me to finish that?”
“No, thanks. Grab a cup of coffee and relax. Let me feed you today,” I offered.
