“Did she like to cook?”
The question seemed to leave Vernon nonplussed. He moved the broom back and forth over a patch of floor he’d already swept, looking puzzled. “I don’t know,” he finally said. “She did it—you know, your steaks and your chops and what have you. Meatloaf. She made a fine meatloaf.” He paused, still sweeping. “I don’t know if she liked it. She didn’t complain.”
“Well, I love to cook,” said Daisy. “I think it’s fun. And can be an expression of creativity. Like art.”
“Art,” Vernon said, his upper lip curling. “Art that ends up in the crapper the next morning. Pardon my French.”
“Preparing a meal,” Daisy continued doggedly, “is a way of showing people that you love them. You’re showing them you care. You’re offering them sustenance.”
“Money is sustenance. Food is just food,” Vernon said.
“And, for a single person, cooking a nice meal, setting the table, and taking time to eat can be a way of taking care of yourself.”
Vernon scowled. “I don’t need taking care of.” The way his lips twisted made Daisy wonder if his sons had proposed some kind of long-term-care arrangement after his wife had died.
“Hal and Jeremy, they wanted to put me in one of those places,” Vernon said. Bingo, thought Daisy. “？‘Assisted living,’ they call it. You start out in a house or an apartment, and six months later you’re in an old folks’ home. Well, I don’t need any assistance. I can look after myself.” He gave her a baleful look. “That’s why I said it was okay for you to come. I don’t want Hal thinking I can’t feed myself.” Another glare. “I’ve been getting along fine.”
Daisy thought of the rotted Chinese food and the chunky milk and kept her mouth shut.
“What’s wrong with takeout?” Vernon demanded.
“It’s not the healthiest option.”
He pursed his lips, like he was tasting something unpleasant. “At my age, I should worry about health?”
“And,” said Daisy, “it’s not the most economical. I’ve read,” she said, lying glibly, “that a single person who eats out three or four nights a week can save up to five hundred dollars a month by cooking those meals at home.”
That caught Vernon’s attention, just the way she’d hoped it would. “Really?”
She put her hand on her heart. “Swear to God.”
He sucked his dentures, then sighed. “All right,” he said. “Lead on, Macduff. At least it’ll get Hal off my back.”
Together, they scrubbed the kitchen spotless. She showed him how to operate his coffee maker, and how to set its timer so it would brew coffee for him every morning, and taught him how to make his favorite breakfast of eggs over easy and bacon and his favorite lunch, which was a patty melt, and his favorite dinner, which was steak. She seared his rib eye in a cast-iron pan, and instructed him as he scraped up the browned bits from the bottom of the pan, then added butter and flour and red wine and cranked up the heat to a boil. “Once it’s reduced, you can add some fresh herbs and some more butter and you’ve got a sauce.”
“Huh.” Vernon didn’t exactly look impressed, but he didn’t look unimpressed, either. Daisy pulled the potato she’d baked out of the oven, gave a handful of sugar snap peas a quick blanch in boiling salted water, and mounded them on the plate, next to his steak and potato. “See? Doesn’t that look nice? You’ve got to give a plate a little color.”
“No,” said Vernon, picking up his knife and fork, “you don’t.”
At the end of the lesson, Daisy gave him the printouts of menus and recipes that she’d brought with her, and the address of a website where he could buy a cast-iron pan. When the lesson was over, he’d said, gruffly, “You’re a fine young lady,” and pressed a hundred-dollar bill into her hand. Then he’d eyed her carefully, as if she were a horse he was about to bid on at auction. She was ready for him to ask to see her teeth, wondering if he’d proposition her.
“Are you married?” Vernon asked.
Oh, here we go, Daisy thought. Vernon smirked at her.
“Not me. My son. Hal’s an attorney.” Vernon was already heading to his desk, in search of pen and paper. “I bet he’d love to meet a girl who can cook.” He’d handed Daisy a heavy piece of stationery, embossed with his initials, and a phone number written below. “Call him, don’t call him. It’s up to you.”