Today she’s eating lunch. Tuna salad again. The breeze is riffling the tops of the trees. Two yards over, the neighbors are painting. Steve, the husband, leans a ladder against the side of the house and it sways and clanks menacingly.
She takes another bite, chewing slowly, and watches out of the corner of her eye as Steve bends over to pick up a paintbrush, then straightens. Steve is a salt-of-the-earth type. He grew up in Harwich, out on the Cape, where his dad ran a boat repair shop and his mom raised him along with three brothers: rowdy, ruddy-cheeked boys who all settled nearby after high school and immediately set about having children. Sometimes they come to visit. She’s met them all separately but still can’t tell them apart in their sameness. They’re all broad-shouldered, with the weatherbeaten skin of someone who grew up on the water.
They all married steely-eyed Irish Catholic girls with milky skin and wavy red hair. (She once asked Steve whether the brothers ever got their wives confused and he laughed so hard—a true guffaw, she thought at the time—that he had to lean against the wire trellis he was installing against their limelight hydrangea bushes.) Whenever one of the brothers pulls up for a visit, a cluster of children tumble from the car, screeching into the backyard to leap on the tire swing and beg Steve’s wife Linda for potato chips and glass bottles of Orangina. The brothers all drink beers and affably shout out at their offspring. “Joe Jr.! Off of the rose beds buddy!” or “Eleanor, gentle with the dog’s ears.”
Steve’s blond hair has gone silvery gray. Privately, she and Hadley agree that he looks like Robert Redford, if Robert Redford was leaner and lankier and had a beaky nose. As for celebrity resemblances, Linda could pass for Andie McDowell, with her dark ringlet curls and kind, crinkly-eyed smile. Linda is from Santa Barbara. (“We’re beach babies from opposite coasts!” she likes to say, beaming, as she squeezes Steve’s hand.) Her parents still live there, running a gourmet food shop that sells flavored olive oils and fancy jams and dried pasta that costs more than a bottle of nice wine.
Steve and Linda seem to possess a deep, quiet contentment in their lives with each other. She suspects part of this is their own centeredness in themselves.
Linda is an artist who does custom watercolor and oil paintings, having stumbled upon an extremely successful niche of creating designs for greeting card companies. She tosses off the question of any existential crisis over creativity and profit: “I’m lucky! The more art in the world, the better. I paint what I love all the time, some of it happens to be work.”
Steve is a contractor who specializes in cabinetry and tile work. “He’s an artist too,” Linda will always say, patting Steve on the knee, as Steve shakes his head. He’s laconic: the quiet cove to Linda’s colorful storm of a personality.
They’re Hadley’s neighbors, but over the years she’s spent enough time with them that she almost considers them family. At first, it was just a few conversations in passing: Linda would stop by to drop off half of a lemon pound cake for Hadley’s mom, and stay for a glass of wine. Steve would notice that one board on the front porch was loose, and come over unannounced to hammer it down.
While he worked, he’d talk—this was his form of communication. You couldn’t crowd him or approach him straight on with questions, or he’d balk and shut down, but as he worked with his hands, he’d open up. In a way, it was Steve she’d learned the most from, even though he said fewer words. He had a poetic, deliberate view of the world and she used to think she should write a book of single sentences of wisdom he’d doled out over the years.
Steve was the one who’d given her the most useful piece of advice about moving on from Henry. “Some people don’t turn on your light. There’s nothing wrong with them, or you. Or you two together. But if you want to be lit up, you both need to find someone else to do it.”
Simple as that. Henry did a lot of things for her: Made her furious, made her want to change everything about herself, made her feel beautiful and important, taught her how to move more confidently through the world. Taught her how to hit a solid squash drop shot, how to mix a Southside cocktail, how to open a beer can with her teeth, how to dress for a cocktail party at a yacht club, how to run hill repeats like the men’s soccer team did at practice.
But he did not light her up. Reframing this as a matter of improper matching, rather than a failure, has allowed her to just…move on. It was a square peg in a round hole, as her dad would say, frowning slightly.
It took meeting someone new to fully illuminate how true this perspective was. The process of moving past Henry was complete when she realized how you could click neatly into place with someone else. That a relationship could be hugely significant—life-changing, as it were, if you were someone who threw that kind of word around—without being heavy.
Henry had been brooding and introspective. His emotions were gray and weighty, like pewter tarnished with the patina of disuse. The prospect of being with someone light, someone who was straightforward with their needs – sleep, a long run, the lamb vindaloo with garlic naan from India Palace – was bliss. And because it was bliss, she couldn’t trust it. She was sure that it was, as they say, too good to be true. The only people she’d ever dated had been of little consequence, and then Henry.
As she thought about this now, sandwich in hand, she noticed Hadley’s mother Caroline standing with Linda in the kitchen—she could see them through the window from the table where she sat in the backyard. As she watched them, Hadley walked in through the gate that led to the driveway and dropped into the seat beside her. She was in running clothes; her hair slicked back with sweat.
“Hey,” she said, swiping a few potato chips from her plate. “I’m going to shower. Mom says we’re supposed to take something to this barbecue tonight, so let’s go to the wine store when I finish and get that paté stuff, the kind with the truffles that Dad likes. Oh! Or maybe that peach jam. I’ll ask her.”
Calling the de Withers’ party tonight “just a barbecue” is like calling a Givenchy ball gown “just a dress.” Technically, they would be barbecuing, but the similarities between that and a casual backyard dinner ended there. The party would be fully catered, with a staff of at least twenty. Miles de Withers was known for his excellent golf game and his even more excellent Scotch collection, so there would be at least two bars set up: one outside on the manicured lawn beside the trimmed border of boxwood bushes edged with azaleas, and one just inside the French doors that separated the living room from the backyard.
Some of Hadley’s high school friends would be there; a handful of them would probably sneak back to smoke a joint behind the white-washed clapboard cottage that housed the pool equipment.
Hadley stands up and wipes her hands on her shorts, then checks her phone. “Fuck! I just got scheduled to be on call next Wednesday night. I promised Mack I’d go to Sarma with him and he’s been trying to get a table forever. Can you take the reservation instead? He won’t stop talking about the lentil chips or whatever it is.”
“Nachos,” she replies. “Lentil nachos. They actually are supposed to be kind of amazing.”
She’s about to continue when Linda leans her head out from the kitchen. “Can you girls come taste this?”
Inside, the kitchen smells like melting chocolate and something warmly bitter, like coffee. Linda and Caroline are standing at the marble island, looking down at something. “So rich!” Linda says, licking her fork, then stabbing it in the air like an orchestra conductor, as if to punctuate her point.
She walks to the island and peers over. A tart sits in a long rectangular pan, the top a snowy landscape of meringue, each pillowy swoop lightly toasted. Chocolate pudding oozes from the center, and crumbs are strewn across the base of the pan where they’ve taken large forkfuls.
“Have a taste,” Linda says thickly through another mouthful. “We skipped plates, no need to stand on ceremony.” Caroline giggles—one of her most sterling qualities is the ease with which she laughs. In this case, it could also be partly thanks to the open bottle of Riesling sitting on the countertop.
(Caroline’s penchant for white wine is growing increasingly apparent; it’s becoming less of an indulgence and more of a crutch, she observes, though she wouldn’t ever bring it up. Drinking white wine is like drinking water amongst her friends—everyone did it, even right after a tennis match, Hadley would quip when she was in a mood to make mincingly critical observations of the social circle of her upbringing. Thomas, Hadley’s father, stopped drinking when she was ten years old after he infamously walked back onto the trading floor after a five martini lunch and stumbled into an entire wall of screens, incurring almost $10,000 in electronic damage. He hasn’t touched a drop since. As he puts it, “There’s an extremely fine line being the comedically drunk one and everyone pitying you. I crossed the line a few too many times.”)
The crust is more reminiscent of shortbread than pie crust, with a sturdy, buttery quality instead of a shatteringly delicate flake. The meringue is as fluffy and sweet as a marshmallow, the torched tips tasting just like the gooey inside of a campfire s’more. She grew up with chocolate pudding from a plastic cup—the kind that tasted largely of sugar with a wan hint of chocolate—so this filling is a revelation. It’s rich and luscious, as if a very fancy cup of hot chocolate was stirred right into it. She hesitates to call it pudding: Something this creamy and velvety deserves a nicer name. Custard? Panna cotta? Or that term people are always bandying about in posh accents on the British Bake-Off—creme pat, that’s it.
“Hadley used to beg me for this chocolate pudding when she was little,” Caroline says. “We’d make it after dinner, and she liked to stand on the stepstool and stir. We kept a can of whipped cream in the refrigerator for pudding nights.”
She knows this because Hadley has told her, but it still shocks her. Hadley’s household is not a Reddi-Whip household. It’s a whipped cream from scratch using heavy cream in a pretty glass jar from a local artisan food shop household. They’re Haagen-Daaz people, not Breyer’s. Sharp Vermont cheddar over American.
Hadley had also told her that they used to fight over who got to squirt the whipped cream onto the warm pudding until her brother Brooks once overenthusiastically wielded the can and sprayed it all over Caroline’s Goyard tote containing her leather Smythson planner. (Brooks had been a bit of a terror until he mellowed out after high school. He now lives in Palo Alto and is married to a peach of a woman named Nina who everyone agrees is a saint for putting up with Brooks and his energy. Nina runs development for the de Young museum and possesses a preternatural calmness despite an admittedly high-powered job and a household of three young children.)
“I used to make it on its own, but it works perfectly as a tart filling. I’m calling it a chocolate meringue tart for tonight, because Bennett would judge me for something as lowbrow as s’mores, but really it’s almost a s’mores tart. Or, if I used a graham cracker crust it would be…” She trails off, thinking about it.
Bennett de Withers is Miles’ wife, and her photo would be displayed next to “consummate hostess” in the dictionary. Bennett will likely be wearing something silk, with an armful of Cartier bangles and a full blowout, but will call her outfit tonight “casual” because she slipped on sandals (Manolo) instead of heels (Louboutin).
Linda chimes in. “Do you know that I never had a s’mores until I met Steve? But it’s actually kind of why we started dating.”
They both look confused. “How is that even possible?” she asks. “That’s like…never having gone swimming. Or never having tasted lemonade.”
Linda shrugs. “My parents were in more of the ‘smoke a joint’ at a beach bonfire camp than the ‘s’mores-for-kids’ camp I guess. But Steve was more aghast than you. I told him that the first time we met, at this party one of his high school friends was throwing in Wellfleet. I can’t even remember why it came up, but it did, and he kept saying I had to try one. The next evening, he pulled up outside the house we were renting—I was there with three girlfriends from college for a weekend trip—and honked. He drove this cool, beat-up old Wagoneer and he’d packed a basket with a blanket, some beers, and everything. He took me to this secluded beach and built a bonfire and showed me how to toast marshmallows. I always tease him now that he never actually asked me on a first date, and I never said yes.”
She loves hearing Linda talk about Steve, and this is the first time she’s heard the story of how they met. The quiet romance of it tracks with what she does know about them: She considers them to be the gold standard of a relationship.
She said as much once to Linda when they were sitting outside one day waiting for Caroline to come home from the garden supply store so they could help her unload the terra cotta pots for her cranesbill geraniums.
“You guys are perfect together,” she said glumly (she was still suffering from a post-Henry malaise at the time). Linda snorted, and then looked at her gently. “I know you think that because you see us now. But no relationship is perfect–even in its best years.” She readjusted herself on the porch swing, tucking her legs beneath her like a teenager, and told her about being married. Steve, it turns out, had had an affair. At three different times in their marriage, he’d picked up with Frances Dorman, his high school girlfriend who still lived three streets over from his parents on the Cape. Frances was in what Linda terms a “complicated marriage” (Linda doesn’t elaborate and she’s hoping to hear more but too polite to ask—was Frances’ husband a mercurial, depressed musician? Was he a hedge fund manager who only came to the Cape on the weekend and refused to emotionally connect? Did he drink too much? Gamble? Was he just an ordinary man married to an ordinary woman in a marriage that had run its course?)
Every time she sees Steve and Linda together she thinks about Frances Dorman. She wonders if the affair still stings, if Linda hurls her name at Steve sometimes in an argument, if Steve ever thinks about it. Probably it’s just a piece of their history, same as the first date beach bonfire: all pieces of the bigger picture of a life together, and on balance you have to decide if the good ones tip in your favor.
Chocolate Meringue Tart
For the crust
56g (4 tablespoons) unsalted butter, softened
3 tablespoons sugar
1 egg yolk
120g (1 cup) all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
For the filling + topping
3 tablespoons cornstarch
2 tablespoons cocoa powder
198g (1 cup) granulated sugar, divided
1/4 teaspoon espresso powder, optional
1/2 teaspoon salt
454g (2 cups) whole milk
113g (4 ounces) dark chocolate (70% or higher)
3 eggs, separated
1 tablespoon butter
To make the crust, preheat the oven to 375° F.
In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, salt, and sugar.
Add the softened butter and egg yolk and stir until well combined. Press the shortbread mixture firmly into a 13-x-4-inch tart pan or a 9-inch pie pan. Prick with a fork and bake for 20 minutes, or until lightly golden brown. Remove from the oven and let cool while you make the filling.
For the filling, whisk together the cornstarch, cocoa powder, 99g (1/2 cup) of sugar, espresso powder (if using), and salt in a saucepan. Whisk in the milk and add the chocolate; bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring to melt the chocolate. Cook until the mixture thickens, then continue to cook for 1 more minute.
In a medium heatproof bowl, whisk together the 3 egg yolks. Slowly pour 1/2 cup of the hot mixture into the egg yolks, whisking constantly. Add the egg mixture back into the saucepan with the rest of the hot ingredients, whisking constantly.
Cook, stirring, for 1 more minute. Remove from the heat and stir in the butter and vanilla. Let the pudding cool completely.
While the pudding cools, make the meringue. Beat the 3 egg whites on high speed until frothy. Slowly add the remaining 99g (1/2 cup) of sugar and continue to beat until stiff peaks form.
Pour the pudding filling into the cooled shortbread crust. Spoon the meringue over top of the filling and smooth it over. Place the pie under a broiler (watch carefully!) until the meringue is toasted, or use a kitchen torch to brown the top. Slice and serve! Keep any leftovers in the refrigerator.