If you’re reading this, stop. Unless something bad has happened, in which case, screw it. I’m obviously not there anymore to stop you.
I hope I didn’t make a big deal out of dying. Hope there were no last minute confessions or wistful wishes that I’d seen more sunrises. If I did succumb to those clichés and killed everyone’s vibe, I’m sorry. If I didn’t? Well, bully for me. But I’m succumbing now, in this book, because I’ve had too much bourbon.
Oh, come on. At least pretend to be scandalized.
So, here goes. I love my kids. I love that I didn’t have to say it every day for them to know it. To be comfortable in it. But looking back—hindsight is more like 40/40 when you’re about to croak—I know I only fixed minuscule problems and ignored the mammoth ones. I never cooked family dinners, which is pretty damn ironic when you think about it. I am—or was—a culinary genius, after all.
People make dying wishes and their loved ones carry them out. That’s how it works, right? Well, I don’t wish to put that weight on my kids. But I have no such qualms with a cheap notebook I bought at Rite Aid. So here it is. My. Dying. Wish.
Please be patient and try to remember that I often have—or had, rather—a plan.
When I was eighteen, I spent a year in New York City. On New Year’s Day in 1984, I jumped into the icy waters of the Atlantic with the Coney Island Polar Bear Club. I was a guest of a guest of a guest, as eighteen-year-olds trying to make their way in New York often are.
Now here’s where shit gets corny—apologies to my daughter, Rita, who of my four children, will likely find and read this first. See? I paid attention sometimes.
As I was saying.
Clarksons. I’m still coming down from those phone calls.
To Eagle at Aquila Editing, thank you for beta reading this book and giving great notes, as always. Your insight means a lot to me.
When I walked back up onto that Coney Island beach, dripping wet and exhilarated, I could see my future. It wasn’t perfect, but I glimpsed it. It glimpsed me back. I could see where I was going. How I would get there. Who would be beside me.
My life changed that day. If I had one wish, it would be for my four children, Belmont, Rita, Aaron, and Peggy, to jump into that same ocean, on that same beach, on New Year’s Day.
Together.
Knowing I’m right there with them.
And no, Rita, I’m not joking. How dare you question a dead woman.
The roof! The roof! The roof is...literally on fire.
Rita Clarkson stood across the street from Wayfare, the three-star Michelin restaurant her mother had made a culinary sensation, and watched it sizzle, pop, and whoosh into a smoking heap. A well-meaning citizen had wrapped a blanket around her shoulders at some point, which struck her as odd. Who needed warming up this close to a structural fire? The egg-coated whisk still clutched in her right hand prevented her from pulling the blanket closer, but she couldn’t force herself to set aside the utensil. It was all that remained of Wayfare, four walls that had witnessed her professional triumphs.
Or failures, more like. There had been way more of those.
Tonight’s dinner-service plans had been ambitious. After a three-week absence from the restaurant, during which she’d participated in the reality television cooking show In the Heat of the Bite—and been booted off—Rita had been determined to swing for the fences her first night back. An attempt to overcompensate? Sure. When you’ve flamed out in spectacular fashion in front of a national TV audience over a fucking cheese soufflé, redemption is a must.
She could still see her own rapturous expression reflecting back from the stainless steel as she’d carefully lowered the oven door, hot television camera lights making her neck perspire, the boom mic dangling above. It was the kind of soufflé a chef dreamed about, or admired in the glossy pages of Bon Appétit magazine. Puffed up, tantalizing. Edible sex. With only three contestants left in the competition, she’d secured her place in the finals. Weeks of “fast-fire challenges” and bunking with neurotic chefs who slept with knives—all worth it, just to be the owner of this soufflé. A veritable feat of culinary strength.