Running Through the Words, 14

Fourteen.

There was a time when the house smelled always of baked goods. If the kitchen was a canvas, then the Italian woman, with her long hair tucked up under a bandana and her forehead streaked with flour, was the artist who created masterpieces within its walls. The house remembers the pleased exhalation of air each time a pie, baked to perfection, was pulled from the oven; it remembers the soft chuckle that escaped her each time a sample of soup had just the right amount of spice. It remembers, too, the rush of footsteps on the stairs whenever a fresh batch of cookies was relocated to the cooling rack. The sweet aroma of chocolate seemed to waft through the whole house, infiltrating rooms the family wasn’t even aware of.

The house had been surprised when a child arrived. In the past, the new life had been expected, but this time, the baby appeared without warning. The belly of the sugar-scented woman hadn’t grown big and round. Instead, the infant had been delivered by a pretty lady with sad eyes. She’d handed the cooing bundle to the man—a kind fellow who often smoked a pipe in the evenings—and, crying, had then walked away. The house, unable to discern words and dialogue, knew only the emotions being felt in that moment: overwhelming sadness, shame, and regret.

The sugar-scented woman raised the child as if she were her own. And the man… Well, it was obvious that the child was his. They shared the same quizzical expressions when contemplating a problem, and when they laughed, they both placed a hand on their belly as if to feel the joy. And when the second child arrived, decades later, she and the man had a lot of similarities too. But it was the sugar-scented woman the house observed the most. It was the sugar-scented woman who fed both children with love and comfort and warmth.

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Isabella Crocetti Lane

I no a-grow up in Lake Caywood; I come a-here when I just a young girl, after meeting my Jasper. He visit California after the war—probably nineteen forty-six, I think—and come into my papa’s bar. It called Babbo’s, because that’s a-what I call my papa. He order a beer, and then another, and I not a-sure how many drinks he and my papa share! It a lot, though, because Babbo, he bring-a him home for dinner that night and I make-a a pizza. I think that’s a-why Jasper like-a me so much: my cooking, it a-tempt him.

We not together very long before we marry. My Jasper, he stay in California for a lot of months. Three, maybe. And then we drive-a back to this small town together. But in California? That’s when he propose. He get down on a knee right there in the kitchen one night. I in the middle of making a-gnocchi, you know, with my hair a-frizzed and flour all over! And Jasper, he a-walk over to me and kiss-a my cheek, and then he pull a ring from his pocket. “Bella,” he say to me, and go down on his knee. “Bella, I would want to call you my wife. Will you say yes please?” And I do say it to him; I tell him yes right-a then and there.

Our wedding, it not big. No one from Jasper’s side of the family come to it; he not have many relative, you know, and so we get a-married in front of my mamma and Babbo and my brother Antonio. My cousin, Maria, she come-a too with her husband and baby girl. We have a big meal with many pasta and gelato for dessert.

For our honeymoon, we drive east. Jasper, he show me all the pretty places along the way, like the mountain and the sunset and the big geyser at Yellowstone National Park. And when we get to the town he love, Lake Caywood, we find this farmhouse and buy it. You see, my papa—my Babbo—he a very wealthy man and he like-a my Jasper very much, so he give us the money we use to start a home.

My Jasper, he hire a lot of men to work the land. Sometime he help them with the planting and the picking, but he mostly like-a to grow his hops. Like my Babbo, Jasper like a-brewing the beer. He make a lot of good things in his barn, always mixing flavors and making things to try. “Come here, Bella,” he always be saying. “Try this stout!” Or “Taste this lager!” My Jasper, he something like a-me that way… only I make a lot of good things in the kitchen, not the barn! Ha!

We married not long—few months a-living in the farmhouse, no more—when we get our baby. Fiona, her name. Dark ringlets and chubby, chubby legs! She so cute, but she so wild and have such a strong will, you know? She take-a after her papa that way, always a-doing what she want to do. But she a good child. She grow up to be a good woman, too, even though she give me grey hair when she a young adult! My Jasper and me, we send her to school and she earn a degree, but it don’t keep her from trouble. Fiona, she always into something. For a while, she travel with a band, I remember. They go all over the place, up and down the coast, camping and singing and probably a-doing the drugs, even though I tell her that-a not so smart… But she wise up when she get pregnant. That’s a-when she come home to us. Not to the house, no, but to Pennsylvania, and she have a baby girl she name Charlotte. Charley.

They live not too far from us, and my Jasper and me, we see them a lot. Fiona, she never tell us who the papa of her baby is. I think-a maybe she don’t know… Ha! Like I say, she wild when she young.

Fiona not too old when she die. It a-happen in the snow one night. She a-driving when she skid on some ice. My Jasper and me, we take Charley after that. We raise her like she our own. I teach her to make a lot of things: sour cream peach pie, strawberry shortcake, blueberry cobbler… She learn all my secrets in the kitchen, but she don’t really love-a to bake like her Noni. The one who like to bake is the little boy she used to babysit. Addy. He a-come around a lot, and he still use a lot of the recipes I show him all-a those years ago. Charley, she make-a him get a degree in culinary, she did. She love that boy.

Charley also love-a the beer, just like her Gramps. They sit in the barn together all the time, and when my Jasper plant his hops, Charley a-right there with him, asking all a-kind of question about things I know not much about. She have a sweet tooth, yes, but she have a beer tooth even more!

When my Jasper and me first a-come to the house, we do a little work outside. He take care of the orchard and the barn; I take care of the garden. It a funny thing, that garden: everything in A-B-C order. Basil, carrot, celery, cucumber, eggplant… I no understand why, but it make-a me laugh so I keep it that-a way. Charley, she help me sometime, but she never like to pull-a the weeds. She a-like it when it time to pick the tomato, though! We make a lot of sauce, Charley and me. I teach her that a peach give the flavor a better sweetness than sugar. I teach Addy that too.

Charley leave home when she go to college. She not come back much after that, just for holidays sometime, and my Jasper and me, we learn to get along without her. I know it very hard for him; he miss talking about beer and sharing what he make with her. He a-miss showing her off at the big party we host every year. It a New Year’s Eve party and we invite the whole town. I bake and bake and bake! The kitchen get a-steamy with heat and it smell-a so good it make your mouth water! The whole town invited… and every year, just about the whole town show up! I make-a my gnocchi because Charley love it so much; I make it even when she stop coming home to eat it.

That New Year’s Eve party when the house really show-a its personality. Lake Caywood not a big town, but it big enough to not fit in one house! And yet… the town, it always fit because the house make-a room for all the people. It become a thing we always do. Every year, we do it. Every year, Dorothy Kirkland show up with her chocolate cupcake topped with peanut butter frosting and Ruby Gallagher, she bring a-fancy cookie with the lavender she a-grow in her garden. Mr. Doc, he bring a big plate of sweet potato fries. He make a-them very, very salty. They always a big hit!

Kirby, Jasper’s brother, he come too, and around that time of a-year he bring along a big bottle of bubble bath that smell-a like roses. “For you,” he say to me each a-year. “Because you been on your feet for days and need to rest. You need to soak your bones,” he tell-a me all the time. Kirby, he a really thoughtful man. He always giving me little gifts like that.

Jasper stop doing the big party when I gone. He lose his way a bit, I think, with Charley gone a lot and then me gone forever. The house, it get dim around that time. It don’t shine again, really, until Charley come home.

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Every now and again, even when no one was around to bake, a very faint scent of cinnamon might waft through the abandoned rooms of the house. And every now and again, despite the home being uninhabited, there was a warmth that resonated from the unused oven. Because every now and again, even though the old farmhouse was technically empty, there were several spirits still haunting it.