A Recipe for Daphne Nektaria Anastasiadou (the rosie project .TXT) 📖

On Monday evening, after completing his cake orders and regular tasks, Kosmas experimented with variations of the light choux pastry dough, different-flavored creams, and fondant icings. By Wednesday, he had gone through so much butter, flour, and chocolate, so many eggs and nuts, that Uncle Mustafa feared they would have to place special orders so that the bakery would have enough supplies to finish the month. On Thursday at teatime, Uncle Mustafa and his friends gathered to critique the day’s experiments: “Good, but not like it was,” they said. “Pretty, but not like it was. Almost, but not quite.” Kosmas repeated his mantra to himself: İdare. You can manage this.

He passed Thursday and Friday nights at work, struggling not only with Hamdi’s Ottoman script, but also with the challenge of achieving a taste that he had only heard about and never experienced. All the while, memories of Daphne—the smoothness of her skin on the inside of her thighs, the way her hands fit completely inside his, and the lovemaking that had occurred atop the very table on which he worked—kept breaking his concentration and causing his hands to tremble. On the night before Daphne’s expected arrival, Kosmas was so tired that he could hardly stand up. He had to pull a stool to the counter in order to pipe the last creams. Sometime past ten, he stepped outside to calm his nerves with a shot of raki. As he sat in the alley, listening to the scratching of the crickets in the sidewalk weeds and the angry yakking of the seagulls that nested on the building’s roof, Uncle Mustafa opened his bedroom window and called, “Shall I come down?”

“Don’t trouble yourself,” said Kosmas. “I probably didn’t get it this time either.”

“I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

Uncle Mustafa descended in black loafers and pajamas, cut the pastry with the care of a contest judge, and inhaled. “A delicate balance of discreet flavors,” he said. “Firm but thin pastry. From the scent I’d say you used the organic flour, didn’t you?” He took a small bite, closed his eyes, moved it around his mouth, and pronounced his verdict with a blind smile: “This takes me back in time.”

Kosmas grabbed Uncle Mustafa’s shoulders, kissed his waxy forehead, and stepped out into the alleyway. He stretched his hands up to the navy blue sky. “Thank you,” he whispered, turning in circles.

Uncle Mustafa called Muharrem the candy-maker. He also rang the doorbells at the nearby apartment blocks where his brother and backgammon partner lived. Then he put the teapot on the stove for their expected visitors and made a strong double coffee for Kosmas, whose hands were shaking from fatigue and over-excitement. Only with an immense effort did Kosmas manage to sip the coffee without spilling too much of it into the saucer.

Ten minutes later, Muharrem arrived, wearing his white lab coat. His expression was inquisitive and serious, like that of a doctor making a bedside visit to an ailing patient.

“Thanks so much for coming,” said Kosmas. “I’m so sorry for the late—”

Muharrem held up his hand to quiet Kosmas and said in French, “Que’est-ce qu’il y a?” What’s the matter?

Uncle Mustafa served him a slice of the pastry. “Your opinion, Master,” he said.

Muharrem’s white mustache prevented Kosmas from seeing whether he smiled or not, but his eyes brightened. He washed his hands, like a surgeon preparing for a procedure, carefully picked up a clean fork from the steel counter, and swirled it in the creams. “Excellent consistency.” He took a bite. “And it seems to me—from the cardamom, which adds a hint of supplication—that you’re not just trying to win the lady, but to win her back?”

“Yes,” said Kosmas. “But I was only following the recipe, so I can’t claim that I actually intended—”

“Even following is a creative process,” said Muharrem, decisively.

“Did I get it right?

Muharrem took another bite. “From a historical standpoint, yes. This is a very nice version. From a romantic standpoint . . . why don’t you ask these fellows?”

Two pajama-clad old men filed inside. They rubbed their eyes and gratefully took the teas that Uncle Mustafa passed out. A few minutes later, after the caffeine and fluorescent lights had awakened them from their television-watching stupor, they tasted the Balkanik.

Uncle Mustafa’s backgammon partner—a withered man in a white prayer cap—leaned dreamily back against the refrigerator and said, “This reminds me of Eleni, my first love. We kissed in the boiler room while playing hide-and-seek.”

Uncle Mustafa’s fat brother sat down on a box of almond flour, causing Kosmas and Uncle Mustafa to exchange fearful glances about the fate of the box’s contents. He said, “It reminds me of my neighbor, Janet Benchimol. She broke my heart when she packed off to Israel.”

Uncle Mustafa said, “It’s everything we lost.”

Κοsmas slid his hands into his hair, pulling at its roots until it hurt. The pain meant that this was real, that he hadn’t fallen asleep and dreamed his success.

“The most important opinion, however,” said Muharrem, “will be hers.”

Eleven hours later, only four and a half of which were spent in fitful sleep, Kosmas stepped into Neighbor’s House, said good morning to the young employees setting up behind the counter, and proceeded to the patio, where Julien sat at the only table ready for customers. Kosmas carefully set a fresh, boxed-up Balkanik on the table and collapsed into one of the canvas patio chairs.

“What’s that?” asked Julien.

“A treat I made this morning,” said Kosmas. “For Daphne’s name day.”

Julien opened the flap of his wool overcoat and revealed the jacket of a double-breasted suit. “I put on my Sunday best for the occasion, and I looked so good that I got nostalgic for a Catholic mass. But San Antonio smelled like a goddamn funeral, and the dull hymns almost put me to sleep. I didn’t feel any of the sanctity I remember from my childhood. So I came straight to Neighbor’s House to keep company with the bones.”