Finding Miranda

CHAPTER 19: THE SUPPER

The following evening Miranda returned from work to find Dave sitting patiently beside her driveway. When she emerged from her tiny car, Dave jogged to her and sat, looking into her face. He carried a rolled sheet of paper in his teeth.

"Hey, Dave, sweetie," said Miranda, patting his head and scratching the soft dimple behind his ear. "Is that for me?"

She gently grasped the rolled paper, and Dave released it into her hand. The message, unfurled, read, "Your kitchen is toast. Have dinner with us. Come as you are." It was signed "P., S., & D."

Miranda laughed. "I guess you're my escort?" she said to Dave. "In that case, 'Lead on, McDuff.'"

"Whupf," snuffed Dave, and he began padding toward the back hedge.

"Oh, you don't like Shakespeare. Too pretentious?" said Miranda, following him across the yard.

Moments later the Krausse kitchen door swung open just as Dave and Miranda approached it. "Been listening for you," said Shepard, gesturing for her to enter.

"I appreciate the invitation," she said. "To tell the truth, I hadn't given a thought to what I was going to do about dinner. I keep forgetting I don't have a kitchen. Ooh, what smells so delectable in here?"

"I'ma make you my grandmother's especial torta rustica, with super secret ingredient. You gonna love it," Pietro spoke from his place at the stove. He wore a red apron that covered him from armpits to knees.

Miranda translated the Italian words embroidered on the apron: " 'Cooking lasts longer than kissing?' And what, sir chef, do you mean by that, exactly?"

Pietro looked up from the pot he was stirring and grinned at her. "It means if you smart, you don't marry the pretty one," he nodded toward Shepard and winked, "you marry the one who can cook."

"Watch it, buddy," snarled Shepard.

"Calm down, Thor," said Pietro. "We just talkin' about my apron."

"Your apron, my a—"

"Shepard!" Miranda interrupted, feigning outrage. "If you intend to propose to me every time you speak to me, you can hardly complain if someone else does it, too, now can you?" She winked at Pietro.

Shepard opened his mouth as if to argue, then closed it and pulled back a chair for Miranda. "Have a seat, Castor Bean. What can I get you to drink?"

"Thank you," she said, taking her place at the table. As Shep settled her chair, she asked, "What are you two drinking?"

"Iced tea," Shep answered. "We have to leave for work after dinner."

Pietro announced, "Everybody sit! It'sa perfect right now. In ten minutes will be ruined. Sit! Sit!"

"You sit! I'm getting the tea," Shepard said.

"Velocemente! I'ma serve the plates!" snapped Pietro.

Shepard said something rude in Italian. Pietro ignored him. Miranda laughed. Dave went to his waiting food dish and sat beside it.

....

As they consumed Pietro's culinary masterpiece—which indeed it was—they enjoyed talking in first one language, then another. Miranda held her own in four of the languages, though her accent was admittedly imperfect. Pietro and Shepard knew a smattering of Russian, Turkish, even Hebrew, but when they discovered Miranda wasn't keeping up, they quickly changed to a tongue with which she was familiar.