to her formidable husband, Beatrix secretly came into the bakery every week anyway for three loaves of sourdough bread. When the bakery began to thrive under Emilienne’s and Wilhelmina’s talented hands, John Griffith sneered at his neighbors, “Any day now you’ll all be traveling by broom.”
Not knowing that with each morning breakfast of toast and eggs, he, too, was making his own contribution to Emilienne’s success.
MOTHERHOOD PROVED bewildering for Emilienne. At only twenty-three years of age, she had already lost her parents, all three siblings, and a husband. She was the sole owner of a now-successful bakery and the sole parent of a little girl whose exhausting exuberance seemed to double with each passing day.
By the time Viviane turned two, Emilienne realized that she’d given birth to a child unlike herself in every way. Whereas Emilienne was dark like her
maman
, with long black hair that she kept wrapped in a thick chignon, Viviane was pale like her father, with wispy thin brown hair framing her cherubic face. To Emilienne, seeing a spider spinning a web was a sign of good luck; to Viviane, a spider was a reason to fetch a jar, preferably one with holes hammered into the lid. There was nothing Roux about Viviane, as far as Emilienne could tell.
Occasionally, Wilhelmina Dovewolf stepped in to take care of my mother — typically when she was sick. It was Wilhelmina’s long braids Viviane reached for in comfort when struck with a case of the stomach flu or a bout of bronchitis. Viviane would later come to connect Wilhelmina’s woodsy scent of dry leaves and incense with a feeling of safety and security.
In the end, Viviane all but raised herself — meals were yesterday’s pastries; baths and bedtimes were rarely enforced. Her childhood was spent amid the scents and sounds of the bakery. It was her sticky fingers that topped the Belgian buns with glazed cherries, her hands that warmed the pie dough. As a toddler, she could easily whip up a batch of
profiteroles
, standing on a chair and calmly filling each
choux
pastry with cream. With barely a sniff of the air, Viviane Lavender could detect the slightest variation in any recipe — a talent that she would perfect in later years. Yes, Viviane spent many hours in the bakery. Her mother barely acknowledged she was there.
The summer before her seventh birthday, Viviane found an old white dress in one of the many forgotten closets in the house at the end of Pinnacle Lane. The dress resembled a child-size wedding gown. Emilienne assumed correctly that the dress once belonged to the young Portuguese girl for whom the house had been built. The First Communion dress was by then yellowed with age and had an inexplicable burn mark down the front. Through the course of the summer, Viviane refused to wear much else. It was subjected to many stains and tears — a blotch of raspberry jam on the collar, a rip along the seam.
It was while wearing this dress that Viviane met her best friend, Jack.
The day they met, Viviane climbed into the branches of a large birch tree in front of the bakery to watch a boy dig a hole in the wild overgrown patch that was his father’s lawn. It was a hole the boy believed would eventually lead him to the remains of King Tut. Burdened by shovels and buckets, the boy woke early each morning to take on what he considered a serious project, one full of routines and hours of dedication and more than anything else, of belief. His day began with a survey of the previous day’s work, a solemn walk around the site, a measuring of the depth of the hole. Buckets went to the left, shovels to the right. Rocks were separated from the dirt; worms and other insects were spared and collected tenderly into one of the buckets reserved solely for such sensitive things. At the end of the day, upon the collapse of the sun, the boy transported each insect from the bucket and placed it gently into the churned ground of his mother’s compost pile.
Of
Not knowing that with each morning breakfast of toast and eggs, he, too, was making his own contribution to Emilienne’s success.
MOTHERHOOD PROVED bewildering for Emilienne. At only twenty-three years of age, she had already lost her parents, all three siblings, and a husband. She was the sole owner of a now-successful bakery and the sole parent of a little girl whose exhausting exuberance seemed to double with each passing day.
By the time Viviane turned two, Emilienne realized that she’d given birth to a child unlike herself in every way. Whereas Emilienne was dark like her
maman
, with long black hair that she kept wrapped in a thick chignon, Viviane was pale like her father, with wispy thin brown hair framing her cherubic face. To Emilienne, seeing a spider spinning a web was a sign of good luck; to Viviane, a spider was a reason to fetch a jar, preferably one with holes hammered into the lid. There was nothing Roux about Viviane, as far as Emilienne could tell.
Occasionally, Wilhelmina Dovewolf stepped in to take care of my mother — typically when she was sick. It was Wilhelmina’s long braids Viviane reached for in comfort when struck with a case of the stomach flu or a bout of bronchitis. Viviane would later come to connect Wilhelmina’s woodsy scent of dry leaves and incense with a feeling of safety and security.
In the end, Viviane all but raised herself — meals were yesterday’s pastries; baths and bedtimes were rarely enforced. Her childhood was spent amid the scents and sounds of the bakery. It was her sticky fingers that topped the Belgian buns with glazed cherries, her hands that warmed the pie dough. As a toddler, she could easily whip up a batch of
profiteroles
, standing on a chair and calmly filling each
choux
pastry with cream. With barely a sniff of the air, Viviane Lavender could detect the slightest variation in any recipe — a talent that she would perfect in later years. Yes, Viviane spent many hours in the bakery. Her mother barely acknowledged she was there.
The summer before her seventh birthday, Viviane found an old white dress in one of the many forgotten closets in the house at the end of Pinnacle Lane. The dress resembled a child-size wedding gown. Emilienne assumed correctly that the dress once belonged to the young Portuguese girl for whom the house had been built. The First Communion dress was by then yellowed with age and had an inexplicable burn mark down the front. Through the course of the summer, Viviane refused to wear much else. It was subjected to many stains and tears — a blotch of raspberry jam on the collar, a rip along the seam.
It was while wearing this dress that Viviane met her best friend, Jack.
The day they met, Viviane climbed into the branches of a large birch tree in front of the bakery to watch a boy dig a hole in the wild overgrown patch that was his father’s lawn. It was a hole the boy believed would eventually lead him to the remains of King Tut. Burdened by shovels and buckets, the boy woke early each morning to take on what he considered a serious project, one full of routines and hours of dedication and more than anything else, of belief. His day began with a survey of the previous day’s work, a solemn walk around the site, a measuring of the depth of the hole. Buckets went to the left, shovels to the right. Rocks were separated from the dirt; worms and other insects were spared and collected tenderly into one of the buckets reserved solely for such sensitive things. At the end of the day, upon the collapse of the sun, the boy transported each insect from the bucket and placed it gently into the churned ground of his mother’s compost pile.
Of
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