“I’d like a grilled cheese,” she said.
Joey’s face did something complicated. “You want me to make you a grilled cheese.”
“That’s generally how ordering works, yes.”
“It’s just—you invented our grilled cheese. You eating one I made is like... I don’t know, Michelangelo critiquing a finger painting.”
“I’m hardly Michelangelo.”
“You’re Michelangelo to me.”
Margo felt a flush of warmth for this anxious, earnest boy who had become so much a part of her family. “Make me the sandwich, Joey. I promise not to critique.”
He disappeared into the kitchen. Margo heard the familiar sounds — the sizzle of butter, the soft thud of bread on the grill, the scrape of the spatula. She’d made those sounds herself for fifty years. They were as familiar as her own heartbeat.
Bernie appeared at the stool beside her.
“Checking up on things?”
“Having coffee.”
“Mm-hm.” He settled onto the stool with the careful movements of a man whose body had opinions. “Tyler told you what I said? About Mrs. Patterson?”
“He did.”
Bernie nodded slowly. “Thirty-seven years. And now it’s ‘fine.’”
Before Margo could respond, Joey emerged with her sandwich. He set it down with the reverence of an altar offering — perfectly golden, perfectly cut, steam rising from the melted cheese.
“I followed your recipe exactly,” he said. “Same bread, same butter, same cheese, same temperature, same timing. Everything the same.”
Margo picked up one half. The weight was right. The color was right. The smell was right.
She took a bite.
And there it was.
The sandwich was good. Technically correct. All the right elements in all the right proportions. But Bernie was right—something was missing. Some ineffable quality that turned good into perfect, food into comfort, a meal into a memory.
“Well?” Joey asked, barely breathing.
Margo set down the sandwich. “It’s very good.”
“But?”
“But nothing. It’s very good.”
Joey’s shoulders slumped. “Very good isn’t good enough. I know. I can taste it too.” He braced his hands on the counter. “I just don’t know how to fix it.”
Margo was quiet for a moment. Then she pulled out her phone.
“Joey, is Tyler here?”
“In the back. Going over schedules.”
“And Meg?”
“San Clemente today. But she said she’d be back by four.”
