She opened her mouth to say no, she was fine.
“It eases heartache.”
“Sure, yes, that would be nice,” she said. “Thank you.”
Mulligan smiled so widely that the skin of his cheeks stretched thin. “Delightful indeed to have company in this time of sorrow, to share the pain of existence with a fellow traveler of the deepest part of the night.” He bustled over to the stove and placed a copper pot on it, and then he poured the mixture he’d been stirring in the bowl into the pot. “Low heat, and when it’s ready, we shall add the chocolate. Would you be a dear, my dear, and chop-chop-chop?” He flapped his hand toward the counter.
She located the bag of chocolate, tied with a pink ribbon. As she opened it, the scent of chocolate rolled out, and she breathed it in, rich and luxurious. “Smells wonderful.”
“The most wonderful!” Mulligan agreed. “It is made from the rarest of cocoa beans, cultivated by the reclusive denizens of the forest of everlasting day and obtained from the Night Market.”
She wondered where that was. Hedidhave a bit of an accent. Maybe British? Maybe Indian? She couldn’t tell. “Sounds amazing. How much should I chop?”
“A generous amount, my sweet fellow seeker of solace.” He stirred the milk and cocoa while she spilled a handful of chocolate chunks onto a cutting board and located a knife. “Tell me, what has drawn you out of slumber and into the cold unflinching night?”
Again, it was only nine-thirty, but she wasn’t going to point that out.
“You don’t need to share if you don’t wish to,” Mulligan continued. “I don’t intend to pry. If you wish to hold your pain close—”
“Heartbreak,” Calisa said. “Really ordinary, embarrassing,he-cheated-on-me-then-tried-to-lie-about-it heartbreak. It’s not a very interesting story, and I’m hoping that this place will help me forget it.” She said it as lightly as she could.Not going to mope.It wouldn’t bring back the imagined dream of a future with Ethan, the summer she was supposed to have, the next school year, whatever followed…. She’d spent time worrying about how they’d fare with a long-distance relationship after graduation, if she went off to one college and he went to another. She’d nearly decided to pick the same city as him, when it came time. But they hadn’t made it to senior year. Or evenJuly.
“Ah, yes, the pain of life’s inexorable cruelty. I know it well. I too am nursing a heartache, though of a different sort.” He sighed even more dramatically than before. “Mine is the pain of regret, of failure, for I continue to fail the one I love the most.” He gazed out the window for a moment at the darkened gardens and then said, “But I think you are perhaps not as cavalier about your wound as you pretend? It is new, yes?”
She felt a lump in her throat. It wasn’t all that new—it had been a few weeks, and she had plenty of proof that she was better off without him. Other stories about other girls…He wasn’t who she’d thought he was.
It still hurt, though. Like someone had reached into her heart and clawed out a chunk.
“Chop as fine as you wish,” Mulligan advised. “It will only melt faster. Like joyful memories as time dissolves them in the never-ending night of loss.”
“It’s more that I miss who he should have been,” Calisa said.“What I thought I had. What Ididhave—I have all these joyful memories, yes, but I also had all these hopes and dreams.” She sliced the chocolate into slivers.
“You mourn the loss of someone who never was,” Mulligan said. “A future that never will be. That is as much a death as a true one.”
“Except he’s walking around, smiling and laughing.” She chopped faster.
“He is not. That is a simulacrum. You carry the true him in your heart, or the him as he could have been, and there is no shame in that. Allow yourself to feel what your heart wishes to feel. Do not deny your pain.”
That was…actually nice to hear. So many friends told her to forget him, that he wasn’t worth a single tear, that he didn’t deserve her pain, but that didn’t make it hurt any less. “I’m not denying it,” Calisa said. “I’m just hoping that being here and far away from his smiling and laughing simulacrum will, you know, make it better.” She wasn’t sure if it would work. She wasn’t doing a good job distracting herself from thoughts of him so far. “Did you…Is that why you’re here? Do you want to talk about your heartache?”
He smiled, stretching his skeletal face. “Not at present, but I thank you for your kindness in asking, and for your assistance with tonight’s concoction.”
She showed him the slivers on the cutting board. “Is this the right amount?”
He clapped his hands together. “Perfection! Now, bring them here.”
She carried the cutting board over to the stove, and he swept the slivers into the milky chocolate. They fell like dark snow, and she inhaled the already-rich chocolaty scent. “It smells amazing,” she reported as she washed the empty cutting board and knife in the sink.
“Its taste will transport you. Metaphorically, of course, not literally—though it is said that taste can directly link to memories. Ah, to remember happier times.”
Out of the corner of her eye, Calisa saw a shadow shift and looked out the window over the sink. The sky was a sweep of dark blue and the mountains were silhouettes. The apple tree shivered in the night breeze. Beneath it was the statue of the lady.
Leaning forward, Calisa peered out at the statue. She wondered why someone had moved it from the front lawn to the back. And how. It had to weigh a ton. She thought of Jack carrying the stone gargoyle up to one of the guest rooms. She supposed he might just like to rearrange sculptures? Or maybe this was a different statue from the one in the front. That seemed more likely. She just hadn’t noticed it in the daylight, when she’d been awed by the view of the forest and the mountains.
Mulligan claimed two mugs from one of the cabinets. Both looked handmade, slightly lopsided but glazed with colors like a sunset. He poured the hot chocolate into each, then took a sip. Closing his eyes, he swallowed. She waited a moment, expecting him to sigh dramatically, and he didn’t disappoint. He sighed like the wind over the sea.
Calisa lifted the mug to her lips. The chocolaty steam rosedeliciously into the air until she felt as if she’d tasted it already. She took a sip, and…Wow.She’d had lots of hot chocolate before, some from really nice bakeries in Manhattan and one from a gourmet chocolate shop in Park Slope, but this…It tasted like the warmth of a hug from a friend who just wanted you to feel better. Closing her eyes, she took a second sip, larger than the first. She felt it warm her throat as it slid into her rib cage, and she imagined the chocolate spreading into her heart, enveloping it with rich sweetness.
“It’s the vanilla,” Mulligan explained.
