Outside the Lines: A Novel

My heart fluttered when I arrived at Hope House the Tuesday afternoon after my initial visit. I was more nervous than I thought I’d be to start my volunteer work with the homeless community, a little scared to be so up close and personal with how my father had been living for the majority of the past twenty years. I had to take several deep breaths to calm my pulse before walking into the building. I’d agreed to be there by two o’clock to help cook the evening meal.

Jack had left me a message on Sunday instructing me to dress casually in jeans, a sweatshirt, and comfortable shoes. Working as a chef, I always wore comfortable shoes—much to Georgia’s chagrin, of course, since the woman lived in three-inch heels to lengthen what she jokingly referred to as her “stubby legs”—but it had been a while since I’d been in a kitchen without my chef’s coat. It felt a little strange to know I wouldn’t be wearing it.

I did my best to swallow any apprehension I felt as I walked through the front doors and back to the office I’d been in Friday night. There were a few men in the hallway standing in groups of two or three. A couple of them made eye contact and nodded in acknowledgment as I moved past, but mostly, they ignored me. I searched their faces out of habit—none of them were my father.

“Hey there,” Jack said, looking up with a big smile when I rapped on the open door. He sat at the desk he apparently shared with Rita. “Right on time. I wasn’t sure you’d show.”

“Why wouldn’t I?” I asked. He wore jeans and a long-sleeved thermal shirt the same color green as his eyes.

“I get people volunteering all the time.” He shrugged, looking a little sheepish. Maybe he realized his words rubbed me the wrong way again. “‘Oh yeah, I’d love to help,’ they say. ‘Just tell me what you need.’ Then the time comes and it doesn’t fit into their schedule or whatever. And I never see them again.” He smiled and said, “I’m glad that’s not you.”

“Me too.” I shifted my weight from my right foot to the left and stuck my hands in the front pockets of my jeans. “What do you need me to do?”

Jack stood up, came over, and rested his palm lightly on my lower back. “I’ll show you. Rita’s already in the kitchen.”

“What are we serving?” I asked. We left the office and moved into the hallway.

“Scalloped potatoes with diced ham.”

“What about a veg?”

Jack stopped and looked puzzled.

“Oh, sorry. Restaurant speak. Vegetables.”

“Ah. Well, if we can sneak those in somewhere we will, but for the most part, we’re not dealing with salad fans here. They need a hot, filling meal. Sometimes it’s the only one they’ll get for a few days.”

“Okay.” I considered my ravenous appetite and how terribly I’d fare on one meal a day, if I was lucky enough to find it. I had no idea how my father managed to survive. Of course, I still didn’t know whether he had.

I followed Jack the rest of the way down the hall and through a room about the size of a basketball court. The room was filled with wall-to-wall cots. We walked a narrow path and I tried not to wrinkle my nose at the musty, sweaty odor. I suddenly found myself fighting back the bitter, painful memory of my father sleeping in our old garage. Oh Dad, I thought. Where are you?

“How many people do you get spending the night?” I asked Jack.

He looked at me over his shoulder. “It depends, but usually we can accommodate around fifty.”

“Do you feed dinner to more than that?”

He turned back to look where he was going. “We feed as many as we can until we run out of food.”

“How often does that happen?”

“Both nights we serve dinner. Right now we can only afford to do it on Mondays and Tuesdays. But the rest of the time we usually have things on hand like bread and cheese for sandwiches, and eventually I’d like to be providing a hot dinner seven days a week. We only get so many donations, you know?” He sighed, as though he was disappointed that he wasn’t doing more.

I nodded, thinking about the absurd amount of waste that went on at my job. Even with the leftovers I sent home with Juan, there was always food thrown away. My budget consistently included a 10 to 15 percent write-off for excess supplies. How much of that could have been used to feed those who really needed it?

We made our way through another doorway into the kitchen, an area about twenty feet square. There was an L-shaped counter running the length of two of the walls, a large stove and refrigerator on the third, and a wall full of cupboards on the fourth. It was about a tenth of the size of the kitchen I worked in at my job. Rita stood at the sink with four enormous sacks of russet potatoes lying next to her on the counter. The radio by the stove played a bass-heavy tune—the Black Eyed Peas, maybe? Rita smiled when she saw me. It lit up her entire pixie face.

“Eden!” she said, continuing to peel the potato she held. “So happy you could make it!”

“I’ll leave you in Rita’s capable hands,” Jack said. “I’ve got a ton of paperwork to do.”

“Oh sure,” Rita said. “You just want to get out of potato-­peeling duty. Again.”

Jack laughed and put his hands on his hips with false indignation. “Come on, now. You’ll make me look bad to the new recruit.”

“Don’t let him fool you,” Rita said to me. “He’s sneaky.”

“Have fun, you two,” Jack said. He disappeared out the door.

“He’ll be back soon,” Rita said. “I was just giving him a bad time. He’s great about multitasking around here. He cares too much not to be.”

“I can tell,” I said, thinking of how protective he was about his clients’ privacy.

“He’s actually a total softy. Just serious about what we do, you know? He put a lot on the line to get this place off the ground. It’s his baby.” She nodded toward the stove. “Can you make a sauce for the potatoes? There’s milk and cheese in the fridge.”

“Sure,” I said, again noting her attire consisted of jeans and a snug black T-shirt, this one embellished with the phrase runs with scissors. It felt a little odd to be the one in the kitchen taking orders instead of giving them, but I reminded myself that I didn’t go there to be in charge. I pulled one of the aprons off the wall and put it around my neck. “Anything special I need to be aware of in how you like things prepared?”

“We don’t put nuts in anything in case someone is allergic, but other than that, have at it. I have complete faith in you. Jack tells me you’re a professional.”

“Yeah, cooking is pretty much what I live for.”

“Really? I live for sex.” She widened her dark brown eyes and gave me a suggestive, sideways grin.

I laughed. “Well, I like to sprinkle a little of that in where I can, too. Though it helps if you have a partner.”

“A pretty gal like you doesn’t have a boyfriend?”

I shook my head as I tied the apron strings behind my back. “That is very sweet of you to say, but nope. Not at the moment.”

“You’ll have to let me do your chart. I’ll figure out when Mr. Right will show up.”

“You do astrology?”

Nodding, Rita set a potato on the cutting board and began to slice it. “What’s your sign?”

“Libra.”

“Oooh, the scales.” Rita set her knife down and rubbed her hands together conspiratorially. “You’re all about love, then. And balance.”

“Well, I’m rarely balanced,” I said, and she laughed. “Where are the pots and pans?”

Rita directed me to the correct cupboard and I began to build the sauce with a roux. They had margarine instead of butter, so I crossed my fingers, hoping the right chemical reaction would take place in order to thicken the sauce. The music filled the silence and we fell into a comfortable pace of my asking for guidance to find what I needed and Rita telling me where to look.

After about half an hour, the sauce was coming together. Just as I was putting in the shredded cheese, a man with dirty blond dreadlocks stuck his head in through the doorway.

“What’s for dinner?” he asked. He was gaunt and had black smudges on his face. “Smells good in here.”

“None of your beeswax, Saturn,” Rita said playfully. She set the bowl of sliced potatoes she’d been carrying onto the counter, then stood on her tiptoes to reach for a bag of pink and white frosted animal cookies. She opened it and handed a few to the man. “Now, this is our little secret, right? Don’t go telling everybody or I’ll run out and won’t be able to give you any more.”

“Would I do that to you, Rita? I think not.” He jutted his chin over toward me. “Who’s she?”

She rubbed the man’s arm and smiled. “That’s Eden. She’s a bona fide chef, my friend.”

“Nice to meet you,” I said, continuing to stir the sauce on the stove.

He looked wary but nodded in acknowledgment.

“You better not miss what she’s cooking up for you,” Rita said. “Now, scoot so I can get back to work!” He left, and Rita came over and dipped a spoon into the sauce. “Mmm. Tasty. We need to get the water boiling for the potatoes.”

“We can pour the sauce right on the raw slices,” I said. “As long as they’re thin enough, they’ll cook in the oven just fine. How many baking pans are there?”

“We can fit four in the oven at a time. Dinner is served at six, so that gives us about three hours to cook it all. Does that sound doable to you? I usually just boil the potatoes and pour the sauce over them.”

“I think they taste better in the oven,” I said. “With the edges and top all browned and crisped up?”

“Oh yeah. Just like Mom used to make.” Rita patted her flat belly appreciatively.

I laughed. “Not my mom. I get my culinary passion from my father, for sure. He taught me a lot of the basics.” My voice quavered. I swallowed hard to keep the muscles in my throat from closing up.

Rita set her spoon down and gave me an unexpected hug. She was surprisingly powerful for her petite frame. When she pulled back, she kept her hands on my arms and looked me straight in the eyes. “You are a wonderful daughter for trying to find him, Eden. All about the love, like I said. Your life feels out of balance without him.”

I nodded and the tears rose up and spilled down my cheeks despite my best attempt to keep them at bay. “I miss him,” I whispered. “So much.”

“Of course you do. And I have no doubt he misses you, too.” She gave my forearms a squeeze before letting go, then clapped her hands together once. “Okay then! We need to get our asses moving if we’re going to get done!”

I wiped at my eyes with a dish towel. “Right. So if you spray the pans down with nonstick and fill them about three-quarters of the way with sliced potatoes, I’ll get the ham diced.”

“I can do that,” Jack said. I whipped around to see him standing in the doorway. I had no idea how long he’d been there or what he’d witnessed. Great. I’d spent maybe a total of half an hour with the guy and I’d already cried twice. I probably seemed as off-kilter as some of his clients.

Jack walked over to the refrigerator and pulled out two good-sized plastic-wrapped hams. Not the kind from a butcher with a bone, like I would use if I were making this dish for a party, but rather the pressed lunch meat variety of ham, factory-injected with water to keep it moist.

“So, tell me what to do, Chef,” he said with a sparkle in his eye. “How do I cut this up?”

I sniffed and attempted a smile. “With a knife?”

He laughed and I went to stand next to him. He pulled out a large serrated knife from the drawer and held it up for my appraisal. “Will this do?”

“It’s the right size, but the serration will tear the meat up.”

“It’s the biggest one we’ve got,” Rita said. “Our peeps won’t care if the meat is a little torn around the edges. I say go for it.”

“Okay,” I said, pushing down the professional chef’s voice inside my head that was screaming about using the wrong tool. “And I noticed a huge bag of grated carrots in the crisper. Were you planning to use them for anything?”

“No,” Jack said. “The produce guy who donated the potatoes threw those in as an extra. I thought maybe we could make carrot cake or something.”

“You’re going to bake?” Rita said, incredulous.

“No, smart-ass,” Jack said. “I was hoping I might talk Eden into it.”

“I have a better idea,” I said. “Since they don’t get a ton of vegetables, how about I throw them into the sauce? The cheese will cover up the taste and most of the color. They’ll never know we’re sneaking in the vitamin A. They could use it, right?”

Jack smiled and nodded. “Absolutely. I say do it.”

Rita agreed. “Definitely. But when you’re done with that, there’s cake mix in the cupboard. You know. If you feel inclined to whip up some dessert.”

“I’ll see what I can do,” I said. The nervous flutter in my chest had disappeared. I put my head down and did what I knew best. I cooked.

As it turned out, I didn’t have time to bake a cake since the oven was occupied with scalloped potatoes until it was time to open the doors for dinner. After dicing up the ham, Jack went back to his office for a while, but then returned to the kitchen a few minutes before six. “We should get the food out there,” he said. “I’m sure the guys are chomping at the bit to eat.”

I helped him carry out the first couple of deep-dish pans to the dining room. Four rows of rectangular tables were set up and another one sat by the door, where Rita stood holding a huge pitcher of bright red Kool-Aid. We took the pans over and set them down, and Jack went over to the double doors and unlocked them. “Ready?” he asked.

“Bring ’em on!” Rita said. She motioned for me to stand next to her. “Why don’t you scoop the potatoes into the bowls and I’ll get them their drinks. They’ll get their own coffee over there.”

I looked over to the corner, where three full coffeemakers sat on a small, round table with white paper cups, just as the rush of bodies lined up at the table where the food was set up. The first man in line grabbed a bowl and looked at me with a toothless grin. I grabbed the serving spoon and filled his bowl.

“Hope you enjoy it,” I said with a smile.

“Smells great,” he said. “Thank you so much.”

“You are very welcome. How are you tonight?”

“C’mon down, Mickey,” Rita said to the man before he could answer me. “I got some of your favorite fruit punch Kool-Aid here.” She held up a paper cup and he took it. “We have to keep the line moving,” she whispered. “Otherwise they’ll stand there and talk your ear off. We’ll leave the socializing for Jack.”

“But I thought I was supposed to be building relationships—getting to know them?” I whispered.

“Let’s have you sit back a bit tonight and just take it all in. They’ll warm up to you better if you don’t force it, you know? They can be a little cautious of newcomers.”

“Okay,” I said.

And so it went over the next hour, me filling up bowls, smiling and sending the clients down the line to Rita. Jack moved around the room, chatting up different people, men and women alike. “So you guys serve dinner to anyone, but only the men can sleep here?” I asked her.

“Yep,” she said. “Safer that way, you know? Too many bad things can happen in the dark.”

As I worked over the next couple of hours, I watched the clients mingle, sitting together in groups of two or three, a little like the lunchroom in high school. There were those who sat alone, too, but for the most part, people were talking as they would have at one of the dinner parties I catered. The content of the conversations was much different, of course, and as I served them their meal, I found myself listening in with silent fascination.

“Dude, I got ticketed for sleeping in my car!” I heard one man tell another as they sat at a table nearby. By this point, it was toward the end of the evening and we had run out of food. Jack was slowly ushering people into the bunk room or out the door and Rita was already in the kitchen starting to clean up. I couldn’t believe how quickly time had passed.

“You can fight that, man,” his friend said. “There’s a Washington State law that says if you get tired driving, you should pull over and rest. Show up in court and tell ’em that shit and they have to drop the fine. I mean, how they gonna tell if you weren’t driving home from your mama’s?”

“My mama’s dead,” the first man said.

“Well, they don’t know that, now, do they?” The men laughed together, slapping each other on the back the same way I’d seen Bryce and his friends do. It helped, seeing this sense of community, and a little while later, as I drove home from my first night at Hope House, I pictured my father connecting with other people like the men I’d witnessed—building another family of sorts. A family that stuck with him longer than my mother and I had. One that loved him enough to keep him from running away.