The tea room is dim and cozy, lit by soft glass lanterns that dot the walls, which are lined in an opulent red and gold wallpaper. The murmur of voices drifts down the marble hallway and out into the hotel lobby, where it meets and gets subsumed by the bright cacophony of comings and goings. Bellhops whirl their gold wheeled luggage carts to and fro, the elevators ding cheerily, the glass doors whoosh open and shut.
Read moreAPPLE PEAR STREUSEL CAKE
The farm stand is situated just off the side of the road—tucked behind a beautiful old farmhouse with a wraparound porch. The stand itself is a ramshackle wooden building that’s open in the front and on both sides so that people can wander around the tables full of pumpkins and lean down to pick up an apple from the bushel baskets lining the pathway. A strong gust of wind could probably blow the whole thing over, she thinks, but then reconsiders—this very structure has likely withstood the force of generations of Maine winters, weathering the snow and ice with its steadfast, stoic presence.
Read moreCINNAMON TWISTS
The floor in her bedroom is made of wide wooden planks. The apartment is on the 8th floor of an imposing limestone building on the corner of Commonwealth Avenue, a stone’s throw from the Boston Public Garden. Pale-colored brick covers part of the faded facade—this is a building that whispers old money and summers on Nantucket and Harvard alumni. Inside, the lobby reminds her of an aging patrician matriarch: once beautiful and still formidable, but time-worn and washed out. The walls are mirrored and an ancient green carpet directs visitors around a massive oak table upon which sits a flower arrangement so large you can barely see the doorman in his navy blazer. He sits at a marble-topped desk, the polished brass buttons dotting his lapel a perfect complement to the brass trimming along the wainscoting. Wainscoting: this was one of many words she’d never spoken aloud, or knew of, before she moved into apartment 8F. Part of her education is living in the rarified sphere of wealth of the Carlton House (she didn’t know apartment buildings could have names that sounded like prep school dormitories); part of it is Hadley.
Read moreCHEESY SPINACH ARTICHOKE SWIRL BUNS
“Okay but, I might not be able to keep up,” she says nervously. The road ahead is narrowing; a mile back it curved sharply near the town green where she can see scattered figures kicking a soccer ball in the gathering dusk, and began to slope gently up the hill. “Oh, so you’re already intimidated by my athleticism?” he teases, but the thing is that she is, yes, definitely. “Your legs are twice as long as mine!” she protests. This trail run will mark the first time that they’ve run together: a milestone which is particularly monumental to her.
Read moreCHOCOLATE HAZELNUT BISCOTTI
The first letter he writes is almost impossible to read. “I don’t even have to worry about how I phrased it,” he jokes, “because you won’t be able to figure out what it says.” She smiles and slips the thin envelope into the pocket of her bag. The envelope is white and flimsy: the sort that comes in 100-packs from Office Depot. He must have picked it up at work, stopping by the supply cabinet somewhere to search for the stack of envelopes—the idea of him in a meeting, thinking about writing to her, makes her inexplicably glad.
Read more