Chapter 4

I held the serving dish for her to choose, then picked up a taco for myself. It was tasty, hot and clearly freshly prepared, and well presented. Those pieces of chicken hadn’t just been dipped in sauce moments before serving; they had been marinated for a while before cooking, so that the flavor and color had permeated the whole chunk. Oh my! Not only tasty, but also spicy!

I took a gulp of water before daring to speak. “This taco is really good! How did you find this place?”

“Pure luck! I was looking for a convenience store to buy a bottle of cold water for my babies after a walk, and ended up here. I’ve come back a few times since, whenever I’m over at Corriganville. It’s a good place to sit and relax; you don’t get chased out of here so someone else can have your table.”

She took another sip of her wine. “What about diet? You got any allergies or intolerances? I didn’t think, I should have asked. I guess I kinda assumed that you’d be okay with this place to eat; you aren’t a vegan or anything?”

I shook my head as I assured her that I hadn’t picked up any food fads. “I eat anything and everything, unless it’s just too pretentious or criminally overpriced. Some of these LA eateries are all about being seen there, and nothing about the food. My ex took me to a few of those places simply so she could network, and that was a few too many. Half the time we were still hungry when we left and had to eat again when we got home!”

She was smiling again, showing that she understood. “Believe me, I know the feeling. Every so often I go shopping with a girlfriend or two, and we always end up having lunch at a place I later despise myself for having patronized! How about comfort food? What perks you up on a wet day?”

“You need to ask a boy from Georgia?”

“Lemme guess. Cliché time. Fried chicken or pulled pork?”

I had to chuckle. “You know it! Okay, my arteries won’t thank me if I do it too often, but a little in moderation never hurt. Dumplings are a problem, I’ll admit. I like them too much in a good onion gravy, and Mom makes the best. Something else I miss badly, so many great barbecue restaurants, all over the South.”

Mel nodded sagely. “That was one of the best things about doing college in Atlanta; amazing food and it was affordable, even for a poor scholarship student. I was living with friends off campus, out in Decatur, so we weren’t on the meal plan, and if we needed cheering up, then a dose of barbecue did the trick better and cheaper than beer.”

“Decatur? I’m from Scottdale. Darn it, we might have met a dozen years ago! Maybe I should have attended more college parties?”

She giggled at the thought. “We might have hated each other on sight! But yeah, totally spooky that we were so close then, right next door. I’ve been over that way quite a few times. Hence the photo I sent you when I saw you’d grown up in Atlanta.”

There was a moment’s silence as we both considered what a small world it was. Half the time when I mention Scottdale, the person I’m talking to automatically assumes I mean Scottsdale, Arizona. It felt good to be with someone who had actually been to my home town. Heck, some of the people I work with just about know where San Francisco and Las Vegas are; their geographical knowledge beyond the La La bubble doesn’t go a whole lot further. To be honest, though, some of the hosts on the ‘Hollywood’ themed TV channels seem to reckon that the ‘civilized’ world ends just beyond Orange County...

“How about you, Mel? What floats your boat after a bad day? Wisconsin cuisine?”

She laughed. “Cheese curds, anyone? Anything in the comfort food line. As we’re being totally truthful, I’ll admit to past habits of Steak ‘n Shake, back when they were better run, chocolate chip pancakes, chocolate cake and ice cream, peanut butter and Nutella cookies, oh yeah, and I once ate a whole two pound pack of Twizzlers all by myself and didn’t feel sick! Spaghetti’s good, pizza too if I don’t wanna cook. Oh, and I’d better confess something else. I’ve got a food truck habit. Now that IS one of the greatest things about Los Angeles. My current favorite is a German Wurst truck; some of them are just like back home, and they make the normal sausage links from the deli butcher taste like unflavored paste. There’s a chili-smoked one which is just out of this world, you gotta try it one day. Not that I mind the Oscar Mayer classic beef franks from the store; it’s a way for me to support local businesses back home, and my girls enjoy them too!”

“Yeah, I love the food trucks too. It’s a struggle to show restraint sometimes, to keep it at ‘habit’ rather than ‘addiction’. What about the big one, Miss Wisconsin? Do you take ice cream or cheddar cheese with your apple pie?”

She raised her eyebrows and chuckled. “How did you find that one out? It’s the ultimate secret test of our state patriotism!”

I grinned back at her. “I have my sources. Okay, to be honest, when I read your profile and that you were originally from Wisconsin, I did look up the Wikipedia page to remind myself of a few things. I’ve never been over that way, so I had to cheat a little. So, which is it?”

She deliberately tried to look totally guilty, like a dieting schoolgirl caught with a hand in the cookie-jar. Gawd, she looked so cute! “Ice cream, and I don’t say no if there’s a jug of real cream about to pour over it. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with having a slice of cheese and a couple of crackers to follow, or maybe with it?”

Once again, I had to laugh. No way was this lady ever going to truly commit to the LA diet binary choice of Lo-fat or No-fat. My Dad once joked that going dairy-free is un-American; I know from my work that some unfortunate people have no choice in their diet, but if there’s a lactose product going, count me in. Sounded like this lady would get on well with my folks. “I’m impressed. I guess you must work out a whole lot to keep yourself that slender?”

She nodded in confirmation, not seeming to mind me getting a little personal. “I was carrying maybe fifteen pounds too much when I was a High School sophomore; eating a whole load of junk food and candy, bored I guess. Fun sized bars are okay, but one isn’t ever quite enough, so I tended to have a second. Whoever thought up that marketing idea of ‘fun size’ sure wasn’t thinking much about the nation’s health. Wisconsin winters don’t help with self-motivated portion control either. Once I got the braces off of my teeth, I decided I needed a makeover and started doing a lot more sport. Now I rely on the gym and going running; my butt has always been a little big, but some people seem to like it the way it is.”

“Count me in that number; your jeans looked real good whenever I could take a peek!”

Another smile. I risked another possible deal-breaker. “Mel, you planning on staying in LA forever?”

She looked closely at my face before replying, “It’s ... strange you should ask me that question. I’d always assumed so, but right now, I just don’t know. Quite recently, I’ve been thinking about moving away. I could find work elsewhere easy enough; I did accountancy school as a back-up when I wasn’t sure I was getting on in films, so that’s an option I could go back to. I’ve really enjoyed the LA lifestyle, heck, what twenty-something doesn’t?, but the air pollution and water shortages are bugging me. I had to evacuate from the wildfires last fall, some friends lost their houses. I guess compared to them I was lucky, but I don’t want to have to go through that much more. Maybe I’m getting older, maybe the earthquake is getting too long overdue. Oh, and the pollution is getting bad again. I really like to be able to see the mountains, some days it’s just that yellow-brown haze blocking them out, and you pray for the wind to get up and blow all that smog out to sea.”

I totally got where she was coming from. It was another point of connection. “Yeah, I’m feeling the same. Crazy, I know, but at 32 I sometimes feel I’m one of the older ones in town. There seem to be so many 20-somethings around. It’s been a whole lot of fun being in such a young and vibrant city, but occasionally I think I’m getting over the sugar rush. I might go back to Atlanta one day; I miss the outdoor life, you know, the cafes with the seating outside where you can sit and watch the world go by, and not choke with all the traffic fumes. Here, it’s all aircon and keeping in the shade.”

“Yes, it may be pretty much perfect weather all year round, and that’s one reason people keep flocking here, but heat and sunshine are one heck of a problem when there isn’t a whole lot of water. I heard they blocked another reservoir proposal recently; yet the population just keeps growing. And don’t get me going on Southern California Edison! They’re almost as far behind on their infrastructure work as friends tell me PG&E are around San Francisco Bay!”

I’d heard that too. There’d been reports that the Santa Ana winds had blown trees down onto power transmission lines, the tinder-dry leaves and branches bursting into flames and starting off new fires. The utility companies should have cleared any trees in the proximity of their lines, so they couldn’t then come down on their cables. Was it simple mismanagement, or the effect of greed and neglect from a stockholder-dominated penny-pinching Board?

I sighed. “That’s yet another issue, and I don’t know the answer, frankly I doubt that anyone does. The cost of living in SoCal is rising fast, too. You know our gasoline prices are the highest in the nation, thanks to the tax rates? A whole lot of the new people moving in are not actually producing anything, just taking. Real estate is more than crazy; a lot of ordinary workers are being priced out, can’t even live in trailers or public housing anywhere near their jobs, heck, you see working people living in cars and tents. I’m lucky that I’m on the housing ladder already, but I’m not sure I can afford to get a family home anything like the size my folks have got back in Georgia. I’ve heard colleagues openly talk about doing a few more years to get some good things on their resume, and then heading off to a lower-tax state, even if the weather won’t be as great.”

She nodded in agreement as she finished her last taco, licking the tips of her long slim fingers to clean them off. Her tongue was pink and almost cat-like; I had to be careful not to be caught staring.

“Yeah, the cost of living here is astronomical compared to Wisconsin or Georgia, it took me years of hard work and saving to get myself out of rented apartments. For the note I’m paying here, I could almost have bought my parents’ house AND the one each side. I guess that’s another reason why so many Angelenos just live for today. I’d not want to go back to the Wisconsin winters, though, I’ve kinda softened up. Maybe Arizona? I did some filming in Phoenix a couple of years back, and there are some nice-looking suburbs. We were in the south, Chandler, near the airport, and it had a good feel about it, a permanent community. LA, well, it’s got that transitory feel to it, you know?”

She laughed at herself, “Not that I can talk, the number of places I’ve rented until I finally bit the bullet. I was in five different short-term places in Canoga Park until I moved to Woodland Hills, and I never really did get to know the neighbors in any of them. Not that I see much of my neighbors now! Note to self, try to do better!” She flashed me a wonderful smile across the table, and I grinned my appreciation back at her.