Free Fry Me a Liver by Delia Rosen Page B

grand scale—like a pogrom.
    Gwen, you’re rambling , that small rational part of my brain said to the rest. You have to focus.
    On what? I asked myself.
    Time to call a truce. Bean went off to talk to her officers and I walked toward the deli, drawn to it like Sleeping Beauty to the spindle. I reached the police tape at the curb, went under, saw Bean from the corner of my eye motion a patrol officer who was moving toward me to back away. I went to the open door where a cloud of dust hung like a theater scrim. I stood there, staring past the cash register to the hallway with my office and into the kitchen. Except for the dust, everything seemed okay there. Beyond, out back near the Dumpster, I saw first responders and firefighters working with portable winches and video monitors. I didn’t know if they were lowering people in or trying to get the van out. It didn’t matter just then. What was important was that everything this side of the kitchen was fine. The fryer, oven, refrigerator, and freezer seemed intact. There was no power—we’d lose all our perishables—but those could be replaced quickly.
    â€œDon’t think about it now,” someone said beside me.
    I turned. It was Benjamin and his girlfriend. I returned his crooked little smile with a crookeder one, then looked at her. She was about five-three, a very slender blonde whose svelteness was a walking advertisement for Tex-Asian fusion. She had pale blue eyes, long lashes, and a big California girl smile framed by full lips. And there was a slender strand of pearls around her swan-long throat. Despite everything else that was going on, standing next to the girl made me feel ancient, unfit, undesirable, and so ethnic that I felt sure I could pass for a lifelong orthodox Lubavitcher.
    Benjamin’s hair was wet and his face was washed back to the ears. His blue button-down shirt looked blue around the shoulders, pale charcoal below. He’d apparently taken the same Evian shower I had.
    â€œHow do you know what I’m thinking?” I asked.
    â€œBecause we’d be thinking the same thing,” the young woman said. She offered her hand. “I’m Grace.”
    I shook it. “Gwen Katz.”
    â€œI’m pleased to meet you and very glad you’re okay. I love your homemade gefilte fish,” she said. “Very delicate, not too fishy.”
    â€œThanks.” I smiled. It seemed an odd time for a compliment but I accepted it gratefully. Any port in a . . . “And thanks for using the present tense.”
    It took them both a moment to get my meaning. Grace nodded with understanding; the gefilte would plate again.
    I was looking at the young woman closely. “Are you sure we haven’t met?”
    â€œQuite sure,” she said. “Never been here.”
    â€œYou look familiar,” I said.
    â€œWith all the faces you see, I’m sure you saw one of my doppelgängers,” she said. “We all have them—people who look just like us.”
    I wasn’t in the mood for crazy. I turned to Benjamin. “So you’re okay?”
    â€œThat’s what the medics say,” he answered. “And I feel fine.”
    Grace clutched her boyfriend’s arm with both hands. “It’s a miracle, right? What a thing to have happen!”
    â€œWhat a thing,” I repeated. That was a strange, understated way to describe an explosion in a metropolitan restaurant.
    â€œDid Candy get her video?” I asked Benjamin.
    â€œIt’s already on the website,” he said.
    â€œOf course it is.”
    â€œI’m happy for her,” Grace said. “I’m happy for any woman who works hard and makes it.”
    I didn’t rebut that. I would have been happy too if she hadn’t built her career on exploitation. Of course, my disapproval sounded tinny even to my own ears when I thought of how many women I knew who had built their careers on bad financial