People thing working in a resort town is like long vacation. And it might be, if the tourists would only stay at home.
I stood behind the counter of TenHuis Chocolade (“Handmade chocolates in the Dutch tradition”) and hated the girl on the other side. I’d been working for my aunt and uncle, Nettie and Phil TenHuis, for only a week, and this girl had been in every day, apparently with the sole objective of ruining my life.
Her name, according to her credit card, was Alana Fairchild Hyden. She would have been pretty if she hadn’t been so thin. She was about my age – which was sixteen that year – and she had dark hair and big brown eyes, which she emphasized with liner, mascara, and shadow until they dominated her face.
Alana Fairchild Hyden was about the only teenaged customer TenHuis Chocolade ever drew, since Aunt Nettie and Uncle Phil’s candy wasn’t the kind you’d eat in the movies. Oh, they had some inexpensive items, like a milk chocolate sailboat on a stick, but most of their stock was luxury chocolates and fancy dipped fruits. One bonbon cost as much as two Hershey bars.
But Alana Fairchild Hyden came in every day and bought half a pound of bonbons and truffles, a different assortment every day. She did this, I’d decided, to torture me. She got this smirk on her face, and she went through the whole display case, pointing.
“Now what’s that one?”
Since I was new, I’d have to consult the list. “Creamy, European-style caramel in dark chocolate.”
“How about the one behind it?”
I’d look at the list again. “Raspberry cream.”
“No, the one with the yellow dot.”
“Lemon canache.”
“Yuk! How about the white chocolate with the little nutty things on top?”
That one I knew, because it wvorite. “Amadeus,” I said. Then I winced. She’d goaded me until I was nervous, and that was when my tongue twisted itself into knots and the wrong word came out. “I mean, Amaretto.”
Of course, Alana Fairchild Hyden laughed. “’Amadeus’! How funny! How about the one at the back of that row?”
Back to the list. “Frangelico.”
“Frangelico? Just what the hell is that?”
“I’ll ask.” I turned toward the big window that overlooked the sparkling white room where middle-aged women in white aprons and hair nets produced the chocolates.
“Oh, never mind! You’d think people would train their employees. Give me four of the fudgy ones and four square ones with the white centers. Then I’ll have eight of the dark chocolate balls. The rummy ones.”
Seeting, I put her chocolates – four double fudge and four Bailey’s irsh Cream bonb...
