Page 2 of Christmas with the Irish Devil
He picks up a slice of soda bread so thin you could pass it through customs, eyes narrowing at the flecks of caraway and the uneven crust. He bites. Chews. Pauses, as if listening for a message in the crumb. Then he looks at me, really looks, and says, “You proofed this with Guinness.”
It is not a question. I nod, unwilling to let him off the hook.
“It’s brilliant,” he says. “You get the dark, almost chocolate finish, but the sour lingers. Like the old breads in Galway. If you close your eyes, you’d think you were at Kelly’s on a wet morning, not” —he gestures at the chandeliers, the marble, the sea of hungry, overdressed sharks— “in a fishbowl.”
The accent is faint, but it’s there, a Vassar-bleached echo of Connacht. I let myself smile, just a little. “Do you always monologue at bread, or is this a special occasion?”
He laughs. It is nothing like the brittle titter of the suburban wives. It is a sound that belongs in a bar after midnight, after too many shots and confessions. “Sorry. I get distracted.” He reaches for a ramekin of seaweed butter and spoons it onto his bread. “Declan O’Connell,” he says, extending a hand over the display. His shake is confident, dry, one pump and release. “I’m… well, let’s just say I’m an investor in lost causes.”
I know the name. O’Connell & Sons, importers, philanthropists, the kind of people who pay for library wings and never put their faces in the paper. If there were ever a patron saint for underfunded culinary programs, he’d be top of the list. But I also know better than to show it.
“Aoife Kelly,” I say, and see the recognition in his eyes. Not that he’s met me but that he knows the name from the program brochure. He does not mention it. Instead, he says, “You grew up in Southie, didn’t you? The Kelly family bakery?”
“Guilty.” I reach for a fresh stack of plates, organizing them by size. “My grandfather started it. My mother ran it until she…” I stop, not willing to finish the sentence. “Now it’s condos.”
He nods, as if this is the most natural endpoint for all human endeavor.
“Your mother’s barmbrack was legendary. You use the old recipe?”
“Modified,” I say. “Less sugar, more peel. I don’t believe in nostalgia as a flavor profile.”
He gives me a look—part amused, part impressed. “But you respect tradition.”
“I respect taste,” I say, and I hear the edge in my own voice. “And I’m not afraid of failure.”
His eyes crinkle at the corners, crow’s feet deepened by years of not sleeping enough. He glances at the oyster station, where Maggie is valiantly pretending not to be terrified of the shucking knife. “You don’t eat at these things, do you?” he asks, voice low.
“I taste,” I admit. “But I don’t eat. Not when I’m working.” The truth is, I can barely swallow when I’m being watched, and tonight I feel like every molecule of me is under a microscope.
“Then let me.” He plucks a beet-pickled quail egg from the tray, studies it, and pops it in his mouth. He closes his eyes and lets the flavors break over him like a wave. When he opens them, I see something like satisfaction, but not the lazy kind. This is a man who weighs every bite. “The vinegar is Irish, but the spice isn’t,” he says.
“Cardamom,” I say, not bothering to be coy. “And a touch of star anise.”
He nods, approving. “You’re playing with the old country. Making it new.”
I shrug. “Old country never did much for me except make good stories. I like to see what survives when you take the nostalgia away.”
He leans closer, as if sharing a secret. “What survives, then?”
I smile, feeling the adrenaline settle in my veins. “Salt. Hunger. And spite.”
He laughs again, louder this time, earning a glance from the band leader, who seems personally offended that anyone is enjoying themselves. Declan doesn’t notice. He moves along the display, choosing one item at a time, never overfilling his plate. He asks questions, the real kind—about fermentation, about preserving flavors, about how I handled the late-season citrus. He tells me about his grandmother’s kitchen, where the air was always thick with yeast and onions, and how he learned to knead dough before he learned to tie his shoes.
He stands just close enough that I feel his presence but not so close that it’s a challenge. The space between us is charged, but not sexual. It’s more like the tension in a line that’s about to snap, and you’re not sure whether it’ll break toward you or away.
At one point, the mayor’s wife floats by, trailing a gaggle of finance bros, and pauses to greet him. She kisses both his cheeks, murmurs something about the silent auction, and moves on, leaving a cloud of perfume and expensive expectation in her wake.
“She’s running for Congress next year,” he says, sotto voce. “I predict a platform based entirely on tax credits for gala attendance.”
“She’s got my vote,” I say. “If she lowers the food budget.”
“Doubt it,” he says. “She only eats if there’s a camera present.”
We trade stories—him about the slow disaster of his boarding school in Limerick, me about the infamous Kelly Bakery arson scare of 2003, when my mother tried to teach me flambé and instead taught the fire marshal several new curse words. I realize, slowly, that I am not performing. I am talking. I am, somehow, at ease.
The conversation goes deeper. He asks about my favorite fermentation, and I tell him about the kraut I started as a dare but now keep as a pet, alive and mutating in a jar above my fridge. He confesses his preference for the way brined herring can make even a stale roll taste like a feast. We talk about sour, about why people in America are so afraid of it, about how every family has a secret for saving old bread, and how in the end, everything comes back to hunger.
I am hyperaware of his eyes, the way they hold mine a fraction longer than necessary, the way his questions never quite cross the line into flirtation but always, always skim its surface. I want to be annoyed, but it’s too interesting.
