Butterball Hotline

(November 28, 2002)

She hasn't thought about Webb for a month, and probably wouldn't think about him now except she managed to volunteer to hold Thanksgiving for the entire JAG office at her apartment because Harriet needs this, needs someone taking care of her for a change, and Bud needs to be something other than a burden to his wife, and Harm needs to stop laughing at the idea of her playing hostess.

So a week before, she pulls out the little notebook she'd tucked in the back of the family recipe box she never opens, and carefully makes her grocery list, growing a little nostalgic for Webb's commentary on food and the decline of the American palate. And that makes her think of him, down in Paramaribo, where right now it feels like the first blushes of summer, where no one is buying the ingredients for stuffing or needs rescuing from canned cranberry sauce, where he probably won't even get turkey loaf. And no one deserves that, not even the Tin Man.

He stays with her that week, a temperamental guest in her mind, alternately surly and sad, and she doesn't have the heart to kick him out because after all he gave her the capacity to give this to others. On Sunday she sits down and outlines cooking times and temperatures and tries to come up with a battle plan that will endanger as little food as possible because she can't stand the thought of Harriet having to rescue her.

On Monday, she moves the frozen turkey to the refrigerator to thaw and thinks how Webb would be proud she remembered to buy it far enough in advance and how she should have listened a little more closely to the roasting time for larger birds. It's enough to make her wish she had his email or phone number because really these things are important, and the guest Webb in her head insists he'll be greatly offended if she manages to ruin one of his recipes in front of Rabb because she failed to obtain precise information.

So on Tuesday she goes searching for a way to contact him, which is easier said than done. She could ask Harm, but that would involve explaining why she wants to contact Webb, and she doesn't think he's going to buy cooking times, though it is the true and legitimate explanation. She calls the CIA, but they are really just as forthcoming as you would imagine, and she didn't have much hope on that front. However, the phone call does yield some valuable intel because apparently her name has come up in conversation with Agent Webb more than once, and perhaps she'd like the number for his mother? She would.

It takes her until the evening to work up the nerve to call Porter Webb. While she considers herself a brave woman, not easily intimidated by anything, the Great Falls address throws her back to her childhood, to being the girl in cheap clothes that smelled like beer, to invitations over that got extended by girls at school and never followed through by their mothers. There are fences and train tracks between people like her and the Webbs, and she's always thought they might be there for a reason. But the thought of Harriet guiding her through this is too much to handle, so she shores herself up, straightens her uniform and picks up the phone.

It's a mistake.

Porter Webb is inordinately polite (they always are, it just makes it worse), but when she asks for a way to contact Webb in South America, there's a fractional pause, a silence that can't be anything other than disapproving. Suddenly she's thrown back to dirty dresses and birthday party invitations that got lost in the mail, and before she can stop herself she's explaining about using one of Webb's recipes and cooking times.

"I do have a number for Clayton, but he's not always easily reachable. Let me have Charlotte come and speak with you. I'm sure she'll be able to help you with whatever you need. Clayton learned to cook from her, you know."

She didn't know. "Oh really, that's not necessary if I could just--"

"I assure you Charlotte would be happy to help, and I hate to think of you making an international call just for something like this."

Which is how she winds up taking notes as the Webbs' cook rattles through rapid fire instructions on cooking times and gravy and how unnecessary it is to baste. Charlotte is a nice woman and gives her the number where she can be reached on Thanksgiving day if any emergencies come up, and Mac thinks that if she had had a Charlotte in her kitchen as a child she might have learned to feel as passionately about food as Webb.

Porter gets back on the phone and asks politely, "Was Charlotte able to help or would you still like Clayton's number, dear?'

She would, but she doesn't know why. After all she had only wanted to call about the turkey and she has all the necessary information now. "No, no, that's fine, but would you um . . . tell Clay Happy Holidays for me?"

"Of course, and I'm sure he would wish you the same."

When she hangs up, the Marine can't shake the vague feeling she just got outmaneuvered by a five foot one, ninety eight pound member of the Junior League.

Thursday comes around, and she can feel the panic setting in. What the hell was she thinking? She can't do this. Sure she can put together an airtight case not even her old lawschool professor can get through, speak fluent Farsi, strip down any gun you give her in under thirty seconds, take out a terrorist with her bare hands . . .

No, that's not quite right. She didn't take out that terrorist alone. Webb was there. Webb with his calm eyes and steady voice. Webb who made her stronger with his arrogant certainty, his irrational confidence in her abilities. Webb who long before he believed she could do that, trusted her to do this.

She can't let him be wrong. He's been through too much recently. So she rolls up her sleeves, lays out the little notebook beside the stove, and sets to work—chopping and mixing, sautéing and boiling—and throughout it all there's Webb in her head, shoring her up, making her the best of herself because he's too much of a snob to associate with anything less.

It doesn't come out perfectly (the stuffing dries out at the edges, and the gravy's lumpy), but there's still the sense of accomplishment that only comes with doing something so far out of your comfort zone its off the map, and the look of joyous relief on Harriet's face when she's presented with an entire spread of food she didn't have to cook wipes away any remaining self-consciousness. Even Harm's suitably impressed, and when he corners her in the kitchen to tell her so, her stomach does a little flip flop that hasn't happened in a long time.

"This is amazing, Mac. You really outdid yourself."

"You had doubts?" She tries to put an edge in her voice, but they both know she's just teasing.

"Never, ninja-girl." He says it with such sincerity, as he takes his time brushing a smudge of imaginary flour off her cheek, that she forgets the past week and a half of teasing. Somewhere in the back of her head, Clayton Webb snorts in derision. She tells him to shut up.

She does however treat him to the sight of Harmon Rabb trying to find something to eat other than cranberry sauce and green beans for a full ten minutes, before she finally silences her little devil Webb and pulls Harm to the side to present him with a wild-rice stuffed squash and mixed green salad that earns her a knee-weakening smile and the accolade of life-saver.

It's months until she thinks about Webb again.