Pear Crisp, and a Tartlet's Bracelet

They say that trust is the bedrock of any relationship. But sometimes that trust is violated, compromised, thrust into awkward positions and finally abandoned in the face of fear and pain. Normally sophisticated, non-jealous women become the screaming Heather Locklears, Glenn Closes with a pot full of bunnies, LaToya Jacksons.

Internet, this is the story of an obsessed and crazy lady.

A few weeks ago, I was cleaning out the Lawyer from Southie's sailing backpack when I found a gold bracelet at the bottom of it. It was left at the bottom of the pocket that usually contains his wallet, iPhone, and a few charts crumpled up into Kleenex. A little mark on it said that it was 14k gold, and it was the standard chain link type of bracelet you see people wear every day of their lives.

And it was not his.

Now, it's not mine. And it was old enough to show me that he hadn't rushed out to buy me jewelery. It obviously belonged to someone. But whom that person was, I hadn't a clue.

For a few days I managed to leave the bracelet in the cleaned backpack, hoping that he'd find it as he was puling out his keys. "Oh, this - it's my sister's," he'd tell me. And I'd be thrilled, knowing that I could send it to her with a little note or something cute for her son. But the days passed and he never said anything - either about his sister or her bracelet.

Slowly the bracelet's history started to form in my mind. As my imagination started taking over, the bracelet's owner formed into a slow amalgamation of all the things I hated in women who run around leaving their jewelery in other peoples' boyfriends' backpacks.


She was a giant bitch.

She was the exact opposite of me, and her name was Muffy. Muffy was a crappy sailor who was just in it for the men - we call them Racer Chasers. Muffy had beged the Lawyer from Southie into teaching her how to sail, telling him that she had always loved being on the water, that her uncle had an amazing sailboat somewhere in North Carolina. Muffy showed up to learn how to sail with a 6-pack of wine coolers and proceeded to get totally and completely drunk. Muffy barfed over the side, Muffy begged TLFS to take her back to his place after motoring around the harbor for 45 minutes. Muffy threw herself on him, and after a few beers, he decided to try to shut her up for a while.

But Muffy was stupid enough to leave her bracelet on his bedside table the next morning. She left wearing one of his white cotton undershirts, trying to make her Ride on the Bus of Shame a little less noticeable, although you just can't wash skank off, if you ask me. Muffy had gone into work that morning and written him a quick email - "Ur t shirt is my hostage!!! : )" That's right - she used emoticons and poor grammar. The Lawyer from Southie felt dirty.

So now I had Muffy's bracelet in my house. And that made me exceptionally uncomfortable. I needed to get it out of here, but by this point I had to hear whether or not Muffy was still around. Was Muffy a friend of his on Facebook? Did they chat every once in a while? Had they had lunch recently? WAS SHE FROSTBITING??? Was there absolutely any way that Muffy knew about me and was saying to her friends, "That's the beeyotch who has my bracelet." ???

I decided to bring the bracelet out of the backpack and put it on our dining room table for him to see. We needed to have a confrontation about this hooker's bracelet, but the Passive Aggressive Lemming in me couldn't just come out with it. So the bracelet lay on our dining room table for two days. On the third day, I moved it to our bureau, right by his deodorant. I laid it out so that he couldn't help but see it when he was getting ready in the morning.

He helped but see it, I guess, because on Day 6 of Operation Muffy Extermination, I finally said to him "Look, I don't know whose bracelet that is, but you should probably return it to its rightful owner. It's real gold."

He looked at me with those eyes that men give women - you know those eyes. Those eyes that try to intimidate you with "Whatcha thinkin, crazy lady?" but also seem to promise "I will still respect you if you just come clean right now and tell me exactly what you've done."

"I found the bracelet in the sailing bag," (that's right, it's the sailing bag, not your sailing bag. learn from me, ladies, relationships are all about communication) "and it's not mine, so I figured you should return it to its owner."

He picked up the bracelet and looked at it. "Oh this," he said, "I just found this somewhere."

NOW DON'T LIE TO ME, BOY.

"Seriously, it's fine if it's someone else's," I said. "Just return it."

He looked at me, then it, then threw the bracelet at me, saying "You want it? Try it on."

Now, no woman in her right mind will wear Muffy's bracelet. Am I right? So I was all "Oh hells to the no!" But then, as I'm sitting there on our bed, trying to plead my case with the bracelet in my hand, I actually looked at it. There was no way in the world it would fit me - Muffy had ginormous wrists. Wrists that must have been 16 inches in radius. "This would never fit me," I told him. "It's huge."

"Of course it's huge," he said to me. "It's a man's bracelet."

I confessed my Muffy Obsession to him later that night, after he had put the bracelet on much to my protestations. He had worn it while he stomped around our bedroom in his boxers and white t-shirt, speaking in a Sopranos accent and offering to throw a dead body into the East River as I shrieked and begged him to take it off. He told me that my punishment was that he'd wear the bracelet in public, and tell people that I had bought it for him. I begged him for a lighter sentence. He thanked me for cleaning his backpack asked me if I wanted to try to sell the bracelet for money on ebay. I told him I'd think about it. A big part of me would feel badly, doing that to Old Muff.

I baked a crisp this week, substituting pears from my friend Hillary's tree for the apples called for in the recipe. And I turned the crisp of it into a granola, so that we could eat this for breakfast. But as all Dorie's recipes, no matter how hard you try to mess them up, you just can't muddle a good thing.