Food - A Love Language

Warning: Violent intrusive thoughts, brief discussion of softcore pornography

By the time I finish making the food, I’ll definitely be warm enough and A1 to drive. I hum as I pull out the fresh ingredients from my fridge and cupboards. I set a timer for fifty minutes for the salmon with one hand, leave a bagel in the toaster, and grab a chef’s knife with the other. My hands return to slice a carrot and celery stalk, as well as chop a small onion. For some reason, chopping onions and shredding chilli don’t tend to get me unless I touch my eyes. Never been much of a crier, I guess.

Working fast helps but the slices are still jagged and irregular in thickness. I remember when they used to be smooth and uniform as a kid, hoping to impress Papá when he’d return from deployments with my improvement. I slice the ginger and mince garlic, although the garlic ends up more inconsistently crushed than minced. Some are chunks. Others are almost paste-like. “Hm. That’ll affect the sauté,” I mutter. As I saw the golden toasted bread in half, my tremor makes the breadknife slip. The halves are uneven. I spread the cream-cheese on top unevenly to compensate. I return to the pot and scrape the minced garlic and sliced ginger in, sprinkling in a bit of turmeric too, and stir. I like to think stirring is something my tremor helps with, even if it makes some bits miss the pot. I scoop up whatever lands on the counter. The floor chunks will just have to be wasted and put in the bin… or I can eat them. Depends on how impulsive I feel when I pick them up; we’ll see.

While waiting for the pot to simmer as the flavours meld together, I prep Link’s favourite: a giant fruit salad. “Mango, dewberry, raspberry, lychee, loganberry, blackberry. Make sure to save some for Bridget since they’re her favourite.” The mango’s skin is smooth and slippery – a real enemy for my tremor but not my grip. Still, my paring knife has to scrape multiple times to clear up the patches left behind during the initial peels. Like the carrot and garlic, the vibrant ripe cubes come out awkward and inconsistent. My hands are now wet and sticky. I eat a few of the wedge-shaped chunks and plop the matzo balls I made earlier from the fridge into the pot. As the matzo balls simmer, I peel the lychees and toss everything into a bowl. It’s a vibrant riot of glistening gold, deep purplish-black, and ripe reds. That’s one dish done!

I glance in the pot as I wash and dry my hands. “Barely started.” I’ll move onto Chichi’s dish then. Hopefully, she’ll appreciate my jollof rice. It’s not her mamá’s but her mamá is a professional Nigerian chef, so I’m fine with ranking second in this instance. I stuff my blender with passata, tomato purée, chillies, onions, peppers, garlic, rosemary, thyme, ground coriander, and paprika. I plug my ears as it blends. Some people may say that my use of earplugs was excessive when I was in the military. But those people have tinnitus now while I don’t, so who’s really the loser here? I take my earplugs out once the blend is smooth. The matzo balls are still going. I grab the chopped onions, carrots, shredded celery, and cherry tomatoes and return to my chef’s knife.

“Better start planning the trips to their places then,” I murmur as I grip the onion tightly in a claw. Elisha and Link are the closest to my place while Chichi is half-a-klick out from them. Bridget will be last since she lives farthest away so, if I go to Chichi first, I can loop back around to Elisha and Link and then just head straight to Bridget. My knife bounces slightly, erratically chopping. The second carrot suffers like the first. I shred the celery into uneven frayed strings and struggle to keep the small slippery tomatoes in place, leading to uneven halves and runaways. I frown. “Need to make a pit stop at that bakery on her road first.” I’d make her maritozzi and coffee myself if I could, but I cook. Baking is a different beast, cousin to pastry, and I’m not getting anywhere near that kitchen god-killer.

“I can use a cooler box to keep all this hot and fresh, ¿no? Put two layers of towels at the bottom, everything in Tupperware, and drive reaaaalllyy carefully to not spill everything…” I wonder aloud as I grab a saucepan, dash olive oil in, and drop the vegetables in. The chopped onions are a haphazard mess of large chunks while others are nearly minced…or crushed. The carrots are a mix of thick and thin. The celery is a wild bouquet of differing lengths. I accidentally crushed some of the tomatoes. I eat those ones.

Once Elisha’s vegetables are soft and golden, I separate them into the pot to simmer with the matzo ball. Chichi’s tomatoes remain in the pan, joined by the sauce blend. The timer for the salmon goes off. The ones with shrill screaming spook me, so this one makes a cute little jingle instead. I pull the salmon out, slice out a square, and lay the blanket on. Bagel complete! Soon, bay leaves and rice are added to the pan. “Malditos temblores. Making it impossible to measure salt. Just one and a half of salt- No, all over the counter instead. Ugh. Whatever. Pinch it like the black pepper.” I stir and boil Chichi’s ingredients together before ladling Elisha’s food into a bowl with a sprinkle of fresh dill on top. Two done! I cover both bowls in clingfilm to keep them fresh before returning to the rice. “No. No sticking. Or I’ll have to stir you apart, entiendes?”

Once the rice is fully cooked through, I turn off the heat. Now, I just have to cover it with a lid and leave it to steam. Easy! I chop coriander and fry the plantain while waiting. The leaves scatter unevenly onto the large stubborn chunks and finely minced cuts. When it comes to frying, I’ve learned the hard way to just leave the pan on the stove. Holding it by the handle tends to cause sizzling oil splatters that have a penchant for landing on me. Luckily, it’s only a few minutes until the plantain is golden and tender. I spend the remaining minutes prepping the cooler box, transporting the other dishes into Tupperware boxes, and checking the pan by spinning the lid to clear the trapped steam. Abuela always gets mad when someone just pops the lid off, letting all the hot air and steam escape. Everything comes together with a sprinkling of coriander in a Tupperware box.

“Count it! One, two, three!” I cheer once it’s all in the cooler box. “Now, just gotta wash up.” It doesn’t take too long. Just a pot, a pan, and a few knives. I load up the dishwasher, turn it on, and check my watch again: 1050 hours. “Jaj. I’ll be right on time.” I climb down to the ground floor, set and tie the loaded cooler box to the back of my Yamaha YZF-R6, pop my helmet on, and head out. Mmmh, speed. Unfortunately, I have to slow down to 40 km/h and then even more to 30 km/h. It takes barely five minutes to reach Chichi’s, and I don’t want that to be prolonged if I’m caught speeding again. My fresh hot meals depend on it.

I ring the doorbell. The building’s exterior looks incredibly normal – almost boring: clean lines, large windows, open spaces. You think a woman like Chichi would live in a much more… cartoonishly fabulous building. I think it used to be a former commercial space, explaining the exposed brick siding where the fire staircase is and the vintage storefront. Outdoor seating areas for cafés and restaurants line the streets beyond, with cars parked in lines along the sides and avoiding the bus stops on the main road. I spot stark yellow out of the corner of my eye and admire a large great northern diver that Elisha has graffitied onto the exposed brick until the door opens. Compared to the building, Chichi stands out like a nuclear explosion on the horizon… in a good way. And so does the interior of her place. God. It’s like she’s a bird of paradise, hoping to bedazzle an unsuspecting mate into her nest. Open concept with high ceilings, the walls are purple with fancy white trims and golden lighting fixtures. Every cushion and scrap of drapery has a pattern on it, as if everything is a potential fabric swatch to her. The only plain things are the wooden sections of her furniture, and even those are still decoratively carved! And I can only see into her living room behind her. God only knows what the rest of the place looks like.

“Cass! What’chu doin’ here? I ain’t expectin’ to see you today!”

I grin sheepishly, presenting the cooler box to her. “Here. I made you jollof rice.” Her eyes light up like flash-bangs, and she immediately digs it out. “It’s probably not as good as your mamá’s but–”

“Shut up, I love you! You too much! I been cravin’ it earlier. God don butter my bread!” She gestures for me to come in. “Come chop.”

“Ah, no, I can’t, Chichi.” I pat the box. “Got other meals to deliver.”

“Na so?”

“Yeah. I should be heading to Link and Elisha now, and then I’ll meet up with Bridget.” I check my watch again. “Should make it in time for our photo shoot.”

Chichi perks up, already eating. Oh, no- “Photo shoot?! Girl, you definitely comin’ in! I’ma style you! Ain’t no question ’bout it!”

“No, Chichi, I really don’t have time!” I exclaim, stepping back to dodge her hand. “And your place has dolls in it–”

“And poppets.”

“–and I hate dolls, and your clothes won’t fit me anyway!”

“Tell Bri I’ma style you fo’ der next one!” she yells as I drive off.

A minute later, I park again and let myself into the flat. Link is in the middle of their monthly apology to their mamá about not working as an engineer despite having the qualifications: “Maan, mujhe khed hai, ve sochate hain ki main atiyogy hoon (माँ, मुझे खेद है, वे सोचते हैं कि मैं अति योग्य हूँ)!” Meanwhile Elisha is watching the news: “The increased precipitation will contribute to more overcast days and a rise in the frequency and intensity of storms, particularly lightning storms. Farmers have already reported crop damage from salt spray, soil saturation, and livestock stress.” As I leave the fruit salad and soup next to a pair of unlit Shabbat candles, he kvetches about how my hospitalisation is a very bad start to Rosh Hashanah before I slip back out. After nine minutes of driving and a pitstop on the way, I knock on Bridget’s door. Relájate, Cass. All you have to do is give her the food, and then get on with the shoot.Shoot.

…Shoot.

“Cass! Come on in. Oh, don’t you look lovely!”

I glance down at myself. “I look how I usually do.”

She smirks. “I know.”

Faint warmth fills my cheeks. She either doesn’t notice or politely ignores it as she leads me to her in-house studio room. It consists of a white backdrop, a few surrounding light-stands with various light modifiers, and a laptop on a coffee table with a cushion as a seat and a nearby power-board for outlets and USB ports off to the side. I’m surprised at the lack of plants. There are only two flowerpots. The one on the table has an acanthus, while the one on the windowsill is full of red daisies and burgundy roses. “I thought about decorating the set like I usually do, but I didn’t want to risk overwhelming you,” she says. “So! This’ll be a… lite glamour photography photo shoot. Like a tutorial! So, it’ll just be about forty-five minutes instead of the usual hour or so.”

“Okay. Um…” I awkwardly step onto the backdrop after setting the plate of maritozzi and blackberries next to her laptop. “What’s, uh, glamour photography? Sounds like something Chichi would like.”

Bridget chuckles. “Maybe. But another name for it is pin-up or beefcake photography! Tha’nos?”

I stare at her. “It’s what.”

“Don’t worry, Cass, I won’t ask you to do any erotic poses or undress unless you want to. Glamour photography doesn’t even need to include nudity. You can be completely and fully clothed!” She smiles softly with the kind of love and gentle admiration that creatives have for their craft, first at her camera, then at me. “The focus lies in the beauty of the subject’s body.”

“So, it’s softcore porn.”

She shrugs as she checks over her camera. “The distinction is largely a matter of taste. However, sexual contact is an important difference. It isn’t in this genre of photography but is in porn.” She then grins brightly. “Now, let’s get started!”

“Right. What do you want me to do?”

“Get comfortable, and I’ll work with what you give me.”

I have absolutely no clue how to do that, especially in this environment with literal spotlights on me. I’ve gotten too used to having the element of surprise. Whatever. Focus on the objective, Cass: “the beauty of the subject’s body”. Beauty, huh? I don’t exactly have that, but I’ve certainly got experience focusing on the body. Adapting militant physical assessments to a glamour photo shoot shouldn’t be too hard. My attire might get in the way though. A long-sleeved shirt with the sleeves down and an open collar with a tight smart jumper on top isn’t exactly what shows up in glamour photography or softcore porn.

“Um, you sure you don’t need me to change into more fitting attire?” I awkwardly ask, checking my boot heel as it lightly scuffs against the floor.

“I think your attire fits you perfectly well!” Her camera shutter snaps, drawing my attention. “Besides, our focus is on the beauty of your body. Your clothes are part of that beauty. They interact with your body to create very lovely effects!”

I glance down at myself again. “How? What effects?”

Bridget steps closer, a free hand mildly raised as a silent ask for permission. At my nod, she gently traces the contours subtly conveyed beneath.

“Your clothes accentuate your form rather than conceal it.” She brushes my collar. I tense up as her hand nears my neck. Strike the front – extreme pain, gagging, potential vomiting. Crush the windpipe – death. Shock the carotid artery, jugular vein, and vagus nerve on the side – unconsciousness, or involuntary muscle spasms and intense pain if not struck powerfully enough. Hit the back – whiplash, a concussion, possible broken neck and death. Thankfully, her hand doesn’t breach my collar. “The fabric clinging hints at the toned muscle beneath, highlighting your defined neck and shoulders. And here–” Her fingers lightly trail down my sleeve. My bicep twitches. A painful strike to it renders the arm ineffective. Attacking the radial nerve in the forearm muscle does the same but extends the ineffectiveness to the hand as well. “–suggests strength while still appearing invitingly soft.” I swallow, willing my hand to remain by my side. Bridget smiles. She doesn’t understand. She doesn’t even know. “See? It’s not about exposing skin alone. Glamour involves appreciation for what’s there as is.”

She pulls away to show the photo of me that she snapped earlier on her camera. A shaky exhale escapes me. My cheeks are warm. I don’t understand. What’s wrong? I both do and don’t want her to touch me. It’s so nice. She’s so gentle with me. It’s wrong.