Recipes

The grandmother liked to sit at the foot of the long walnut table in the dining room at her daughter’s house, in the chair closest to the door. She liked to come and go as she pleased, constantly threatening to arrive or disappear in a rhythm all her own, punctuated by the jingling keys always in her hand. This freedom was a luxury she had come to know only late in life and, among the unexpected joys of widowhood, gave the most pleasure.

Perhaps she should have been a lion-tamer, a white-collar criminal, or a card-shark in an old frontier town. A small, comfortable life in southern California had allowed her only to be bossy, and invariably correct—if not also often wrong.

Among her family, conversation was almost entirely unknown. So unlike herself, her descendants resembled sea urchins or beautiful, pale underwater corals, crusted around the edge of the dark table. As if moved by an invisible current, they seemed to sway and interact in arbitrary and impersonal patterns that described the merely physical laws of cause and effect—attraction and repulsion—more common to plants than to people. They nibbled at life, like goldfish, or pigeons endlessly pecking at one dry spot or another on an empty sidewalk, too stupid or never hungry enough to move on.

If Julie was to become one of them, she too would have to learn to meander in the slow-motion selvage of purposelessness, whatever she might actually think. Paul’s grandmother was at the center of this universe, not so much because of the power of her attraction or force, but for the laziness of all the others, who circled in predictable orbits, like marbles around the rim of a big platter. It didn’t really matter if there was anything at the center, but for the sake of form, as an idea.

“We had a wonderful dinner last night at Café Verdi—linguini with lobster and saffron sauce.” Julie put her hand on Paul’s shoulder as she spoke to his grandmother. She was only trying to be polite. Of course, these people could be crowding around her little kitchen table whenever they want, if she marries Paul. The grandmother rustled her pearls, planning the attack she could neither admit nor resist.

“A million years ago, I used to cook lobsters. Finally, I couldn’t stand the noise.”

Not known for her prowess in the kitchen, the grandmother’s idea of cooking included mashing fresh strawberries and whipping heavy cream for pastries that came in a box from a bakery. Anything to which she applied heat experienced a transformation far more alchemical than culinary and produced relics rather than meals.

For Julie, cooking was also little more than a bothersome concept: she subsisted on steamed zucchini, dressing-less salad, and English Breakfast tea. She was better read, and much less daring than the grandmother, and believed that the lobsters must have made some terrible screech as they were plunged into the boiling water.

“Is it a high-pitched sound? It can’t go on for that long, can it?”

“No, dear… it’s the tapping.”

“Tapping?”

“Yes, you just can’t imagine.” The grandmother repositioned her eyeglasses, like a gunner setting her sights. “Everyone loves to eat lobsters, but no one thinks about the cook who first has to get them all into the oven and then must listen to their relentless tapping on the glass of the oven door, until they’re cooked. Silence is the only way to know they’re done.”

Was she simply lying? Was it possible that, from cruelty or kindness, no one had ever countered this woman and told her how lobsters are cooked? Paul must have heard this story a million times, but his face was as pure and blind as a crystal paperweight. He looked straight ahead at the ugly credenza loaded with china dogs, and his shoulder dipped slightly, away from her hand.

“What are your other favorite recipes?”

Paul’s mother finally spoke, “Who wants more iced tea?” The grandmother rattled her keys.