The Red Onion and the Date
“What the hell is so bloody important it couldn’t wait till Monday? Or next weekend?” Carol questioned Abby and Genevieve the minute she entered the foyer carrying her weekend bag. “I had made plans with Rindy, goddammit, and Fred wouldn’t say a word the entire…” Therese. When Carol first noticed her standing on the second floor landing, her heart not only skipped a beat, it altogether refused to act normally.
“Calm the fuck down, Carol,” Abby retorted dryly. “Take your bag upstairs, I’ll be with you in a little while.” She took off her reading glasses and was about to join Gen in the kitchen. Before she did just that she shot a glance at Therese and to the brunette’s great astonishment winked a mischievous eye at her.
Peeved, Carol unpacked her bag and sat down on the foot of the bed to figure out what the hell was going on. Seeing Therese had taken her completely by surprise – why was she here and why hadn’t she been told she was here in the first place? Carol hated conspiracies of every kind and she was getting a very bad feeling about this. After all she had already put this unfortunate chain of events behind her and was getting on with her life. Brooding over her displeasure over what had just been revealed to her, Carol heard a determined knock on her door.
To Carol’s further dismay, Abby ignored her apparent unwillingness to invite her in. “Well, hurry up,” Abby spouted, “the dinner’s not going to get ready on its own. We need your help in the kitchen.” Her hands shoved in her pockets, Abby stood in the doorway watching her or rather waiting for her to do what she’d just told her.
“I just got in,” Carol pointed out not taking the trouble to hide her grievance. “And I’m not particularly hungry anyway.” She stared at Abby vehemently.
“But I am,” Abby clarified, “and you are going to sing for your supper – or in this case, prepare it with the rest of us, so get on with it!” She turned around and left as abruptly as she’d appeared.
By the time Carol got down Therese was there already, following closely Gen’s orders. Abby had given Margaret the day off since she’d wanted to visit her son in Hoboken. “It’s not like we’re going to starve to death,” she’d convinced Margaret who’d been reluctant to leave them to their own devices.
Truth be told, Genevieve wasn’t a bad cook at all. She’d been known to throw dinner parties even without any professional help in the past so she did know her way around the kitchen. Something was cooking in the oven and it let out a hearty, disarming fragrance that was enough to fill the entire kitchen with its exhilarating, robust aroma.
“Here,” Gen said to Carol giving her a wooden board and a sharp knife. “Chop these and put them in a small bowl.” She placed a red onion and a handful of Medjool dates on the counter in front of her. “Slice the onion, quarter the dates,” she instructed as one must someone who has absolutely no idea what she’s supposed to do.
Therese was working the food processor for the chickpeas. She looked uncomfortable and almost more because of the chore that had been forced upon her than because of Carol. She pulsed the cooked yellow peas into a stiff paste adding something she’d just learned to call tahini along with lemon juice, garlic, salt and finally iced water in it to make it smooth and creamy enough to meet with Gen’s approval.
“Add a tablespoon of vinegar to the onion slices and the dates,” Gen told Carol, “and some salt as well – then we’ll leave it to marinate for a half an hour or so.” She did what was asked of her even though her actions were far from relaxed. When Gen asked her to cook the pita bread pieces and chopped almonds in butter, Carol felt already way out of her league. “It’s not complicated at all,” Gen laughed at her confusion, “Just get some colour and crispiness on them, that’s all.” After a while she nevertheless took over the pan and did it herself.
Abby tended to the wine and it seemed to be based on some silent agreement that she would not take part in any other kitchen duty. Gen and Carol obviously shared this knowledge and Therese saw no reason to question it as someone who sensed a greater truth in actions of those in the know.
It took another half an hour for them to finally sit down at the dinner table to eat what they’d come up with: a flavourful baby spinach salad with dates and almonds, and a gratifying hummus with a spiced, tender lamb shawarma falling off its bone in generous, succulent slices to top it off.
The food compiled of such complex layers tasted glorious, and it rendered all four of them thankfully quiet for now. There was something to be said about them having made it together, having accomplished a meal they were now eager to share amiably. The fiery sprinkles of sumac coloured almost every other bite in its delightful redness leaving its tempestuous remnants on their welcoming taste buds.
“I love the way the onion and the date are so malleable here,” Abby smiled at Gen. “The vinegar just tempers them both, sort of brings them together and not only softens the onion’s sharp edge but also gives the sweet date some tangy character.” Nodding, Gen gave her beloved an approving smile.
“Subtle, Abigail, really subtle,” Carol retorted but her witty yet disagreeable manner was not appreciated by anyone around the table
“Can’t you just enjoy the food?” Therese asked her sharply. “Sometimes an onion is just an onion and a date is just a soft, brown dried fruit.”
Without giving it another thought, Carol shot an angry glance at her. “Can’t you just butt out? Sometimes my words for my friend are meant only for her.” It was a stupid thing to say and she knew it as well.
“Butt out?” Therese challenged. “You of all people talking about butting out? As in minding one’s own business? Oh… and you – you’re such a pro in doing just that!”
Abby glanced at her watch and raised her eyebrows at Gen quizzically. Carol and Therese had managed to stay out of each other’s hair for an hour and 45 minutes, which wasn’t too bad for two people looking forward to getting at it. Trying hard not to pay too much attention to the arguing couple, the two of them picked up their wine glasses and sneaked out of the dining room as quietly as possible.
“How long do you think they’ll stay that way?” Genevieve asked Abby once they were safely out of earshot.
“Hard to say for sure,” Abby lamented, “but I guess they’ll have to get it out of their system.”
It did take the rest of the evening and a good portion of the night as well. The heated argument spawning out of a red onion and a date took upon heights never before experienced with these innocent cultivars. If Carol was the quartered date, her usual sweet essence had a hard time mixing with Therese’s tear-inducing onion-y sharpness.
Carol had insulted Therese, and Therese had no intention to soften her words with any winsome vinegar. Who the fuck do you think you are poking your nose into my business? Do I look like I need fucking saving? Carol had insulted her – yes, maybe – with good intentions, but she had done it any way and it had made her feel like shit.
Carol had infuriated Therese, made her feel less than her equal by flaunting her money, throwing it around as if all it took to make her come around, to see the folly of her ways was just a hefty cheque or a bulging bank account. As if I didn’t guess who had bought the damn portrait in the first place and with such a ridiculous amount of money! How could she, a pampered Jersey Princess, every step of her way secured with dear ol’ Daddy’s delectable dollar bills, understand a single thing about a poor half orphan of Czech origin who had ended up keeping company to bored, wealthy women just to pay for her tuition?
But the money had never meant anything to her, Carol had insisted stubbornly. Since she had it, why wouldn’t she use it to help out someone she cared about? she had questioned Therese. She would willingly give away every last cent if it would make Therese see how absolutely of no value it was to her. And all this had just egged Therese on, made her even more furious since only a wealthy person with no real idea of how the world revolved around money and finances would say something so stupid and claim it to be true.
While Carol had sullenly noted that nothing she had said had so far had no effect whatsoever, Therese had suddenly blurted out that she in fact wants to be with Carol – that she wants it so much and, what was even worse, all the time. And what did she even mean by saying something like that in the heat of the moment? Carol had thought angrily. What the fuck did anything mean anyway and what was she supposed to say to Therese when she had said she’d wanted so much ? I give up, she had said throwing her arms in the air, I fucking refuse to listen this any longer, Carol had decided and slammed her room door behind her.
WHOA… Hold your horses! Wanted or wants ? Therese had said ‘want’, that’s why it had sounded a bit off in the first place. Or had she said it? Carol had to know for sure and since she was able to ask about it right away, she most certainly would.
Ripping the door open between their adjacent rooms Carol stormed in to catch Therese half-dressed and clearly surprised by her showing up.
“You want or wanted?” Carol questioned impatiently. “Which one did you mean?”
Therese stared at her in disbelief. “What the hell are you talking about?” She was standing next to her bed in her underwear.
“Want or wanted – as something that is now or… isn’t anymore,” Carol specified stubbornly only now noticing what Therese was or rather wasn’t wearing. “GOD… NEVER MIND.” The sudden urge to retreat to her room, behind its closed door, was too much to fight and she fled Therese’s boudoir in panic and confusion.
As Carol was back in her room, leaning against her side of the connecting door, she felt Therese trying to push it open. “Step away from the doorway, Carol,” she said emphatically. “Now, Carol,” she continued when nothing happened in a reasonable time. “It’s something I WANT RIGHT NOW.”
Meekly, Carol stepped aside, which made Therese stumble in uncontrollably, in one mad dash. Barely maintaining her balance, she looked rather comical in her state of undress. “Carol…” Therese said coming closer. “Carol…” she said clearly wanting and letting it show. “Now, Carol,” she confirmed as she wished for her to approach as well. “Now – as if choosing to accept you and me and… us... as one continuous present tense,” Therese acknowledged as she did away with the rest of her clothing. “Now, for I don’t intend to settle for anything less than…” she said discarding the last piece of her dress, “…what begins now”.
There was no moon peeking through a window that night. No borrowed rhymes or sentiments of any kind, only a light turned low next to a bed big enough for two – enough for them to finish what they’d started, to even stop for a little while, for a fraction of a second, for a heartbeat and an eyeful of sleep to only pick up where they’d left it, enough for their friends to recognise that what had happened and made them so aware of their temporality, had not finished at all but only just begun.
Never had Carol found speech so utterly pointless as when she succumbed to silence she found that night. For the words unspoken, yet revealed in their full meaning, took over their bodies like armies moved fearlessly across the map of their common ground. And so much of the terrain was still uncharted for, so much in Carol, it frightened her with its immensity but what she did not and could not know at the time was that it did not frighten Therese at all.
All the insults and the accusations, both the just and the uncalled for, withered away, the last hurtful line of defence caved in and lost its last lonely motive. It would’ve been quite fitting to say something, to fill the former angry void with spoken, tender passion but its time had not come yet.
It was as if the night and the darkness enshrouded the estate, its quaint rooms and winding stairs, in some serene, secret time created for its own private pleasure. It didn’t mark the minutes or the hours of the many meetings the house had witnessed – it measured the distance from one caress far too fugacious and thus forgotten to those always created in the heart of now.
Therese was the first to wake up the next morning. Even though she had spent a considerable time just watching Carol as she lay sleeping next to her, she knew everyone else to be still sound asleep when she descended the stairs and headed towards the kitchen.
She had been happy enough in the past to know she’d never been this happy before. Therese relished her private moment, the luxury of reflecting the joy she’d experienced in the night on the reliable kitchen counter, the gleaming gas stove and the curious cupboards waiting to be riotously ransacked.
For Therese it was impossible not to smile although she had never been known as one to curve her lips upward in excess. She beamed at each inanimate object her eyes touched upon, and had she been one to sing, she would have most likely hummed some silly tune as well.
Hello, bowl, Therese greeted conjuring a whisk from a drawer to flick its bright metal flower on the bowl's red plastic side. She had already peeked into the pantry and the fridge to know she had plenty of what she needed. She set out to work her magic.
When Carol came down, Therese had already missed her. And when Carol saw her in the kitchen toiling over the stove, she found a new woman – one so at ease and relaxed, full of laughter and loving tease, it couldn’t help but find its mirror image in her eyes.
Carol wanted to help Therese and she gracefully allowed her to do so, for it is always in the most mundane of chores in which new lovers find an exciting adventure. It is not the task itself they are focused on, though, but always on the awareness of their bodies touching or not while accomplishing it. They derive pleasure from the frivolous things since everything, after all, seems to exist only a step away from what beckons them the most.
When Abby and Genevieve made it to the kitchen, they were pleased to find it in sweet disarray. For some a newfound love may look like a nuisance or even an impoliteness aimed at them, but to those, who appreciate the true friendship these mad individuals may have temporarily shed aside, it is a most welcome sight, an evidence of their ability to find happiness and fulfilment, joy and wonder in life that may have resembled a wretched routine for far too long.
And yes, everyone agreed – the scrambled eggs tasted impeccable too.