Heat, Food, Ice
Later that night, after he’d left, I lay on top of my sheets with the fan an inch from my face.
—
I listen only to the motor, a consistent sweeping sound, and hold an ice cube in my right hand. My body is sticky from the heat, from walking outside, from opening and closing the oven door.
“Mm,” I think, drinking in the busy air. I haven’t felt like eating for two days. I haven’t felt like doing much of anything, except sip iced tea with cloves and read, and read, and read. I do all of the things I don’t feel like doing, though, like going to school and cooking heavy, sauce-laden sweetbreads. Like pouring wine, like writing.
It is so hot. I run the ice cube over my chest in small circles, feeling collarbones through the wetness. My stomach is full, distended from the café au lait, the rosé, the roasted figs, the rye bread with caraway torn into hunks with our hands, the minted pea salad, the crumbles of crisped prosciutto. I hadn’t intended to eat so much; these things just happen. Anyway, I am happy and not hungry. I made everything myself. I really didn’t want to cook – I haven’t, since June – but it felt good to do it anyway. So I don’t mind the stomach. The ice moves over it in bigger circles before gliding back up my chest and finding a spot just below my neck. I leave it there and soon it becomes unbearable, like a pepper caught in my throat, like spicy food I can’t stop eating. I don’t want to stop eating so I leave it there and feel the drips pool on my pillow as my body heat turns the ice to water.
I’ve told you before, but your writing is HOT!
Seriously, I’m starting to believe there’s a correlation between heat and good writing. The best thing I’ve written in awhile came to me when it was 104F and the air-conditioning in my car was broken. Maybe someday someone will do the research and determine that there have been fewer Twains and Faulkners since the invention of A/C? But whether it’s the heat of your cooking, or the heat of your passion for food, or in this case, the actual weather, your writing always warms my heart. Great story, Rochelle!