a twelfth new story...'garnish'

‘Just put a basil leaf on top’. They were arguing about garnishes again, and their dinner guests were waiting. ‘It doesn’t make a jot of difference to the flavour’, said Annie, who preferred to dice herbs and mix with Bolognese, where Roger preferred to keep flavours clean, simple – bland, Annie often complained.

‘It’s because you’re smoking again’, said Roger, hovering behind Annie like a culinary sex pest; Annie, bent over the gas light stove browning the meat. ‘Your taste buds are shot to pieces’. Annie reached for the salt. ‘And no more salt’, said Roger, putting his hand on her forearm, authoritative Gary Cooper style. ‘Why not?’, said Annie.  ‘Are you going to give me a Chinese burn if I do?’ Roger let go, moved beside her.  ‘Less of the backseat driving’, said Annie, jaded, her face red from the heat and steam.  Roger stuck his long, thin nose into the pot, an anteater, or a common rat? ‘You know both Jenna and Ian smoke?’ Annie continued, ‘and don’t give me anymore shit’. They hadn’t had sex since Roger’s accident. Roger sat down on a stool in the kitchen behind her, the meat was nearly brown enough.

‘Why don’t you go back through to the dining room?’, asked Annie. ‘Don’t mix in chopped basil’, said Roger. ‘Right!’, said Annie, ‘go back into the dining room and ask everyone if they want their basil chopped and mixed, or, if they’re happy to make do with a basil leaf on top’. Annie was getting mad, feeling the strain of catering to Roger’s myriad demands.  Sectional interest! Aaarrrrghhhhh! Why couldn’t she be more like a politician in her marriage and simply pay no mind? Roger stood up again, began tugging at his shirt collar. ‘It’s too hot in here’, he said. Annie laughed, short and sharp.  ‘Well, darling, if you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen’.

Once Roger had slouched back through to the dining room, Annie reached for the salt and added another desert spoon, shut off the hob and chopped up the basil into the smallest, meanest pieces she could, stalks and all, then mixed with the Bolognese.  She could hear Roger in the dining room: ‘Who wants their basil mixed in? Or as a garnish?’. This is too much, thought Annie, I will have to file for divorce, failing that find a new front of house.

In the event, of course, nobody cared. And even Roger agreed Annie’s Bolognese was a winner.  Later, in bed, Annie asked: ‘When do you think it will heal?’ Roger put down his book – Churchill: the War Cabinet Years. ‘What will heal?’, he asked, seemingly oblivious to the fact his penis wasn’t working. Annie sighed, ‘nevermind’, she said. Nevermind: or failure, resignation, terminal decline!