The Girl Who Can Cook_A Novel of Revenge and Ramen Noodles

by Mike Wehner

  “No, I’m going to read it and you’re going to listen.”

  “And if I don’t?”

  I stood. A shock tensed every muscle in my body, “I’ll tape you to that goddamn chair if I have to.”

  I eased back and Charlie wiped rain from his cheek that might have been tears. The book was filled with sticky notes to mark passages I’d read and reread. I leafed through my highlights and gave his fractional attention span small bites of text.

  He stopped me a few minutes in, “how do you know any of this is true?”

  “That’s why I stayed, to find out. You preach self-exploration or whatever it is you equate with being in the woods, ‘find your howl,’ you told me once. I’m here, trying to figure this out, trying to figure me out.”

  “So you dig up this book and come out here and when things don’t turn out you fucking stay? That doesn’t make sense.”

  “I felt like I wasn’t the same person, I couldn’t go back to my old life with all this hanging over me. I tried to kill someone, it isn’t easy to live with that.”

  The waft of lemon and short bread bloomed from the house and eased the mood.

  “I’m not saying forget, but we can’t drag this trauma around with us the rest of our life and let it color every experience we have.”

  I didn’t relate well to Charlie, torment was our strongest bond. Snot ran down his face.

  “In the wild it’s only about now, there is no then. But I’m not a possum, Alex, I have a memory. Being present isn’t the same as ignoring the past.”

  I pressed on with the book, Charlie listened but I’m not sure he heard. A lemon square in his hand and another in his belly he leaned back in the chair, looking up at the overripe banana sky and unsure what to believe.

  ◆◆◆

  We were up on a hillside a few hours later, Zeke roamed around while we argued with baby gin blossoms and red cheeks. A waxing moon hung over Charlie’s shoulder.

  “I’ve been living backwards for too long, we need to let go, Charlie.”

  Charlie hung his head between his knees, Zeke poked his ear with his tongue and he swatted him away like a mosquito. “I can’t.”

  “I believe you’re a good man. Thinking hatefully is one thing, but acting on it isn’t something a good man can live with, I know I couldn’t. If you hurt her the agony will empty you out like a dead tree being slowly returned to the forest floor, your loose ends will wilt then your trunk and finally your heart.”

  Now I was the one crying, finally. Tears streamed into the corners of my mouth and the salty snap crinkled my tongue. My voice was on desperate autopilot while my mind showed me an image of Erin’s sunken body at the bottom of the ocean. A knife was stuck in her heart.

  “You should have talked to me about this,” Charlie said. “We could have worked through it together. I feel like you are trying to tell me you’d snitch.”

  “I’m scared.” This was the most honest thing I said to him, I was scared for everybody. My life had become quantum, it was both a wave and a particle and I knew I couldn’t exist as both. As soon as someone saw me for what I was I’d be revealed to be one or the other.

  “I’m not promising tonight changed how I feel, but we need to stay on the same page. You need to be more open,” Charlie said. He stood up and stretched. “If you agree to talk more, I will tell you if I have a change of heart.”

  It wasn’t the confirmation I hoped for, but it was enough to sleep that night. It was enough to keep me from looking over my shoulder. I closed my eyes and John floated inside my eyelids, his starched shirt peppered with red dots and his eyes opened. He was filled with rage.

  “I want to go home,” Charlie said snapping me out of the trance. Wave or particle, beam or dot, I’d soon find out which one I was.

  With and Without You

  PAGE 233

  It was early evening, maybe five o’clock on a crisp autumn night. I made room in my closet for sweaters I’d taken from storage earlier in the day. I went to John’s apartment to talk, the nasty exchange on the carpet was a week old now. I loved him and wasn’t ready to give up—though I didn’t tell him that.

  All week I was horrible to him, threatened him. Threatened to call the police. Threatened to leave. Threatened to tell his friends. Empty threats, but they seemed to work. As long it was a one-time thing I thought I could deal with it and the nastier I got the more he groveled. He sent lavish gifts, no flowers or candy. A designer handbag, a watch, an incredible handmade Japanese knife with a jade handle. The more desperate his pleas for forgiveness the happier I was. It was my turn, I deserved to make him pay financially and emotionally. That night he was done groveling.

  John was sunken into a worn club chair when I walked into the apartment, a glass of bourbon balanced on his chest and harlequin socked feet up on the coffee table. There was a political debate show on TV. He loved to watch those shows where a liberal and a conservative pretend to be outraged by everything the other one says. The names are always stupid and confrontational, Partisan Strike or whatever. He didn’t bother looking at me when I let myself in.

  I pulled up a stool to the kitchen bar and waited for him to speak, or at the very least look my direction. Neither one of us liked the ambiguous turn our relationship had taken but John seemed exhausted by it. He was sitting there inking his rubber stamp: I’ll finish this tonight, one way or another.

  When he did talk he wasn’t himself. It wasn’t the booze or the pills. I just caught myself doing to him what the media did to me. It wasn’t pills, like that, they were prescribed. I’m still not sure what they were for. He was on an anti-depressant and had something else for sleep. Like I said, he was very private. John didn’t like me using his laptop to check the weather let alone asking for the details of a prescription.

  There was a sadness in him that took hold sometimes, so I understood why he was in therapy and I tried to understand when he would lash out.

  It’s such a cliché. The over-privileged, over-educated, over-dog was clinically depressed. That didn’t bother me. He was trying to get better, he was sick. I did use it to excuse his behavior, I regret that. When someone is mentally ill it’s easy to dismiss everything they do. I felt terribly guilty when I dressed down his behavior and even worse when I thought about leaving him because of it. I figured the social scientists would fix him eventually.

  That night when John spoke he was flat and monotone, disconnected from the body his mind controlled. He struggled to turn his head and address me. He was overcome by a darkness so heavy he could barely move and I think his plan that night was to escape the world that vexed him so. The gun was in his pocket, he wanted off this rock.

  There he was on the couch, sleeves rolled up, arms covered with bandages from where I scratched him trying to loosen his grip so that I could breathe. And there I was in the kitchen, not a mark on me, my neck the same shade of ivory it’d been my whole life.

  It doesn’t matter how smart a good man is, he can do well even if he isn’t bright. A bad man has to be smart to get anywhere or anyone. The more evil you are the smarter you have to be. John was so evil that before the demonic swivel of his head I never noticed how evil he was.

  Choking me hadn’t left a trace, it’s the perfect abuse. I didn’t have to wrap my neck up in a scarf of shame or lie to my co-workers. That’s really important. Not only were there no marks for others to see and prove what he’d done, but there weren’t any marks for me to see either. When I got up the next day and looked in the mirror, I was whole, I thought.

  “How many times do I have to say I am sorry before things can go back to normal? I am so tired of this.”

  Being sorry for suffocating me wasn’t good enough, I pressed him.

  “You’re sorry? I should have had you thrown in fucking prison.”

  He labored to stand up, slow, oafish.

  “Stop threatening me Erin, I’ve apologized and apologized. What I did was terrible but it wasn’t without cause. Tell me how
to fix this.”

  I stood. I sensed weakness in his desperation so I went on the offensive. The thing about being manipulated is that it’s hard to know what you wanted to do and what the manipulator made you do. I remember what I did that day, but I’ll spend the rest my life wondering whether they were my choices or John’s.

  “What kind of a man strangles a woman from behind? Are you too weak,” I pushed him, “or too pathetic,” I pushed him again, “to see my face while you choke me.” It felt good to stand up for myself, but that was short lived. He ragdolled me into the wall, I felt the drywall buckle. I stared into the carpet sobbing, too afraid to look way, way up at him again.

  “Enough,” he told me. He took a handgun from his pocket. It was black and had a plastic grip. John once said I needed to know how to protect myself and learn how to shoot. I would never go to the range with him, right then I wished I had. Even if I could get my hands on the gun and wanted to shoot him I wasn’t sure I’d know how.

  “You don’t take anything seriously, you don’t understand that everything isn’t a competition or some goddamn game. You can’t win at a relationship, I’m going to make you understand.”

  “John, put the gun down, I’m not trying to be the best at making you feel bad.”

  “Actually, it is a game Erin, you’re right, everything,” he waved his arms around in circles, “is all one big game.”

  “John, I need you to put that gun down right now.”

  “Fine, is that how to fix this?” He set the gun on the end table. I was still on the floor of the living room.

  “There are winners and losers in life Erin. Look how unhappy we are, look what you make me and I make you. One of us has to lose so the other can win.”

  “John I don’t understand, I love you, but I don’t understand.”

  “We were perfect Erin, you were perfect and I was perfect. We ruined it together. I make you worse. You make me worse. The solution is simple.”

  “John,” I spoke slowly, “I’m going to put the gun away.”

  “You do whatever you have to Erin, I know you’re a winner.”

  He let me take the gun off the table but before I could stand up he was on top of me again, this time the choke was much deeper. He let up just before I blacked out.

  “You chicken shit, you’ve got a gun, stop me.” I tossed the gun an arm’s length away and stared him down. I didn’t want to hurt him.

  “You keep getting worse, look at what we do to each other. There’s nothing left inside you, I’ve rotted it all away,” he said and stomped down the hall towards his bedroom.

  He came back with the silver revolver he kept in a hidden compartment under his bed. My face was purple, I was so tense my body was cutting off my own air supply. I could barely stand.

  “I thought you were special, but you’re like every bitch in love. Spineless. A follower. You were so good, why’d you have to go and start acting like me. I don’t want a puppet you stupid whore, you do exactly what I say when I say it, you aren’t what I thought you were. Show me there’s more to you than some love-sick devotee.”

  Nothing he said made any sense. He’d gone mad. I clawed my way to the gun I’d thrown and put my back to the wall so it would be harder for him to get his arms around my neck. My knees were up and my hands were shaking. The gun bobbled up and down.

  “You fucking loser, it’s you or me.” He unlocked the safety and walked at me with the barrel pointed at my heart.

  “Choose!” he said.

  “Choose!” He was a few feet from me. I pushed myself up the wall, a hurricane of thoughts and feelings enveloped me and I had no sense of right and wrong. No thoughts of good or bad. All I heard were his words. The weight of the universe was upon me, stifling everything but my ears.

  “Choose!”

  I pulled the trigger and kept pulling long after he was down, then collapsed so hard and fast I thought I’d never stand again. Twenty-seven minutes later I stood up and nothing was ever the same and nothing was ever good, but I know I made the right choice.

  Thirty

  DAY 987

  Charlie left on Sunday almost as planned. He refused to let me drive him to the airport and elected for public transit instead. He didn’t ask for directions to the train station, he was so eager to leave he called a cab.

  He was all I thought about at work Monday, distracted, all my food came out wrong.

  Under.

  Over.

  Mixed up.

  My food was a reflection of my mind.

  Erin caught every mistake and even though she was agitated by the carelessness she still took the time to slide me a cup of revolting green tea and two aspirin, assuming the long weekend was what had me in a haze.

  “You guys sure know how to get after it,” she said turning the mug’s handle towards me.

  It was a usual Monday at any job, the groove wasn’t greased—the routine felt slightly unfamiliar. The handle of a pan was too wide or the dial on the burner was more sensitive than I remembered.

  I managed to get through it without any grievous errors and stayed late to close with Erin with hopes of taking her back to my place or vice versa. I was starting to like my new life and as fucked up as that was I was starting to believe that I could keep this up a while longer. The floor was wet with bleach and my feet squeaked as I ran a rag over the can opener, the last device left to clean when Erin called me over from the bar.

  The tint on the front windows made the dining room extra-dark when the main lights were off, but there was enough of a red hue from the Exit/Salida sign above the bathroom hallway to navigate. Erin sat on top of the bar with sputnik lamps exploding warm yellow light over each shoulder. My journal of recipes and semi-forgotten pain sat next to her with her right hand on top of it.

  “You left this under Tommy’s station on Friday, I thought you might want it.” She jumped down.

  I searched her face for emotion, did-you did-you did-you, did you read it? It would be hard to find anything incriminating with a casual glance. It was a few pages history, some conjecture, but most of it was about food. Ideas for stupid condiments like kimchi buffalo sauce and elaborate restaurant concepts. The laughable Essen Ramen. These were the last things I thought about before the void.

  I stepped up to kiss her and got to the finish line when my world went dark; that last little bit where the girl stops before your faces come together to tell you that no matter how this turns out, that you did this, this was your fault. I palmed her lumbar and wafted her in, Erin got taller, back arching up to make herself a little easier to reach. I took in her kitchen stink, hair dusted with the sulfuric remnants of the grill vent she’d cleaned a few minutes prior. I focused on the dimple between her nose and lips, something I’d done since I first kissed Lindsey Atwater in third grade. Aim for the middle, hit something. I saw her nose, closer, bigger nose, closer, blurry nose, black. My light went out.

  ◆◆◆

  It’s hard to be a cynic when you wake up bound and gagged in the dark and you know you deserve it. I wasn’t thinking what shit luck this is, oh woe is fucking me, oh cruel world, no, all I could think about was scratching my nose.

  I wormed forwards and back trying to find a wall to rub my nose on. I wiggled my shirt up and my flank scuffled along the icy floor. The chemical stench of tape drifted into my nostrils. I poked at the tape with my tongue and it bowed out and rubber-banded back.

  My mouth wasn’t the only part of me covered, the tape wound around my whole body—trussed and ready for roasting. From spitter-to-shitter she’d tied me, good girl I thought. There’s nothing worse than an itch you can’t scratch. Love is an itch I can’t scratch.

  I wondered how Erin did it, a big, fuck-off knife hidden behind her back maybe. She must have only worked up enough courage to whip me with the handle, I felt whole, not punctured. I hoped I didn’t go out on the first whack, I hoped she had to bash me in the head so many time she was winded when I finally passed out. I tried to pry m
y lips open again, my aching tongue did nothing.

  The rattle and hum around me was something I felt more than heard. My right ear was taped and it played loud slaps from my heart while my left, pressed against the floor, echoed the vibrations from some nearby machine. The clues had me thinking I might be stuffed in an ice machine on a truck headed for the bottom of the ocean, or worse, Philadelphia.

  I wanted to scratch my nose as much as I wanted to know how she found me out. Like a children’s mystery game I turned the clues over in my mind. Was it the book under the nightstand in bedroom, or the journal under the prep table in the kitchen? Or was it a conversation with her mother where she tells her that she’s met a boy and mom scours the web with his name to see what she can dig up. To see if there are any red flags that might cause her cub to turn lioness again and participate in the hunt.

  I was hell bent on getting the tape off my mouth, if not to scratch my nose, so I could bark out a few words of defense before she killed me.

  I jerked forwards like a sledder trying to start down a hill and spun my body around in a circle until my feet hit something solid. I flutter kicked the object to get a sense of its shape. Then I scooted to it, set both heels as high as I could and pressed. Metal clanked against the wall and after a snap of silence a thunderous rain of heavy melons, loose butternut squash, and bagged celery punched down on me. The crates of fruits and vegetables smashed into my ribs and calves. The tipped shelf of the walk-in cooler laid across my face and I slid my nose across the rough edge with great relief.

  I soothed my itch and loosened the tape on its frame. I couldn’t move but now I could talk. The hum was the fan on the refrigeration unit and I knew by the direction of the sound that the cooler door was behind my head. When it opened I’d have a chance to speak, I’d be awfully hard to stab covered in cantaloupes and squash.

  The next light I saw wasn’t going to mean salvation, it meant judgment. I pleaded to the dark that when she came, she’d give me time to speak. To say that as impossible as it was, as stupid and nonsensical, that I loved her. I’d be happy with those last words. I accepted my fate and accepted the pressure of the fallen produce as the last hug I’d ever receive when a quivered voice came from over there in the black.