Vanilla Salt

by Ada Parellada

  We are social animals, but excessive dependence on a group weakens us. Annette tells herself she has to be strong, has to learn to live alone, as this is the last option open to her. She must cling to solitude like a drowning sailor clings to a bit of flotsam. She is that drowning sailor, lost in the immensity of the world, about to go under… swallowed up in the hatred and envy of the human beings around her.

  “The smell of bread woke me up,” says Àlex, standing in the kitchen doorway.

  “We no open today, because I receive email from Health Department. They send inspector to discover why journalists sick. I make cornbread. You want breakfast?”

  “No, I’m not hungry, and I don’t eat maize.”

  “You so chic you no can to eat humble thing like is corn?”

  Àlex makes himself a cup of coffee, talking to Annette with his back turned to her. “I don’t think anything. You know I don’t eat that kind of stuff, and you also know why. Don’t push me. I’m not in a very good mood and have no wish to try to decipher the hidden meanings in your enigmatic words.”

  “The Indian people in the Americas they worship the maize. It the basic part of diet.” Annette is teaching again. “It result from many years experiments and study, one of first crops where they use genetic selection, which mean the people that they live in this territory no primitive, but they have the high level of the culture. They never eat maize alone, but put with it meat, legume, vegetable and fish, so they get balance of diet.

  “Spanish people they no like maize, and they say it food for poor people, like what happen with big part of food from New World. The poor people they eat it alone, like also they do with wheat, but no can to eat more things with it, so it insufficient. The wheat it have gluten that is protein, and vitamins also, but the maize it have only carbohydrates, so the poor people they get sick and the rich people say it no good for to eat because it make sick the poor people.

  “Fifty years the maize take for to arrive to Germany, and there the famous artist Hans Burgkmair he make it immortal with woodcut print, which make the rich German class they get interest and start to eat it. It very strange that simple thing can to change perception of all the social class, but it happen like this today also.” Annette muses aloud on the culture of food as she makes a cornbread sandwich with slices of tomato, cottage cheese, a few kernels of fried corn, a gherkin and some leek mayonnaise.

  “I haven’t eaten for three days. Looks like I’ll have to force myself to accept your sandwich. Thank you.” Àlex’s tone and expression are blank.

  Annette glances at him as he grudgingly eats her sandwich. He looks like a wounded animal, vulnerable, sad, hurt and broken. He couldn’t have poisoned the food. Not Àlex. But why did Carol accuse him? Maybe pride, envy or jealousy led him in a fit of fury to poison the journalists, but if that’s the case, why is he behaving so oddly now? He’s hardly said a word these last two days. When he’s worried about something he resorts to sarcasm; when angry he turns to insults; when sad he starts drinking and eventually tells her why. But he never goes mute. Annette doesn’t understand it and she’s suspicious.

  Àlex finishes the sandwich and leaves, saying that, since they’re closed today, he’ll make the most of the time as he has a few things to see to.

  * * *

  It’s late. The Health Department inspectors are leaving Roda el Món. They’ve spent ages checking the cold rooms, the kitchen and also the toilets. Annette helped them as much as possible and showed them the little packet of blue power, as she, more than anyone else, wants to know the cause of the poisoning. Rat poison, they conclude. In certain doses it can cause intestinal problems in humans. Annette is increasingly bewildered. They’ve never bought rat poison or any other pest-control product, because they employ a company to look after the health and hygiene aspects of the business. So what was a bag of rat poison doing in the drawer with the spoons? Although she is disconcerted, Annette starts joining up the dots and seeing a pattern and connections emerge.

  Àlex comes back quite late that night. Annette is in her room, still awake. As soon as she hears the front door squeak she runs downstairs. She can’t wait a moment longer to find out what really happened. Àlex is sitting at the kitchen with a beer in his hand.

  “Àlex, I must to speak with you.”

  “You want a beer? It’s been a bad day. I don’t want to do anything, but if you like we can go to my room and listen to some music.” His eyes are red and his voice slurred. He’s very drunk.

  “No, I no want the beer and no go to your room. You drink enough the alcohol.”

  She joins him at the table, serious and severe. “I arrive to point. The journalists no suffer upset from food. Someone poison them. You understand? This deliberate. It seem you have relation with this.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “I say that, if I look at all people who make the party, you from this win most. We know you do it.”

  “‘We’? Who knows this? You and who else? Who’s behind this stupid accusation?” He’s very nettled now, with angry, red, swelling veins standing out in his neck. “What proof do you have? I’ve never heard anything so ridiculous. What possible interest could I have? Professional suicide maybe? You’re crazy.”

  Annette takes the packet of blue powder from her apron pocket and throws it on the table.

  “I find the rat poison in drawer with spoons. We no buy this never and no use it. I open this drawer every day for making the cakes. It no was there before party. The symptoms they suffer the journalists they the same as give the rat poison. I cannot know why you do this, but I know you are speaking lies to me all the time.”

  “I haven’t lied to you! I haven’t poisoned anyone. I see Carol’s tentacles behind all this, because she was the one. It was this bloody woman who poisoned the journalists.”

  “I no believe you!” Annette retorts angrily. “Why she want to poison the colleagues? What is good it make for her?”

  “She didn’t want to hurt the journalists, but was aiming at me and, in particular, she wanted to destroy our love. I can’t believe you don’t see this. This woman is an evil fucking bitch. She gets pleasure out of being malicious and harming people and, more than anything else, she loves her own power of destruction. And she wants you. She wants to have you totally in her thrall. You’re a pushover for her, especially as she knows how desperate you are.”

  “This no is true,” she protests. “She no need be so extreme for to get what she want. Carol no do this. You manipuler. She no have access to kitchen, and now there is the proof of crime, the rat poison.”

  Annette doesn’t know what to think. Both versions are incoherent and seem implausible. And both suggest sick minds at work.

  “Think what you like, girl. You’ve been in bed with both her and me. Maybe you’re the crazy one. I didn’t put poison in the watercress soup.”

  “It was you, Àlex! I no sure for a moment, but you just betray you because how you know poison in watercress soup? You sick, you murder and I have fear. I no want you here. This restaurant it belong to me now and I want make it good again. I will do this, but I no want you here.”

  “Don’t worry. I’m leaving. Not because you’re making me leave, but because you don’t believe me. Your lack of trust in me is the worst poison you could ever have fed me. I’m very sad to be leaving, because I love you, Annette. You’re the only person who makes me believe in life and you’re all I have in my life.”

  Annette watches Àlex closing the restaurant door. He has a small bag in his hand, far too small for his music and film collection.

  Annette has been running Roda el Món by herself for four weeks. Each week has brought a new cook and each cook has brought new problems. Carol carries on as if she’s the owner and is in her element. Graça gets ticked off because her earrings are too big; the suppliers get ticked off because she considers that their products are not good enough for a first-rate restaurant like this; Eric gets ticked off because she can’t s
tand his standard vocabulary of “hey man”, “cool”, “awesome” and “dork”. She berates the chefs until they walk out and takes Annette to task because she’s always too tired at night to “reward” her for all the effort she’s so unselfishly putting into the restaurant.

  The four chefs have left, not only because of Carol’s tongue-lashings but also because they consider that Roda el Món is far too humble for a place that aspires to cuisine d’auteur. Annette can’t stand this stupid way of thinking and is fed up with Carol. The suppliers’ bills are rising with the new, increasingly exquisite products they’re bringing day after day. She has to put the prices up and the customers soon voice their complaints.

  “Annette, these tomatoes are excellent, but not worth the ten euros you’ve charged me for them. I’ve never paid so much in all the time I’ve been coming here,” complains an executive from one of the nearby factories who often comes for lunch.

  “Excuse me, miss,” one of the summer holidaymakers complains, “I asked for a fillet of the ‘fresh fish of the day’, but you’ve charged me for the whole fish!”

  The solitary customer has come for lunch today. He’s not the only one who eats alone, but his watchfulness and his questions always put her on edge. She now knows he’s not a Michelin Guide inspector, but that’s the whole extent of her knowledge. It’s not that he seems particularly interesting, but the other customers who eat alone always end up talking about their work, where they come from, their families…

  A person who eats alone isn’t necessarily a loner, but usually someone who is circumstantially lonely, which means he or she wants to speak, begin a conversation with the owner which, while usually consisting of the most trivial chitchat, does give some idea of the person sitting at the table. The mysterious “solitary” customer, however, is quite another story. This man, the “loner” as Annette calls him, is skilled at extracting information, while never revealing the slightest detail about himself.

  “How are things, Annette? Have you recovered from the problem with the journalists? That must have been tough. Are you coping OK? Has that ever happened to you before?”

  “Not exactly like this.” She is sincere with him. “But life it is full of surprises and they not all good. A person no can use always what she learn from experiences that they happen before.”

  “You’re a philosopher. So are you saying you had a similar experience before this, but you can’t use what you learnt to sort out the new problem?”

  “Exactly! ‘Avoid scandals,’ the people say, but if you experience a scandal, learning it is no good if you no can to apply it when it arrive the next scandal.”

  “I’ve run into Àlex a couple of times in Barcelona. He doesn’t look good. He told me he lives in the Raval. I guess I’ll see him quite often, as I tend to be around that area. I understand you’re not working together any more.”

  “He no here now. He needed to change. He not feel good?”

  “What isn’t good is the food you’re serving here now. I don’t want to offend you, but I do want to warn you. This food is too pretentious and too expensive. It’s lost the authentic taste you had before. It’s dressed up as something else now.”

  It’s true. The cooks Carol has found all want to be celebrity chefs and have no idea of what the public in this part of the world expects. Accordingly, the takings have dwindled considerably, and the pages of the reservation book are verging on immaculately white once more.

  Annette can’t cover their excessively high costs with what they’re earning. It’s not only a matter of paying suppliers and the staff’s wages, but she also has to pay rent on the house. The Can Bret owner is implacable. Annette’s resolve is shaky.

  Tomorrow is Monday and Roda el Món is closed. Carol has decided to go and have lunch in some fashionable place in Barcelona, because she has to write about it for her newspaper. The idea of spending her day off with Carol is unbearable for Annette, but Carol will never take no for an answer. She’s the boss and makes or cancels decisions as she pleases. Annette is her puppet and must satisfy her every whim. She hasn’t left Annette alone for a single day since Àlex left. Now Annette only wants to have a day to herself, with time to think about how she can get out of this prison in which she’s now trapped. She believes that the bars have been forged by Carol’s possessiveness, but the real prison is her own brain, which keeps forcing her to recollect Àlex’s words: “I’m very sad to be leaving, because I love you, Annette. You’re the only person who makes me believe in life and you’re all I have in my life.”

  * * *

  Furthermore, she’s starting to see in Carol’s behaviour some other words uttered by Àlex that night: “She didn’t want to hurt the journalists, but was aiming at me and, in particular, she wanted to destroy our love”; “She wants to have you totally in her thrall. You’re a pushover for her, especially as she knows how desperate you are.” A few remarks made by Carol – and one of them in particular: “It’d be better to take the watercress soup off the menu, because the clients might think we want to poison them” – have again made her doubt that Àlex is the guilty party.

  How did Carol know the poison was in that particular dish? The inspectors couldn’t analyse it, because not a drop was left. They never discovered how the journalists were poisoned. The Health Department couldn’t fine Roda el Món because they found no negligence in the cooking procedures and all the spaces of the restaurant observed the most rigorous standards of hygiene. Àlex had said it too: “I didn’t put poison in the watercress soup.” Now Carol has mentioned it. Annette’s head is spinning. How did they both know which dish was poisoned?

  16

  TURKEY

  Pleasure is like food. The simpler it is the less you tire of it.

  FILIPPO TOMMASO MARINETTI

  Carol has drunk a lot tonight and, snoring rhythmically, is hogging most of the small bed. Annette, kept awake by the unlovely noise, is looking for Òscar on Facebook, because she hasn’t spoken with him since the party. She’s been avoiding him for weeks, as she’s afraid he’s going to ask her to repay the loan, but she also needs to talk to somebody who understands her and knows the characters in this show, which is more twisted than anything any author could ever dream up. She wants to suggest that they have lunch together so they can chat without hassles and she can also get out of Carol’s clutches for a while.

  “Òscar…”

  “About time you contacted me! I’ve written, phoned and was about to turn up at Roda el Món to see how you are. I see you haven’t made any attempt to pay me back. I imagine there’s not much coming in.”

  “No, we no do well, as you can to imagine. After the scandal in all newspapers it very hard to keep going. And you, you are OK? I no ask you still if you get poison also.”

  “I found out about it in the newspapers, but I felt very sick. I didn’t know what it was, because it wasn’t the usual kind of stomach ache you get from overeating or eating something that’s gone off. It was a strange sensation. I had diarrhoea and a terrible headache for two days. I couldn’t leave home, but it stopped all of a sudden, and now I barely remember it. What caused it?”

  “We no know, really. I have some signs, but it is all big mess. I need talk with you, because you involved also. I no have money, but we find cheap restaurant for to eat. What you say?”

  “I’m delighted with your proposal, but I’m working, so it can’t be lunch. Come here for dinner if you like. Then we can talk and I’ll also show you the video I made that night. What with the stomach upset and all my work I haven’t had time to post it online yet. But it’s great. It was a fantastic party, even if we did all end up poisoned.”

  Annette is already hard at work in the kitchen very early in the morning. Sharing a room with Carol is a nightmare and she gets up at dawn. Carol comes downstairs a few hours later, as happy as a sandboy. She pours a glass of cava and makes herself a plate of different kinds of cheese. Annette doesn’t know how she can start drinking so early.
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  “Carol, you drink cava at this time?”

  “It’s your day off, isn’t it? It’s a big day and we’re going to have fun. Now we’re going to have a few drinks, then we’ll go up to your room and, while everyone else is working, I’m going to have my way with you. You’ve been very mean to me lately and ignoring all my caresses for days. I want to touch you, see you opening up, feel how wet you get and watch you coming. I want you to be all mine this morning. Then we’ll go out for lunch and, if you’re a good girl, this afternoon I promise you’ll see stars… of pleasure. I want you all to myself today, sweetheart.”

  “Well, this morning I must to go for talk with this man of Can Bret. He ask many times for to talk and I no can postpone more.” Annette doesn’t want to see Carol’s sex-induced stars. “Oh and I sorry, but I no can to have lunch in this restaurant because—”

  “Because nothing!” Carols snaps. “You’re having lunch with me. We arranged this and you’re not going to spoil my plans. You can go to Can Bret this morning, OK, but after that we’re going to have lunch in the restaurant I’ve chosen especially for you and then we’ll spend the afternoon in our room. You’ve kept me waiting too long and I’m fed up. It’s my turn to be pleasured by you today. It’ll do you good too, because you’re very tense. Sex is what you need. Believe me, you’ll come out of it relaxed, full of energy and ready to face anything next week may bring.”

  Annette can’t find any good excuse that might let her off the hook. Without answering, she takes off her patchwork apron and leaves Carol alone in the kitchen with her cava and cheese. It’s time to go to Can Bret.

  The meeting is an ordeal. The Can Bret boss insists she has to sell the restaurant, showing her a document signed by Àlex in which he agreed to transfer the business. He’s paid Àlex an advance. Either she sells him the restaurant or Annette must return the advance with interest, plus a fine for “financial loss and damage”. This is more than she can handle. There’s too much money involved, not to mention all the stress, much more than she can take either physically or psychologically. She asks for time. He gives her thirty days, after which she has to sell him the restaurant or pay back his money.