The look passing from Beth to Ron is perhaps one of the reasons Andrew Riley refused to remember that she is only five years his junior and not ten or twenty. A grown woman of thirty-two. Teeth come down to bite into her lower lip, devoid of the careful colouring most women choose to shellac themselves in. Hands held up before her modest chest with fingers curled together, a tawny contrast to the white sweater ~ jumper, they call it here~ and apron. Hair done up in twin buns on either side of her face though she’s got some escapee strands that have legged it toward her neck. Wide doe eyes staring on as if they’re dealing with unhoused nuclear isotopes rather than potential food options.
She watches his hands, a greater indicative of thought and mood than his face ~this is not a masquerade, they are not required to hide behind the acceptably palatable~ and which have a life of their own. She still bears a spare glance now and then to eye and lip. Resorts to atonal vibrations of his voice to fill in the gaps. He speaks wisdom, Ron Kray, and she soaks it all up like a sponge having near perished in a desert. She doesn’t know how Andy always managed to come up with all the right things, how everything was perfectly regimented and prepared.
She can hardly cook packet rice or the saimin that comes in the wrinkly little plastic packaging with the salt-spice flavouring that never really tastes right and tries to pass it off as ramen. {It was a microwave and she’d been going on nearly an entire week with perhaps four hours of sleep and it wasn’t like they’d had to call the fire-department, the little extinguisher on the counter’d done the trick, in her defense}.
Granted, looking at the words now, half of them upset her in that vague malaise kind of way. There was the one that had spiced beef, gravy, bread sauce ~she will have to use the internet to to see if they mean stuffing by that~ cranberry sauce, potatoes, of course, root veggies, and sprouts cooked with bacon. The most traditional Irish of the three. The second was more English: swapping out turkey or prime rib for the spiced beef, the pigs-in-a-blanket ~so much different than what she’s used to on the mainland~ and not much else.
Tiny fingers squirm over and around his arm and she peeks out from behind him as if the menus will bite if she has not a solid wall of this man to stand behind. Even smaller still is her voice.
“I...don’ need t’ make anyt’ing special.”
She means for herself. There’s enough vegetables to suffice her small needs. Nothing that will add extra time, expertise, or any more daunting prospects to what’s already being made. Especially in the light that it’s been over a year of missed family dinners on Sunday where she’s felt anything but a part of that, and has choked down every dead animal imaginable.
“Uh...” A little more timber on this one. “He gonna come in on Solst...ah.. on...uhm... twen’y first. If he can. Twen’y t’ird if he no can. Depends on if dey bump him or he come firs’ class. New York got lotsa bad weaddah around dat time ususally, so sometimes he take military flight. Plan t’ ring in da new year wi’....us.”
While her face might not be in view, the energy picks up when she has time to process what he’s said. “Oh t’ank fu...I mean choke mahalo to da universe for Aunties.
