Eighteen Years and a Kitchen Island

Eighteen years and a kitchen island stand between me and Anton. Eighteen years, a kitchen island, three mixing bowls, and a whisk. If he wasn’t here, in this kitchen, in this home (our home), dipping flour-coated shrimp into eggs (beaten), sprinkling them with shredded coconut (heavy pour), I don’t think I’d recognize him at all.

I make my way over to where he stands, swaying to Otis Redding. He still uses the old Dansette record player I bought him for our second wedding anniversary. Its sky-blue paint is chipped now, its leather handles faded and flakey from use. As I get closer to him—only two feet apart—I catch a whiff of his cologne. Geranium, cedarwood, bergamot. His musk cuts through the balmy sweetness of coconut. He smells like our wedding day.

And he tastes like salt. My lips are pressed against the back of his neck, right up against that soft crevasse his childhood friend once told him was deadly, if you push hard enough to reach the brain. Anton never confirmed if this was true or not, but he hasn’t slept on his stomach since. I kiss this spot, trace circles around it with my tongue and feel him shudder beneath my lips.

I’m drizzling coconut oil over the skillet, enough to coat the pan not drown it, when I feel a cool tickle around my soft spot. Cool in the way that fresh mint is cool when pressed up against the tongue—enough to make you shiver. I shiver now—not because I’m chilled but because it’s my soft spot and because no one’s touched it in years.

My soft spot. I smile. That’s what Naomi used to call it. She laughed so hard when I told her what Kevin said, about it being dangerous, about my fear of rendering it vulnerable that she fell to her knees and complained of sore abs for two days afterwards.

She clung to my fear like a wet t-shirt clings to skin, never letting me forget its hold on me. At night, when I’d cook us dinner, something nice, something that reminded us of home—Cuban tamales, coconut shrimp—she’d sneak up behind me, wrap her arms around my chest, and whisper, Are you scared? I’d laugh, say, Very funny, and then she’d lean in closer, brushing her bottom lip against the base of my neck crevasse and whisper, How about now?

Even now, after all these years (how long has it been? eighteen?), I can feel her there, feel the warmth of her palm against my chest, the weight of her arm on my shoulder, the cool of her kiss.

My phone buzzes against the granite countertop. It’s Trinity. She’ll be here in fifteen.

Using a pair of metals tongs, I gently place the coated shrimp onto the skillet with about an inch’s distance between each other in every direction (the trick is not to crowd the pan), wipe my hands across the rag draped over my shoulder and turn the heat to low. Trinity will be here in fifteen, and the back of my shirt is slick with sweat in the places where my belt holds it firm against my skin. 

…

The completed version of this piece will be made available upon request.