Lasagna

When I broke up with my third boyfriend, he asked me to call his mother. “She loves you.” he said, as if that were enough explanation. She’s all alone in that house, and Lord knows I can’t be there for her all the time.

He and I had been together for a year and a half. I had only been to her house twice. “Okay,” I said because there was no other way to reply. It seemed a simple enough request. We hung up without recognizing that it was probably our last phone call. He never stuttered over an accidental “I love you”, but, neither did I.

I put off calling her for two days. I had almost forgotten, but after looking at the phone in my kitchen I remembered why I wished I no longer had it. I didn’t even have her phone number—I had to search for her existence in a phone book. She was, thankfully, the second one in a long list of identical names.

“Hello?” she said after a ring and a half. She couldn’t possibly have been expecting me, but I pretended that she had. It was better than thinking that she had just been sitting alone, staring at the phone as she prayed for it to ring. Wishing she had the courage to call up an old friend.

“Hi, it’s uh, Jessie. Jeremy’s uh—”

“Oh, hello! It’s so great to hear from you sweetie. How are you? How are things with Jeremy?”

“Oh, I’m doing fine. Things with Jeremy are okay. How are you doing?”

“I’m doing fine! Haven’t heard from Jeremy in a while, but he’s busy, I understand. I’m sure with his job even you barely get enough time to see him, right?” she chuckled. “It’s always great to hear from him, when he gets time.”

“Oh, uh, yeah. He is always busy with work. We’re actually thinking about moving in together, we were just talking about it today. We looked at a few places online, but nothing seems worth the asking price.” I swallowed.

“Oh, that’s wonderful! I’m so glad to hear it! Listen, sweetie, why don’t you come over for dinner sometime? I’ll prepare some lasagna, and you can show me some of the places that you and Jeremy have looked at. I’m sure he won’t be able to come, but of course invite him anyway.”

“Yeah, I doubt he’ll be able to come. But, uh, what about next week? Maybe Tuesday? I don’t work on Tuesdays, so my evening is pretty much free. Does 6:30 work?”

I could feel her smiling through the phone. “Sounds great! I’ll see you then! Talk to you later, dear. Take care, and thanks again for calling.”

“Oh yeah, of course. Talk to you soon.”

I wasn’t entirely sure what had made me lie to Jeremy’s mother. There wasn’t a single part of me that wished I were moving in with Jeremy, and he had never asked me to go to dinner with his mother—just call her. She hadn’t even pressed me. I had volunteered myself to eat her lasagna on Tuesday. Now I would have to make a list of a few places that Jeremy and I would have liked, if we had ever discussed moving in together.

On Monday I spent two hours looking up recipes for simple desserts online. Any woman who was willing to make lasagna for her guest’s first visit, I assumed, would expect a contribution to the meal. A box of brownies felt cheap. I finally settled on lemon squares.

I’m not necessarily angry that neither of my parents taught me to make lemon squares in my youth. I only wish that there had been some sort of mentor in my kitchen at some point while I was growing up, who perhaps could have warned me against chasing a recipe that sent me to the grocery store two separate times in order to replenish ingredients as I methodically wasted them. Eventually, with flour all over my kitchen and my clothes, I produced a batch of lemon squares as close to tolerable as I could make them. It was 5:45 on Tuesday evening. It would take about twenty minutes to get to Jeremy’s mother’s house. I ran my head under the faucet in the sink, ignoring the fact that there were dishes there and that my hands smelled like an old sponge. I ran upstairs to change.

It was just beginning to get dark when I left my house. I found it hard to concentrate on the road when the sky was so willingly changing from pink to black. At a particularly dangerous intersection, I slammed on the brakes, and in a reflex, pushed my hand to protect the imaginary passenger next to me. It was something Jeremy had always made a joke of when we drove. He said it was an excuse to touch my boobs, and I would laugh in a way that wasn’t entirely forced. This time I slammed my hand straight down and into the pan holding the lemon squares. I decided to wait to do damage control until I got to Jeremy’s mother’s house.

As I pulled up, I noticed that the drapes on her kitchen window were decorated with small orange carrots. They didn’t have cartoonish faces drawn on them, but I pictured faces there anyway. As I approached the door, I wondered how many knocks she would wait before opening the door. It was 6:32.

I knocked one and a half times, and Jeremy’s mother opened the door brightly. She was dressed in what I can only call baby blue slacks and a kind-looking white button-up. Over this she wore a simple black apron, the kind you would expect to see a busboy wearing in an old family restaurant. There wasn’t a speck of food on it.

“You’re just on time!” she said, not glancing for a watch. The lasagna needs about three more minutes. Come on in, sit down!”

I joined her at a small table in the kitchen. We sat positioned strategically under a ceiling fan with an attached overhead light. There was a small television playing some local news station with the volume at about half audible. The room was cozy, and I nervously clutched my lemon squares.

“I brought dessert.” I said quietly.

“Oh, you did? That’s so kind! I made some lemon squares, but I would much rather try whatever goodie you brought. Here, let me take that.” She reached out and took my old casserole dish. “What do we have here?”

“Oh, uh, it’s just uh, I actually made lemon squares too. I’m so sorry.”

She just laughed. “Well, in that case, let’s eat some of both. Maybe we can get rid of all of them, together.”

She put my lemon squares in the fridge on a shelf with a large empty space. I wondered if she had assumed I would bring something, or if she had left that space open for the lasagna leftovers.

We sat in comfortable silence for two and a half more minutes, and I pretended to be interested in the local news station, though I couldn’t hear a word of it. The oven beeped quietly, and Jeremy’s mother turned to it and slipped on a pair of oven mitts decorated to look like lobsters. She pulled out a large pan covered in foil. She smiled in a private way, and I looked back at the television. “Dinner’s ready!”

I stood up to walk to the oven and make myself a plate, but Jeremy’s mother stopped me. “Sweetie, I’ll serve you, sit.” Not sure what else to do, I slowly lowered myself back onto my chair. I watched her simple black apron as she placed a steaming plate of lasagna in front of me. She hurried back to the oven and quickly made herself a plate, bringing it back and smiling at me.

“Do you mind if we pray before we eat?” I shook my head. She took my hands and bowed her head, apparently preparing to pray silently. I stared at my lasagna plate. The edges of it were decorated with small red barns.

After a moment, Jeremy’s mother raised her head, and let go of my hands. She picked up her fork, and so did I. We ate for a few moments in silence, both of us engaged in the motion, and glancing dutifully at the television. It felt like a bad time to tell her that until today I had been a vegetarian. It was something Jeremy had gotten me into. It felt good to let go of him just a little bit more.

A nanosecond after finishing my first piece of lasagna, Jeremy’s mother asked if I wanted another. I said no, that I wanted to save room for the pile of lemon squares we had ahead of us. She laughed and took my plate. “Well, if you’re ready to get started on those, I’ll get them right out!” She turned toward the fridge. I turned again to the television. It was playing Jeopardy.

When I heard Jeremy’s mother laugh lightly, I turned to look at her. She was staring at the lemon squares in my casserole dish. I glimpsed an indent and immediately knew that there was a large handprint glaring like a judgmental child after she has been punished for something about which she feels no guilt.

“I’m so sorry,” I said. “There was a red light, I reached out to make sure it didn’t fall off the seat…”

“Honey, it’s all right. I’m sure they taste just fine.”

They didn’t. Still, Jeremy’s mother dutifully scooped them out of the casserole dish and pushed them one after another onto both of our plates. Neither of us had the heart to admit that we would rather eat her lemon squares. We silently watched Jeopardy, pretending without fail that we could hear the subtitles as if they were just as good as the volume on the television.

When we both silently admitted that we were finished eating, Jeremy’s mother stood up and cleared our places once again. As she began to wash dishes, I offered help, but of course she declined. Blessedly, she appeared to have forgotten about the houses Jeremy and I had theoretically looked at together. She asked me if I would like to play some Scrabble before I left. Unsure of what I really wanted, I said yes. She asked if I could grab it from the other room. I dutifully obeyed.

In the living room, I stumbled across a picture of Jeremy and his brother. In it, they were both smiling in the truest way, their arms encircled around each other and their eyes squinted from the sun. Jeremy’s brother wore his uniform, although it wasn’t the same one I saw at his funeral. Jeremy wore a suit with a loosened tie. Their mother wasn’t in the photo, but I assumed she was the one taking it. I swallowed the lump in my throat and grabbed the Scrabble board.

Jeremy’s mother was staring at the television when I entered the room. I set the board on the table, and she turned to me. “Great! Are you ready to play?” I nodded.

I think the game took about thirty minutes. She beat me by thirteen points, but I didn’t mind. Scrabble had never been my favorite game. It seemed important that I had gotten the chance to play with Jeremy’s mother at all.

As we collected the tiles and put them away, I glanced at my phone. “I suppose I should get going.” I said quietly.

“Oh, darling, of course! I’ll get you your leftovers, if you wouldn’t mind putting the game away?” I nodded. She stood up and moved to the fridge. I put the rest of the game in the box and took it to the living room, making sure to avoid seeing the picture of Jeremy and his brother again.

As I came back into the kitchen, I noticed that Jeremy’s mother had put the rest of my lemon squares and her own lemon squares into my old casserole dish. She had covered it with plastic wrap, and on top of it had placed a large piece of foil that housed an enormous piece of lasagna. She handed them to me as part of a hug. “Thank you so much for coming sweetie, I hope everything was okay!”

“Everything was great, thank you so much. This was really very nice. I think I’ll call again soon, if that’s all right.”

Her face lit up. “That would be just wonderful.”

She walked me to my car, and helped me find a secure place on the floor for my leftovers. “Drive safe, sweetheart.”

I nodded. “I’ll talk to you soon.”

On the way home I had to pull over for a few minutes to catch my breath. I imagined her walking slowly back into her house, gently turning off the lights in the kitchen, and padding quietly upstairs. I imagined that she would fall softly asleep in a bed that had long ago grown too big for her.

I called Jeremy three times, but he didn’t answer. I didn’t feel right leaving him a voicemail, and, anyway, I wasn’t even sure what I wanted to say. When I got home I carefully placed the leftovers in a vegetable drawer in the fridge. I couldn’t bear to look at them for another minute. I left the dishes in the sink and collapsed into my bed fully clothed.

I woke up at 2:37, and walked downstairs with zombielike purpose. I pulled the lasagna out of the fridge and stuffed every last bit of it in my mouth. After pathetically few swallows, I opened the lemon squares. I ate every single one, and, with powdered sugar on my face and the fridge door still open, I fell asleep facedown on my kitchen floor.