MACK
I thought eatingher out might change our relationship—or at least how we interacted with each other, but in the week that has passed, it seems like nothing is different. We had scary movie and tacos on Tuesday. We watched Big Brother on Sunday where Sunny fell asleep again.
There hasn’t been more sex, though, since Sunny went to the doctor and came home looking pale and weak. She said it was the flu and she just needed to drink lots of fluids, eat well, and get plenty of rest.
I figured that was code for me to not touch her.
“You feeling okay today, Sunshine?”
Sunny’s been getting up real early in the morning and going downstairs. I hear her in the hallway but when I asked her about it, she brushed me off, saying she needed to be to work early. I contemplated following her to work but figured that was too much. Like I didn’t need to be a whole stalker. We lived together, and it wasn’t like she was going home to Brad or Brick or whatever his name was. She’s coming home to me.
I’ve got to learn to be patient, which isn’t easy when you are a spoiled, only child.
“Are we making Tuesday our new scary movie night?” I ask over dinner. “I saw a German horror flick on Netflix is getting good reviews.”
“What day is it today?”
“Monday, all day.”
She’s been confused a lot lately. I guess it’s some kind of mental fog related to her flu. I should’ve taken more science classes in college because this medical shit is hard to figure out. I wish I would’ve gone to the doctor with her but she was adamant that she go alone.
“Maybe we should lay off the scary movies.” She inhales and presses her hand to her stomach. “And I need to stop inhaling all the food I see.”
“You look good.” She’s a little rounder in the cheeks these days, but I like it. It makes her look sweeter, more angelic. “Here, have some more cake.”
She hesitates for a half second and then digs into the carrot cake. “I used to hate carrot cake,” she says, her mouth partially full of the dessert.
“I know. You said vegetables don’t belong in dessert. They are solely an appetizer or main course food.” That used to be her stance, and then the other day she came home with a giant piece of cake someone had brought to the office. Before she even took her coat off, she sat down at the table and devoured the whole thing. Ever since, we’ve had carrot cake every night from a different bakery as Sunny appears to be on a mission to find the perfect one.
“Isn’t it weird how your whole body can change and crave things you used to hate before?” She sets down her fork. “You know what I would kill for right now?”
“No.”
“Jell-O salad.”
“I have no idea what that is.”
“My grandmother used to make it. It’s cabbage and carrots and God knows what else inside a Jell-O mold.”
I almost vomit in my mouth. “Sounds…interesting.”
“You mean disgusting, but I’m not offended. I used to hate it, too, but now I can’t get the thought out of my head,” Sunny replies cheerfully. She picks up her phone and taps something in. I blink twice when she shows me her search results. An unappealing circular mass formed out of what looks to be an upside-down bowl of Jell-O with finely chopped carrots separated with, according to the recipe, mayonnaise and green peppers, fills her screen. I can almost feel the picture jiggling.
“Looks…interesting.”
“Interesting is your default word when you don’t want to offend me but you find something objectionable, so you might as well come out with whatever it is you want to say because I know you hate it.”
“I’m not saying I hate it because maybe it’s delicious.” But to be honest, I think I’d rather eat my shoe than what’s in her photo.
She pulls the phone back to her face and taps at her screen. “It’s not. The last I remember is the slightly sour taste of the mayo and the sweet taste of the Jell-O, but weirdly, I want to try it again. I can’t find any place that makes it.”
I can see why. Who would buy it?
“I guess I’ll have to make it.” She casts a glance at the clock on the wall. “It’s getting late. Is there a store that’s still open?”
We search, and the nearest twenty-four-hour grocery is forty minutes away.
“How about I pick stuff up tomorrow?”
“No.” She gets to her feet. “I need it now.”
I hop up and grab the keys to the Range Rover. “How about some more carrot cake? The place on Monterrey is open until midnight.”
She pauses, cocks her head, and considers my suggestion. “No. It’s the Jell-O cake or nothing.”
I pluck the phone out of her hand to check the directions and figure out our shopping list. The directions on how to make it give me pause. “Sunshine, it says you have to wait hours for the gelatin to set. At least three.” I turn the screen to her face. As her eyes scan the recipe, she grows more distressed until suddenly she bursts into tears.
“No. This is awful,” she sobs against my chest. “My whole day is ruined. No. My whole life.”
These are real waterworks, too, not a few drops but a whole gusher. I mop at her face, completely unmanned. “Sunshine, I’ll go. Just stop crying. We’ll figure something out. I’ll get liquid nitrogen. We’ll freeze it all up in a nano second. There’s some tech at a lab I bet. Nathan Brock works over at Cryogenics. He’ll know something.” I make a hundred dumb promises, but none of them work. Sunny’s completely distraught. In the end, I do the only thing I know how to do, and that is kiss her.