NaCl by Anna Kingston

Harriet rummaged through the spice jars, frowning impatiently when her fingers didn’t land immediately on the one she wanted.

“Rosie, next time you cook, put these jars back properly!” She exclaimed crossly.  “You know I have to have them in order so I can find stuff!”

“Mum, they’re better stored alphabetically, much more logical,” sighed Rosie.  “Basil doesn’t go next to oregano or marjoram.”

“It makes sense to me, and it’s luckier to group them according to recipe,” Harriet mumbled absentmindedly, as she painstakingly re-organised the cupboard.  She sent a silent prayer to the Goddess she believed in, apologising for her daughter’s ignorance.

Rosie studied her mum, trying to conceal her concern and - let’s face it - growing impatience and unease at her mother’s erratic behaviour, becoming more so with each anniversary.

“Mum, let me make it this year, and I promise to put all the jars back as you like them - won’t spill anything either,” Rosie gently offered, taking her mum’s fidgety hands from the jars, as she tried to keep the annoyance from her voice.

“It’s an important anniversary this time, love,” Harriet replied, anxiety (and almost terror it seemed to Rosie) etching the lines more deeply into her face.  “13 years since I found this recipe that saved your life.  Please don’t muck it up, or everything will go wrong - I can’t lose you again!" 

Rosie really did sigh and didn’t hide her impatience this time.

“Mum, it’s just herb bread from that tatty old recipe book of grandma’s, it’s you and your superstitions that have made it into this big thing, all woo-woo and black magic!  Nothing will happen if it’s not 100% the same - this is just a nice tea for us to share as a memory - nothing else!”

“It’s not black mag-!” Harriet started, before suddenly - and literally - snapping her mouth shut.

“Ok, you make it then, but PLEASE don’t make a mess or spill the herbs, especially that” - and pointed to her ‘special’ salt that she’d trekked all the way to Lizard Point for - “and if you do, for the Goddess’ sake throw a pinch over your left shoulder!”

“Or the devil will get me?” laughed Rosie.

Harriet looked terrified, and Rosie was instantly mortified - she was usually more forgiving of her mum’s increasingly fragile mental state.  She shooed Harriet from the kitchen and began baking.

True to her word, Rosie put every jar back precisely in its own place, exactly as Harriet had organised it 13 years ago on the day that Rosie had inexplicably awoken after being pronounced brain dead following the throw from the horse.  Her mum had spent weeks researching science, medication, surgery, religion, and what Rosie termed mumbo-jumbo.  Harriet claimed that some ritual or other - plus this bloody bread! - had brought Rosie back to life, and she would countenance no other explanation.  Rosie’s dad became unable to cope with his wife’s fixations, her obsession with rituals, and her slow retreat from the real world, and quietly left Harriet and Rosie after a stroke in the middle of the night.

Harriet was convinced that making the bread each anniversary would ward off Death or the devil, or something equally unspeakable, but Rosie was sick of it now.

She washed up, cleaned the kitchen, and checked the bread.

“Five more minutes,” she thought, ”soup now”, and rummaged for a couple of tins of their favourite.

A moth flew out of the cupboard, startling Rosie into knocking the salt off the worktop.

“Bugger!” she muttered irritably, and swept it all back into the tub, totally forgetting her mother’s admonition about throwing salt over her left shoulder, absentmindedly flicking a pinch over her right…

At ten past one, as per Harriet’s superstitions, the two women sat down to lunch, ready to begin eating at precisely 1.13pm.  Harriet saw the spilled salt and anxiously asked Rosie about it, who replied, “Yeah, chucked a bit over my shoulder,” indicating her right.  The clock ticked over to 13.13 just as Harriet fully understood Rosie’s words, and terror struck her face.

“Oh, Rosie, what have you done?” Harriet breathed, colour draining from her face and her spoon fell, unheeded, to the floor, tomato soup splattering like blood droplets.

THUD! THUD! The front door shook in its frame, and Harriet leapt to her feet, slipping on the spilled soup. She staggered, losing her balance, and fell, her head striking her prized Aga with another, more sickening, thud and then was suddenly motionless, horror still etched on her face.

Rosie calmly opened the door to the burly delivery man, smiling as he apologised for knocking hard but those were his instructions, and took the parcel back to the table.  The hard copy of the book she’d read electronically a year ago today - ‘The Dying Art of Auto Suggestion and Subliminal Advertising” - aimed at salesmen but very useful in so many other contexts peeped out of the packaging.  Rosie dipped the last piece of herb bread she’d ever eat into her soup as she began to read.

Anna M. Kingston

© 2021